Lechmere was not at home, but he had left directions that if anybody desired to see him particularly he was to be found for the next hour or so at the Orient Club, and thither Merehaven made his way. He found Lechmere reading an evening paper and smoking a long black cigar as if he were one of the most idle and purposeless men in the world. But as he glanced up at Merehaven's face he saw that the latter knew everything. He laid his paper aside and drew Merehaven into a corner.
"I suppose you have heard the amazing story, my lord?" he asked.
Merehaven replied that he had nothing to acquire in that direction. He plunged immediately into his subject. He could be very direct and to the point if he chose.
"That is why I came to you," he said in conclusion. "Is it not possible that you can give me a real helping hand in the direction of recovering those confounded papers?"
"I think that I can be of material assistance to you and that before very long," Lechmere smiled. "I have laid the match to a carefully prepared mine and the explosion may take place at any moment. You see I take a considerable interest in the career of international adventurers, and the careers of both Prince Mazaroff and Countess Saens interest me exceedingly. I hinted to you that if the continental police liked to follow certain things up it would be awkward for the lady. As to the gentleman, I gave such information about him as led to his arrest and subsequent detention in Paris. Unless I am greatly mistaken, he will not trouble the world much for the next few years. Now it so happens that I also desire to have the Countess Saens out of the way for a space. There are certain possessions of hers that I desire to examine. So I have found the means."
"Will that bring those papers into sight, though?" Merehaven asked.
Lechmere rather thought that it would. He was proceeding to explain when an excited man rushed into the smoking-room evidently primed and bursting with some fine piece of scandal. He pounced upon the two acquaintances in the window as proper recipients of the news.
"The latest, the very latest," he cried. "Who on earth would have thought it? A fine woman like that with a good position and any amount of money. Who do I mean? Why, Countess Saens. Arrested by the police as she was getting into her carriage and taken to Bow Street like a common thief. Charged with forgery or something of that kind. What?"
Lechmere rose very quietly from his seat and pitched his cigar into the grate.
"Come along," he whispered. "There is no time to be lost. Unless I am grievously out in my calculations, those papers will be in your hands before the hour is up."