Elusive Isabel Part 24

"I believe I know Mr. Grimm better than you do," she argued. "You think he will weaken; I know he will not. I am not arguing for him, nor for myself; I am arguing against the frightful loss that will come here in this room if the compact is not destroyed."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "You think he will weaken; I know he will not."]

"It's absurd to let one man stand in the way," declared the prince angrily.

"It might not be an impertinent question, your Highness," commented Mr.

Grimm, "for me to ask how you are going to _prevent_ one man standing in the way?"

A quick change came over Miss Thorne's face. The eyes hardened, the lips were set, and lines Mr. Grimm had never seen appeared about the mouth.

Here, in a flash, the cloak of dissimulation was cast aside, and the woman stood forth, this keen, brilliant, determined woman who did things.

"The compact will be destroyed," she said.

"No," declared the prince.

"It _must_ be destroyed."

"_Must? Must?_ Do you say _must to me?_"

"Yes, _must_," she repeated steadily.

"And by what authority, please, do--"

"By that authority!" She drew a tiny, filigreed gold box from her bosom and cast it upon the table; the prince stared at it. "In the name of your sovereign--_must_!" she said again.

The prince turned away and began pacing, back and forth across the room with the parchment crumpled in his hand. For a minute or more Isabel stood watching him.

"Thirteen minutes!" Mr. Grimm announced coldly.

And now broke out an excited chatter, a babel of French, English, Italian, Spanish; those masked and cowled ones who had held silence for so long all began talking at once. One of them s.n.a.t.c.hed at the crumpled compact in the prince's hand, while all crowded around him arguing. Mr.

Grimm sat perfectly still with the revolver barrel resting on his knees.

"Eleven minutes!" he announced again.

Suddenly the prince turned violently on Miss Thorne with rage-distorted face.

"Do you know what it means to you if I do as you say?" he demanded savagely. "It means you will be branded as traitor, that your name, your property--"

"If you will pardon me, your Highness," she interrupted, "the power that I have used was given to me to use; I have used it. It is a matter to be settled between me and my government, and as far as it affects my person is of no consequence now. You will destroy the compact."

"Nine minutes!" said Mr. Grimm monotonously.

Again the babel broke out.

"Do we understand that you want to see the compact?" one of the cowled men asked suddenly of Mr. Grimm as he turned.

"No, I don't want to see it. I'd prefer not to see it."

With hatred blazing in his eyes the prince made his way toward the lamp, holding a parchment toward the blaze.

"There's nothing else to be done," he exclaimed savagely.

"Just a moment, please," Mr. Grimm interposed quickly. "Miss Thorne, is that the compact?"

She glanced at it, nodded her head, and then the flame caught the fringed edge of paper. It crackled, flashed, flamed, and at last, a thing of ashes, was scattered on the floor. Mr. Grimm rose.

"That is all, gentlemen," he announced courteously. "You are free to go.

You, your Highness, and Miss Thorne, will accompany me."

He held open the door and there was almost a scramble to get out. The prince and Miss Thorne waited until the last.

"And, Miss Thorne, if you will give us a lift in your car?" Mr. Grimm suggested. "It is now four minutes of three."

The automobile came in answer to a signal and the three in silence entered it. The car trembled and had just begun to move when Mr. Grimm remembered something, and leaped out.

"Wait for me!" he called. "There's a man locked in the coal-bin!"

He disappeared into the house, and Miss Thorne, with a gasp of horror sank back in her seat with face like chalk. The prince glanced uneasily at his watch, then spoke curtly to the chauffeur.

"Run the car up out of danger; there'll be an explosion there in a moment."

They had gone perhaps a hundred feet when the building they had just left seemed to be lifted bodily from the ground by a great spurt of flame which tore through its center, then collapsed like a thing of cards. The prince, unmoved, glanced around at Miss Thorne; she lay in a dead faint beside him.

"Go ahead," he commanded. "Baltimore."

XXIV

THE PERSONAL EQUATION

Mr. Campbell ceased talking and the deep earnestness that had settled on his face pa.s.sed, leaving instead the blank, inscrutable mask of benevolence behind which his clock-like genius was habitually hidden.

The choleric blue eyes of the president of the United States shifted inquiringly to the thoughtful countenance of the secretary of state at his right, thence along the table around which the official family was gathered. It was a special meeting of the cabinet called at the suggestion of Chief Campbell, and for more than an hour he had done the talking. There had been no interruption.

"So much!" he concluded, at last. "If there is any point I have not made clear Mr. Grimm is here to explain it in person."

Mr. Grimm rose at the mention of his name and stood with his hands clasped behind his back. His eyes met those of the chief executive listlessly.

"We understand, Mr. Grimm," the president began, and he paused for an instant to regard the tall, clean-cut young man with a certain admiration, "we understand that there does not actually exist such a thing as a Latin compact against the English-speaking peoples?"

"On paper, no," was the reply.

"You personally prevented the signing of the compact?"

"I personally caused the destruction of the compact after several signatures had been attached," Mr. Grimm amended. "Throughout I have acted under the direction of Mr. Campbell, of course."

"You were in very grave personal danger?" the president went on.