That the train had been deliberately and wantonly wrecked with a view to preventing the journey of the king to Asturia, Lechmere knew quite well. To further their own design these people had taken no heed of human life, they had stopped at nothing. And yet their plan had not been carried out quite so successfully as they had hoped though a great meed of triumph had been theirs. No doubt Mazaroff was hanging about the neighbourhood to report progress. But Mazaroff would be puzzled and rendered somewhat uneasy by the strange disappearance of the king. That he was dead the Russian could not possibly know or he would have visited Pierre Loti.
All these things Lechmere turned over in his mind as he made his way after dark to the cottage where Maxwell was lying. The primitive peasants who gave him shelter had already retired to bed, but the door had not been fastened, possibly to permit the visit of the doctor. Lechmere cautiously opened the door and looked in. The common sitting-room of the family had been divided by a couple of sheets over a clothes-horse, and behind this Lechmere guessed that the patient lay, from the smell of carbolic on the sheets. Lechmere secured the door as a means of precaution, and passed behind the sheet. As he expected, Maxwell lay there.
His face was terribly bruised and battered, but the restless motion of his limbs testified to the fact that the nervous vitality was not greatly impaired. Maxwell opened a pair of languid eyes as Lechmere touched him on the shoulder.
"Go away," he said. "Why do you bother? There is nothing much the matter with me if I were not so terribly sleepy. I can't get my head right. I don't know what that peasant fellow is doing? I gave him all the money I had, too. What's the matter?"
Maxwell's eyes suddenly changed, he identified Lechmere with a smile of pleasure.
"I felt quite sure that you would turn up," he whispered. "Was I successful? Did I baffle them? But you don't know anything about that or about the king——"
"Indeed I do," Lechmere hastened to reply. "I know everything. The king is dead, because I have seen his body. And by this time the little plot has been successful. The king has not returned to his capital, and it will be understood by his people that he has taken advantage of the accident to go off on one of his dissipated excesses, and the revolution will be in full blast."
"But those people don't know that the king is dead?" Maxwell asked eagerly.
"They don't. You worked that business very cleverly. And Peretori must have been pretty near, for he sent me a cablegram telling me what to do. I found your Pierre Loti. He shewed me the body of the king covered with straw in his cottage. Did you manage all that?"
"I did," Maxwell said, not without a smile. "When the accident happened it came to me like a flash that the whole thing had been brought about by design. Our carriage was literally smashed to pieces and we were thrown on the permanent way. The engine-driver and stoker were killed, so I and Alexis managed to stagger as far as the engine. The king lay perfectly motionless and I felt that I was going to collapse. It was at this point that Pierre Loti came up. I gave him all the money I had in my pocket to get the king out of the way and say nothing till he heard from me again. I should say that he has obeyed instructions."