must have conveyed the intimation that he was not going to
give it to Wanda, but intended to read it aloud, for Lady Orlay walked
to the other end of the long room, out of hearing. Cartoner was about to
follow her, when Wanda turned and glanced at him, and he stayed.

"The letter begins," said Deulin, unconsciously falling into a
professional preliminary--

"'I have received Cartoner's letter supplementing the account given by
the man who was with Martin at the last. I remember Captain Cable quite
well. When we met him at the Signal House, at Northfleet, I little
thought that he would be called upon to render the last earthly service
to my son. So it was he who read the last words. And Martin was buried
in the Baltic. You, my old friend, know all that I have given to Poland.
The last gift has been the hardest to part with. Some day I hope
to write to Cartoner, but not now. He is not a man to attach much
importance to words. He is, I think, a man to understand silence. At
present I cannot write, as I am virtually a prisoner in my own house.
From a high quarter I have received a gracious intimation that my
affairs are under the special attention of a beneficent monarch, and
that I am so far to be mercifully forgiven that a sentence of perpetual
confinement within the barriers of Warsaw will be deemed sufficient
punishment for--not having been found out. But my worst enemies are
my own party. Nothing can now convince them that Martin and I did not
betray the plot. Moreover, Cartoner's name is freely coupled with ours.
So they believe. So it will go down to history, and nothing that we
can say will make any difference. That I find myself in company with
Cartoner in this error only strengthens the feeling of friendship, of
which I was conscious when we first met. Beg him, for his own sake,
never to cross this frontier again. Ask him, for mine, to avoid making
any sign of friendship towards me or mine.'"

As fate ruled it, the letter required turning at this point, and Deulin,
for the first time in his life, perhaps, made a mistake at a crucial
moment. He allowed his voice to break on the next word, and had to pause
for an instant before he could proceed.

"Then follow," he said, rather uneasily, "certain passages to myself
which I need not read. Further on he proceeds: 'I am in good health.
Better, indeed, than when I last saw you. I am, in fact, a very tough
old man, and may live to give much trouble yet.'"

Deulin