The Great Prince Shan Part 17

"Isn't it wonderful!"

"Marvellous!" Nigel replied. "It's the largest aeronautic station in the world--bigger, they say, than all our railway termini put together. Look at the flares, Maggie! No wonder the sky from the housetop at Belgrave Square seems always to be on fire at night!"

They were approaching now the first of the huge sheds which were arranged in circular fashion around an immense stretch of perfectly level asphalted ground. Every shed was as big as an ordinary railway station, its arched opening framed with electric illuminations. Inside could be seen the crowds of people waiting on the platforms; in many of them, the engine of a great airship was already throbbing, waiting to start. In the background was a huge wireless installation, and around, at regular intervals, enormous pillars, on the top of which flares of different-coloured fire were burning. The automobile came to a standstill before a large electrically illuminated time chart. Nigel alighted for a moment and spoke to one of the inspectors.

"Which station for the _Black Dragon_, private ship from China?" he enquired.

The man glanced at the chart.

"Number seven, on the other side," he replied. "You can drive around."

"How is she for time?"

"She crossed the North Sea punctually," he replied. "We should see her violet lights in ten minutes. Mind the traffic as you pa.s.s number three.

The North ship from Norway is just in."

Nigel addressed a word of caution to the chauffeur, and they drove on.

From the first shed they pa.s.sed a stream of vehicles was pouring out,--porters with luggage, jostling throngs of newly arrived pa.s.sengers on their way to the Electric Underground. They drove into number seven shed, left the car, and walked to the end of the long platform. The great arc of gla.s.s-covered roof above them was brilliantly illuminated, throwing a queer downward light upon the long line of waiting porters, the refreshment rooms, the kiosks and newspaper stalls. In the far end, a huge airship, bound for the East, was already filling up. Maggie and her companion stood for a few minutes gazing into the huge void of s.p.a.ce.

"Tell me about Naida," the former begged, a little abruptly.

"Naida is a wonderful woman," Nigel declared enthusiastically. "We lunched at Ciro's. She wore a black and white muslin gown which arrived this morning from Paris. Afterwards we went down to Ranelagh and sat under the trees."

"Throwing yourself thoroughly into your little job, aren't you!" Maggie sniffed.

"You'll have a chance to catch me up before long," he replied. "Naida has promised that she will arrange a meeting with the Prince."

"I wonder what Oscar Immelan will have to say about it," Maggie reflected.

"To tell you the truth," Nigel said hopefully, "I believe that Immelan is losing ground. His whole scheme is too selfish. Of course, Naida won't discuss these things with me in plain words, but she gives me a hint now and then. Amongst her gifts, she has a marvellous sense of justice and a hatred of any form of bribery. That is where I feel convinced that she and Immelan will never come together. Immelan could never see more than the selfish side, even of a world upheaval. Naida searches everywhere for motive. She has the altruistic instinct. I wonder no longer at Matinsky. She is a born ruler herself."

"I'm glad you are getting along with her," Maggie remarked. "Look!" she broke off, catching at his arm. "The violet lights!"

High up in the sky outside, two violet specks of light suddenly rose and fell like airb.a.l.l.s. A crowd of mechanics appeared through subterranean doors and stood about in the vast arena. Very soon the airship came into sight, her cars brilliantly illuminated. She circled slowly round and came noiselessly to the ground, and with the mechanics running by her side, and her engines now scarcely audible, came slowly into the shed and to a standstill by the side of the platform. Maggie and her companion stood well in the background.

"There he is," the latter whispered.

Immelan, suddenly appeared as though from the bowels of the earth, was shaking hands warmly with a tall, slender man who was one of the first to descend from the airship. They talked rapidly together for a few minutes. Then they disappeared, walking down towards the luggage-clearing station. Maggie watched the retreating figures earnestly.

"He doesn't look in the least Chinese," she declared.

"I told you he didn't," Nigel replied. "He was considered the best-looking man of his year up at Oxford."

Maggie was unusually silent on their way back.

"It was perhaps scarcely worth our while, this little expedition of ours," Maggie said thoughtfully.

"You're not sorry that we came?" he asked.

She shook her head. "I think not," she replied.

"Why only 'think'?"

She roused herself with an effort.

"I don't know, Nigel," she confessed. "I can't imagine what is wrong with me. I feel shivery--nervous--as though something were going to happen."

He looked at her curiously. This was a Maggie whom he scarcely recognised.

"Presentiments?" he asked.

"Absurd, isn't it!" she replied, with a weak smile. "I'll get over it directly. I don't think I am going to like Prince Shan, Nigel."

"Well, you haven't been long making up your mind," he observed. "I shouldn't have thought you had been able even to see his face."

"I had a queer, lightning-like glimpse of it," she reflected. "To me it seemed as though it were carved out of granite, and as though all that was human about him were the mouth and the eyes. I wish he hadn't been looking."

"Are you flattering yourself that he will recognise you?" Nigel asked.

"I know that he will," she answered simply.

In a corner of the white-and-gold restaurant at the Ritz on the following evening, Prince Shan and Immelan dined tete-a-tete, Immelan in the best of spirits, talking of the pleasant trifles of the world, drinking champagne and pointing out notabilities; Prince Shan, his features and expression unchanging, and his face as white as the perfectly fitting shirt he wore. His clothes were fashionable and distinctive, his black pearls un.o.btrusive but wonderful, his smoothly brushed dark hair, his immaculate finger nails, his skilfully tied tie all indicative of his close touch with western civilization. There was nothing, in fact, except his sphinx-like expression, the slightly unusual shape of his brilliant eyes, and his queer air of personal detachment, to denote the Oriental. He drank water, he ate sparingly, he preserved an almost unbroken silence, yet he had the air of one giving courteous attention to everything which his companion said and finding interest in it. Only once he asked a question.

"You are well acquainted here, my host," he said. "You know the trio at the table just behind the entrance--the attractive young lady with her chaperon, and a gentleman who I rather fancy must be an old college acquaintance whose name I have forgotten. Tell me some more about them in their private capacity, and not as saviours of their country."

Immelan frowned slightly as he glanced across the room.

"There is not much to tell," he answered, without enthusiasm. "The young lady is, as you know, Lady Maggie Trent. The older lady, with the white hair, is, I believe, her aunt. The name of their escort is Lord Dorminster. You would probably know him by the name of Kingley--he has only just succeeded to the t.i.tle."

Prince Shan was looking straight across the room, his eyes travelling over the heads of the many brilliant little groups of diners to rest apparently upon an empty s.p.a.ce in the white-and-gold walls. He had been a great traveller, but always his first evening, when he came once more into touch with a civilisation more meretricious but more poignant than his own, resulted in this disturbing cloud of sensations. His companion's voice sounded emptily in his ears.

"They say that the young lady is engaged to Lord Dorminster. That is only gossip, however."

For the second time Prince Shan looked directly at the little group. His eyes rested upon Maggie, simply dressed but wonderfully _soignee_, very alluring, laughing up into the face of her escort. Their eyes did not actually meet, but each was conscious of the other's regard. Once more he felt the disturbance of the West.

"If we should chance to come together naturally," he said, "it would gratify me to make the acquaintance of Lady Maggie Trent."

CHAPTER XIV

The introduction which Prince Shan had requested came about very naturally. The lounge of the hotel was more than usually crowded that evening, and the table towards which an attentive _maitre d'hotel_ conducted Immelan and his companion was next to the one reserved by Nigel. The transference of a chair opened up conversation. Immelan was bland and ingenuous as usual, introducing every one, glad, apparently, to make one common party. Prince Shan remained by Maggie's side after the introduction had been effected. A chair which Immelan schemed to offer him elsewhere he calmly refused.

"This is my first evening in London, Lady Maggie," he said. "I am fortunate."