“Quarter after one, sir,” he said. “Yes, it must be something important.” He paused, struck by a sudden thought. “By Jove, sir! Maybe Count Blowinski has been captured.”
“Pshaw!” said Lord Hastings. “That is hardly possible. They can’t have been looking for him more than a couple of hours.”
“And still that may be it, sir.”
“Oh yes, it may be, but I don’t think so.”
But as it developed Jack’s guess had been correct.
For, when they were ushered into the Czar’s presence once more, the first figure upon which their eyes rested was that of the count himself.
“By Jove! you were right,” said Lord Hastings in an aside to Jack.
The lad smiled but said nothing aloud. To himself, however, he remarked:
“Another of those things Frank calls hunches.”
The Czar greeted them with a smile. In spite of the lateness of the hour, the Czar was as fully dressed as when they left him earlier in the night and he had the appearance of not having retired.