it was strange to me, but always the same.”
“Then your spy is a blunderer. Let us try and sift this matter: A lady may be shadowed for numerous reasons; do you know why you are watched?”
“N – no,” hesitatingly.
“So,” thought the detective, “she is not quite frank, with me.” Then aloud: “Do you suspect any one?”
“No.”
“Madam, I must ask some personal questions. Please answer them frankly and truly, or not at all, and be sure that every question is necessary, every answer important.”
The lady bows her head, and he proceeds:
“First, then, have you a secret?”
She starts, turns her head away, and is silent.
The detective notes the movement, smiles again, and goes on:
“Let us advance a step; you have a secret.”
“Why – do you – say that?”
“Because you have yourself told me as much. We never feel that uneasy sense of espionage, so well described by you, madam, until we have something to conceal – the man who carries no purse, fears no robber. You have a secret. This has made you watchful, and, being watchful, you discover that you have – what? An enemy, or only a tormentor?”
“Both, perhaps,” she says sadly.
“My task, then, is to find this enemy. Mrs. Warburton, I shall not touch your secret; at the same time I warn you in this search it is likely to discover itself to me without my seeking. Rest assured that I shall respect it. First, then, you have a secret. Second, you have an enemy. Mrs. Warburton, I should ask fewer questions if I could see your face.”
Springing up suddenly, she tears off her mask, and standing before him says with proud fierceness:
“And why may you not see my face! There is no shame for my mask to conceal! I have a secret, true; but it is not of my making. It has been forced upon me. I am not an intriguante: I am a persecuted woman. I am not seeking it to conceal wrong doing, but to protect myself from those that wrong me.”
The words that begin so proudly, end in a sob, and, covering her face with her white, jeweled hands, Leslie Warburton turns and rests her head against the screen beside her.
Then impulsive, unconventional Dick Stanhope springs up, and, as if he were administering comfort to a sorrowing child, takes the two hands away from the tear-wet face, and holding them fast in his own, looks straight down into the brown eyes as he says:
“Dear lady, trust me! Even as I believe you, believe me, when I say that your confidence shall not be violated. Your secret shall be safe; shall remain yours. Your enemy shall become mine. If you cannot trust me, I cannot help you.”
“Oh! I do trust you, Mr. Stanhope; I must. Ask of me nothing, for I can tell you no more. To send for you was unwise, perhaps, but I have been so tormented by this spy upon my movements … and I cannot fight in the dark. It was imprudent to bring you here to-night, but I dared not meet you elsewhere.”
There is a lull in the music and a hum of approaching voices. She hastily resumes her mask, and Stanhope says:
“We had better separate now, madam. Trust your case to me. I cannot remain here much longer, otherwise I might find a clue to-night, – important business calls me. After to-night my time is all yours, and be sure I shall find out your enemy.”
People are flocking in from the dancing-room. With a gesture of farewell, “Sunlight” flits out through the door just beside the screen, and a moment later, the Goddess of Liberty is sailing through the long drawing-rooms on the arm of a personage in the guise of Uncle Sam.
“What success, my friend?”
“It’s all right,” replies the Goddess of Liberty; “I have seen the lady.”
A moment more and her satin skirts trail across the toes of a tall fellow in the dress of a British officer, who is leaning against a vine-wreathed pillar, intently watching the crowd through his yellow mask. At sight of the Goddess of Liberty, he starts forward and a sharp exclamation crosses his lips.
“Shades of Moses,” he mutters to himself, “I can’t be mistaken; that is Dick Stanhope’s Vienna costume! Is that Dick inside it? It is! it must be! What is he doing? On a lay, or on a lark? Dick Stanhope is not given to this sort of frolic; I must find out what it means!”
And Van Vernet leaves his post of observation and follows slowly, keeping the unconscious Goddess of Liberty always in sight.
Passing through a net-work of vines, the British officer comes upon two people in earnest conversation. The one wears a scarlet and black domino, the other a coquettish Carmen costume.
“That black and red domino is my patron,” mutters the officer as he glides by unnoticed. “He does not see me and I do not wish to see him just at present.” A few steps farther and the British officer comes to a sudden halt.
“By Heavens!” he ejaculates, half aloud; “what a chance I see before me! It would be worth something to know what brought Dick Stanhope here to-night; it would be worth yet more to keep him here until after midnight. If I had an accomplice to detain him while I, myself, appear at the Agency in time, then the C – street Raid would move without him, the lead would be given to me. It’s worth trying for. It shall be done, and my patron in black and red shall help me.”
He turns, and only looks back to mutter:
“Go on, Dick Stanhope; this night shall begin the trial that, when ended, shall decide which of the two is the better man!”
And the British officer hurries straight on until he stands beside the black and scarlet domino.
CHAPTER IX.
“A FALSE MOVE IN THE GAME.”
Pretty, piquant Winnifred French was the staunch friend of Leslie Warburton.
When Winnie was the petted only daughter of “French, the rich merchant,” she and Leslie Uliman had been firm friends. When Leslie Uliman, the adopted daughter of the aristocratic Uliman’s, gave her hand in marriage to Archibald Warburton, a wealthy invalid and a widower with one child, Winnie was her first bridesmaid.
Time had swept away the fortune of French, the merchant, and death had robbed Leslie of her adopted parents, and then Winnifred French gladly accepted the position of salaried companion to her dearest friend.
Not long after, Alan Warburton had returned from abroad, and then had begun a queer complication.
For some reason known only to himself, Alan Warburton had chosen to dislike his beautiful sister-in-law, and he had conceived a violent admiration for Winnie, – an admiration which might have been returned, perhaps, had Winnie been less loyal in her friendship for Leslie. But, perceiving Alan’s dislike for her dearest friend, Winnie lost no opportunity for annoying him, and lavishing upon him her stinging sarcasms.
On her part, Leslie Warburton loved her companion with a strong sisterly affection. As for her feelings toward Alan Warburton,
