“Well?” I asked.
“Well,” he said, his mouth drawn and hard, “under compulsion and more threats of exposure, I launched the bomb, which, alas! killed her father, while the young lady escaped unhurt.”
“Then he still intends that Her Highness shall die? His warning the other day was no idle attempt to terrorise me?”
“No, Excellency. Take every precaution. The General means mischief, for he is in hourly fear lest Her Highness should expose certain facts contained in those fateful letters which have already cost two ladies their liberty and a Grand Duke and several Cossacks their lives.”
“Is this the actual truth?” asked Hartwig in a changed voice, looking the informer full in the face.
“Yes,” he answered solemnly. “I have told you the truth; therefore I believe your solemn word that you will make no exposure to the Party.”
“If you will disassociate yourself from these dastardly actions,” he said.
“Ah!” sighed the other in despair, “that is impossible. The General holds me always to the compact I made with him. But I beg of you to be warned,” he added. “Her Highness is daily in gravest peril!”