Her Majesty's Minister

We mounted to the vestibule on the first floor, where a concert-room had been fitted up, and there with difficulty found seats among the crowded audience.

Aristide Bruant himself was concluding one of his popular songs of the street:

La moral’ de c’tte oraison-là,C’est qu’ les p’tit’s fill’s qu’a pas d’ papa,Doiv’nt jamais aller à l’école,À Batignolles,

and bowed himself off amid thunders of applause. As a Paris singer has not to submit his lines to a paternal County Council, they are frequently a trifle more free than those to which English audiences are in the habit of listening. Nevertheless, it must be remembered that this charity function was a very smart affair, all the best-known people remaining in Paris being present. After Bruant, an outburst of applause greeted the renowned Spanish dancer, La Belle Otero, who danced and sang, followed by pastourelles of the eighteenth century, romances by Florian and Marie Antoinette, and songs by Paulus. Lastly, there bounded upon the stage Eugénie Buffet, the “chanteuse des rues,” together with her troupe. She sang that weird song of Paris life so popular at the cafés, called “À la Villette,” commencing:

Il avait pas encor’ vingt ans,I’ connaissait pas ses parents,On l’app’lait Toto Laripette,À la Villette.Il était un peu sans façon,Mais c’était un joli garçon:C’était l’pus beau, c’était l’pus chouette,À la Villette.

The audience had heard much of the song, but few of those present had ever ventured into the insignificant café where she sang it nightly. Consequently there was distinct novelty in it. She sang it through, to the accompaniment of her street musicians, until she came to the final verse:

La derniér’ fois que je l’ai vu,Il avait l’torse à moitié nu,Et le cou pris dans la lunette,À la Roquette.

Then, with a sudden outburst of enthusiasm, the whole audience threw hundreds of sous and francs to the singer.

Sibyl, seated beside me, her ladyship having found a seat with the Baronne de Chalencon some distance away, turned to me, saying:

“The air is simply suffocating here. Shall we go?”

“Certainly,” I answered, glad myself to escape from the semi-asphyxiation. We rose and passed out together. On the stairs we met Prince Roland, delighted with the success of the entertainment, ascending, with, as usual, hat on the back of his head and hands in pockets.

“Ah, mon cher Ingram!” he cried, greeting us. “And you are here with mademoiselle?”

Sibyl congratulated him upon his great success, whereupon he answered, with a broad smile:

“It seems, mademoiselle, that my hotel is not large enough for charity.”

And he passed on, leaving us to laugh at his rather witty mot. In Paris everyone knows the Prince, for he is one of the central figures in Society. Below we encountered the Baronne de Nouilles, who with Madame Bornier was sharing the feminine literary honours of Paris at the moment. The Baronne’s poems were well known, especially “Il n’y a plus d’îles bienheureuses.” She greeted us merrily, for Sibyl was her especial favourite. She was still quite young, dark, slim, and distinguished-looking. In addition to much originality and charm in her manner of writing, she possessed an insight into, and a power to judge, human nature in its many varied aspects which had been pronounced by the critics to be remarkable. She was very graceful, with auburn hair and a face such as Burne-Jones loved to paint. Indeed, she had sat for the faces of several of that artist’s more recent pictures.

“What!” she cried, “you, too, find the crush too great? And I also. I am returning home. Come with me, both of you, and have a quiet cup of tea. I will explain to her ladyship;” and walking quickly across to where Sibyl’s mother was standing, she uttered a few words to the Ambassador’s wife. Then we all three entered her landau and drove to her house.

The Baronne was, as all Paris knows, in every way an artist, wealthy, chic, and philanthropic to a degree. Her house was, I found, a dream of exquisite taste.

When we entered, Sibyl turned to me, saying:

“These white carpets and delicate hangings make one tremble at the thought of dirty feet or smutty fingers!”

And they certainly did. The effects everywhere were highly artistic – more striking, I think, than I had ever seen in any private house. Her refined taste and rare turn of – mind were shown in every corner of that delightful house, so delicate and restful in every detail. The salon in which tea was served was all white – soft white velvet hangings, white carpet, white wood furniture, and a little gallery also in white. Along the dado-line, in white wood, were painted butterflies in pale opal shades, frail symbols of the flitting gaieties of life.

We had been chatting some little time, and the conversation between the Ambassador’s daughter and the poetess had turned upon frocks, as it so often does between women devoted to La mode. They were discussing the toilette of Madame de Yturbe, one of the prettiest women in Paris, and the tendency of late towards the Empire and Directoire periods in dress, when I asked a question to which I had often failed to get a satisfactory answer.

“Who is really the smartest – the Parisienne, or the American woman, in Paris?”

“Ah, m’sieur!” cried the merry little Baronne, holding up her hands, “the Americans run us so very close in the matter of dress nowadays that I really do not know. Indeed, many Americans are in my opinion more chic than the vraie Parisienne.”

“Well,” observed Sibyl rather philosophically, “there is, I think, more independence and individuality in the American woman’s manner of putting on her clothes. The French woman – forgive me, Baronne – accepts her frock just as it comes from the dressmaker, and looks more or less as though she has just stepped out of a bandbox. But the American knows better what suits her in the first place, and in putting on her clothes adapts them, by a judicious touch here and there, to her own particular style and taste.”

“I thoroughly agree,” observed the Baronne. “We have been actually beaten on our own ground by the Americans. It is curious, but nevertheless true, that we French women are being left behind in the mode, as we have been left behind in the laws. Here, in France, we are twenty years or so behind the age in regard to the laws affecting women.”

“I don’t understand,” observed Sibyl.

“Well, in brief, our modern intellectual young man in Paris is all for woman’s rights. In England you have long been aware that to educate and gradually emancipate the women-folk is one of the most important points in modern progress; but though the Feministe movement in France has been actively pushed by a small minority during the last few years, we in Paris have only just heard of your so-called New Woman.”

“And do you believe, Baronne, that the movement will progress?” I inquired.

“Ah! it is difficult to say, m’sieur,” she answered, with a slight shrug of her well-formed shoulders. “When the reformers’ ideal has once been placed in the category of practical politics it will probably be accorded a welcome and given a deferential attention which has scarcely been vouchsafed to it on your side of the Pas de Calais. At present, as you know, a married woman in France has no right to her own earnings. They belong to the husband. A man can actually imprison his wife for two years if discovered with a lover; while a woman who has been wronged is not allowed the recherche de la paternité. In short, you English respect your womenkind, and are a free and enlightened people in comparison with us. Here, ‘Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité,’ are words which apply solely to the masculine sex.”

We both laughed, but the Baronne was quite serious, and from her subsequent observations it was patent that I had accidentally touched upon one of her pet subjects. To confess the truth, I became rather bored by her violent arguments in favour of the emancipation of women, for when a voluble Frenchwoman argues, it is difficult to get in a word edgewise.

Presently she exclaimed:

“A couple of days ago I had a visit from an old friend who inquired whether I knew you – the Comtesse de Foville. She has left Paris.”

“Yes,” I said, “I think she has. Her visit has been only a brief one. They have gone for their cure at Marienbad, I believe.”

“Very brief. She wrote telling me that she and Yolande would remain in Paris at least a month, and yet they’ve not been here a week!”

“Is this the same Yolande whom you knew in Brussels?” asked Sibyl, turning to me with a glance of surprise.

“Yes,” I answered in a hard voice. Why, I wondered, had this woman brought up a subject so distasteful to me?

“You were her cavalier in Brussels, so I’ve heard,” observed the Ambassador’s daughter. “I was still at college in those days, I suppose. But is it really true that your flirtations were something dreadful?”

“Who told you so?” I inquired, in a tone which affected to scout such an idea.

“Mother said so the other day. She told me that everyone in Brussels knew you had fallen violently in love with her, and prophesied marriage, until one day you suddenly applied for a change of post, and left her. They whispered that it was owing to a quarrel.”

“Well,” I said with a sad smile, “you are really awfully frank.”

“Just as you are with me. You’re always chaffing me about my partners at dances, and making all sorts of rude remarks. Now, when I have a chance to retaliate, it isn’t to be supposed that I shall let it slip.”

“Certainly not,” I laughed. “Now describe all my shortcomings, and make a long list of them. It will be entertaining to the Baronne, who dearly loves to hear a little private history.”

“Now, m’sieur, that is really too bad,” the other protested. “You Englishmen are always so very cynical.”

“We find it very necessary for our existence, I assure you, madame.”

“Just as Yolande was once necessary for your existence – eh?” she added mischievously, as they both laughed in chorus at my discomfiture.

“Well, and if I admit it?”

“If you admit it you will perhaps set our minds at rest as to the reason of her sudden departure from Paris yesterday,” exclaimed the Baronne, with a strange expression upon her face, as though she knew more than she would admit.

“I have no idea of the reason. They have gone for their cure at Marienbad, I believe.” Madame smiled, pushing a little tendril of her auburn hair from off her brow.

“You believe!” she echoed. “Are you not certain?”

“No, I’m not certain. They left hurriedly. That is all I know.”

“And all you care?” asked Sibyl, regarding me very gravely.

“And all I care,” I added.

“What a courteous cavalier!” exclaimed madame, laughing. Then she added: “I’ve known Yolande and her mother for quite a number of years. Yolande is a most charming girl.”

“I’ve heard that she is now engaged,” I observed, resolved upon a ruse. “Giraud, of the Belgian Embassy, told me the other day that she was to marry some German – I think he is – named Wolf. Do you know him?”

“Wolf!” ejaculated the Baronne, her fine eyes fixed upon me with a strange look, as though in a moment she had become paralysed by some sudden fear. The next instant, however, with a woman’s marvellous self-possession, she made shift to answer:

“No, the name is quite unfamiliar to me.”

“Why,” cried Sibyl suddenly, “that was the name of the dark-bearded man who was so charming to me at the de Chalencon’s the other night. Is he the same?”

“Yes,” I said. “His character, however, is none of the best. I would only warn you to have nothing whatever to do with him – that’s all.”

“He was awfully kind to me the other evening,” she protested.

“Well,” I replied earnestly, “but you and I are friends of old standing, and I consider that I have a right to give you warning when it seems to be necessary.”

“And is one actually needed regarding Rodolphe Wolf?” asked the Baronne, evidently much puzzled, for she undoubtedly knew him, even though she had declared her ignorance of his existence.

“Yes,” I said, “he is a person to be avoided. More, I cannot tell you.”

Chapter Fifteen

Across the Channel

A week went by, but the war-cloud still hung heavily upon the political horizon.

At my direction Grew, assisted by other members of the secret service, had searched high and low in Paris for Rodolphe Wolf; but in vain. After entering that dingy old house on the Quai, he had suddenly and unaccountably disappeared. The fishing-tackle shop was not, as I had believed, his headquarters, but he had evidently only made a visit there, and had afterwards left Paris suddenly, at almost the same time as the Countess de Foville and Yolande. The ladies had also completely eluded us. They were not in Marienbad, for inquiries had been made in that town without result.

I was in daily expectation of Kaye’s return to Paris; but he did not arrive, and I had heard nothing of his whereabouts. The astute secret agent had a habit of being lost to us for weeks, and of then returning with some important piece of information; not infrequently with a copy of some diplomatic document by means of which our Chief was able to foil the machinations of England’s enemies. Nevertheless, in view of the curious events which had occurred, I was anxious to learn what facts he might have ascertained in Berlin regarding Yolande.

Lady Barmouth was receiving in the grand salon of the Embassy one afternoon, the fine apartment being full to overflowing with the usual chattering cosmopolitan men and women who circle about from one embassy to another, when I suddenly encountered my friend Captain Giraud, the Belgian military attaché. He had been absent on leave for several days, and had only just returned to Paris.

“I’ve been to Brussels,” he exclaimed, after we had exchanged greetings. “A cousin of mine has been married, and I went to the feasting.”

“And now you have the usual attack of liver, I suppose?”

“Yes,” he laughed. “I’m feeling a little bit seedy after all the merry-making. But, by the way, you knew my cousin, Julie Montbazon? She was often a guest of the Countess de Foville at the château.”

“Of course I remember her. She was tall, fair-haired, and spoke English extremely well,” I said.

“The same. Well, she has married the son of Tanchot, the banker, of Antwerp – an excellent match.”

“And the Countess and Yolande, what news of them?”

“They are in Paris, are they not?”

“No, they left suddenly some days ago.”

“Well, they are not to be blamed,” he said, smiling. “No one stays in Paris during this heat if they can possibly avoid it. Yolande told me she was going to Marienbad.”

“She told me so, too. But they have altered their plans, it seems.”

“Oh! So you have met again?” he cried, opening his eyes widely. “I thought your friendship had ended long ago?”

“So it had.”

“Then it has been resumed?”

“No, it has not,” I replied.

“Are you certain?” he inquired, with sudden earnestness. He had been one of my most intimate friends in Brussels in the old days, and knew well the secret of our broken engagement.

“Quite certain.”

“And they have left for some destination unknown to you?”

“Yes.”

“But why did you seek her again, my dear Ingram? It was scarcely wise, was it?”

“Wisdom has to be thrown to the winds in certain circumstances,” I answered. “I was in this instance compelled to see her.”

“Compelled?” he echoed, puzzled. “Then you did not call upon her of your own free will?”

“No. I called, but against my own inclination.”

“And are you absolutely certain, mon cher Ingram, that all is broken off between you – that you have no lingering thought of her?”

“Quite. Why?”

He paused, as though in doubt as to what reply he should make to my question.

“Because,” he said slowly, at last – “well, because if my information is correct, her character has changed since you parted.”

What could he know? His words implied that he was aware of the truth regarding her.

“I don’t quite understand you,” I said eagerly. “Be more explicit.”

“Unfortunately I cannot,” he answered.

“Why?”

“Because I never condemn a woman, either upon hearsay or upon suspicion.”

A couple of merry fellows, attachés of the Russian Embassy, strolled up, and we were therefore compelled to drop the subject. Their chief, they told us, was about to leave Paris for his country house in Brittany – a fact interesting to Lord Barmouth, as showing that the political atmosphere was clearing. One ominous sign of the storm had been the persistent presence of all the ambassadors in Paris at a time when usually they are in the country or by the sea. The representative of the Czar was the first to move, and now without doubt all the other representatives of the Powers would be only too glad to follow his example, for the month was August, and the heat in Paris was almost overpowering enough to be described as tropical.

In the diplomatic circle abroad the most accomplished, the merriest, the most courteous, and the best linguists are always the Russians. Although we at the British Embassy were sometimes in opposition to their policy, nevertheless Count Olsoufieff, the Russian Ambassador, was one of Lord Barmouth’s most intimate friends, and from the respected chiefs downwards there existed the greatest cordiality and good feeling between the staff of the two embassies, notwithstanding all that certain journalists might write to the contrary. Volkouski and Korniloff, the two attachés, were easy-going cosmopolitans, upon whose shoulders the cares of life seemed to sit lightly, and very often we dined and spent pleasant evenings together.

We were gossiping together, discussing a titbit of amusing Paris scandal which Volkouski had picked up at a dinner on the previous night, and was now relating, when suddenly Harding approached me.

“His Excellency would like to see you at once in his private room, sir.”

I excused myself, having heard the dénouement of the story and laughed over it, and then mounted the grand staircase to the room in which my own Chief was standing with his hands behind his back, gazing thoughtfully out of the window. As I entered and closed the door, he turned to me saying:

“The political wind has changed to-day, Ingram, and although the mystery regarding Ceuta remains the same, the outlook is decidedly brighter. I had a chat with de Wolkenstein and Olsoufieff over at the Quai d’Orsay an hour ago, and the result makes it plain that the tension is fast disappearing.”

“Olsoufieff leaves for Brittany to-morrow,” I said.

“He told me so,” answered the Ambassador. “Yet with regard to Ceuta I have learned a very important fact, which I must send by despatch to the Marquess. Anderson, however, left for Rome to-day, and we have no messenger. You, therefore, must carry it to London by the night service this evening. If you object, Vivian can be sent.”

“I’ll go with pleasure,” I responded, glad of an opportunity of spending a day, and perhaps even a couple of days, in town. We who are condemned to exile abroad love our dear old London.

“Then if you will get out the cipher-book I’ll write the despatch.”

I unlocked the safe, handed him the book, and then stood by, watching as he reduced the draft despatch which he had already written to the puzzling array of letters and numerals. The operation of transcribing into cipher always occupies considerable time, for perfect accuracy is necessary, otherwise disastrous complications might ensue.

At last, however, His Excellency concluded, appended his signature, and took from a drawer in his big writing-table a large envelope bearing a formidable red cross. Despatches placed in those envelopes are for the eye of the principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs alone, and are always carried by the Royal messengers in the chamois-leather belt worn next their skin. They are essentially private communications, which British ambassadors are enabled to make with the great statesman who, untiring by night and by day, controls England’s destinies. The messengers carry the ordinary despatches to and fro across Europe in their despatch-boxes, but what is known in the Foreign Office as a “crossed despatch” must be carried on the person of the messenger, and must be delivered into the actual hand of the person to whom it is addressed.

When the communication was placed in its envelope, duly secured by the five seals of the Ambassador’s private seal – a fine-cut amethyst attached to his plain watch-guard of black silk ribbon – he handed it to me to lock in the safe until my departure. This I did, and after receiving some further verbal instructions went to my rooms to prepare for the journey. I dined early, called at the Embassy for the despatch, which I placed in my waist-belt, and left the Gare du Nord just as the summer twilight had deepened into dusk.

I was alone in the compartment on that tedious journey by Amiens to Calais. The night service between Paris and London never holds out a very inviting prospect, for there is little comfort for travellers as compared with the saloon carriages of the Chemin de Fer du Nord and the fine buffet cars of the Wagon Lit Company which run in the day service between the two greatest capitals of the world. The boats by the night service, too, are not all that can be desired, especially if a strong breeze is blowing. But on arrival at Calais on the night in question all was calm; and although the boat was one of the oldest on the service, nevertheless, not the most delicate among the lady passengers had occasion to seek the seclusion of a cabin or claim the services of the portly, white-capped stewardess.

In the bright moonbeams of that summer’s night I sat on deck smoking and thinking. What, I wondered, did Giraud know concerning Yolande? It was evident that as my friend he had my interests at heart, and wished to warn me against further association with her, even though he had done it clumsily and without the tact one would have expected of a man so well schooled in diplomacy. I remembered how at one time he was frequently a guest at the Château of Houffalize; indeed, we had been invited there at the same time on several occasions for shooting and wild-boar hunting in the Ardennes forest.

Yes, it seemed apparent that he knew the truth, that Yolande was actually a secret agent. But she had disappeared. Perhaps, after all, it was as well. I had no desire that Kaye and his smart detectives should hunt her through Europe, unless it could be actually proved that through her the secret of our policy towards Spain with regard to Ceuta had been betrayed to those Powers which were ever at work to undermine British prestige.

But how could she possibly have obtained the secret? That was the crux of the whole situation. The despatch from the Marquess of Malvern to Lord Barmouth had been a crossed one, and it had never left the person of the foreign service messenger until placed in my Chief’s hands with the seals intact. The mystery was absolutely inscrutable.

The moonbeams, reflected by the dancing waters, and the many lights of Dover harbour as we approached it, combined to produce an almost fairy-like picture. Indeed, in all my experience of the Channel I had never known a more perfectly calm and brilliant night, for the sea was almost like a lake, and on board the passengers were promenading as they chatted and laughed, pleasantly surprised to find the passage such an enjoyable one.

But as I lolled in my deck-chair, my eyes fixed upon the silver track of the moonbeams, a figure suddenly passed along the deck between my vision and the sea. There were a good many passengers, for a P&O steamer had come in at Marseilles, and about a couple of hundred travellers from the Far East were hurrying homeward. Every moment they were passing and repassing me; therefore I cannot tell what it was that attracted my attention to that particular silhouette dark against the silvery sea.

I only saw it during a single second, for next instant it had passed and become lost in the crowd of promenaders on deck. It was that of a woman of middle height, wearing a long travelling-cloak heavily lined with fur and a small sealskin toque. The fur collar of her coat was turned up around her neck, and thus hid the greater part of her face; indeed, I saw little of her countenance, for it was only a grey blotch in the shadow; yet her dark eyes had glanced at me inquiringly, as though she wished to mark well my appearance. Her height and gait struck me as somewhat unusual. I had seen some person before closely resembling her, but could not remember the occasion. She had passed me by like a shadow, yet somehow a strange conviction had in an instant seized me. That woman had followed me from Paris. She had stood on the platform of the Gare du Nord watching me while I had walked up and down awaiting the departure of the train.