The secretary looked a little doubtful.
“I think not, sir,” he decided.
“Very good. Go and get something to eat. You look fagged. And tell Hyson to bring up some liqueurs, will you! I shall be engaged for a short time.”
The secretary withdrew. A servant appeared with a little tray of liqueurs, and in obedience to an impatient gesture from his master, left them upon the table. Brott closed the door firmly.
“Prince,” he said, resuming his seat, “I wished to speak with you concerning the Countess.”
Saxe Leinitzer nodded.
“All right,” he said. “I am listening!”
“I understand,” Brott continued, “that you are one of her oldest friends, and also one of the trustees of her estates. I presume that you stand to her therefore to some extent in the position of an adviser?”
“It is perfectly true,” the Prince admitted.
“I, too, am an old friend, as she has doubtless told you,” Brott said. “All my life she has been the one woman whom I have desired to call my wife. That desire has never been so strong as at the present moment.”