"I am going to trust you," the earl said suddenly. "I am going to think of you as the chivalrous gentleman. The man who wrote the post card is a very big figure in the politics of what used to be called mittel Europa. Our interests clashed. He was on one side and I on the other. It happened that I was usually able to out manœuvre him because my training had been such that no man in public life knew the Balkans as I did, and do still, the wheels within wheels, the inner hidden things that make national sentiment so dangerous at times or so valuable as the case may be. In time he came to think me the one man who could comprehend his activities and check them. He set out to ruin me. He believed his ends justified other methods than I used. I was shot at on the Ferencz Jozsef rakpart for example and a companion killed."
"Do you still seem a menace to him?" Trent asked.
"More than ever if I take the position offered me in the near East. You see the rumour in the Times brings instant recognition. I knew he was in London."
Trent looked at the speaker and wondered what it could be which kept him from the work his country demanded of him. Assuredly it was not lack of courage.
"He was in London when he obtained the hold over me that keeps me buried here. Arthur was at the moment a secretary of Rudolph Castoon. One night he opened a strong box of mine and took some bank notes to pay a racing debt. It was a terrible blow to think he had fallen so low, but I was more alarmed to find a tentative draft of a treaty which was never made effective, a document in my own writing, had disappeared. At the time it might have incensed a country since allied with us almost to the point of a declaration of war. Arthur told me it was gibberish to him and he had thrown it on the fire. A month later I was summoned to a cabinet meeting. A friend told me I was to be asked to produce the treaty draft. I called Arthur to see me. I told him my honor was involved and that if he had not destroyed it or was holding it to sell another power I must know. He gave me his solemn word of honor, uttered in the most convincing manner, that he had thrown it into the open fire.
"When the prime minister asked for the draft I told him I had destroyed it thinking its value gone and fearful of the danger of having it at my house in Grosvenor Place. At the moment I was absolutely convinced that my son had been honest with me. It was obvious I could not tell the cabinet I had caught him stealing money or that he had torn up the draft. I gave the cabinet my word of honor that it was destroyed and I allowed them to assume that I did it. It was a lie and I do not justify its use, but first and foremost my son's protection seemed necessary. It was less than three months later that I received a visit from the man who wrote that post card.
"It was in Paris where I was staying with my daughter. He said that at last he had a weapon which would wound me. Arthur had sold him the draft. He had it concealed where none could get it. Unless I retired from public life and activities he would show it to the same cabinet which had heard me swear I had destroyed it with my own hands. The inference would be that I had sold it. It was known that I had lost money through the failure of a London bank. No matter what the cabinet thought my honor was smirched and I should rightly be considered unfit for high office. There, Mr. Trent, is the real reason."
"Do you know where the draft of the treaty is hidden?"
"In his almost inaccessible castle in Croatia."