“That is well. Approach, Highness; all is safe,” he whispered down the darkness behind him, and flattened himself against the narrow wall space, as a second figure came into sight,—the Grand Duke Loris himself, who greeted me with outstretched hand.
“I do not care for this sort of thing,—this elaborate secrecy, Mr. Wynn,” he said softly in English. “But unfortunately it is necessary. Let us go through to your dressing-room. There it is less likely that we can be overheard.”
I followed him in silence. He sat himself down on the wide marble edge of the bath, and looked at me, as I stood before him, as though his brilliant blue eyes would read my very soul.
“So you have come; as I thought you would. And you are very welcome. But why have you come?”
“Because I hope to serve your Highness, and—she whom we both love,” I answered promptly.
“Yes, I was sure of that, although we have met only twice or thrice. I am seldom mistaken in a man whom I have once looked in the eyes; and I know I can trust you, as I dare trust few others,—none within these walls save the good Mishka. He has told you that I am virtually a prisoner here?”
I bowed assent.
“I am closely guarded, my every word, my every gesture noted; though when the time is ripe, or when she sends word that she needs me, I shall slip away! There is a great game, a stern one, preparing; and there will be a part for us both to play. I will give you the outline to-night, when I shall come to you again. That staircase yonder leads down to my apartments. I had it made years ago by foreign workmen, and none save myself and the Pavloffs—and you now—know of its existence, so far. In public we must be strangers; after the formal audience I give you to-night I shall probably ignore you altogether. But as Gould, the American farming expert, you will be able to come and go, riding the estates with Pavloff—or without him—and yet rouse no suspicion. To-night I shall return as I said; and now au revoir.”
He left just in time, for a minute or two after I had unlocked the door, Nicolai reappeared, and conducted me to an ante-room where I found quite a throng of officers, one of whom introduced himself as Colonel Grodwitz, and presented me to several of the others. They all treated me with the easy courtesy which well-bred Russians assume—and discard—with such facility; but then, and later, I had to be constantly on guard against innumerable questions, which, though asked in what appeared to be a perfectly frank and spontaneous manner, were, I was convinced, sprung on me for the purpose of ascertaining how much I knew of Russia and its complicated affairs.
But I was quite ready for them, and if they had any suspicions I hope they abandoned them for the present.