"It has been a splendid achievement, Mademoiselle," he said, enthusiastically. "I shall see that—what? Who is this?" he exclaimed, as Harry and Pauline burst into the room.
"Marie, Marie, I told you that I was at home to no one!" screamed Mlle. de Longeon.
"How dare you intrude in these apartments?" demanded the diplomat.
"I dare, because I want those papers," declared Harry.
The packet was still in the diplomat's hands. He tried to thrust it into his pocket, but Harry was upon him. They clinched, broke from each other's grasp and struggled furiously.
As the last resource the diplomat drew the packet from his breast and flung it across the room toward Mlle. de Longeon. She pounced upon it. But Pauline was beside her. Stronger both in body and in spirit than the adventuress, she grasped her wrists, and in the luxurious, soft-curtained room there raged two battles.
But the struggles did not last long. Harry hurled his antagonist, an exhausted wreck, to the floor, and sprang to the side of Pauline. Throwing off Mlle. de Longeon's grasp, he picked up the packet from the floor, and with Pauline ran from the room.
A revenue cutter was landing a group of faint and silent men, at the pier of the Navy Yard when an automobile flashed in.
"Hurrah! They did it! You're safe!" cried Pauline, rushing past Harry to greet Ensign Summers.
The officer took her extended hands gratefully, but there was no light in his eyes as he answered.