“Do you mind telling me how you happened to come to this place?” he asked.
She answered indifferently: “Supposing that the Japanese had stolen the papers, I searched Maku’s room at our house. There was a torn envelope there, with the name ‘Arima’ printed in the corner.”
Alcatrante bowed. “You are cleverer than most Americans, my dear young lady,” he said. His lips curved into a smile that disclosed his fangs.
“That,” she replied, “is as it may be. But I have not your admiration for trickery, Mr. Alcatrante.”
Again he smiled. “Ah,” he exclaimed, “trickery is the detail work of diplomacy.” Then with a shade of seriousness in his voice, he asked: “Why did you use that word ‘unless’?”
“Why, indeed?” She made this noncommittal answer, and if Alcatrante had hoped to soothe her into friendliness and draw from her a clue to her suspicions, he was disappointed.
There was another period of silence, broken at last by the Japanese. “The fact that we have failed, my dear young lady,” he said, “makes concealment unnecessary. I know, of course, that this matter will never become public. You understand that the representatives of great nations often have to take steps which, as private citizens, they would never think of.”
“Yes,” she answered, “I understand. There is no more to be said. Good-day.”
There was a step and the sound of the door closing. She had gone.
Alcatrante and the Japanese looked at each other. “We have not failed—yet,” said Alcatrante in French. “The girl does not know where the documents are, or she would not have come here. If her father does not have them before midnight our plans are safe. We remain merely at a loss as to the details of the documents, and we already know what they contain in a general way.”