“I’ll translate that for you right now, if you like,” I said politely. “Or you can take it away with you!”
I think they were both baffled by my apparent candor and nonchalance; but the man who was bossing the show returned to the charge persistently.
“Ah, that railway accident. Yes. But surely you have made a slight mistake, Monsieur? You incurred your injuries, from which, I perceive, you have so happily recovered.”
He bowed, and I bowed. If I hadn’t known all that lay behind, this exchange of words and courtesy—a kind of fencing, with both of us pretending that the buttons were on the foils—would have tickled me immensely. Even as it was I could appreciate the funny side of it. I was playing a part in a comedy,—a grim comedy, a mere interlude in tragedy,—but still comic.
“You incurred these, I say, not in the accident, but while gallantly defending the Grand Duke from the dastards who assailed him later!”
I worked up a modest blush; or I tried to.
“I see that it is useless to attempt to conceal anything from you, Monsieur; you know too much!” I confessed, laughing. “But I’m a modest man; besides, I didn’t do very much, and his Highness seemed quite capable of taking care of himself.”
I saw a queer glint in his eyes, and I guessed then that the attempt on the life of the Grand Duke had been engineered by the police themselves, and not, as I had first imagined, by the revolutionists.
My antagonist waved his hand with an airy gesture of protestation.
“You underrate your services, Monsieur Wynn! I wonder if you would have devoted them so readily to his Highness if—”