The Dark Star Part 55

"I don't think you have understood--perhaps even yet you do not understand why the papers you carry are so important to certain governments--why it is impossible that you be permitted to deliver them to the Princess Mistchenka----"

"Where did _you_ ever hear of _her_!" he demanded in astonishment.

The girl smiled:

"Dear Mr. Neeland, I know the Princess Mistchenka better, perhaps, than you do."

"Do you?"

"Indeed I do. What do you know about her? Nothing at all except that she is handsome, attractive, cultivated, amusing, and apparently wealthy.

"You know her as a traveller, a patroness of music and the fine arts--as a devotee of literature, as a graceful hostess, and an amiable friend who gives promising young artists letters of introduction to publishers who are in a position to offer them employment."

That this girl should know so much about the Princess Mistchenka and about his own relations with her amazed Neeland. He did not pretend to account for it; he did not try; he sat silent, serious, and surprised, looking into the pretty and almost smiling face of a girl who apparently had been responsible for three separate attempts to kill him--perhaps even a fourth attempt; and who now sat beside him talking in a soft and agreeable voice about matters concerning which he had never dreamed she had heard.

For a few moments she sat silent, observing in his changing expression the effects of what she had said to him. Then, with a smile:

"Ask me whatever questions you desire to ask, Mr. Neeland. I shall do my best to answer them."

"Very well," he said bluntly; "how do you happen to know so much about me?"

"I know something about the friends of the Princess Mistchenka. I have to."

"Did you know who I was there in the house at Brookhollow?"

"No."

"When, then?"

"When you yourself told me your name, I recognised it."

"I surprised you by interrupting you in Brookhollow?"

"Yes."

"You expected no interruption?"

"None."

"How did you happen to go there? Where did you ever hear of the olive-wood box?"

"I had advices by cable from abroad--directions to go to Brookhollow and secure the box."

"Then somebody must be watching the Princess Mistchenka."

"Of course," she said simply.

"Why 'of course'?"

"Mr. Neeland, the Princess Mistchenka and her youthful _protegee_, Miss Carew----"

"_What!!!_"

The girl smiled wearily:

"Really," she said, "you are such a boy to be mixed in with matters of this colour. I think that's the reason you have defeated us--the trained fencer dreads a left-handed novice more than any cla.s.sic master of the foils.

"And that is what you have done to us--blundered--if you'll forgive me--into momentary victory.

"But such victories are only momentary, Mr. Neeland. Please believe it. Please try to understand, too, that this is no battle with masks and plastrons and nicely padded b.u.t.tons. No; it is no comedy, but a grave and serious affair that must inevitably end in tragedy--for somebody."

"For me?" he asked without smiling.

She turned on him abruptly and laid one hand lightly on his arm with a pretty gesture, at once warning, appealing, and protective.

"I asked you to come here," she said, "because--because I want you to escape the tragedy."

"You want _me_ to escape?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I--am sorry for you."

He said nothing.

"And--I like you, Mr. Neeland."

The avowal in the soft, prettily modulated voice, lost none of its charm and surprise because the voice was a trifle tremulous, and the girl's face was tinted with a delicate colour.

"I like to believe what you say, Scheherazade," he said pleasantly.

"Somehow or other I never did think you hated me personally--except once----"

She flushed, and he was silent, remembering her humiliation in the Brookhollow house.

"I don't know," she said in a colder tone, "why I should feel at all friendly toward you, Mr. Neeland, except that you are personally courageous, and you have shown yourself generous under a severe temptation to be otherwise.

"As for--any personal humiliation--inflicted upon me----" She looked down thoughtfully and pretended to sort out a bonbon to her taste, while the hot colour cooled in her cheeks.

"I know," he said, "I've also jeered at you, jested, nagged you, taunted you, kiss----" He checked himself and he smiled and ostentatiously lighted a cigarette.

"Well," he said, blowing a cloud of aromatic smoke toward the ceiling, "I believe that this is as strange a week as any man ever lived. It's like a story book--like one of your wonderful stories, Scheherazade.

It doesn't seem real, now that it is ended----"

"_It is not ended_," she interrupted in a low voice.

He smiled.