"The worst is that Vera lost the papers," Jessie resumed. "When the news of the accident came to me, I slipped out and with great risk went to the hospital. Dr. Varney gave me a permit. Vera had lost the papers, she had not the least idea what had become of them. But that is not all. Countess Saens has found out that a girl answering to my description had been taken to the hospital and she went there. Fortunately she was refused admission. But she will get this in the morning and that is why I want to go out so early. The suspicions of the countess are aroused, she begins to understand. And there is Prince Mazaroff."
"What can he possibly have to do with it?" the Queen asked.
"Your Majesty is forgetting that Prince Mazaroff knows both Vera Galloway and Jessie Harcourt, the shop girl whom he honoured with his hated attentions. He knows that there is a girl in London identical in looks to Miss Galloway, he heard what Countess Saens's maid said. Indeed he went so far to-night to hint to Lord Merehaven that a trick was being played upon her ladyship. There is only one thing that prevented his discovery outright."
"And what was that?" the queen asked. "Why should he hesitate?"
"Because he was not absolutely sure of his ground," Jessie said. "He knew the shop girl Jessie Harcourt. But he was puzzled because he did not imagine that a shop girl would be so wonderfully at ease in good society and have all the manners of it at her fingers' ends. He did not know that the Bond Street girl was of gentle birth, and he was puzzled. Do you see my point?"
The queen saw the point perfectly well and admitted that it was a very clever one.
"I am more than glad that you have told me all this," she said in a thrilling voice. "Your frankness may save the situation in the long run. One thing is certain, we must get Vera out of the hospital and back again here without delay. And for the time being you must disappear. I seem to have as many enemies here as I have in Asturia, only they are cleverer ones. These people are all in the pay of Russia. Countess Saens must be baffled at any cost. Wait a moment."
The carriage had pulled up, but the footman did not dismount from the box. So far as Jessie could judge, the carriage had stopped nowhere near the Queen of Asturia's headquarters. She smiled as Jessie looked up with a questioning eye.
"You are wondering why we are here," she said. "It is imperative before I sleep to-night that I should have a few words with General Maxgregor. I understand that he has a suite of rooms in the big block of flats. I fancy those are his windows on the second floor, those with the lights up. Somebody has just come in and looked out of the window. My child, who is that?"
The queen's voice changed suddenly, her tones were harsh and rasping. A man in evening dress stood in one of the lighted windows looking out.