dead, thanks to
your service. After all, it was a stroke of war; the princess, whose
little rose you have, was to have been a hostage."

"If she had refused to be a wife," Maurice replied.

Beauvais curled his mustache.

"I know a good deal more than Kopf."

"You do, certainly; but you are at a convenient nearness. What you know
will be of no use to you. Let us sit down."

"I prefer to stand. The honor you do me is too delicate."

"O, you may have no fear."

"I have none--so long as my back isn't turned toward you."

Beauvais passed over this. "You are a very good blade; you handle a
sword well. That is a compliment, considering that I am held as the
first blade in the kingdom. It was only to-day I learned that formerly
you had been a cavalryman in America. You have the making of a soldier."

Maurice bowed, his hand resting near one of the bayonets.

"You are also a soldier of fortune-like myself. You made a good stroke
with the archbishop. You hoodwinked us all."

Maurice did not reply.

"Very well; we shall not dwell on it. You are discreet."

Maurice saw that Beauvais was speaking in good faith.

"You have something to say; come to it at once, for it is trying to
watch you so closely."

"I will give you--" He hesitated and scratched his chin. "I will give you
ten thousand crowns as the price of your silence in regard to the South
American affair."

A sardonic laugh greeted this proposal. "I did not know that you were so
cheap. But it is too late."

"Too late?"

"Doubtless, since by this time the authorities are in possession of the
interesting facts."

"I beg to differ from you."

"Do as you please," said Maurice, triumphantly. "I sent an account of
your former exploits both to my own government and to the one which you
so treacherously betrayed. One or the other will not fail to reach."

"I am perfectly well aware of that," Beauvais smiled. He reached into
a pocket, and for a moment Maurice expected to see a pistol come forth.
But he was needlessly alarmed. Beauvais extracted two envelopes from the
pocket and sailed them through the intervening space. They fell on
the table. "Put not your trust in hotel clerks," was the sententious
observation. "At least, till you have discovered that no one else
employs them. I am well served. The clerk was told to intercept your
outgoing post; and there is the evidence. Ten thousand crowns and a safe
conduct."

Maurice picked up the letters mechanicall