Chapter Twenty Two.

Perfume and Politics.

Upon my table a letter was lying. The handwriting I recognised instantly as Edith’s, and not without a feeling of anger and impatience I tore it open in expectation. Long and rambling, it upbraided me for leaving her without a single reassuring word, and declared that my refusal to kiss her at parting had filled her heart with a bitter and uncontrollable grief. As I read, memories of those midnight hours, of my walk to that distant village, and of my meeting with that shabby lover crowded upon me, and the impassioned words she had written made no impression upon me. I had steeled my heart against her. She had played me false, and I could never forgive.

“I know I have been foolish, Gerald,” she wrote, “but you misjudge me because of an indiscretion. You believe that the man with whom you saw me last night was my lover; yet you left me without allowing me to make any explanation. Is this right? Is it just? You know how well I love you, and that without you my life is but a hopeless blank. Can you, knowing that I love you thus, believe me capable of such duplicity as you suspect? I feel that you cannot. I feel that when you come to consider calmly all the circumstances you will find in your own honest heart one grain of pity and sympathy for the one woman who loves you so dearly. Write to me, for I cannot live without a word from you, because I love no other man but you?”

I crushed the letter in my hand, then slowly tore it into fragments. I had no confidence in her protestations—none. My dream of love was over.

We often hear it remarked that those who are themselves perfectly true and artless are in this world the more easily and frequently deceived. I have always held this to be a commonplace fallacy, for we shall ever find that truth is as undeceived as it is undeceiving, and that those who are true to themselves and others may now and then be mistaken, or, in particular instances, duped by the intervention of some other affection or quality of the mind; but that they are generally free from illusion, and are seldom imposed upon in the long run by the show of things and by the superficies of any character.

There was a curious contradiction in Edith’s character, arising from the contrast between her natural disposition and the situation in which she was placed, which corroborated my doubts. Her simplicity of language, her admission of an “indiscretion,” the inflexible resolution with which she asserted her right, her soft resignation to unkindness and wrong, and her warmth of temper breaking through the meekness of a spirit subdued by a deep sense of religion,—all these qualities, opposed yet harmonising, helped to increase my distrust of her. To me that letter seemed full of a dexterous sophistry exerted in order to ward off my accusations. Her remorse was without repentance; it arose from the pang of a wounded conscience, the recoil of the violated feelings of nature, the torture of self-condemnation.

The fragments of the letter I tossed into the waste-paper basket, and, putting on my hat, went down to the Grand CafÉ to idle away an hour among friends accustomed to make the place a rendezvous in the afternoon.

On entering, I found Deane sitting at a table alone, his carriage awaiting him at the door. He was having a hasty drink during his round of visits, and hailed me lustily.

“Sit down a moment, Ingram,” he cried. “I want to see you.”

“What about?” I inquired, lighting the cigarette he handed me.

“About that curious incident in the Rue de Courcelles—Mademoiselle de Foville’s strange attack.”

“Well, what of it?” I asked eagerly.

“Strangely enough a man, who proved to be an Englishman giving himself the name of Payne, was brought to the HÔtel Dieu three nights ago in what appeared to be a cataleptic state. He had, it seemed, been found by the police lying on the pavement in the Boulevard St. Germain, and was at first believed to be dead. Some letters in English being found upon him, I was called, and upon examination discovered exactly the same symptoms as those which mademoiselle your friend had displayed. I was enabled, therefore, to administer an antidote, and within twelve hours the man had sufficiently recovered to take his discharge. The case has excited the greatest possible interest at the hospital, for I had previously submitted a portion of the solution obtained from the envelope which mademoiselle had used to Professor Ferrari, of Florence, the greatest authority on toxicology in the world, and he had declared it to be an entirely unknown, but most potent, poison.”

“Who was the Englishman? Did he tell you nothing?”

“No. Unfortunately the hospital authorities allowed him to leave before I deemed it wise to question him. I read the letters found upon him, however; but they conveyed nothing, except that he had been recently living somewhere in the neighbourhood of Hackney.”

“Then you have no idea of the manner in which the poison was administered?” I said, disappointed.

“His right hand was rather swollen, from which I concluded that he had accidentally touched some object impregnated with the fatal compound.”

“You don’t know its composition yet?”

“No. Ferrari is trying to discover it, but at present has failed. The fact of a second person suffering from it is in itself very mysterious. I intended to call upon you this evening and tell you all about it.”

“The affair is extraordinary,” I admitted. “I wonder whether the same person who made the attempt upon Yolande’s life is responsible for the attempt upon the Englishman? What can be the motive?”

“Ah! that’s impossible to tell. All we know is that some unknown person in Paris has in his or her possession a deadly compound capable of producing catalepsy and subsequent death in a manner most swift and secret. In order to ascertain whether any other person is attacked in the same manner, I have sent letters to the Direction of all the hospitals in Paris explaining the case, and asking that if any similar cases are brought to them for treatment, I may be at once communicated with.”

“An excellent precaution,” I said. “By that means we shall be able to watch the progress of the mysterious criminal.”

“You have heard nothing from Mademoiselle Yolande?”

“Nothing,” I said.

“Hers was a curious case,” he remarked. “But the man Payne’s was equally strange. It appears that he made no statement to either police or hospital authorities before he left. He only said that he was walking along the boulevard and suddenly fell to the ground insensible.”

“You think he had some motive in preserving silence?” I inquired quickly.

“Yes, I feel sure of it. I only wish I could rediscover him. They were foolish to allow him to take his discharge before giving me an opportunity of concluding my investigations. It was simply owing to professional jealousy. English medical men are not liked in Paris hospitals. But I must be off,” he said, rising. “Good-bye.”

Then he went out, and, entering his carriage, drove away.

Volkouski, the Russian attachÉ, was sitting close by, and I crossed to him, greeting him merrily. He was a good fellow—a thorough cosmopolitan, who had been trained in the smartest school of diplomacy—namely, the Embassy in London, which is presided over by that prince among diplomatists, Monsieur de Staal. Whatever may be said regarding the relations between Russia and England as nations, it cannot be denied that in the European capitals the staffs of the embassies of both Powers are always on terms of real friendship. I make no excuse for repeating this. The mutual courtesy of the representatives of the two nations is not, as in the case of those of France, Germany, and Austria, mere diplomatic manoeuvring, but in most instances a sound understanding and a deep personal regard. England, Russia, and Italy have interests in common, hence their representatives fraternise, even though certain journals may create all sorts of absurd scares regarding what they are pleased to term the “aggressive policy of Russia.” This is a stock journalistic expression, as meaningless as it is absurd. We who are “in the know” at the embassies smile when we read those alarmist articles, purporting to give all sorts of wild plans, which exist only in the imagination of the leader-writer. There is, indeed, one London journal known in the Russian Embassies on the Continent as The Daily Abuser, because of its intensely Russophobe tone. Fortunately nobody takes it seriously.

I chatted with Volkouski, sipping a mazagran the while. He was, I found, full of projects for his leave. His chief had already left Paris, and he himself was going home to Moscow for a month. Every diplomatist on service abroad gets homesick after a time, and looks forward to his leave with the same pleasurable anticipation of the schoolboy going for his summer holidays. To escape from the shadow of a throne or the ceaseless chatter of an over-democratic Republic is always a happy moment for the wearied attachÉ or worried secretary of embassy. One longs for a respite from the glare and glitter of the official world of uniforms and Court etiquette, and looks forward to rambles in the country in flannels and without a collar, to lazy afternoons upon the river, or after-luncheon naps in a hammock beneath a tree. To the tired diplomatist, sick of formalities, and with the stifling dust of the ballroom over his heart, the expression “en campagne” conveys so very much.

Shortly before midnight I stepped from a fiacre and ascended the broad steps of the ElysÉe. Tired as I was of the ceaseless whirl of the City of Pleasure, it nevertheless amused me to fix the physiognomy of the great official fÊtes. They are inevitably banales, of course; but there is always a piquancy of detail and of contrast that is interesting.

If one wishes to see what a mixed crowd is like, there is no better illustration than the flocks of guests at the ElysÉe balls. Ah! what a crowd it was that night! What dresses! What a public! I know, of course, that it can never be otherwise under the present democratic rÉgime. One man, who came on foot and whose boots were muddy, forgot to turn down the tucked-up ends of his trousers. People were walking about with their hands in their pockets, jostling each other without a word of excuse. Many were touching the furniture, and feeling the curtains and tapestry with that sans-gÊne which so disgusted Gambetta with his former friends. You could see that they were determined not to appear astonished at anything, and that, after all, they were at home in the ElysÉe. They were of the detestable breed of cafÉ politicians, of loud-voiced orators at party meetings, of successful carpet-baggers, who render the ideas of equality and fraternity at times insufferable.

Before the buffet these fellows displayed themselves as goujats—cads—plain and simple. They grabbed for sandwiches, for biscuits, for glasses of champagne across the shoulders of ladies in front of them, or even elbowed them aside to get to the front row—and stop there. In the smoking-room the boxes of cigars were gone in the twinkling of an eye. One man struck his match on the wall. With these odd guests about it is not surprising that the Budget writes off a certain sum every year for articles that have disappeared from the buffets.

Whew! the heat there was insufferable!

In my search for Sibyl I passed through the antechamber. The footmen wore new livery. I saw none of those restaurant waiters who used, in the time of ce pauvre Monsieur Faure, to be employed at twenty francs the evening, supper included. Yes, things had slightly improved, but the crush was terrific. I made my way to the Salon des Aides-de-Camp, that historic chamber where, in the armchairs still furnishing the room, on the night of the coup d’État, sat, a prey to mortal anxiety, Morny, Persigny, Saint Arnaud, PiÉtri, Rouher, King JÉrÔme, and the Prince President.

The Japanese military attachÉ, walking before me, mixed himself up somehow with his sabre, and fell. This contretemps was greeted, as at a theatre, with laughter. Someone cried, “Oh, la la!” as if the stumble were a very clever bit of clowning indeed. The unhappy Japanese looked as if he wished the floor would swallow him.

I struggled up and paid my respects to the President, who was standing in the centre of the salon. Smiling, affable, displaying a simplicity that was real and unaffected, and yet devoid of mere familiarity, his bow and hand-shake were perfect. He struck the right note. I was impressed, moreover, by his sense of proportion. A little more cordiality, and he would cease to be Chief of the State. A little more solemnity, and he would be stilted. It is a little hard to convey the distinction; but imagine, on the one hand, a host who wants to make you forget his official position, and on the other a President of the Republic who is determined to be a good host. For well-bred people there is always a well-defined shade of difference between these two; and the President was the latter.

While turning away I suddenly came face to face with Monsieur Mollard, the chef-adjoint of the Protocol, who greeted me affably and commenced to tell me the latest story of General de Galliffet, Minister of War.

“It is amusing,” he laughed. “You must hear it, M’sieur Ingram. The General arrived at his club, the Union, last night, and for some reason or another his former friends were more than usually cold in their treatment of him. After saying a bonjour to one and the other of them, and receiving a curt reply here and a snub there, the Minister of War realised this. But he took their coolness coolly. With his back to the fireplace he said quietly, by way of bringing home to his friends the absurdity of their attitude: ‘You may come near me. Je ne sens pas mauvais—I don’t smell bad. You see, there was no Cabinet to-day!’ Is it not excellent?”

I smiled. It was a purely French joke. Mollard was always full of droll stories. Every diplomatist in Paris knew him as the keeper of the ElysÉe traditions, as guardian of its unwritten law by inheritance, his father having been, under other presidencies, the official known as introducteur des ambassadeurs. When a question of precedence puzzled the plebeian bigwigs at the Quai d’Orsay—the Foreign Office—it was Monsieur Mollard who would run to the archives to look it up. Nature had not, however, endowed him with a demeanour befitting his office, for he wore his uniform as awkwardly as a middle-aged volunteer officer, and looked more like a clerk than a chamberlain. But when he spoke he dragged on the mute syllables as French actors are taught to do in delivering Racine. He put three “l’s” in “Excellence” and four “r’s” in “Protocol.” For the rest, he was a good fellow, much liked in the diplomatic circle, although many jokes had from time to time been played at his expense. Presently, after we had been talking for a few moments, I inquired whether he had seen Sibyl.

“Ah, no! I regret, m’sieur,” he answered. “But a lady who is sitting over in the Salon Diplomatique has just inquired of me whether you are present.”

“A lady? What is her name?”

“I know her by sight, but cannot recall her name,” he responded. “She is a grande dame, however.”

“Young or old?”

“Young. You will find her in the salon talking with Count Tornelli, the Italian Ambassador. You will easily recognise her. She is wearing a costume of black, trimmed with silver. She told me that she desired to speak with you particularly, and that I was to tell you of her presence.”

“But you don’t know her?” I laughed.

“Go and see,” he answered. “You probably know her;” and, smiling, he turned away.

My curiosity being aroused, I struggled through the throng until I reached the spot indicated. Only the diplomatic corps and distinguished guests were allowed there, and the other guests, huddled together before the open door, were pointing out well-known personages.

I looked in, and in a moment saw before me the striking figure in black and silver. No second glance was needed to recognise who she was. For a moment I stood in hesitation; then, with a sudden resolve, entered, and, walking straight up, bowed low before her.

Chapter Twenty Four.

In the Forest of Fontainebleau.

Sixty kilometres from Paris, just off that straight and noble highway that runs through the heart of the magnificent forest, and passes through the old-world town of Fontainebleau—where Napoleon signed his abdication—through the mediaeval, crumbling gates of Moret, and away far south to Lyons, rises the fine old ChÂteau of Chantoiseau. Half-way between the clean little village of By, standing in the midst of its well-kept vineyards, and the river-hamlet of Thomery, it occupies a commanding position on the summit of a cliff, where far below winds the Seine, on past Valvins and Samois, until it becomes lost like a silver thread among the dark woodlands in the direction of Paris.

The position of the splendid old place is superb. From its windows can be obtained a view of the great forest stretching away to the horizon on the left, while to the right is the valley of the Seine, and across the river spread the smiling vineyards with their white walls—the vineyards of Champagne. The house, a long, rambling place with circular towers, has been historical for many centuries. Once the property of Madame La Pompadour, in the days when the splendours of the Palace of Fontainebleau were world-renowned, a latter-day interest also attaches to it, inasmuch as it was the headquarters of the German Crown Prince during the advance of the Prussians upon Paris. Its grounds, sloping down, enclose part of the forest itself; therefore, during the blazing days of August one lives actually in the woods. The forest is an enormous one, and even to-day there still remain many parts unexplored, where the wolf and wild boar retreat in summer, and where even that most ubiquitous forester, the viper-hunter—the man whose profession it is to kill vipers and sell them at the local mairie—has never penetrated. In the whole of the great forest, however, no spot is more charming or more picturesque than that in which the chÂteau is situated. It is not a show-place, like Barbison or the Gorges de Franchard, but entirely rural and secluded—on the one side the open valley, on the other the dark forest, where in the tunnel-like alleys the trees meet overhead, and where the shady highroads to the painter colony at Marlotte and to Bois-le-Roi are perfect paradises for the cyclist.

Chantoiseau itself is not a village, not even a hamlet, only a big old-fashioned cottage in which the forest-guards live. Above it, on the high ground beyond, stands the fine old chÂteau. Many of those who read my story have driven or cycled in the forest, and many have no doubt given the great old place a passing glance before plunging deep into those leafy glades that lead to Fontainebleau. If when you have driven past you have inquired of your cocher, “Who lives there?” he has probably only shrugged his shoulders and replied: “Servants only. Madame la Princesse, alas! seldom comes,” and you have gone on your way, as many others have done, wondering why such a beautiful old place should be neglected by its owner.

One hot evening at sundown, about three weeks after the President’s ball, I strolled slowly beside the Princess down the hill, entering the forest by that well-kept cross-road which leads by the Carrefour de la Croix de Montmorin straight to the pretty village of Montigny on the Loing.

Contrary to expectation, no immediate result had accrued from the mysterious theft of the secret instructions to Lord Barmouth; hence I had obtained leave and accepted my hostess’s invitation, although I was compelled to spend two days each week at the Embassy, going up to Paris in the morning and returning by the six o’clock express from the Gare de Lyon. That some result of the exposure of our policy must certainly make itself felt we knew quite well, but at present the political atmosphere seemed clearer, and by the fact that several of the ambassadors had left Paris considerable confidence had been established. Yet in those sultry August days the war-cloud still hung over Europe and the representative of Her Majesty was compelled, as he ever is, to exercise the greatest tact and the utmost finesse in order to preserve peace with honour. Truly, the office of British Ambassador in Paris is no sinecure, for upon him rests much of the responsibility of England’s position in Europe and her prestige among nations, while to him is entrusted the difficult duty of negotiating amicably with a nation openly and avowedly hostile to British interests and British prosperity.

Those summer days, so sunny, happy, and pleasant, in the forest depths at Chantoiseau, were, nevertheless, perplexing ones for the rulers of Europe. The stifling air was the oppression before the storm. I had more than once chatted in the billiard-room with my fellow guests, the German and Austrian Ambassadors, and both had agreed that the outlook was serious, and that the storm-cloud was upon the political horizon.

But life at the chÂteau was full of enjoyment. The Princess, a born hostess, knew exactly whom to invite, and her house-parties were always congenial gatherings. There was riding, cycling, tennis, boating, billiards; indeed, something to suit all tastes, while she contented herself with looking on and seeing that all her guests enjoyed themselves.

A riding-party had gone over to Montigny, and after tea the Princess had suggested that I should accompany her for a stroll down into the forest to meet them. She was dressed simply in a washing-dress of pale blue linen, and wore a sailor-hat, so that with her fair hair bound tightly she presented quite an English appearance, save perhaps for her figure and gait, both of which were eminently foreign. The feet that all Paris had admired two years ago were encased in stout walking-boots, and she carried a light cane, walking with all the suppleness of youth.

Soon we left the full glory of the mellow sunset flooding the Seine valley, and entered the forest road where the high trees met and interlaced above, and where the golden light, filtering through the screen of foliage, illuminated here and there the deeper shadows, struck straight upon the brilliant green of the bracken, married with the greyness on the lichen-covered trunks, and kissed the leaves with golden lips. Birds were twittering farewells to the day, and here and there a red-brown squirrel, startled by our presence, darted from bough to bough with tail erect, while on each side of the road was a carpet of moss and wild-flowers. The sweet odour of the woods greeted our nostrils, and we inhaled it in a deep draught, for that gloomy shade was delightfully cool and refreshing after the blazing heat of the stifling day. As I had been compelled to attend to some official correspondence, I had not joined the riding-party. The Princess had given some half-dozen of us tea in the hall, and, while the others had gone off to play tennis, she and I had been left alone.

Suddenly, as we walked along in the coolness, she turned to me, saying in a tone of reproach:

“Gerald, you have hidden from me the true seriousness of the situation at your Embassy. Why?”

“Well,” I answered, facing her in surprise, “we do not generally discuss our fears, you know. Others might profit by the knowledge.”

“But surely you might have confided in me?” she said gravely.

“Then de Wolkenstein has told you?”

“He has told me nothing,” she answered. “But I am, nevertheless, aware of all that has come to pass. I know, too, that since my absence at Rudolstadt you have fallen in love.”

“Well?” I inquired.

She shrugged her well-formed shoulders as if to indicate that such a thing was beyond her comprehension.

“Is it a disaster, do you think?” I asked.

“You yourself should know that,” she replied in a strained tone. “It seems, however, that you do not exercise your usual discretion in your love-affairs.”

“What do you mean, LÉonie?” I demanded quickly, halting and looking at her. Who, I wondered, had told her the truth? To which of my loves did she refer—the spy or the traitress?

“I mean exactly what I have said,” she answered quite calmly. “If you had confided in me I might perhaps have used my influence in preventing the inevitable.”

“The inevitable!” I echoed. “What is that?”

“A combination of the Powers against England,” she replied quickly. “As you know well enough, Gerald, I have facilities for learning much that is hidden from even your accredited representatives. Therefore, I tell you this, that at this moment there is a plan arranged to upset British diplomacy in all four capitals and to ruin British prestige. It is a bold plan, and I alone outside the conspirators am aware of it. If carried out, England must either declare war or lose her place as the first nation in the world. Recollect these words of mine, for I am not joking at this moment. To-day is the blackest that Europe has ever known.”

She had halted in the path, and spoke with an earnestness that held me bewildered.

“A conspiracy against us!” I gasped. “What is it? Tell me of it?”

“No,” she answered. “At present I cannot. Suffice it for you to know that I alone am aware of the truth, and that I alone, if I so desire, can thwart their plans and turn their own weapons against them.”

“You can?” I cried. “You will do it! Tell me the truth—for my sake. I have been foolish, I know, LÉonie; but tell me. If it is really serious, no time must be lost.”

“Serious?” she echoed. “It is so serious that I doubt whether the present month will pass before war is declared.”

“By England?”

“Yes. Your country will be forced into a conflict which must prove disastrous. The plan is the most clever and most dastardly ever conceived by your enemies, and this time no diplomatic efforts will succeed in staving off the tragedy, depend upon it.”

“Are both Wolkenstein and de Hindenburg aware of the plot?”

“I presume so. I have watched carefully, but have, however, discovered nothing to lead me to believe that they understand how near Europe is to an armed conflict.”

“Then your information is not from Wolkenstein?”

“No, from a higher source.”

“From your Emperor?”

She nodded.

“Then this accounts for your sudden reappearance among us?” I said.

“You may put my presence down to that, if you wish,” she replied. “But promise me, on your word of honour, that you will not breathe a single word to a soul—not even to Lord Barmouth.”

“If you impose silence upon me, LÉonie, it shall be as you wish. But you have just said that you can assist me. How?”

“I can do so—if I choose,” she responded thoughtfully, drawing the profile of a man’s face in the dust with the ferrule of her walking-stick.

“You speak strangely,” I said—“almost as though you do not intend to do me this service. Surely you will not withhold from me intelligence which might enable me to rescue my country from the machination of its enemies?”

“And why, pray, should I betray my own country in order to save yours?” she asked in a cold tone.

I was nonplussed. For a moment I could not reply. At last, however, I answered in a low, earnest tone:

“Because we are friends, LÉonie.”

“Mere friendship does not warrant one turning traitor,” she replied.

“But Austria is not the prime mover of this conspiracy,” I said. “The rulers of another nation have formed the plot. Tell me which of the Powers is responsible?”

“No,” she answered with a slight hauteur. “As you have thought fit to preserve certain secrets from me, I shall keep this knowledge to myself.”

“What secrets have I withheld from you?” I inquired, dismayed.

“Secrets concerning your private affairs.”

I knew well that she referred to my passion for Yolande. For a moment I hesitated, until words rose to my lips and I answered:

“Surely my private affairs are of little interest to you! Why should I trouble you with them?”

“Because we are friends, are we not?” she said, looking straight into my face with those fine eyes which half Europe had admired when le pied de la Princesse had been the catchword of Paris.

“Most certainly, LÉonie,” I agreed. “And I hope that our friendship will last always.”

“It cannot if you refuse to confide in me and sometimes to seek my advice.”

“But you, in your position, going hither and thither, with hosts of friends around you, can feel no real interest in my doings?” I protested.

“Friends!” she echoed in a voice of sarcasm. “Do you call these people friends? My guests at this moment are not friends. Because of my position—because I am popular, and it is considered chic to stay at Chantoiseau—because I have money, and am able to amuse them, they come to me, the men to bow over my hand, and the women to call me their ‘dear Princess.’ Bah! they are not friends. The diplomatic set come because it is a pleasant mode of passing a few weeks of summer, while still within hail of Paris; and the others—well, they are merely the entourage which every fashionable woman unconsciously gathers about her.”

“Then among them all you have no friend?” Again she turned her fine eyes upon me, and in a low but distinct tone declared:

“Only yourself, Gerald.”

“I hope, LÉonie, that I shall always prove myself worthy of your friendship,” I answered, impressed by her sudden seriousness.

Her face had grown pale, and she had uttered those words with all possible earnestness.

Then we walked on together in the silence of the darkening gloom of the forest. The ruddy light of the dying day struggled through the foliage, the birds had ceased their song, and the stillness of night had already fallen. We were each full of our own thoughts, and neither uttered a word.

Suddenly she halted again, and, gripping my arm, looked up into my face. I started, for upon her pale countenance I saw a look of desperation such as I had never before seen there.

“Gerald!” she cried hoarsely, “why do you treat me like this? You cannot tell how I suffer, or you would have pity upon me! Surely you cannot disguise from yourself the truth, even though your coldness forces me to tell you with my own lips. You know well my position—that of a woman drifting here and there, open to the calumnies of my enemies and the scandalous tales invented by so-called friends; a woman who has borne great trials and who is still, alas! unhappy! Of my honesty you yourself shall judge. You have heard whispers regarding my doings—escapades they have been called—and possibly you have given them credence. If you have, I cannot help it. There are persons around us always who delight in besmirching a woman’s reputation, especially if she has the misfortune to be born of princely family. But I tell you that all the tales you have heard are false. I—”

Suddenly she covered her face with her hands; the words seemed to choke her, and she burst into tears.

“No, no, LÉonie!” I said with deep sympathy, bending down to whisper in her ear and taking her hand in mine. “No one believes in those foul calumnies. Your honour is too well known.”

“You do not believe them—you will never believe them, will you?” she asked quickly through her tears.

“Of course not. I have denied them many times when they have been repeated to me.”

“Ah!” she cried, “I know you are always generous to a woman, Gerald.”

Then again a long silence fell between us. Presently, with a sudden impulse, she raised her tear-stained face to mine, and with a look of fierce desperation in her eyes implored:

“Gerald, will you not give me one single word? Will you still remain cold and indifferent?” As she said this, her breast rose and fell in agitation.

I drew back, wondering at her beseeching attitude.

“No, no!” she cried. “Do not put me from you, Gerald! I cannot bear it—indeed I can’t! You must have recognised the truth long ago—” and she paused. Then, lowering her voice until it was only a hoarse whisper, she added, “The truth that I love you!”

I looked at her in blank amazement, scarce knowing what to reply. I had admired her just as half Paris had admired her, but I certainly had never felt a spark of deep affection for her.

“Ah!” she went on, reading my heart in an instant, “you despise me for this confession. But I cannot help it. I love you, Gerald, as I have never before loved a man. In return for your love I can offer you nothing—nothing save one thing,” she added in a strange, mechanical voice, almost as though speaking to herself. “In return for your love I can save your country from the grievous peril in which it is now placed.”

She offered me her secret in return for my love! The thing was incomprehensible. I stood there dumbfounded.

“This is a moment of foolishness, LÉonie. We are both at fault,” I said, as soon as I again found tongue. “Think of the difference in our stations—you a princess, and I a poor diplomatist! I am your friend, and hope to remain so always—but not your lover.”

“But I love you!” she cried fiercely, raising her blanched and pitiful face until her lips met mine. The passion of love was in her heart. “You may despise me, Gerald; you may cast me from you; you may hate me; but in the end you will love me just as intensely as I love you. To endeavour to escape me is useless. Since the die is cast, let us make the compact now, as I have already suggested. I have confessed to you openly. I am yours, and I implore of you to give me your love in return. You are mine, Gerald—mine only!”