"What a fuss you two make about a trifle," said the widow, shrugging her shoulders. "Come, Mercy, we must do something, instead of chattering here; and let poor Mr. Mayhew off duty. I hope he isn't as awfully uncomfortable as he looks;" and she and Mercy crossed to Sarita.
"Lord Glisfoyle wants you a minute, Mr. Mayhew," she said, and then earnestly to Sarita, "My dear, let me call you that, I want to apologise to you, but I didn't know. Will you forgive me? Lord Glisfoyle is a very dear friend of mine—and you must be too."
"I didn't know that I had a cousin in Madrid," chimed in Mercy, kissing Sarita. "And you in such trouble too." And at that point Mayhew and I went out of the room on his suggestion, that if we left the three together while we smoked a cigarette, we should find them thick friends by the time we returned.
"This is a ticklish touch-and-go thing, Ferdinand," he said, as we lighted our cigarettes in the corridor.
"My dear Silas, it's a devil of a job, and how to get out——"
"I meant Mrs. Curwen," he said, drily. "You didn't tell me she'd ever cared for you; and to bring your cousin,"—with a distinct emphasis—"here was a bit risky, wasn't it? But I must say you have a devil of a way with you. I couldn't have done it."
"My dear fellow, Mrs. Curwen is a shrewd, level-headed, clever commonsense little woman, who is not of the type you seem to think. Her liking for me is much more platonic than romantic, and—well, I'm thundering glad it's all right. But I couldn't have done anything else if I'd wished to, for I had nowhere else to go. And look here, you behaved like a brick and just saved the situation. And now listen while I tell you something of the mess we're in." I told him pretty well everything, except my rescue of the young King, as shortly as I could, and very grave it made him look.
"You're in deep, sure enough," he said when I finished. "But there's a way out, and if I were you I should take it. I suppose that as your brother's dead you won't stay on at the Embassy here; well, I should go to the chief, tell him pretty well the whole show and just stop at the Embassy until you can get safely away. Quesada can't touch you, of course; and even he won't dare to try any games when he learns through official channels, of course, that the chief knows the facts. But you must give up the fight with him. You can't beat him. No one can."
"And Senorita Castelar?"
"I should get that plucky little widow-woman and your sister to smuggle her out of the country. It's no good blinking things, and there's no doubt that the Carlists will have a mighty bad time for a while; while those who took an active part in the abduction business have—well, they've put their heads in a noose, and that's the truth. It's a life and death matter for some of them: and you say she was a sort of leader?"