The Men Who Wrought Part 23

But it had to come, and she faced it resolutely. There had fallen a pause in their talk, and she drew a deep sigh.

"And now--now for the purpose of this meeting," she said.

Then with a resolute air she rested her elbows upon the table and clasped her beautiful shapely hands.

"Is there any other purpose than--the present?" enquired Ruxton, following her example and leaning forward. His smile was one of whimsical protest. He knew that the moment had come when he must once more return to the harness of his office. "I feel rather like a navvy,"

he proceeded. "After tremendous exertions I have just been lounging away my dinner hour. The whistle has blown, and I must get to work again. You have blown the whistle."

Vita smiled faintly. But her eyes lost none of their seriousness thereby.

"I'm afraid there are liable to be some heavy penalties if--you do not respond to it promptly. Oh, dear, I have so enjoyed myself. I wish there were no Prussians in the world."

"There are fewer than there were."

"Yes, but so long as one remains there are--too many. I have had a communication from my father. It came to-day."

"A letter?"

Vita shook her head.

"We do not communicate by letter. A messenger. A funny little old man who carries samples of b.u.t.tons made in Austria. He represents a b.u.t.ton firm, and sells millions of them over here. He happens to be my father's brother, although no one is allowed to guess the relationship.

He is my father's most loyal--friend."

"And he has brought you word of----"

"Von Salzinger."

Ruxton waited for her to continue. He was watching her with eyes that left him utterly incapable of forgetting her wonderful attraction. She was no longer merely a partner in the work he had marked out for himself. She was more. She was the woman of his early youthful dreams come to life, and every word that fell from her lips had for him a significance which appealed to the big soul within him apart from any verbal meaning it might convey.

"You know father is the oddest mixture of simplicity and shrewdness I have ever known. He is utterly without fear, and his trust, to a point, is childlike. But when he is threatened with serious danger he is possessed of all the subtlety, it seems to me, of the whole world. That is perhaps why I do not gravely fear for his personal safety. His message to me ill.u.s.trates his simplicity, but gives no inkling of that wonderful shrewdness which I know him to possess. Perhaps it is worded purposely so that I should miss its real significance. You see, father knows I am a coward, and does not like to distress me. Perhaps, on the other hand, he only sees in the development the dire result of his protest to Berlin. You see I have had the story of your visit to Borga from him weeks ago. But I see more in it, and I am right. That's why I warned you of 'bad news.'"

"And the news?" Ruxton's imagination had been stirred by the girl's preliminary.

"In brief it is that Captain-General von Salzinger has been relieved of his command at Borga, as a result of his att.i.tude towards you and my father."

"That is what your father a.s.sured me would happen. He a.s.sured me that in Berlin his power was almost unlimited--as regards Borga. I see little to trouble us in that."

"No-o."

Vita's whole att.i.tude underwent a change. She became reflective, and her warm grey eyes grew cold with the bitterness of memory. After some silent moments she seemed to arrive at a decision.

"To impress you with my point of view I--must make something like a confession," she went on presently.

She was interrupted by the returning waiter, who removed the sweet plates and cleared the table for the coffee. After he had poured it out and departed, Vita went on. All doubt had gone from her manner, and her eyes smiled back into the eager face of the man who had made for himself the discovery of the woman in Eden.

"It is just a little bit difficult to tell you these things," she smiled. "But I must do so, or you will not see the danger as I see it.

It is about an early love affair of mine with--Von Salzinger. Oh, don't make any mistake," she cried hastily, at the abrupt, ingenuous change in the man's expression. "I was never in love with him. But he was with me. Ugh! Von Salzinger. A Prussian from head to foot. A typical, soulless Prussian. No, no. This man is ambitious. That is all he cares for in life--himself and his ambition. My father was a great man in the country, and would have been an excellent lever to further his ends. So he strove to--enlist my sympathies. I was very young, and--well, I think most women, even at an early age, like being made love to. I did not so greatly discourage him at first. Then came the War, and I discovered many things about the German people I had never dreamed of.

I also discovered the Prussian in Von Salzinger. He strove his utmost to enlist me in the Secret Service, of which, to my horror, I discovered he was a prominent member. Need I tell you what happened?

There was a scene--a dreadful scene, which he has probably never forgiven, and--may never forgive. Now here is the complication of which my father is unaware. It is my father who has brought about his downfall. Do you see? He undoubtedly has suspicions of you.

Consequently he has suspicions of my father. He is bred to the Secret Service. Where has he gone, and what will he do? What has he told Berlin, and--what understanding has he come to with them? My simple father believes he has settled the matter definitely in the only way his position ent.i.tled him to settle it. I think he has set an unusually swift and poisonous snake upon the tracks of all of us. Now you tell me what you think. You can probably judge the position better than I. You can look upon it from a detached point of view."

"Detached?" Ruxton smiled dubiously. But his interrogation seemed to pa.s.s Vita by. She sipped her coffee and waited. Her grey eyes were completely veiled beneath her long, dense lashes. Ruxton pushed his empty cup aside. "The danger I see is for your father. Not for you, or for anything over here. That, of course, may come later. The immediate danger is for your father."

Vita sighed.

"You have lightened my fears." She raised her shining eyes. "That sounds terrible, doesn't it? But--I would rather have danger threaten him, personally, than threaten his project--our project. His position is unique, and I doubt even if you can appreciate it. And then he has a means of protecting himself which even Berlin has no understanding of.

Father can escape at any moment he considers it necessary. That was all thought out, with many other things, before we approached you. _Our visit to Dorby is still all unsuspected_. Remember that."

"Yes."

"But, in spite of your view-point, we shall hear from Von Salzinger, if I am not very much mistaken. You see, he knows I am in London. Unless we hear soon that he has been given another appointment in Germany, then I feel certain we shall have him swiftly on our tracks. What can he do--to hurt us?"

There was unmistakable apprehension in the girl's eyes. There was a gravity in her a.s.sertion that would not be denied, and even Ruxton realized the soundness of her argument. But he sought to console her, to lessen her fears. He desired more than all things to see her warm smile replace the apprehension she was now displaying.

"He can do nothing here, should he favor us with a visit," he said lightly. "I have taken no chances. Only to-day I have completed negotiations by which our new constructions are definitely placed under the control and protection of our Admiralty. If your father is safe, then I think we can snap our fingers at Captain-General von Salzinger."

"I'm--glad," cried Vita. Then impulsively: "So glad. Perhaps you don't quite understand _our_ feelings. You see," she went on warmly, "our project has been placed before everything else in life. Life and death or imprisonment are secondary--quite secondary--with us. It is this effort to save humanity from the disaster which is being engineered in the Teutonic mind that is all that we care for. If necessary we shall not shrink from yielding up our lives to that cause. I wonder. Can you understand? Yes." She nodded decidedly. "You do understand. That is why we came to you. Now you have rea.s.sured me. Germany cannot stop the work going forward. It has become a British national effort." She sighed again, however. "But for all that my news is bad. I am sure of it.

Perhaps it is only relatively so. I cannot say. If the work goes on no news can be really bad. Yes, I am relieved, and I am glad I 'phoned you. I wish my father had been here to hear you say that the work would go on. It would have been the greatest moment of his life."

There was a great striving for rea.s.surance in her manner. Ruxton watched it, as he watched every other play of light and shade in her voice and expression. Nor was it until he witnessed the return of her brilliant smile that he felt content. With its advent he returned again to the serene enjoyment of the moment.

At length, no further excuse for remaining would serve, and at half-past nine they rose to go. For Ruxton it was the pa.s.sing of an important milestone on his journey through life. There remained no longer any doubt of his feelings. He knew he had met at last the only woman in the world who could reveal to him the true depths of happiness in life. His full realization had come with her frank avowal of the place Von Salzinger had striven to hold in her life. It had been a threatening cloud, a summer billow of cloud tossed up by some adverse air-current, and, for the moment, it had obscured his sun. Its pa.s.sing had left him in the full blaze of a radiance which he now appreciated at its true worth. He knew that he loved this wonderful Princess Vita.

Once again the hand of Destiny had been revealed. He was moving blindly at its bidding. Nor had he will or inclination to diverge from the course marked out. He was content--more than content, and his only alloy was the rapidly approaching termination of the all too short evening.

His car rolled up to the door. He had handed Vita into it, and stood leaning in through the doorway.

"Where shall he drive to?" he enquired, with a smile of amus.e.m.e.nt.

"Kensington?"

"Please, Kensington."

There was almost a challenge in the smile with which Vita replied to him.

A moment later he was sitting beside her in the cabriolet as they drove on towards the crossing of Piccadilly Circus.

"It is too late to let you take me all the way to my home," Vita said quietly. "Besides, I would rather remain in town for the night." Then she broke off in an undecided fashion.

Ruxton caught at the pause.

"Do not think about it. I have no desire to know anything but that which you choose to tell me."

Vita laughed. And Ruxton felt that her laugh was slightly embarra.s.sed.

"It seems strange not to tell you where my real home is," she said.

"There is no adequate reason for not doing so--and yet--I will tell you the reason that I occupy my Kensington flat in my two Christian names, and keep my real home away in the country. Father and I thought it out when we embarked upon our plans. We decided that in emergency it would be necessary to have a secure retreat. We endeavored to forestall all possibilities. We----"

She broke off, gazing across the car at the open window of the door beside Ruxton. Her eyes were full of alarm. The car had stopped in a stream of traffic, held up by the imperious arm of the point policeman.

A taxicab had come to a stop beside them, and slightly in advance. A hatless head had been thrust out of the window to observe the cause of the delay. It was a square head upon still squarer shoulders. The neck that linked them was fleshy and powerful. The hair was short and stubbly.