When Paris opened her eyes on the morning of Thursday, the twelfth of October, it was to rejoice at one of those soft and beautiful days of autumn which make of every house a dungeon to be escaped at the first possible moment. Even as early as nine o'clock, a perceptible tide had set in toward the Bois de Boulogne, or, rather, innumerable little tides, which converged at the Place de la Concorde and rolled on along the Champs-ElysÉes in one mighty torrent.

Against this torrent, a sturdy and energetic figure fought its way across the square; a figure carefully arrayed in black morning-coat and grey trousers, and looking alertly about with a pair of very bright eyes magnified by heavy glasses. The haughtiest of the carriage-crowd felt honoured by his bow, for it was none other than that great diplomat, ThÉophile DelcassÉ, Minister of Marine.

M. DelcassÉ was not in the habit of being abroad so early; it was a full hour before his usual time; but he had an appointment to keep which he regarded as most important, so he strode rapidly across the square, entered the handsome building to the north of it, and mounted to the first floor, where, on the corner overlooking the square on one side and the Rue Royale on the other, he had his office.

Early as it was, he found awaiting him the man whom he wished to see—a thin wisp of a man, with straggling white beard and a shock of white hair and a face no wider than one's hand, but lighted by the keenest eyes in the world—in a word, Louis Jean Baptiste LÉpine, Prefect of Police, to whom full justice has not been done in this story—nor in any other. M. LÉpine had not found the hour early; to him, all hours were the same, for he was a man who slept only when he found the time, which was often not at all.

"Good morning, my dear Prefect," said DelcassÉ, drawing off his gloves. "I trust I have not kept you waiting?"

"I but just arrived," LÉpine assured him; "and I know of no better place to pass one's idle moments than at this window of yours."

Beyond it stretched the great square, with its obelisk and circle of statues, its pavilions and balustrades; beautiful now, and peaceful, but peopled with ghastly memories—for it was here the Revolution set up its guillotine, and it was here that some four thousand men and women, high and low, looked their last upon this earth, mounted the scaffold and passed under the knife. Surely, if any spot on earth be haunted, it is this!

Something of this, perhaps, was in the minds of these two men, as they stood for a moment looking down into the square, for their faces were very thoughtful; then DelcassÉ's eyes travelled from one to another of the heroic figures representing the great towns of France—Lyons, Marseilles, Brest, Rouen, Bordeaux, Nantes, Lille—and came to rest upon the last one, Strasbourg, hung with black and piled with mourning garlands, in memory of the lost Alsace. Every morning, before he turned to the day's work, M. DelcassÉ, standing at this window, gazed at that statue, while he registered anew the vow that those garlands should one day be replaced by wreaths of victory! That vow was his orison.

His lips moved silently as he made it now, then he turned to his desk.

"Be seated, my dear LÉpine," he said. "I have much to discuss with you, as you may guess. First about La LibertÉ. My Board of Inquiry will be ready to report by Saturday. It has decided that the explosion was caused by the spontaneous combustion of the 'B' powder, as was the case with the Jena."

"That theory will do as well as any other," said LÉpine, curtly. "But you and I know that it is not the true one."DelcassÉ looked at him quickly.

"Have you any news?" he asked.

"None," answered LÉpine, with a frown. "The man we sought has vanished as completely as though the earth had swallowed him. I have found no trace of him since he left the office of the Messrs. Cook, with two passages for America in his pocket. I cannot understand it."

"Have the tickets been returned?"

"They have not been returned, and the Messrs. Cook, making inquiry at my suggestion, have a report from the steamship company that they have not been used."

DelcassÉ turned this over in his mind.

"Perhaps the man and his daughter have met with some accident."

"We should have heard of it," LÉpine objected. "I have scrutinised every report—viewed every body which at all resembled him."

"Then," said DelcassÉ, "he has been suppressed, as one who knew too much."

"My own opinion is," said the Prefect, "that he has sought refuge in Germany, until he can prepare for another demonstration against France."

The Minister moved uneasily in his chair.

"I have thought of that," he said, "and I am doing everything I can to render such an attempt impossible—but it is a hard task—one can never be sure. There is another thing I wished to ask you. Where is Crochard?"

"I do not know, sir. I have not seen him since that morning at Toulon when we parted outside the Hotel du Nord."

"Then he, too, has disappeared?"

"Yes, sir, completely."

"Has it never occurred to you, LÉpine, to connect these two disappearances?"

"Yes, I did connect them. You will remember in the note he left for me he stated that he hoped soon to have some good news for us. But when more than two weeks elapse and we hear nothing, I am forced to conclude that he, too, has been baffled."

"Yes, it was for me a hope, also—almost my only one," said DelcassÉ. "I did not believe that he could fail. And if he has failed, do you know what it means for France, LÉpine? It means destruction. Oh, I have spent sleepless nights, I have racked my brain! Germany's attitude is that of a nation which desires war and which is ready to provoke it. You know, of course, how strained the situation is?"

"About Morocco?"

"Yes. It has come to this: France and Germany are like two duellists, face to face, sword in hand. Either they must fight, or one must retreat—and with dishonour!""France cannot retreat," murmured LÉpine.

"I have said the same thing a hundred times; and yet, at the bottom of my heart, I know we cannot fight—not while this cloud of uncertainty hangs over us. To fight, with this power in the hands of Germany, would mean more than defeat—it would mean annihilation. There would be other statues to be draped with black!"

DelcassÉ's face was livid; he removed his glasses and polished them with a shaking hand, and, for the first time, LÉpine saw his bloodshot eyes. DelcassÉ noticed his glance, and laughed grimly.

"Only to you, LÉpine, do I dare to show them," he said. "Before others, I must crush this fear in my heart, bite it back from my lips; I must appear unconcerned, confident of the issue. Only to you may I speak freely. That is one reason I called you here. I felt that I must speak with some one. LÉpine, I foresee for France a great humiliation."

LÉpine looked at his companion with real concern.

"You exaggerate," he said. "You have been brooding over it too long."

DelcassÉ shook his head.

"I do not exaggerate. This thing is so terrible that it cannot be exaggerated. Even at this moment, Germany is preparing the blow. For the past week, she has been extraordinarily active. Her fleets have coaled hurriedly and put out to sea—for manoeuvres, it is said; but this is not the season for manoeuvres. Her shipyards have been cleared of all civilians, and a cordon of troops posted about each one. The garrison of every fortress along the frontier has been at least doubled, and the most rigid patrol established. The police regulations are being enforced with the greatest severity. Every city of the frontier swarms with spies; even here in Paris we are not safe from them—my desk was rifled two nights ago. I live in dread that any day, any hour, may bring the news of some fresh disaster!"

"And do our men learn nothing?"

"Nothing! Nothing! All they can tell me is that something is preparing, some blow, some surprise. Whatever the secret, it is well kept; so well that it can be known only to the Emperor and one or two of his ministers. We have tried every means, we have exhausted every resource, all in vain. We know, in part, what is being done; of the purpose back of it we know nothing. But we can guess—the purpose is war; it can be nothing else!"

LÉpine sat silent and contemplated the rugged face opposite him—the face which told by its lined forehead, its worried eyes, its savage mouth, of the struggles, rebuffs, and disappointments of thirty years. Always, out of disaster, this man had risen unconquered. Upon his shoulders now was placed the whole of this terrific burden. He alone, of the whole cabinet, was fit to bear it; beside him, the others were mere pigmies: Premier Caillaux, an amiable financier; Foreign Minister de Selves, a charming amateur of the fine arts; War Minister Messimy, an obscure army officer with a love for uniforms; Minister of Commerce Couyba, a minor poet, tainted with decadence—above all these, DelcassÉ loomed as a Gulliver among Lilliputians. But greatness has its penalties. While the Minister of Foreign Affairs spent his days in collecting plaques, and the Minister of War his in strutting about the boulevards, and the Minister of Commerce his in composing verses, DelcassÉ laboured to save his country—laboured as a colossus labours, sweating, panting, throwing every fibre of his being into the struggle—which was all the more trying, all the more terrific, because he felt that it must go against him!

"What would you suggest, LÉpine?" DelcassÉ asked, at last. "Is there any source of information which you can try?"

LÉpine shook his head doubtfully.

"It is not a question of expense," DelcassÉ went on, rapidly. "A million francs would not be too much to pay for definite information. We have spent that already! We have had a Prince babbling in his cups; we have had I know not how many admirals and generals and diplomats confiding in their suddenly complaisant mistresses; we have searched their hearts, shaken them inside out—but they know nothing. Such and such orders have been issued; they obey the orders, but they do not know their purpose. They all talk war, shout war—Germany seems mad for war—and the government encourages them. Their inspired journals assert over and over that Germany cannot recede—that its position is final—that hereafter it must be paramount in Morocco. And to-day—or to-morrow at the latest—France must send her ultimatum."

"What will it be?"

"God knows!" and DelcassÉ tugged at his ragged moustache. "If it were not for one thing, LÉpine, I should not hesitate, I should not fear war. France is ready, and England is at least sympathetic. But there is La LibertÉ. What if Germany can treat our other battleships as she treated that one? Yes, and England's, too! And if our battleships, why not our forts, our arsenals ... LÉpine," and DelcassÉ's lips were twitching, "I say to you frankly that, for the first time in my life, I have fear!" He fell a moment silent, playing nervously with a paper-knife he had snatched up from his desk. "What would you suggest?" he asked again.

And again LÉpine shook his head."What can I suggest!" he protested. "Where you have failed, what is there I can do?"

The knife snapped in DelcassÉ's fingers, and he hurled the fragments to the floor.

"There is one thing you can do," he said. "Find Crochard and bring him to me."

LÉpine arose instantly.

"I will do my best," he said, reaching for his hat. "If he is in France, rest assured...."

There was a tap at the door, and it opened softly.

"I am not to be disturbed!" snapped the Minister, and then he stopped, staring.

For there appeared on the threshold the immaculate figure, the charming and yet impressive countenance, for a sight of which the great Minister had been longing; and then his heart leaped suffocatingly, for with the first figure was a second—a man with white hair and flaming eyes and thin, eager face....

As DelcassÉ sprang to his feet, Crochard stepped forward.

"M. DelcassÉ," he said, "it gives me great pleasure to introduce to you a gentleman whom I know you will be most glad to meet——Ignace Vard."