“You confirm what I have ever heard,” answered Florent. “The Prince is only a figure-head,—a cloak to cover the designs of France.”
St. Croix nodded.
“Put it so if you will. And now,” he instinctively lowered his voice, “I come to the main object of my visit.”
A little colour flushed Florent’s face. He had wondered from the first what particular meaning there could be in St. Croix seeking him out. His position was one of power certainly, if put to a traitorous use, but De Pomponne must have many agents and spies. He waited.
“You will understand,” continued St. Croix, leaning forward across the table, “that the Prince is kept very close. His governor, his tutors, his gentlemen, are all M. de Witt’s men and practically his jailers. He cannot go abroad unattended nor receive any one alone; his letters are read—his movements, his speech, watched. It is almost impossible for us to convey to him any message—M. le Marquis de Pomponne’s audiences are formal, and always under the eye of some creature of M. de Witt,—here you can help us.”
Florent still waited. He would not, on the first asking, have betrayed M. de Witt wholesale, but he was not averse to some service to the other side.
The Frenchman smoothed down the ruffles at his wrist, keeping his eyes on his listener.
“M. de Witt visits the Prince almost every day—Tuesday afternoons he devotes to instructing him in politics, afterwards going to the assembly in the Binnenhof. It is his practice to take one of his secretaries with him—it would be possible for this man to convey a packet to the Prince.”
Florent answered quietly, but his eyes shone—
“You want me to try?”