The Cab of the Sleeping Horse Part 51

She threw up her hand, and a nasty little automatic was covering the Secretary's heart.

He gave a shout--and sat perfectly still. Mrs. Clephane, with an exclamation of fear, laid her hand on Harleston's arm. Carpenter was impa.s.sive. Harleston suppressed a smile.

"Tell them if I can shoot straight, Guy," Mrs. Spencer said pleasantly; "and meanwhile do you all keep your exact distance and position. Speak your piece, Mr. Harleston--tell his Excellency if I can shoot."

"I am quite ready to a.s.sume it without the testimony of Mr. Harleston, or ocular demonstration in this immediate direction," the Secretary remarked with a weak grin.

"Tell him, if I can shoot, Guy," she ordered.

"I've never seen her better," Harleston admitted "though I'm not at all fearful for your Excellency. Mrs. Spencer won't shoot; she's only bluffing. If you'll say the word, I'll engage to disarm her."

"Meanwhile what happens to his Excellency?" Madeline Spencer mocked.

"Nothing whatever--except a few nervous moments."

"Try it, Mr. Secretary, and find out!" she laughed across the levelled revolver.

"Train your gun on Mr. Harleston and test him," the Secretary suggested, attempting to be facetious and failing.

Mrs. Spencer might be, probably was, bluffing but he did not propose to be the one to call it; the result was quite too uncertain. He had never looked into the muzzle of a revolver, and he found the experience distinctly unpleasant--she held the barrel so steady and pointed straight at his heart. Diplomatic secrets were wanted of course, but they were not to be purchased by the life of the Secretary of State, nor even by an uncertain chance at it.

"Mr. Harleston's life isn't sufficiently valuable to the nation," she replied, "I prefer to shoot you, if necessary--though I trust it won't be necessary. What's a mere sc.r.a.p of paper, without value save as a means to detect its author, compared to the life of the greatest American diplomat? Moreover, the letter would yield you nothing as to its meaning nor its author. The meaning you already know, since you have found the key-word to the cipher; so only the author remains; and as it is typewritten you will have small, very small, prospect from it." She had read the Secretary aright--and now she asked: "Am I not correct, your Excellency?"

"I think you are," the Secretary replied, "We all are obligated and quite ready to give our lives for our country, if the sacrifice will benefit it in the very least; yet I can't see the obligation in this instance, can you Harleston?"

"None in the least, sir, provided your life were at issue," Harleston answered. "For my part, I think it isn't even seriously threatened. If Mrs. Spencer will s.h.i.+ft her aim to me, I'll take a chance."

Mrs. Clephane gave a suppressed exclamation and an involuntary motion of protest--and Mrs. Spencer saw her.

"Mrs. Clephane seems to be concerned lest I accept!" she jeered.

Mrs. Clephane blushed ravis.h.i.+ngly, and Harleston caught her in the act; whereupon she blushed still more, and turned away.

"Play acting!" mocked Madeline Spencer--then, shrugging the matter aside, she turned to the Secretary. "Since we two are of one mind in the affair before us, your Excellency," she observed, "I fancy I may take it as settled. Nevertheless you will pardon me if I don't depress my aim until we have attended to a little matter; it will occupy us but a moment," making a step nearer the desk and away from the others, yet still holding them in her eye.

"What is it you wish, madame?" the Secretary inquired a trifle huskily; his throat was becoming somewhat parched by the anxiety of the situation.

"I see you have on your desk a small blue candle; employed, I a.s.sume, for melting wax for your private seal," she went on. "May I trouble your Excellency to light the aforesaid candle?"

The Secretary promptly struck a match, and managed with a most unsteady hand to touch it to the wick.

As the flame flared up, she drew a narrow envelope from her bag and tossed it on the desk before him.

"Now," said she, "will you be kind enough to look at the enclosure."

The Secretary took up the envelope and drew out the sheet. It was a single sheet of the thinnest texture used for foreign correspondence. He looked first at one side, then at the other.

"What do you see, sir?" she asked.

"The sheet is blank," he replied.

"Try the envelope," she recommended.

He turned it over. "It also is blank," he said.

"Sympathetic ink!" Carpenter laughed.

"Just what we are about to see, wise one!" she mocked. "Now, your Excellency, will you place the envelope in the candle's flame?"

The Secretary took the envelope by the tip of one corner and held it in the blaze until it was burned to his fingers--no writing was disclosed.

"Now the letter, please?" she directed. And when Carpenter would have protested, she cut him short with a peremptory gesture. "Don't interrupt, sir!" she exclaimed.

And Carpenter laughed softly and did nothing more--being, with Harleston, in enjoyment of their chief's discomfiture.

"The letter--see--your Excellency," she repeated with a bewildering smile.

And as the flame crept down the thin sheet, just ahead of it, apparent to them all, crept also the writing, brought out by the heat. In a moment it was over; the last bit of the corner burning in a bra.s.s tray where the Secretary had dropped it.

"Now, Mr. Harleston," said Madeline Spencer, lowering her revolver as the final flicker of the flame expired, "I am ready to submit to a search."

Harleston glanced inquiringly at the Secretary.

"The lady is with you," the Secretary remarked with a sigh of relief.

"Very well, sir," said Harleston. "Ranleigh has a skilled woman in the waiting-room, she will officiate in the matter. We're not likely to find anything, but it's to provide against the chance."--And turning to Madeline Spencer: "Whatever the outcome, madame, you will leave Was.h.i.+ngton tonight and sail from New York on the morrow; and I should advise you to remain abroad so long as you are in the Diplomatic Service."

And she--knowing very well that the search was necessary, and aware that while there was nothing incriminating upon her yet from that moment, until the s.h.i.+p that carried her pa.s.sed out to sea, she would be under close espionage--answered, pleasantly as though accepting a courtesy tendered, and with a winning smile:

"I had arranged to sail tomorrow, Mr. Harleston so it will be just as intended. Meanwhile, I'm at the service of your female a.s.sistant. She will find nothing, I a.s.sure you."

"Give me the pleasure of conducting you to her," Harleston replied, and swung open the door.

"If Mrs. Clephane will trust you with me," she inflected, flouting the other with a meaning look; which look flitted across the room to the Secretary and changed to one of interrogation as it met his eyes--calm eyes and steady, and with never a trace of the interest that she knew was behind them, yet dared not show--yet awhile.

And Mrs. Clephane answered her look by a shrug; and Harleston answered that to the Secretary by a soft chuckle. As the door closed behind them, he remarked:

"At a more propitious time."

To which she responded:

"Which time may never come." Then she held out her hand. "Good-bye, Guy," she smiled.

"Good-bye, Madeline," said he; "and good luck another time--with other opponents."

"And we'll call this--"

"A stale-mate! I didn't win everything, yet what I lost was of no moment--"