“If you think it wise to place the letter before the Emperor, I should certainly lose no time in doing so,” I replied. “It may soon be too late. Spies will leave no hole or corner in your father’s palace unexamined.”
“You think there really is urgency?” she asked.
I looked my charming companion straight in the face and replied:
“I do. If you value your life, then I would urge you at once to get rid of the packet which poor Madame de Rosen entrusted to you.”
“But I cannot place it before the Emperor just at present,” the girl exclaimed. “I promised secrecy to Marya de Rosen.”
“Then you knew something of the subject to which those letters refer—eh?”
“I know something of it.”
“Why not pass them on to me? They will be quite secure here in the Embassy safe. Russian spies dire not enter here—upon this bit of British soil.”
“A good idea,” she said quickly. “I will. I’ll go home and bring them back to you.”
And in a few minutes she rose and with a merry laugh left me to descend to her carriage, which was waiting out upon the quay.