'I should like a few minutes' conversation with you,' Lavendale proceeded.
Niko was perplexed but acquiescent.
'If it pleases,' he answered a little vaguely.
Lavendale marched him along the street.
'There is a little bridge club to which I belong, close at hand,' he said. 'Come into the sitting-room there for a few moments. We shall be quite alone at this hour of the afternoon.'
Niko suffered himself to be passively led in the direction which his companion indicated. In a few moments they were seated in the comfortable parlour of a well-known bridge club. They were quite alone and Lavendale closed the door.
'Well,' he asked, 'how goes it with your new ally?'
Niko's face betrayed nothing but mild wonder. Lavendale smiled.
'Listen,' he said, 'I may be making a mistake about you. I do not think that I am. I think that you represent for your country what I do for mine. You are intensely patriotic. So am I. You realize the need for a certain amount of diplomatic insight into the workings of her constitution and her future. So do I. The only trouble is that you are for Japan and I am for America.'
Niko assented very gravely. His soft brown eyes were watching Lavendale's lips as though they would read upon them even the unuttered words. His finger-tips, soft and pliant as velvet, were pressed together.