The Egyptian took a few sips of his coffee, and then related almost word for word his interview with Josephus. He ended by saying:
"Your Highness may believe or not now as you please, but I presume you will when you read in your paper to-morrow morning of the suicide of a respectable Hebrew merchant named Isaac Josephus at the address which I have mentioned."
Oscarovitch had pretty strong nerves, and he was well accustomed to regard any kind of crime as a quite proper means of furthering political ends: but there was something in this man's utter soullessness and the weird horror of the crime which he had just accomplished—for by this time his victim would be already lying self-slain on the floor of his own spider's lair—that chilled him, cold-blooded as he was. He looked at him lounging in his chair and calmly puffing the smoke from his half-smiling lips as though he hadn't a thought beyond the little blue rings that he was making.
"That was a devilish thing to do, Phadrig!" he said, a little above a whisper.
"Devilish, possibly, Highness, but necessary, of a certainty," was the quiet reply. "You will agree with me that Nicol Hendry is a dangerous antagonist even for you, and as for me—no doubt he thinks that he can crush me under his foot whenever he chooses to put it down. I should like to know his feelings as he reads of his spy's suicide when he had only just got to work."
"It will certainly be somewhat of a shock to him and his colleagues, and for that reason I am inclined, on second thoughts, to agree that it was necessary, and ghastly, as I confess; it seems to me, I think, that you took the best means to give them a salutary warning. After all, the life of an individual, and that individual a Jew, does not count for much when the fate of empires is at stake. What puzzles me is how these fellows came to suspect me, and what do they suspect me of. I suppose you have no idea on the subject, have you?"
He looked at him keenly as he spoke, but he might as well have looked at the face of a graven image. Then, like a flash of inspiration, the Zastrow affair leapt into his mind. Had his connection with that, by any extraordinary chance, come to the knowledge of the International? The thought was distinctly disquieting. Phadrig had helped in this with his strange arts. He would discuss this phase of the matter with him afterwards.
Phadrig replied, returning his glance:
"Highness, I have only one explanation to offer, and that you have already refused. Were I to speak of any other it would only be vain invention."
"You mean about Professor Marmion and his mathematical miracles?" said the Prince somewhat uneasily.