THE Prince had nerves of steel, and met my threatening look with a calm and steady gaze, absolutely unmoved by my passionate outbreak.

“You had better calm yourself, M. Denver. It will not help the case of an accused murderer to attempt my life, and such an attempt must fail, as a single cry from me will bring in the men at the door.”

“Get out of the room then,” I cried bluntly, “lest the passion to choke the life out of you passes control.” I flung myself back in my chair.

“I wish you could realize that I am indeed grieved for you. Your violence now shows——”

“To hell with your sympathy,” I said brutally. “It is all a lie, like the rest of you. Do what you please with me.”

He took the insult, as he did everything from me, unmoved, save for a shrug of the shoulders, and for a minute was silent.

“You cannot save this woman. Will you leave Russia?”

“Will you spare her if I do?”

He pretended to think for a space.

“No, I will not,” he said implacably. “She has sown the seed and must reap the crop. That is the law of intrigue such as hers. Moreover,” he added as he glanced at his watch, “it is probably already too late for me or you either to save her.”

“Have you no jot of humanity in you? Are you utterly cold, calculating and brutal? You could send her warning.”“It is possible nothing may be done until to-night. But it is no part of my duty to warn a Nihilist who betrays her comrades.”

“Russian chivalry is a noble thing,” I sneered. “But, by God, remember this,” I added fiercely, leaning forward, “if harm comes to her, you shall pay for it with your life, if I come from the other side of the earth to take it.”

“I have been threatened many times, M. Denver, by men as desperate as yourself—and still live. But now,” he asked as he rose, “will you leave Russia, or do you compel me to order your arrest on this murder charge? You are young, with a bright future.”

“Never mind my future,” I put in. “Do what you will.”

“Your violence to me will be added to the charge now, and our influence with our judges is great.”

“Go, before there’s another death to be added also.”

He went to the door and turned.

“I am still very reluctant, for you tried to serve us. Take another day to think, and give me your word of honour to make no attempt to escape. You can then stay here.”

“Go,” I cried, turning my back on him, and I did not look round until he had left the room.

Desperate as my own plight was, my thoughts were not for myself, but for Helga. I cursed myself a thousand times for my insensate blundering stupidity which had brought all this danger upon her, the very blunder against which she herself had warned me.

I remembered scribbling the words in the carriage, and saw now that instead of tearing up the paper on which I had written I must have torn up the blank sheet. I recalled that when she had warned me not to throw even the fragments in one place, I had found none but blanks in my fingers, and I could have torn my hair out to think I had been such a reckless idiot as not to search my pocket again to make sure.

I had destroyed her. I who would have given my life to save her; and that bitter hour of miserable unavailing remorse held horrors for me no description can convey. It will never pass from memory, and I marvel that in my agony I did not go insane.

I was far past caring what happened to me, and when the door opened and I looked up expecting to see the police with the warrant for me, I was ready to welcome this arrest as a distraction from my thoughts. Anything, anything to get away from the maddening oppressiveness of my gloom.

It was not the police, however, but the servant who brought me food.

“Don’t bring that here,” I cried, when the man set it down.

He looked at me in surprise.

“You are in great trouble, monsieur,” he said, not unkindly. “But one must eat, even in trouble.”

“I wish to God I was dead,” I exclaimed desperately; “and you talk of eating. Take it away, man, take it away, or I shall do you a mischief,” and I turned to the window and leaned my fevered head against the sash.

Helga was being pursued by these sleuth hounds and would be killed—killed for having tried to save my life—and it was I—I who had laid them upon her trail and brought destruction upon her. Already they might have struck the blow. And I could barely keep myself from moaning aloud in my impotent anguish.

Then suddenly I started. I had made a discovery.

A man came into sight in the ground below. It was one of the gardeners, and he crossed from the right until an abutment of the Palace hid him from my view on the left.

I was only two storeys from the ground, and the roof of the out-building behind which the man had been lost to sight could probably be reached from my bedroom window. Then by a curious memory freak an old joke dashed into my thoughts, and I smiled. It was the story of the man who languished in gaol for twenty years racking his brains with elaborate plans for escape, and then—opened the door and walked out.

My God, the way of escape lay right here. I might still get to Helga. I had to steady myself against the window frame now in the rush of this new excitement.

I turned back to the servant. He was still there.

“Why don’t you take those things away when I tell you,” I said, trying to speak in my former tone.

“I hope you will try to eat, monsieur. You have fasted long.”

I was conscious suddenly of hunger. I might have work to do for Helga, and must keep up my strength. My new thoughts had changed me.

“How long is it since I breakfasted?”

“Many hours, monsieur. It is now nearly five o’clock.”

Five o’clock. How the time had flown! My interviews with Kalkov, and the intervals, had eaten up the day. Five o’clock! I groaned. The dusk would soon fall, and if Helga were not already in the hands of her enemies, the time in which a warning could reach her might almost be counted by minutes.

I must get rid of the servant, and perhaps if I ate the food he had brought it would save time.

“I will take your advice.” I sat down to the table and ate with the speed which only Americans have cultivated as a fine art. In a few minutes I had swallowed almost everything he had brought.

“I am glad, monsieur. You were then hungry after all,” he said with a deferential air of satisfaction.

“I have finished. You can take it away,” I replied.

I lit a cigar and watched him as he piled the things on the trays. He was very slow and methodical, and I fretted and fumed over the time he took, until I felt I could have kicked him out of the room and thrown the trays after him. Then he showed an inclination to talk.“You are an American, I think, monsieur,” he said, playing at rearranging the things.

“Yes.”

“It is a fine country, I believe, monsieur.”

“Yes.”

“I have a brother there. He is doing well. He is in Chicago.”

“Oh.”

“They seem to earn very large sums of money there, monsieur. He is married and has a business of his own. He sells birds and animals.”

“Ah.” Would he never stop his gabbling and get away?

“Yes. He wishes me to go to him. I think I shall some day. But there is the sea to cross, and I have never seen it. You have crossed the sea, monsieur?”

“Yes.”

“But I should not like his trade, monsieur. I am fond of birds and animals—but not in cages; oh no, not in cages. It is like imprisonment, is it not, monsieur? And here in Russia one does not speak lightly of prisons.”

“No.” I gave him nothing but monosyllables, but his chatter seemed to thrive on it.

“No, I should not like his trade,” and he shook his head dolefully. “I have a heart, monsieur, and if I went there I think I should ruin him. I should want to let the birds out of their cages, monsieur.”

A new interest in him and his chatter sprang to life in my thoughts. I looked up sharply, and caught his eyes fixed on me with an inscrutable expression in them. Did he mean anything by the words?

“A kind heart is a good thing,” I said.

“Yes, monsieur, but”—he sighed—“it is sometimes liable to get one into trouble.” He had finished now with even his pretence of packing the things together, and he paused and said, “You are a prisoner, monsieur?”

“It looks like it.”“It is very sad, monsieur. Well, I will have these things taken away.”

“You can take them away yourself,” I said.

“I am very sorry, monsieur, but my orders are not to leave the room again. I am to stay with you.”

And my heart sank as he touched the bell, and we waited, in silence until the trays had been fetched. Then he stood close to the doorway between the two rooms.

It began to look as if there would be a tussle of strength before I got away, and I measured him in my eye with this thought present to me. He was a slightly built wiry little man, no sort of a match for me if it came to a trial of strength; but I preferred another way if it could be managed.

“Where shall I remain, monsieur?” he asked after a time.

“Was it you who ransacked my pockets this morning?” I asked, recalling Kalkov’s words.

“By the Prince’s orders, monsieur. We all fear him—but we all hate him. We dare not disobey him.”

Whether he meant me to understand anything by this or not I could not tell, but the time was pressing so fast that my anxiety drove me to bring matters to a crisis, and soon I had a plan. Any moment might now find me in the hands of the police.

I got up and passed into the bedroom, my purpose being to catch him suddenly at a disadvantage, fling him on to the bed, and smother his cries with the pillows while I tied him up and gagged him.

He seemed suspicious of my intentions, for he hung back, but one is always tempted to suppose that others may divine such thoughts. So I fooled around with some of my clothes, and then called him to help me move a bag. I got him near enough to the bedstead, and then with a significant look I said—

“You have a good heart, I can see that. Now, assuming I am like one of your brother’s caged birds, will you help me out?”“Monsieur, I dare not, I dare not.”

But he neither called out nor attempted to get away. Instead, he fixed his eyes on mine, and there was no fear in them.

“I will make it worth your while,” I said firmly. “Come.”

“Oh, monsieur, if it were found out. I am sorry for you; but if it were found out.”

“It won’t be. We’ll fix that all right,” I answered. “Listen. I intend to escape by the window there, drop on the roof below, and from there to the ground.”

“Oh, monsieur, monsieur, I dare not,” he cried.

“I shall give you five hundred roubles to help me.”

His eyes gleamed avariciously.

“I will help you,” he said; “but you must make it seem that you have forced me. You must bind me and stop my mouth, so that when they come and find me they shall see you have forced me.”

It was a very thin device, but if it satisfied him I had no reason to care, especially as I had contemplated doing it in earnest.

“Very well.”

“And you must not go yet, monsieur, not until dark. You would be seen; the grounds are alive with guards and soldiers. You must wait till seven o’clock.”

“Why till seven o’clock?”

“It will not be dark enough before; and besides, a number of men go away at that hour—the gardeners—and I can tell you how to get out so that no one will see you if you wait till then.”

“That’s all very well, but I may be arrested first,” I said suspiciously.

“No no, monsieur. You are to stay here all night. I heard his highness say so, and I was told to remain here until ten o’clock, when I am to be relieved.”

There was Helga to think of, however, and to remain there an hour and a half longer while she was in momentary peril seemed intolerable. At the same time, there was wisdom in what the man said. To get out of the grounds in daylight, while the gardeners and others were about, was just a forlorn hope, and bitterly as I chafed at the delay, I resolved to wait until dusk came.

That hour and a half was the longest in my life. The man did his best to occupy my thoughts, telling me over and over again exactly the way I had to go so as to avoid meeting any one, pointing out part of it from the window, and giving me a hundred hints and suggestions.

As the time approached I gave him the sum I had promised, stowed the rest of the money about me, and then fastened him up. He himself suggested an ingenious method. I wrapped a sheet round him, and then wound certain cords about him, until he looked like a mummy in clean clothes, and could move neither hand nor foot; and then I fastened a pillow over his head.

Bearing all he had said in mind, I opened the window, got down on to the roof below, crept along it, and finding the coast clear, dropped to the ground. I fell on to a flower bed, and darted at full speed across the lawn to the point he had told me.

He had earned his money well, for I was able to follow his instructions to the letter with the greatest ease. He had told me to make for that part of the gardens where the greenhouses stood, and past them to take a path to the left until I came to a spot where an out-house with a low sloping roof stood against the high outside wall. By means of this I was to climb to the top of the wall, and then drop into a dark unfrequented road. I was to go along this to the right for about half a mile, when I should find myself at a point from which I could easily reach any part of the city.

I remember being struck by the fact that a part of the Palace grounds so near to the building should be so deserted, but I had not a thought or suspicion of treachery of any kind.I reached the road within a very short time of leaving the room, and turning, as he had told me, to the right, I ran along it at a sharp speed. It was overhung with heavy trees and very dark, but on this fact I congratulated myself as I ran.

I had covered half the distance when the path narrowed between the high wall of the Palace grounds on one side and an equally high hedge on the other, and it was so dark that I could not see the ground beneath me. I was so keen to get to Helga that I pressed on at headlong speed, until my foot slipped on something wet and greasy and down I went all a-sprawl in the dirt.

My hat flew off and my head struck the ground, and my face slid along in the mud, but beyond grazing my skin and griming myself considerably, I suffered no hurt. I fell on the soft mud and thus made scarcely any noise, a fact to which I believe I owed my life.

I sat up, and was groping about for my hat when I heard a sound some way ahead of me. Thinking some one was coming I rolled under the shadow of the great hedge and waited.

I have said before that my sense of hearing is very acute, but though I strained it now to the utmost I heard nothing for some time. In the meanwhile I found that in the dark I had blundered into a kind of broad ditch which crossed the path, the bottom being of soft wet mire.

I pulled myself cautiously up on to the dry ground, and putting my ear to the earth lay as still as death and listened.

Presently I heard the sound of the shuffling of feet, and as it was repeated after a few moments’ interval, I could tell some one was waiting at a distance ahead of me.

I must find out what it meant, and that at once, for minutes were precious. I sat up, therefore, and took off my boots, and as I was rising my hand struck against my hat.I crept forward now as cautiously as before I had ran heedlessly, stopping every few yards to listen.

That any one could be waiting for me did not even then cross my mind; but I was carrying too great a responsibility to run risks and although the slow progress I made chafed and worried me, I dared not quicken it. And well it was indeed that I exercised this restraint.

There was very little wind moving, but what there was came from the direction I was going, and in one of the pauses I made to listen, I caught the sound of a voice, and then heard the tread of heavy feet. In a moment I rolled myself under the hedge.

The steps came nearer, and I could tell there were two men. They were speaking in low guttural tones, but I could not at first catch the words, until one of them said in a louder voice, with a touch of impatience—

“Yes, seven o’clock, of course.”

In a flash my eyes were open. It was the hour the servant had insisted upon for my escape. The whole thing had been planned by Kalkov himself. And these men were—who?

I was not long in doubt on that point either.

The two came on, drew level, and passed; and as I held my breath I heard a muttered reference to the brotherhood and Vastic’s murder, which told me all I needed to know.

The Prince had adopted the same policy toward me as toward Helga, and having planned the means of my escape through that treacherous scoundrel of a servant, had managed to convey to the brotherhood an intimation of where and when I could be found.

But for that fall of mine into the mud the plan would have succeeded, and there would have been an end of any interference from me in his plans.

I had no time to waste in cursing him, however; and as soon as the men were well past I rolled out from the hedge and crept on as quickly as I could.I was afraid there would be a third man to be dealt with at the mouth of the place, but to my infinite relief the coast was clear, and putting on my boots again I turned into the road and walked briskly in the direction of the city.

I was in a deplorable mess from my tumble, and tried with very little effect to get rid of some of the mud from my clothes and face.

It was while I was doing this, and puzzling how I should get admission to Helga’s house that the need for some disguise occurred to me. I should probably have to pass some of the brotherhood spies near the house, and if I were recognized the consequences might be vitally serious.

The means for the disguise were in fact supplied by the mud into which I had fallen. I knocked in the crown of my hat, took off my coat, tore my shirt-sleeves half-way to the elbows, daubed them and my arms and hands with mud, and in a minute was changed into a dirty disreputable loafer, whom any one would have the greatest difficulty in recognizing as Harper C. Denver, the smartly groomed New Yorker.

And in this guise I hurried as fast as I dared without exciting suspicion from the police in the direction of the square of San Sophia.