“Much, I hope. Tell Howard what you know, and he will start for the Continent at once to verify it. Meanwhile, may I invite a friend to come here tomorrow?”
“Need you ask? We can put up six more at a pinch. But I can’t get over Montecastello’s infernal impertinence. Yet, it’s fully in accordance with Italian standards of right and wrong. Your young count or princeling can live like a pig until matrimony crops up. Then he becomes mighty particular. The bride must bring not only her dowry, but an unblemished record as well. I suppose, in the long run, it is a wise thing. Were it not for some such proviso, half the aristocracy of Europe would disappear in two generations.”
Power passed no comment; but he sent the following letter by the night post:
“Dear Mr. Lindsay.—Miss Nancy Marten, who is staying at Valescure Castle, near this house, has honored me by asking my advice and help in a matter that concerns herself and you. She has done this because I am her friend, and was her mother’s friend years ago in Colorado. Can you get leave from your regiment for a few days, and come here? I believe you army men can plead urgent private affairs, and there is little doubt as to the urgency and privacy of this request. I make one stipulation. You are not to communicate with Miss Nancy Marten until you have seen me.
“Sincerely yours,
“John Darien Power.”
He passed a troubled and sleepless night. Dacre’s careless if heated words had sunk deep. They chimed in oddly with a thought that was not to be stilled, a thought that had its genesis in a faded letter written twenty years ago.
When Howard went to London next day he took with him a cablegram, part in code and part in plain English. It’s text was of a peculiarity that forbade the use of a village postoffice; for it ran, when decoded:
“MacGonigal, Bison, Colorado.—Break open the locked upper right-hand drawer of the Japanese cabinet in sitting-room, Dolores, and send immediately by registered mail the long sealed envelop marked ‘To be burnt, unopened, by my executors,’ and signed by me.”
Then followed Power’s code signature and his address.
A telegram arrived early. It read: