"That's it," she said when she'd read it.
She handed me the letter. It was a request for a subscription from some philanthropical society in Hambourg. It informed the Grand Duchess that there was to be a bazaar the following Monday for the benefit of working class crèches.
"We will go," said Aurora quietly. "This is the signal I arranged with Boose."
I had known everything for two days. She had told me that when I gave her the document I had found in Petermann's Mittheilungen she had written to Baron von Boose in the Congo. I have never known what kind of force she had brought to bear upon the man, but the fact remains that the letter Marthe had brought told the Grand Duchess that he had just left Africa. He was now at Hambourg. It could hardly be doubted that he had important revelations to make.
"I've made it worth his while," she murmured with her wan smile.
"We will go tomorrow," she said.
She looked at me, reflected a moment and then said:
"'Tis a little late in the day perhaps, my friend, but I begin to have scruples. I'm abusing your devotion. Do you realize that you have embarked upon a dangerous undertaking?"
"And you?" I said.
"Oh, it's different with me. I am fighting for my liberty, which is more to me than life. Besides, whatever happens, I am the Grand Duchess of Lautenburg, and, more than that, a Tumene Princess. Behind me there is the Czar and all the Russias. They would think twice in my case; but you, dear friend! Think of Cyrus Beck. Think of Melusine. Why, for what would you sacrifice yourself?"