第61章 CHAPTER XXXI(1)

The Prince, being host, arranged the places at his supper-table.

Mr. Sabin found himself, therefore, between Lady Carey and a young German attache, whom they had met in the ante-room of the restaurant.

Lucille had the Prince and Mr. Brott on either side of her.

Lady Carey monopolised at first the greater part of the conversation.

Mr. Sabin was unusually silent. The German attache, whose name was Baron von Opperman, did not speak until the champagne was served, when he threw a bombshell into the midst of the little party.

"I hear," he said, with a broad and seraphic smile, "that in this hotel there has to-day a murder been committed."

Baron von Opperman was suddenly the cynosure of several pairs of eyes. He was delighted with the success of his attempt towards the general entertainment.

"The evening papers," he continued, "they have in them news of a sudden death. But in the hotel here now they are speaking of something - what you call more - mysterious. There has been ordered an examination post-mortem!"

"It is a case of poisoning then, I presume?" the Prince asked, leaning forward.

"It is so supposed," the attache answered. "It seems that the doctors could find no trace of disease, nothing to have caused death.

They were not able to decide anything. The man, they said, was in perfect health - but dead."

"It must have been, then," the Prince remarked, "a very wonderful poison."

"Without doubt," Baron Opperman answered.

The Prince sighed gently.

"There are many such," he murmured. "Indeed the science of toxicology was never so ill-understood as now. I am assured that there are many poisons known only to a few chemists in the world, a single grain of which is sufficient to destroy the strongest man and leave not the slightest trace behind. If the poisoner be sufficiently accomplished he can pursue his - calling without the faintest risk of detection."

Mr. Sabin sipped his wine thoughtfully.

"The Prince is, I believe, right," he remarked. "It is for that reason, doubtless, that I have heard of men whose lives have been threatened, who have deposited in safe places a sealed statement of the danger in which they find themselves, with an account of its source, so that if they should come to an end in any way mysterious there may be evidence against their murderers."

"A very reasonable and judicious precaution," the Prince remarked with glittering eyes. "Only if the poison was indeed of such a nature that it was not possible to trace it nothing worse than suspicion could ever be the lot of any one."

Mr. Sabin helped himself carefully to salad, and resumed the discussion with his next course.

"Perhaps not," he admitted. "But you must remember that suspicion is of itself a grievous embarrassment. No man likes to feel that he is being suspected of murder. By the bye, is it known whom the unfortunate person was?"

"The servant of a French nobleman who is staying in the hotel," Mr.

Brott remarked. "I heard as much as that."

Mr. Sabin smiled. Lady Carey glanced at him meaningly.

"You have worried the Prince quite sufficiently," she whispered.

"Change the subject."

Mr. Sabin bowed.

"You are very considerate - to the Prince," he said.

"It is perhaps for your sake," she answered. "And as for the Prince - well, you know, or you should know, for how much he counts with me."

Mr. Sabin glanced at her curiously. She was a little flushed as though with some inward excitement. Her eyes were bright and soft.

Despite a certain angularity of figure and her hollow cheeks she was certainly one of the most distinguished-looking women in the room.

"You are so dense," she whispered in his ear, "wilfully dense, perhaps. You will not understand that I wish to be your friend."

He smiled with gentle deprecation.

"Do you blame me," he murmured, "if I seem incredulous? For I am an old man, and you are spoken of always as the friend of my enemy, the friend of the Prince."

"I wonder," she said thoughtfully, "if this is really the secret of your mistrust? Do you indeed fear that I have no other interest in life save to serve Saxe Leinitzer?"

"As to that," he answered, "I cannot say. Yet I know that only a few months ago you were acting under orders from him. It is you who brought Lucille from America. It was through you that the first blow was struck at my happiness."

"Cannot I atone?" she murmured under her breath. "If I can I will.

And as for the present, well, I am outside his schemes now. Let us be friends. You would find me a very valuable ally."

"Let it be so," he answered without emotion. "You shall help me, if you will, to regain Lucille. I promise you then that my gratitude shall not disappoint you."

She bit her lip.

"And are you sure," she whispered, "that Lucille is anxious to be won back? She loves intrigue, excitement, the sense of being concerned in important doings. Besides - you must have heard what they say about her - and Brott. Look at her now. She wears her grass widowhood lightly enough."

Mr. Sabin looked across the table. Lucille had indeed all the appearance of a woman thoroughly at peace with the world and herself.