Privately he had another and still more serious cause of anxiety. He had not forgotten the Legitimist bazaar, and he feared that the investigations which had been immediately set on foot might show the name of his brother as figuring among the authors of the disgraceful jest.
The task of the police did not prove a difficult one. Late in the afternoon of the day after the outrage the Chief Commissioner himself waited upon the Secretary of State at the Home Office to make his confidential report.
The Duke received him alone, with an air of embarrassment which the Commissioner found it easy to understand.
“I thought it best to come to your Grace myself, as the matter is one that seems to call for careful handling.”
“What have you found out?”
“The manifesto—they call it the Assertion—comes from the committee of a body styling itself the Legitimist Guild. The real instigator, I suspect, is a Frenchman, the Comte des Louvres, who is a sort of international agent. He is in the pay of the Duke of ——, the King of the ——, and even, I believe, of the Vatican.”
The Home Secretary frowned.
“What was his motive?”
“Simply to show that he was earning his money, I expect. There may be some idea that if they can give trouble to our Royal Family, the influence of the English Court will be exerted on behalf of the Royalist cause in France—or the Pope’s temporal power.”
“Well, what have you done?”