“But how long have you known it? and why didn’t you——”
“Share my knowledge with you? Because I thought that you and Hicks deserved a little punishment for mixing yourselves up in my affairs. I have not known the truth long, of course. When Fräulein von Staubach told you that she could not mention my name to the Queen for a fortnight, that set me on the track. Some time ago I chanced to hear that the Queen had held out for a whole fortnight before she would consent to see some one. Of course she was being sent for from here. When the coincidence had once flashed upon my mind, everything was clear—the Queen’s persistent isolation on the one hand, and the extraordinary proceedings of the Arab Princess on the other. The rescue of the persecuted tribe, the idea of obtaining the mediation of the Empress of Pannonia—who is Queen Ernestine’s sister-in-law—and the threatened appeal to the Powers, are all characteristic of her. Then you know that no one ever heard of the Queen of the Desert until two years ago, which corresponds roughly with the time Queen Ernestine disappeared from the public gaze. My hypothesis accounted for all the facts, and you see it was correct.”
“But how can you be sure, when you didn’t see the lady last night?”
Cyril smiled impatiently. “My dear Mansfield, I felt she was there. That’s enough for me. Did Hicks see her?”
“No, he was asleep.”
“Then I think you need only mention to him that you saw his old lady of the night before. Hicks is a good fellow enough, but there are times when he would sell his soul to purchase a sensation for his paper. It is just like the Queen to have made this midnight expedition, but you needn’t—I don’t want——”
“Oh, I understand,” said Mansfield hastily. “He shall never hear about it from me.”
“And now, Mansfield, we will make a searching investigation of the walls of the passage. I want to find that secret door through which the ladies came and went, and then we will pay them a visit.”
Mr Hicks, returning at this moment from conferring with the sheikh on the subject of a change of food for the party, was duly informed of the reappearance of his ghost, and joined with extreme zeal in the hunt for the door, although a close observer might have perceived that when his face was turned away from the others it underwent a series of extraordinary contortions, suggestive of suppressed mirth. For some time the search was fruitless, the smooth surface of the rock on both sides of the passage displaying no indication of any joint or crack, even when examined minutely with the aid of a lamp.
“Mansfield,” said Cyril at last, “lie down where you were last night, and tell me exactly how far the lady had got when she disappeared.”