gle hour between the hurrying
homewards of the belated reveller and the stolid tramp of the early
worker, were curiously empty and seemed to gain in their loneliness a
new dignity. Trafalgar Square, with the National Gallery in the
background, became almost classical; Whitehall the passageway for
heroes.

"What does it all mean?" Naida asked, almost pathetically.

It was Maggie who answered. Her tone was lifeless, but her manner
almost composed.

"It means that the attempt to assassinate Prince Shan has failed," she
said. "Prince Shan told me himself that he had no intention of going to
the ball. He kept his word. The man who was murdered was one of his
suite."

"But how do you know this?" Naida persisted.

"You heard what I told you in the box," was the quiet reply. "I shall
explain--as much as I can explain--to Nigel when we get home. He can
tell you everything later on to-day at lunch-time, if you like."

"It has been one of the strangest nights I ever remember," Naida
declared, after a brief pause. "Oscar Immelan, who was dining with us,
arrived half an hour late. I have never seen him in such a condition
before. He had the air of a broken man."

"Have you any idea of what had happened?" Nigel asked.

"Only this," Naida replied. "We saw Prince Shan last night. He spent
several hours with us. I may be wrong, but I came to the conclusion then
that he had at any rate modified his views about the whole situation
since his arrival in England."

Again there was a brief silence. The minds of all three of them were
busy with the same thought. Prince Shan's word had been spoken and
Immelan's hopes dashed to the ground,--and within a few hours, this
murder! They nursed the thought, but no one put it into words.

A sleepy-eyed porter opened the door of the car outside the Milan Court.
Naida gathered herself together with a little shiver.

"I think that after to-night," she said quietly, "there need be no
secrets between any of us."

Nigel held her hand in his. Their eyes met, and both of them were
conscious, in that moment, of closer personal relations, of the passing
of a certain sense of strain. She even smiled as she turned away.

"To-morrow," she concluded, "there must be a great exchange of
confidences. I am lunching at Belgrave Square, if Maggie has not
forgotten, and I shall tell you then what I have written to Paul
Matinsky. I showed it to Prince Shan yesterday. Good night!"

She patted Maggie's hand