The Wiles of the Wicked Part 38

She nodded.

"Well, and what do you wish to tell me this evening?" She was silent for a moment, toying with her rings.

"I want to appeal to your generosity. I want you to a.s.sist me."

"In what manner?"

"As before."

"As before!" I repeated, greatly surprised. "I have no knowledge of having a.s.sisted you before."

"What?" she cried. "Is your memory so defective that you do not recollect your transactions with those who waited upon you--those who kept the previous appointments of which you have spoken?"

"I a.s.sure you, madam," I said, quite calmly, "I have not the least idea of what you mean."

"Mr Heaton!" she cried. "Have you really taken leave of your senses?

Is it actually true what your butler has said of you--that on the day you left Denbury you behaved like a madman?"

"I am no madman!" I cried with considerable warmth. "The truth is that I remember nothing since one evening, nearly six years ago, when I was smoking with--with a friend--in Chelsea, until that day to which my servant has referred."

"You remember nothing? That is most extraordinary."

"If strange to you, madam, how much more strange to me? I have told you the truth, therefore kindly proceed to explain the object of these previous visits of persons you have apparently sent to me."

"I really think that you must be joking," she said. "It seems impossible that you should actually be unaware."

"I tell you that I have no knowledge whatsoever of their business with me."

"Then if such is really the case, let me explain," she said. "First, I think you will admit that your financial transactions with our Government have brought you very handsome profits."

"I am not aware of having had any transactions with the British Government," I answered.

"I refer to that of Bulgaria," she explained. "Surely you are aware that through my intermediary you have obtained great concessions--the docks at Varna, the electric trams at Sofia, the railway from Timova to the Servian frontier, not to mention other great undertakings which have been floated as companies, all of which are now earning handsome profits. You cannot be ignorant of that!"

I remembered that Gedge had shown me some official parchment which he had explained were concessions obtained from Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria. That this woman had been the means of securing to me the greater part of the enormous profits which I had apparently made within the past five years was certainly surprising.

"On the day I recovered consciousness--the day of my departure from Denbury--I was shown some doc.u.ments, but took but little heed of them,"

I said.

"You admit, however, that the employment of British capital in Bulgaria has realised a very handsome profit, and that the greater part of it has gone into your own pockets?"

"I suppose that is so," I responded. "Is it to you that I am indebted for those concessions?"

"Certainly."

"Are you, then, an amba.s.sadress of the Princ.i.p.ality of Bulgaria?"

"Well, yes--if you choose to put it so."

"Then, as I understand, it is with some further financial object that you have sought me this evening?"

"Exactly."

This latest development of the affair was certainly most remarkable. I had never dreamed that to this. .h.i.therto unknown woman I had been indebted for the unparalleled success which had attended my career during those past six years. Yet, from the facts she subsequently placed before me, it would seem that it was at her instigation that I first dabbled in finance. She, or rather her agents, had obtained for me the negotiation of a substantial loan to Prince Ferdinand, and this had been followed by all sorts of concessions, not one of which had tuned out badly.

The mysterious Edna, whom I had always believed to be a typical blouse-and-bicycle girl of the true Kensington type, was actually a political agent of that most turbulent of all the European States.

I sat looking at her in wonderment. She possessed a superb carriage, a smart, well-dressed figure, a smiling, intelligent face, white, even teeth, a complexion just a trifle dark, but betraying no trace of foreign birth. Her English was perfect, her manner purely that of the patrician, while her surprising tact possessed all the _finesse_ of an accomplished diplomatist.

"I confess that I have all along been in entire ignorance of my indebtedness to you," I said, after listening to her while she explained how obediently I had followed the instructions contained in the letters signed "Avel," and how I had so materially advanced the interests of the Princ.i.p.ality that the thanks of the Bulgarian Parliament, or Sobranje had been tendered to me, and the Prince himself had a couple of years ago conferred upon me the highest distinction within his power.

Yet it was more than strange that while this shrewd grey-eyed woman, the possessor of the secret of that puzzling crime, held aloof from me, she had ingeniously contrived that I should become the unwitting catspaw of an unstable State.

I was thinking of Mabel--my thoughts were always of my lost love--and I was wondering how I might obtain from this woman the secret of her whereabouts.

CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.

EDNA MAKES A PROPOSAL.

"Well," I inquired at last; "and your reason for seeing me this evening?"

She hesitated, as though uncertain in what manner to place her project before me. She moved uneasily, and, rising, drew forth a large dispatch-box from its leathern case and placed it upon the table. I noticed that the outer case bore a count's coronet with a cipher beneath.

Having opened the box with a tiny gold master-key which hung upon her bracelet, she drew forth some official-looking papers, and with them returned to her chair.

"You have already been entrusted with a secret, which you have not betrayed--the secret of that unfortunate occurrence on the evening when accident first brought us together," she commenced gravely. "Therefore I feel convinced that any further confidence placed in you will not be abused."

"I am honoured to think, madam, that you should entertain such an opinion of me," I said, not, however, without the slightest touch of sarcasm.

I did not forget that she had only rescued me from my enemies in return for my silence. She was not a woman to act without strong motives.

Moreover, she had admitted knowledge of that strange midnight crime at The Boltons, and was, therefore, an accessory after the fact.

"You are the Prince's confidential agent here, in London, and I come to you on a mission direct from His Serene Highness."

"From Bulgaria?" I inquired.

"Yes. I left Sofia a week ago," she answered. "It was at first proposed to place the matter in the hands of Guechoff, our diplomatic representative at the Court of St James's, but, on consideration, His Serene Highness, knowing that with the present state of high feeling in the Sobranje a single hint leaking out might prove disastrous, to the dynasty, and perhaps to the nation, resolved to place the matter unreservedly in my hands. The Prince did me the honour of referring in terms of praise to my previous dealings with you, and instructed me to lose no time in seeing you and invoking your aid."

"In what direction?" Was it not amazing that I should awake from my years of unconsciousness to find myself so powerful in the world of finance that reigning princes sought my a.s.sistance?

"I have here a letter from His Serene Highness;" and she handed me a note which bore the Bulgarian royal arms, and had apparently been written by the Prince's own hand. It was merely a formal note asking me to consider the secret proposals which would be placed before me by the bearer.

"Well?" I inquired, when I had read it. "Explain."

"Briefly," she said, "the facts are as follows: The throne of Bulgaria, never very safe owing to the eternal bickering between St Petersburg and the Porte, is at this moment in imminent danger. The People's Party in the Sobranje have been defeated, and the police have learnt of a projected popular uprising against His Highness in favour of a republic, the agitation being, of course, caused by paid agents of Russia. It is an open secret that Russia, at the first sign of an outbreak, would endeavour to annex the country, hence the position of the throne grows each moment more perilous. Fear of giving offence to Russia prevents orders being issued for the arrest of the secret agitators, and it seems therefore as though a revolution cannot long be delayed. It is your aid His Serene Highness seeks--your aid to negotiate a loan of half a million sterling."

"Half a million!" I e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "A large sum! It seems incredible that I should be a dealer in millions."