Tellier Takes a Hand
The Prince continued his walk to the limits of the beach, with Jax
trotting humbly at his heels; then he returned slowly to the hotel and
mounted to his apartment.
"That will do, Glück," he said, as he gave him his hat and gloves.
"Don't let me be disturbed."
And Glück, with his imperturbable mahogany face, silently withdrew to
mount guard without the door.
The Prince sat down, lighted a cigarette, and stared moodily out of the
window, down upon the shifting crowd which still thronged the beach. His
hand, hanging inert by his side, became suddenly the receptacle for a
moist nose.
"Ah, Jax; and did she pat you on the head, old boy?" he asked. "And are
you properly proud?"
Jax wiggled his remnant of a tail.
"Would you like to belong to her, Jax, and get patted every day? Yet she
wouldn't take you--snapped me off short as that stump of yours when I
offered you to her. Why was that, Jax?"
Jax couldn't say, not being familiar with the ways of fair Americans,
and the Prince patted him softly on his nobbly crown.
"Just the same, she was a beauty, Jax; slim, straight, full of fire--a
thoroughbred; and with a sense of humour, my dear, which you will find
in not many women. Did you notice her cheeks, Jax, and her eyes? But of
course not; you were very properly grovelling before her. And I owe you
eternal gratitude, old boy; but for you, I'd have stalked past without
seeing her. That would have been a pity, wouldn't it?"
There was a knock at the door and Glück's head appeared.
"I thought I told you," began the Prince--
"Your Highness will pardon me," explained Glück, quickly, "but there is
a man here who insists that Your Highness will see him."
"Who is he?"
"This is his card, Your Highness," and Glück entered the room. "I have
sent it back once, saying that Your Highness was not to be disturbed. He
returned it, insisting--"
Markeld took the card, glanced at it, and read:
_"M. André Tellier, Paris. Agent du Service de Sûreté"_
Beneath this was a pencilled line--"Concerning the question of the
succession."
The Prince stared at it a moment in some astonishment, not unmixed with
irritation. What could this fellow know concerning the succession? It
was most probably simply an impertinence. The Paris police were famous
for impertinences.
Glück started for the door; since his master's boyhood, he had watched
over him, attended him--he could read his countenance like an open book.
The Prince glanced up.
"Where are you going?" he demanded.
"I go to tell the imbecile that Your Highness will not see him,"
responded Glück, impassively, his hand on the knob.
The Prince smiled. He had a great fondness for his old retainer.
"Wait," he said. "We must not permit ourselves to be governed by first
impressions, nor swayed by prejudice. It is just possible that this
fellow has something to tell me which I ought to hear. I can't afford to
disregard any chance. So inform M. Tellier that I will see him," and he
lighted a fresh cigarette resignedly.
As he watched the smoke turn gray in the sunlight, it suddenly occurred
to him that, in some unaccountable manner, the question of the
succession had receded somewhat into the background; it no longer seemed
to him of such overwhelming consequence; at least, he had not been
thinking of it a moment before, but of something very different--
There appeared at the door a figure which drew a stare of surprise from
Markeld, accustomed as he was to eccentric habiliment. It was arrayed in
a long, mouse-gray frock coat and shiny black trousers; a hand gloved in
lavender kid carried a top hat, while the other caressed, from time to
time, the carefully-waxed mustachios and imperial adorning a countenance
which was a singular mixture of craft and vanity. The little eyes were
half-concealed under drooping, baggy lids, the nose was long and sharp,
the lips very thin and severe, though at this moment parted in a smile
meant to be ingratiating. The figure entered and bowed profoundly,
disclosing Glück's disgusted face in the doorway.
"Monsieur Tellier?" asked the Prince.
Tellier bowed again, and the Prince noticed the white line of scalp
leading, with geometrical precision, from the brow to the bald spot on
the crown, and then on down the back of the head. It reminded him,
somehow, of the Lake of Constance, with the Rhine flowing through it.
"You have something to communicate?" he continued, repressing a smile.
"Something of the first importance, Your Highness," said the Frenchman;
"otherwise I should not have taken the liberty of disturbing Your
Highness."
"Very well," and the Prince motioned him to a chair. "Sit down. I shall
be glad to hear you."
"It is something," said the Frenchman, with a glance at the open door,
"which should be communicated, if Your Highness please, in confidence."
"Glück, shut the door," commanded the Prince. "Now, my dear sir,
proceed."
"Your Highness is, of course, aware," began the detective, sitting down
with a back very straight, and drooping his lids until his eyes were
almost closed, "that France is deeply interested in this question of the
succession, and that its sympathies are wholly with Prince Ferdinand,
the cousin of Your Highness, and whom, I understand, Your Highness
represents."
Markeld nodded.
"We should naturally expect France's sympathy," he said.
"France," proclaimed Tellier, raising his chin proudly, "is always on
the side of justice and decency."
"More especially," continued the Prince, drily, "when the Emperor of
Germany happens to be on the other side. Come now, confess--if the
Emperor were for us, you would be against us--is it not so?"
Tellier permitted the faintest shadow of a smile to flicker across his
lips.
"Your Highness speaks with a bluntness disconcerting," he said,
deprecatingly.
"I wished merely to clear the air," said the Prince, "and to prick at
the outset the bubble with which you were trying to dazzle me. Let me
assure you that we thoroughly understand France's attitude in this
matter. She is on our side simply because she sees an opportunity of
humiliating, through us, an old enemy."
"'At least," said Tellier, "Your Highness agrees that we are on your
side--the reasons for this attitude do not concern me. I only know that
we are anxious to do all we can to help Your Highnesses cause.
Consequently, when it was learned that Lord Vernon was coming to this
place, the Department of State, fearing some duplicity, asked that a
competent man be sent here to--to--"
"Keep an eye out for developments," said the Prince, seeing that the
other hesitated for a word, "and to watch for an opportunity of forcing
England's hand."
"Precisely, Your Highness; and my superiors did me the honour of
selecting me for this delicate task."
"A wise choice, I do not doubt," said the Prince, gravely. That Tellier
had any important revelation to make he did not in the least believe;
but there seemed a chance of extracting some amusement from the
situation--and time was hanging heavily on his hands--would hang
heavily until the hour of the promenade to-morrow.
"I hope to prove it so, Your Highness!" cried the detective, flushing
with pleasure at the compliment. "In fact, I think that I may say I
have already proved it so!"
"Ah!" said the Prince, and lighted another cigarette.
"I arrived soon after Your Highness; I took a wagon from Zunderburg,
rather than lose precious time by waiting for the train of this
afternoon. I was very weary, for the journey from Paris is a trying one;
but before seeking repose, indeed without even permitting myself to
think of my own fatigue, I ascertained that Lord Vernon occupied
apartment A de luxe, and Your Highness apartment B de luxe, in this
hotel."
"Indeed!" said the Prince.
"I naturally took care at once to secure a room here, since it was of
the first importance that I should be in a position to see everything
that might occur."
"Naturally," agreed the Prince.
"Though it was very difficult, since every room was taken. For another
man, it would have been impossible."
"But for you, I see, nothing is impossible," observed the Prince.
"Very few things, Your Highness," agreed Tellier, modestly. "In this
case I had but to speak a single word," and he paused with an air of
triumph.
"Wonderful!" cried the Prince, and clapped his hands softly. "Some day I
must get you to teach me that word. It must be very useful. Well, what
next?"
"An hour's rest," Tellier continued, "and I was myself again. I soon
made the acquaintance of a chamber-maid--a girl who keeps her eyes
open--and I learned many things--"
"It was not to tell me them that you came here, I trust," interposed the
Prince. "I care little for backstairs gossip."
"Oh, not at all! As Your Highness says, they would, most probably, not
interest you. But to one in my profession, no fact is uninteresting; no
occurrence is too trivial to be noticed."
"Well, get on to your story, then," said the Prince, with some
impatience.
"Just after luncheon today, Your Highness walked on the beach," said
Tellier, "accompanied by the dog yonder."
Jax growled softly as he caught the Frenchman's eye, which pleased him
no more than it had Glück.
"That is true," agreed the Prince. "What of it?"
"The dog attacked a small spaniel, which sought refuge with two ladies,
one of whom picked it up."
"All ancient history, I assure you, Monsieur Tellier. Yet, wait a
moment. Do you happen to know who the ladies were?"
"They are sisters," said Tellier. "Their name is Rushford; their father
is a tall American, who incessantly smokes a cigar and reads a
newspaper in the office of the hotel. If Your Highness wishes, I can
make further inquiries."
"Not at all!" cried the Prince, violently. "I won't countenance such
impertinence! Go on with the story."
Tellier bowed to indicate the most implicit obedience.
"It happened that I was near by," he said, "at the moment of the
encounter. I had taken my stand near a large beach-chair, which, for
reasons, interested me. I was nonchalant, impassive; alert, without
seeming to be so. Many of the women passing I had met upon the
boulevards under circumstances the most peculiar; concerning many of the
men I knew more than they would wish the world to know. Seeing me
standing there, some of them turned pale, others grew red with emotion.
Some went by endeavouring to appear not to have seen me; others threw
me appealing glances. Never, by the quiver of a lash, did I show that I
recognised them. I stood and waited--like the Sphinx."
"For what?" inquired the Prince, whose sense of humour had returned to
him.
"For the dénouement, Your Highness. I knew that, sooner or later, it
would come. I knew it could not escape me, Tellier--the evidence of
duplicity which I was seeking."
"But," objected the Prince, "what duplicity can there be? If Lord Vernon
is ill--"
"Your Highness will pardon me for interrupting; but much depends upon
that 'if.' If, on the other hand, the illness is only for the moment
assumed--"
"Oh, nonsense!" cried Markeld. "What reason could he have for assuming
illness? That would be childish!"
The Frenchman smiled a self-satisfied smile, as he softly caressed his
imperial, and his little eyes glowed with anticipated triumph.
"Let us deal with the facts first, if Your Highness will permit, and
with reasons afterwards. I was, then, standing by the chair in the
attitude which I have described, when your dog appeared and attacked the
spaniel. As the young lady stooped and picked it up, your dog sprang
against her, frightening her so that she cried aloud."
"And you stood by without offering to assist her?" demanded the Prince,
with some indignation.
"There was no need, Your Highness," responded Tellier, easily. "In the
first place, she was, of course, in no real danger. In the second place,
I perceived instantly that fate was playing into my hands. In fact, the
incident could not have been more à propos if it had been arranged by my
guardian angel. For from the chair beside which I was stationed a man
sprang out and kicked the dog away. Your Highness must have remarked his
agility and strength--may even have seen his face."
"No," said the Prince. "I was not near enough to see it distinctly."
"I saw it, Your Highness, very distinctly, and I assure you that it was
that of a man in the full enjoyment of health. Even from his agility,
Your Highness could doubtless judge whether the man was seriously ill."
The Prince hitched about in his chair a little impatiently. He was
beginning to find the Frenchman tedious.
"Most certainly he was not seriously ill," he agreed; "nor, I should
say, even slightly so. What is that to me? Pray have done with this
mystery!"
Tellier's face was glowing with all a Frenchman's pride in a coup de
théâtre--his moment of triumph had arrived.
"Of all the eyes which witnessed that episode, seemingly so slight and
so unimportant," he said, proudly, "mine were the only ones which saw
its full significance. Your Highness will, no doubt, be surprised when I
inform you that this gentleman, so agile and so athletic, was no other
than Lord Vernon!"