The King finally turned, and walking back to the table picked up the innocent-looking instrument. He turned it over and over in his hand and then slowly and carefully wound the platinum wires about it as a boy winds a top and placed it back into its leather case. As he put it down on the table, he said, almost as if to himself:
“We have come today to one of the turning points in the history of the world. This is a remarkable man.”
After a moment, he turned to Underhill: “I think you have done your country a great service today in averting what might have been an appalling catastrophe. Do you not agree with me, Sir Egbert?” he glanced toward the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
“I do, Sire,” the minister acquiesced thoughtfully. “If this man represents the United States of America, it will not be long before she will insist that this war be brought to an end upon her own terms, and it would have been almost suicidal on our part to antagonize him. She doubtless controls this instrument whose practical application will probably be shown us by his pictures.”
“But what this man has just said to you, Sire,” suggested Underhill, “does not seem to bear out the idea that he is acting under instructions from the present State Department at Washington.”
“If it please Your Majesty,” interposed one of the statesmen of the old school, “should we not make some formal representation to the United States of America before this man be allowed to go to Berlin?”
“I should not approve of that,” dissented the King. “In the first place, as far as we know, Mr. Edestone may have already communicated with Berlin, Paris, and Petrograd. I do not think he would put himself so completely in our power if he thought he was risking the destruction of his entire scheme.”
“I believe, Your Majesty,” said another sneeringly, “that this melodramatic exit is just another Yankee bluff. You will probably find in looking into it that the fellow has palmed the real instrument and has forced this one on us by clever sleight of hand.”
“I disagree with you entirely,” said the King, frowning and bringing his hand down on the table as if to put an end to the discussion. “I believe this man to be a gentleman and a thoroughly good sportsman.”