THE MAN OF THE HOUR.

'Selpdorf is the man of the hour,' Counsellor once said to Rallywood, and the Major's sayings had a trick of lingering in the memory. With the Chancellor then still remained the key to the situation. He was implicated in the conspiracy, but he had less to gain and far more to lose than the others. A dangerous condition and one possible of development.

All this passed in a flash through Rallywood's mind as the opposite door opened to admit M. Selpdorf, who replied stiffly to Rallywood's bow.

'I was not prepared to see you this evening,' began Selpdorf.

'I have brought the despatches, your Excellency,' replied Rallywood, taking the packet from his pocket but continuing to hold it in his hand.

Selpdorf eyed him.

'From whom?'

'Lieutenant Unziar.'

The affair was falling out in an unexpected manner. Selpdorf was a student of human nature as all of his craft must be, and Rallywood offered for his observation a character out of the common and hard for a MaÄsaun to read. How had he escaped from the dilemma in which he had been so carefully placed? The Chancellor was curious to hear. The man was an artist in the human passions.

'From Lieutenant Unziar?' Selpdorf repeated tentatively. 'And your prisoner? The man whom I ordered you to keep at the block-house?'

The Chancellor half expected to hear that Counsellor was also in RÉvonde, and that Rallywood with an unassuming but unspeakable effrontery had called to explain his own view of the matter.

'Unziar is with him—with Major Counsellor at Kofn Ford. Unziar was unable to ride on at once after crossing the river, which is in flood. Therefore I have come.'

Was it possible Rallywood had merely shirked facing the difficulty in this way? thought Selpdorf.

'Ah, Major Counsellor? And these are the despatches?'

'These are Major Counsellor's private despatches, which were stolen from him within the frontier of MaÄsau!' said Rallywood.

Selpdorf's round eyes showed their lids in an odd flicker. The attack was sudden. He brushed his moustache upwards with a thoughtful movement of the finger and thumb, regarding Rallywood as he did so.

'Then why have you brought them to me?' he said at last.

'Because a soldier should see no further than the point of his sword, your Excellency,' replied Rallywood slowly.

'Good! And how do you come to know what the packet contains?'

'The persons who robbed Major Counsellor did not even take the precaution of placing it under another cover. He recognised it at the block-house.'

'It seems to me then that you had a decision to make at the block-house?'

'Yes,' said Rallywood simply.

But it was not a subject to bear discussion.

'As a soldier of MaÄsau you decided rightly.' Selpdorf misjudged Rallywood for the moment; it crossed his mind that this was a mercenary after all and to be bought.

'But as a man I now wish to resign my commission.'

Selpdorf raised his brows.

'But why? At the very moment when you have proved your faithfulness and your zeal? When we owe you recognition of these high qualities?'

'I want nothing, your Excellency, but to go out from this house a free man,' returned Rallywood coldly.

'Reconsider your words, Captain Rallywood.'

'Even if other difficulties had not arisen,' went on Rallywood, 'I may remind your Excellency that a soldier's oath does not cover robbery and assassination.'

Selpdorf was, and looked, astonished.

'I don't understand you,' he said gravely. 'Pray tell me what you mean.'

'I found Major Counsellor alone and unconscious in a single carriage that had been sent rolling down the incline on the line where the outgoing mail train could not fail to collide with it. The inference is clear. Some one wished to make an end of him—in a railway accident. But the plan was a curiously stupid one, for nothing could satisfactorily explain Major Counsellor's presence there, since it was well known to the British Legation in RÉvonde that he was entering, not leaving MaÄsau.'

Selpdorf stood silent. Here was another ill-devised amendment born of Count Sagan's blundering brain.

'It is a very strange story,' he said at length. 'Had the train come in collision with the carriage which you assert was on the down line——'

'The troops from Kofn and the railway people at Alfau can prove that.'

'The mail might have been derailed, with no one can tell what loss of life.'

'Count Simon holds life cheap,' said Rallywood. 'No life that stands in his way can be safe. Not even the life of Mademoiselle Selpdorf!'

The Chancellor was moved for once.

'You are out of your senses!' he said sternly.

'It is true!'

Both men looked around. Valerie had entered.

'Father, you must hear me before you—before you——'

She glanced at Rallywood and stopped.

'Go, Valerie; you have nothing to do with these things.'

Selpdorf met her as she came towards him.

'You must hear me to-night, father. You are mistaken; I have had a great deal to do with them. I know all that Captain Rallywood has said to you—yes, I had a right to know. For it was I who brought Major Counsellor to the Duke's apartments at the Castle, because I knew there was a plot against his Highness. But I did not know it was a German plot in which Baron von Elmur was using Count Sagan. Oh, you must be on your guard against them!'

'Who has been frightening you with all this nonsense?' asked Selpdorf with cold suspicion.

'You don't understand me! Father, I know how Captain Colendorp died. I saw it—the struggle and his fall over the cliff. Then I guessed his Highness was in danger, and I went to warn him. Captain Rallywood, tell my father of Count Sagan's visit to the Duke's rooms in the middle of the night with Baron von Elmur. I—we, Isolde and I—heard the shots. You do not know it, but there is a plot. Your life is not safe! Captain Rallywood is right; no life that stands in Count Sagan's way is safe! And you on whom the State depends—you who alone can uphold her liberty—you are the first they will try to destroy! He hates you, else why should he try to kill me?'

She was clinging to his arm.

'To kill you? If I thought that was true—if I could believe he meant to injure you——'

It added very much to Selpdorf's difficulties that he had a conscience and a heart. Perhaps Valerie had kept both awake. He, who acted a part to all the world, had been sedulous to maintain a high rÔle before his daughter. Perhaps he valued her absolute faith in him even more than her love, which is a commoner attitude of mind than we realise.

He felt himself at fault. Although he had heard no details to enable him to judge for himself, yet he knew he could rely upon Valerie's statement that an attempt had been made upon her life. Count Simon's unscrupulousness was an old tale, but this crime was not only cold-blooded but also extraordinarily stupid, since the faintest suspicion of foul play would finally estrange the one person in all MaÄsau whose help was necessary to the success of his plans and hopes. It is to be doubted whether the Count's ineptitude did not disgust the Chancellor more thoroughly than his treachery towards Valerie.

Selpdorf was at no time a man who made up his mind irrevocably. Astuteness sometimes keeps step with uncertainty. To a clever man so many sides of a question are visible. On all counts he was now prepared to yield to Valerie's wishes; perhaps looking ahead even in that moment, he saw a fresh combination before him, which, while quite equally safe and useful to himself, omitted Count Sagan.

The Chancellor raised his eyes. At this moment—diplomatically—he was superb. He had an air of sagacious decision, an air of holding a master-stroke in reserve, whereas he was in reality merely retiring to a negative position to wait upon events.

'Tell me the story,' he said.

'There is nothing further to tell,' replied Rallywood. 'Mademoiselle has given you the main facts. But for her MaÄsau would to-day be a province of Germany, in fact if not in name.

'I have been misinformed and deceived in an incomprehensible manner,' the Chancellor said emphatically. There was still the matter of Counsellor's despatches. Nothing was now to be gained by keeping them, whereas by giving them back to the old diplomatist, MaÄsau was sure to profit for the time at least. The difficulty was to get rid of the packet without loss of prestige to himself. 'Now as to Major Counsellor's despatches,' he added doubtfully.

'You will send them back to him,' said Valerie eagerly.

'You cannot see the difficulty of my position.' The Chancellor laid his hand upon her shoulder. 'To be frank with you, and in confidence, Captain Rallywood, I have not been ignorant that an understanding existed between Count Sagan and the Baron von Elmur. I have even been obliged to countenance it to a certain extent. As you know, they are aware that these despatches have been sent to me. If I use them as my daughter suggests, I need scarcely point out that trouble must ensue, since I, more or less, represent MaÄsau. Now we cannot afford to offend Germany. She only awaits a pretext to hurl down her army of occupation upon us. Had I never had those despatches the way might have been easier.'

His glance at Rallywood held a large reproach.

'But, father, in honesty and justice'—

'It is a case of private justice as opposed to national necessity. If Captain Rallywood had sacrificed his public to his private honour, if he had chosen to prefer his country's cause to his oath of fealty——'

Rallywood understood.

'No one knows I am here,' he said.

'Ah, true!'

'No one need ever know where the despatches have been. In four hours they shall be with Major Counsellor at the British Legation.'

'If you, Captain Rallywood, will bear the whole responsibility that would simplify the matter. Otherwise it is war.' Selpdorf looked meaningly at Rallywood as he spoke.

But Valerie was not deceived.

'Not that! not that!' she cried.

'It must be that or nothing.' Selpdorf did not look at her and he spoke almost brusquely.

'I know what it means. They will say he was false to his oath! Oh, father, is there no other way? I cannot let him go!'

Rallywood's face changed. Fate was crushing her two strange gifts into his hands, love and death at the same moment! He crossed to Valerie's side, and drawing her to him his gray eyes looked their courage and their happiness into hers.

'My darling, this makes it easy, whatever comes!'

'It may be death! It will be death!' He winced at the low agonised whisper.

She turned to her father.

'Father, you have the power to do anything you please in MaÄsau. You will save him for me! You can save him! Promise me that or I cannot let him go!'

Selpdorf was touched. He liked Rallywood. There was much in the single-hearted soldier that appealed to his sympathies. But——

'I will not deceive you, Valerie, at such a time as this,' he answered gently; 'I cannot foresee what may happen. I may not be able to prevent the worst. Captain Rallywood holds the despatches. He offers to sacrifice himself for the State, and the decision rests with you.'

Valerie buried her face in her hands. The clock moved noiselessly on and on, and the very air seemed to throb in the silence. Then the girl raised her head and looked steadily at Rallywood.

'It would not be love if I said otherwise. You would not love me if I said otherwise. You must go, John!'