es?"

This was addressed to the other man, who seemed to be doing all the
work, and was puzzling over some pencil notes in English which he
had picked out of my waste-paper basket. They were the draft of
my yesterday's despatch to the _Courier_, a perfectly innocuous
communication that I had sent openly; it didn't matter whether it
arrived at its destination or not. As I have said, Petersburg was
quiet to stagnation just now; though one never knew when the material
for some first-class sensational copy might turn up.

"I'll translate that for you right now, if you like," I said politely.
"Or you can take it away with you!"

I think they were both baffled by my apparent candor and nonchalance;
but the man who was bossing the show returned to the charge
persistently.

"Ah, that railway accident. Yes. But surely you have made a slight
mistake, Monsieur? You incurred your injuries, from which, I perceive,
you have so happily recovered."

He bowed, and I bowed. If I hadn't known all that lay behind, this
exchange of words and courtesy--a kind of fencing, with both of us
pretending that the buttons were on the foils--would have tickled me
immensely. Even as it was I could appreciate the funny side of it. I was
playing a part in a comedy,--a grim comedy, a mere interlude in
tragedy,--but still comic.

"You incurred these, I say, not in the accident, but while gallantly
defending the Grand Duke from the dastards who assailed him later!"

I worked up a modest blush; or I tried to.

"I see that it is useless to attempt to conceal anything from you,
Monsieur; you know too much!" I confessed, laughing. "But I'm a modest
man; besides, I didn't do very much, and his Highness seemed quite
capable of taking care of himself."

I saw a queer glint in his eyes, and I guessed then that the attempt on
the life of the Grand Duke had been engineered by the police themselves,
and not, as I had first imagined, by the revolutionists.

My antagonist waved his hand with an airy gesture of protestation.

"You underrate your services, Monsieur Wynn! I wonder if you would have
devoted them so readily to his Highness if--"

He paused portentously.

"If?" I inquired blandly. "Do have another cigarette!"

"If you had known of his connection with the woman who is known as _La
Mort_?"

That wasn't precisely what he said. I don't choose to write the words in
any language; but I wanted to knock his yellow teeth down his throat; to
choke