Naniescu waved his podgy hand that held the cigar, then he deliberately dusted away a modicum of ash that had dropped upon his trousers.
"Ah!" he said innocently. "Lady Tarkington, you say, has written such articles?"
"Yes. She has."
"Then no doubt she will honour me by allowing me to see the manuscript. She knows how deeply I am interested in her work."
"No, general," Peter broke in drily. "Lady Tarkington has no intention of allowing you to see that particular manuscript of hers."
"Ah! May I be permitted to inquire how you happen to know that?"
"I happen to know—no matter how—that Lady Tarkington only wrote the articles tentatively; that after she had written them she repented having done so, and that her next act would have been to throw the manuscript into the fire."
"Very interesting. But, forgive me, my dear Monsieur Blakeney, if I ask you in what way all this concerns you?"
"I'll tell you," Peter said coolly. "I also happen to know—no matter how—that you are prepared to pay a large sum of money for those articles, so I thought that I would forestall your spy-in-chief by driving a bargain with you over the manuscript."
"But how can you do that, my dear young friend, without the manuscript in your possession?"