"The veiled Métropole Nemesis was to see the sentry today....
She seemed to be quite happy about something and looked up in the
direction of my window a number of times.... She was eating some of
those champagne-colored rose leaves that are crystallized by the firm
of Demitrof at Moscow and sold as confections to the ladies of the
Court!... What does it mean?... Furthermore, if that _sentry_ is not
the same man who acted as valet to Prince Galitzyn at Monte Carlo when
Delcassé, Grey and Galitzyn (otherwise "Count Techlow") were gliding
about the Grand Hôtel de Londres!
"The mystery is solved....
"That Métropole woman was the companion to Countess C---- at the
Nouvel Hôtel Louvre the day I met her at Monte Carlo!... and this man
was the _same_ fellow she was supping her café Turc and smoking her
Medijeh cigarettes with out on the Terrace Gardens of the Hôtel de
Londres the night I was waiting for an American millionaire to break
away from the Hungarian noblewoman at the table decorated with La
France roses and the same kind of roses pinned to her corsage.... The
American, if he ever sees this in print, will remember the lady with
the wonderful jewels flashing from her wrists and neck and whom the
man with the Boulanger moustache at the adjoining table was trying
hard to flirt with ... the same dark-eyed Juno that same American
met in the Salle des Étrangers at the Casino, the following day about
noon.... Well, that is the connection!... But I did not observe that
that wonderful lady wore any large SAPPHIRE that night ... nor when
she changed her quarters from the _Nouvel_ to the _London_ did she
need any such jewelry to have all the spendthrifts of Europe at her
feet.... If she was a 'Princess' then I was completely fooled....
I never saw a real Princess, except _Eulalia_, who knew how to be
democratic enough to select an American for a quiet exchange of ideas
... the rest, no matter how desperately they may want to be free from
Court _restraint_ and bodyguards, remind me of the poor little caged
girls at the Convent of the Sacred Heart at Seville!... Well, so
my captors have some connection with the Countess C----([Cszecheny]
Chechany)--with the Tolna Festetics of Hungary.... And this is
_strange_, for I had surmised that SHE, at least, would be _friendly_
to MY mission, if she knows anything at all about its origin.... _She_
should _aid_ me to reach Odessa instead of having me sandbagged and
cooped up here in this Soviet cage.... I'm certain this Métropole lady
is a TRAITOR to the Countess now, and will have me murdered if I don't
produce that sapphire of the princess."