"Don't you trust me?"

"You, yes; but your agents, no." He smiled.

"You should go far with the daring with which you push your fortunes."

"Probably I shall go on till my head falls by the wayside," I answered.

I was utterly reckless now. But my tactics succeeded when nothing else could have won.

He took a form and wrote.

"Here is the permit for her to leave the country. It is yours--on conditions."

"What are they? Never mind what they are," I added, quickly. "I accept them in advance. Save that girl, who is innocent, and do what you like with me."

"Do you know what I ought to do with you?" he asked.

"Yes; better than you do. Write me a permit also and have me conducted to the frontier at the same time. But I don't know what you think you should do."

"I ought to write out a very different order and have you both sent straight to the Mallovitch yonder; and let things take their course."

"Well, it's fortunate for me then," I replied, with a laugh, "that your interest and your judgment pull different ways. You won't do that, Prince."

"How do I know that you are not a Nihilist?"

"Instinct, judgment, knowledge of men, knowledge of me--everything.

Besides, if you want proof, no one knows better than yourself that a cipher telegram sent to London, and inquiries made in half a dozen places that I can mention, will put ample proofs in your hands to shew who I am. So far as I know there's one man in Russia at the present moment and actually coming to Moscow, who'll stir up the British Legation and every British consulate in the country to the search for Hamylton Tregethner. That's the Hon. Rupert Balestier." Then I told him what had happened in Paris. At first he smiled, but soon grew thoughtful again.

"I warn you, too," I added, when he made no answer, "that if you chop my head off or stifle me in one of your infernal prisons, or send me packing to Siberia, Balestier is just the man to raise a devil of a clatter. And you don't want a row with our Foreign Office just at the moment when things are so ticklish with the Sick Man."

He waved his hand as if to put all such considerations away from him.

"If the girl you call your sister had got away, did you mean to try to escape?"

"Certainly I did," replied I, frankly, and I told him the scheme I had formed.

"And now?"

"If I give my word I shall keep it. You Russians never seem to think a man will keep his parole to his own disadvantage. We English think differently--and act as we think."

"If we postpone this talk till to-morrow, have I your word that you'll make no attempt to escape?"

"No, indeed, you haven't. Let this girl go at once; then you can have it and welcome."

"You seem to forget that I can keep you under guard?"

"I forget nothing of the kind. Clap me into a prison and you may whistle for anyone to carry out--to do what you wish. You can decide now, or lose the option. That's in the rules of a game like this."

"You carry things with a high hand," he cried angrily.

"Most probably I shouldn't be here if I didn't," said I, with a laugh.

"It's my advantage to force the pace at this juncture; and the risk's too big to throw away a single chance."

He made no reply, but pushing back his chair got up and walked about the room, in a state of indecision absolutely foreign to his character and habits.

I knew how momentous the decision was. If I were the dangerous Nihilist that Paula Tueski had declared, the risk of letting me free and entrusting to me such a task as that we had discussed was critical and deadly. The Russian instinct was to clap me into a gaol and be done with me; but the personal feeling pulled him in the other direction--to use me for a tool in the project that was all in all to him. With the Grand Duke once out of his path there was nothing between him and almost absolute rule.

I watched him with an anxiety he little suspected, for my manner was studiously careless, indifferent, and reckless.

"Did you give this girl any particular task if she escaped?" he asked, stopping suddenly in his walk close to me.

"Certainly; to find Rupert Balestier, tell him of my position, and get him to try and smooth away the difficulties. I had also arranged how she could communicate with and find me if I managed to get away."

He took the answer as I gave it with perfect frankness, and it seemed to help his decision. He resumed his pacing backwards and forwards.

Two or three minutes later he stopped his walk and taking the permit he had written held it out to me.

"Will you give me your word as an English gentleman that if I give you this and allow the girl to leave Russia, you will make no attempt to escape, and will go on with the proposal we have discussed?"

It was my turn to hesitate now.

"No, I cannot," I said after a moment's thought. "An Englishman cannot lend himself out as an a.s.sa.s.sin, Prince Bilba.s.soff. I will do this. I will give you my word of honour not to attempt to leave Russia, and if a meeting between the Grand Duke and myself can be arranged without dishonour to me, I pledge myself to meet him. I will never take that word back unless you release me; but more I cannot do. Let Olga Petrovitch go, and you shall do as you will with me."

"I take your word," he said, quietly. "Your ident.i.ty will remain unknown. Your sister will leave for the frontier under escort at midnight. You can take the news to her, and she can leave with you to make her arrangements for departure. I hold you responsible for her; and you will explain only what is necessary to her. You remain a Russian."

And with the permit and the order for her instant release in my hand I left him, conscious that I had been brushing my back against a dungeon door the whole time and had only just escaped finding myself on the wrong side of it.

CHAPTER XXV.

COILS THAT NO MAN COULD BREAK.

Poor Olga! I shall not easily forget the effect the news had on her.

I went out from the interview impregnated with the conviction that I was now indeed hopelessly baffled. I saw how completely the whole position had been changed. The very axis had shifted. And the knowledge that I had to make Olga understand it all before she left Russia was more unpalatable and depressing than I can describe.

Up to the present moment there had indeed been the slight off-chance that we should both escape, and the knowledge that if we could only do so, we might find happiness in another country. But that hope was as dead as a coffin nail. I was bound to Moscow by a shackle more powerful than iron fetters. I had pledged myself not to attempt to go until the Prince himself had given me permission; and I knew that he would never think of doing this until the duel had been in some way arranged. On the other hand the Nihilist attack on the Emperor was to be made in two days' time. If it succeeded an ignominious death at the hands of the law could be the only result for me; while if it failed, death was almost as certain at the hands of the Nihilists who would adjudge me their betrayer.

Between the upper and nether millstones I was helpless; certain only of being crushed by them. Thus nothing could make me believe that I should ever again set eyes on the woman whose release I had thus secured and whom I now loved with all my heart.

Nor could I part from her without allowing her to see something of this.

She was indeed so quick to appreciate the meaning of what I told her, that all the sweet pleasure and gladness she shewed when welcoming me changed in a moment to sadness.

"I would ten thousand times rather not go," she said. "I do not care what they do to me. I have brought you into this, and it is me they should punish," she said more than once.

"But you can't do what this man wants, Olga," said I with a smile, to rea.s.sure her. "If you could, he would probably let me go and hold on to you. If I couldn't, he would hold on to us both. But you must go for this reason. You must find Balestier and tell him to come here.