CHAPTER XLV
CHECK!
Mazaroff was disposed of at any rate for the present. Lechmere's letter to the Chief of the Police in Paris had not been futile. He was pretty well posted with the life story of the man who called himself Prince Mazaroff, who, in point of fact, was one of the greatest scoundrels of his time. Under another name the French police had long wanted him for an old offence, and Lechmere had been in a position to supply the missing details and facts for identification. Besides, the head of the Paris police was an old acquaintance of Lechmere's and valued his opinion highly. Thus it was that no time was lost in tying Mazaroff by the heels after receipt of Lechmere's letter. Mazaroff was a cunning enough scoundrel, but he had more than his match in the old queen's messenger. The coast was quite clear now.
Nothing was in the way of taking the body of the unfortunate king back to England. Nobody must know that he had died, at least not for the present. The secret was valuable for the moment. Of course the queen must be told, and General Maxgregor, but nobody else. It was early the next morning that Lechmere saw both Alexis and Maxwell and found them going on well. He explained briefly to both what had happened.
"You will both be about again in a day or two," he said. "Meanwhile it exactly suits the position of affairs for you to be here as invalids who are incapable of seeing anybody. But I have arranged with the doctor to keep the gentleman of the pencil at bay. You know nothing, you are capable of no opinion, you are utterly indifferent as to what has become of the king. Obviously he has escaped somewhere or his body would have been found. I fancy you understand."
There was no reason to repeat the question. With an easy mind, Lechmere made the best of his way back to London. With the aid of a few cigars, he worked the matter out to the end. He could see his way to damp the pretty scheme of Countess Saens and also regain possession of those papers. Nor would he shew his hand in the matter at all. The thing would cause a little sensation in London perhaps, there would be complications partaking of an international character, but there it would end.
Lechmere drove straight with his gruesome burden to the rooms occupied by General Maxgregor. He found the latter considerably better and ready for work again. The flesh wound in the old soldier's shoulder had quite healed up, that fine constitution made little of the loss of blood.
"The very man I have been longing to see," Maxgregor cried. "When I heard that you were not in London, I felt sure that you were following that strange matter up. Was it an accident?"