“As I have told you on other occasions, we are not allowed to do so.”
An angry look flamed into the terrorist’s lean dark face. “Then you don’t trust me!” he burst out. “We may differ in methods, but have I not proved my devotion to our cause?”
“Do not take this refusal as a personal matter, Mr. Freeman. The circumstances are such that we are not allowed to reveal The White One’s identity to anyone. We are under oath.”
The terrorist was too keen a man not to see that some slight doubt of him was lurking in their minds. However, he silently swallowed his mortification, and took his double rebuff with a philosophic shrug. He said he would abandon for the present his plan against the military governor’s life, begged to be considered a willing coöperator in whatever activity they might devise, and then took his leave. To Drexel, outside one door, it was a distinct relief when that sinister figure was outside the other.
“To think of his proposing to us to kill Prince Valenko!” said Razoff, laughing grimly.
“But he may undertake the plan himself,” said the woman anxiously.
“If he does,” returned Razoff, “we will warn the governor ourselves.”
All this while the woman had been seated, her back to Drexel; but now she rose and went around the table to snuff the spluttering candle. At the graceful ease of her walk, which even her shapeless garments could not obliterate, a wild and sudden possibility leaped up in Drexel; and when the candlelight fell upon her face, though forehead and chin and cheeks were hidden by the shawl, the possibility became a breath-taking certainty. Nose, mouth, eyes, were the same!
She snuffed the candle. “Excuse me for a few minutes,” she said to the men, and crossed straight toward Drexel’s door.