salaries to my — er — myrmidons! That item, Mr. Baggin, I expect to be supplied by you.”
He laughed outright at Baggin’s frowning, mistrustful face, crossed one leg over the other, and clasped his silk-clad ankle with a shapely hand. Baggin noted the boyish action. It at once irritated him and determined his course.
“Unfortunately,” he replied drily, “we have already chosen our president and voted upon the immediate use of the fund. The map of Europe, I fear, must for the present remain unaltered—”
He glanced up and added hurriedly, “I — regret this Perhaps at our next meeting The membership, as you perhaps know, is — er — limited.”
The young man sprang to his feet. His face was bronze.
“It is of no consequence, my friend.” He laughed softly. “Simply, the scheme appealed to me. It fired my imagination. I am, as you know, a dreamer.
“‘If you can dream, and not make dreams your master,’” he murmured.
He walked over to the corner of the room, picked up his Inverness, and stood looking composedly down upon the figure which it had concealed.
“Salve, my friend! You go down the river tonight, wiser than all the kings of earth.”
He slipped into his coat and turned toward Baggin, who had also risen.
“You will see that it gets into the morning papers,” he said. “I could wish to write it myself,” he added pensively, drawing on his gloves.
“It has possibilities. So: ‘ Grayson a suicide. Great financier shows himself at the opera, bids the gay world goodnight, and throws himself in the Thames. A flying rumour breathes money troubles as a cause for the tragedy.’ Wait!” he fumbled in his breast pocket, “I’ll write a note to pin to his clothes.”
He scribbled hastily in his memorandum book, tore out the leaf, and handed it to his companion.
“He confesses his sins and commends his soul to ‘le bon Dieu.’” He laid a hand upon the door.
“You will leave me here — alone?” asked Baggin.
“But yes! Nothing can harm you from within, and you bolt the door from without — until the preconcerted signal. It should not be long now.” He drew out his watch.
“But — I wish you to remain — I command it—”
Despite his efforts at composure, Baggin’s voice quavered.
His companion laughed. “A Roland for your Oliver, my friend!” he cried. “Favour for favour! You grant my small request?”
Baggin shook his head.
“You will be king, eh? — and alone? Good!”
He put on his top hat, adjusted his silk muffler about his throat, and with an amiable nod to his companion, stepped out into the night.
The fog had thinned to a nebulous haze, fine as a lady’s veil, and the young man strode along briskly. Ten minutes brought him to the waiting hansom.
“Covent Garden,” he directed the driver. He sprang in and leaned back against the cushions.
“So Baggin would be king!” He smiled with a certain grimness.
3. In Which a Certain Momentous Question Is Asked
At precisely ten o’clock, as the curtain came reefing slowly down upon the first act of I Pagliacci, Lady Dinsmore turned with outstretched hand to greet a newcomer who had just entered the box.
“My dear count,” she exclaimed, “I am disappointed in you! Here I have been paying you really quite tremendous compliments to these young people — which for an old woman, you know, is very proper — and you show your complete indifference to me by committing the worst crime in the calendar!”
“I am desolated!” The stranger who was bowing over her hand, a trifle lower than an Englishman would have done, was slender and distinguished looking, faultlessly dressed, and wearing a bunch of Parma violets. He had a way of looking at one gravely with an air of concentrated attention, as if he were seeing through the words, into the very soul of the speaker. He was, indeed, a wonderful listener, and this quality, added to a certain boyish candour of temperament, accounted perhaps for Count Poltavo’s popularity in society.
“Before I ask you to name the crime, Lady Dinsmore,” he said, “or to inform me if the calendar is a lady’s, permit me to offer my humblest apologies for my lateness.” Lady Dinsmore shook her head at him.
“You are incorrigible!” she declared. “But sit down and make your excuses at your leisure. You know my niece, and I think you have met Mr. Van Ingen. He is one of our future diplomats.” The count bowed and sank into a chair beside his hostess.
Van Ingen, after a frigidly polite acknowledgment, resumed his conversation with Doris rather eagerly, and Lady Dinsmore turned to her companion.
“Now for the explanation,” she exclaimed briskly. “I shall not let you off! Unpunctuality is a crime, and your punishment shall be to confess its cause.”
Count Poltavo bent toward her with bright, smiling eyes.
“A very stupid and foolish business engagement,” he replied, “which required my personal attendance. Shall I give you the details? I warn you in advance they will bore you frightfully! They did me.”
Lady Dinsmore threw up a protesting hand.
“Pray spare me,” she begged. “Business has no charms to soothe my savage breast! Grayson,” she lowered her voice confidentially, “can talk of nothing else. When he was with me, he was forever telegraphing, cabling to America, or decoding messages. There was no peace in the house, by day or by night. Finally I made a stand. ‘Gerald,’ I said, ‘you shall not pervert my servants with your odious tips, and turn my home into a public stock-exchange. Take your bulls and bears over to the Savoy and play with them there, and leave Doris to me.’ And he did!” she concluded triumphantly.
Count Poltavo looked about, as if noting for the first time the man’s absence. “Where is he now?” he enquired.
Lady Dinsmore shrugged her shoulders.
“He is — ill! Frankly, I think he had a slight indisposition, and magnified it in order to escape. He hates music. Doris has been quite distrait ever since. The child adores her father.”
Her companion glanced across to the subject of their remarks. The girl sat in the front of the box, slim and elegant, her hands clasped loosely in her lap. She was watching the brilliant scene with a certain air of detachment, as if thinking of other things. Her usual lightness and gay banter seemed for the moment to have deserted her, leaving a soft brooding wistfulness that was strangely appealing.
The count looked long at her.
“She is very beautiful,”
