Scherer was determined to find out all about her. He knew that Paula
Linke was not her real name, and the information bureau to which he
applied was soon able to give him further particulars. Her father
was a Pole by birth, had been naturalized a German, and had been
vice-consul in Macedonia some twenty years ago. Rumour had it that
he was a merchant and a dealer in furs. But according to another
report he was a savant with private means, and had spent much of his
time in exploring out-of-the-way parts of the world. He was now
living in England. Diana herself had recently come from Italy, had
been engaged in manifold activities, had worked in various
institutions, had been a librarian. Her movements were even traced
to a riding school in Munich where she had apparently given lessons
in horsemanship. Three years ago she had been in this very town for
a few months in the company of a certain countess, had been
entertained by the Automobile Club, had been a competitor at the
regatta, and was supposed to have spent one summer at a country house
in Masuria.
Scherer's experience as a man of business had taught him that inquiry
agents, when stumped for accurate information, are wont to spin fairy
tales. He therefore chose to believe about half of this budget, and
it was enough for him to know that the report contained nothing
scandalous. As man of the world he exercised the utmost care in
regard to his private life, avoiding intimacy with persons whose
acquaintance was thrust upon him, and who he considered might be
useful to him. He felt amply rewarded when his affairs in this field
ran smoothly. On the other hand, as financier, he penetrated into
alcoves, private clubs, and bedchambers, for he knew that more money
was lost in such places than on the Stock Exchange.
He had been led to make his inquiries because he was possessed of the
idea of utilizing Diana's services for a special mission, a mission
for which her qualities made her particularly suitable. Every day
brought him fresh surprises as to her abilities. He would constantly
put her to new tests, would engage her in discussion of the political
issues predominant in the countries they were at the moment chiefly
concerned with; would ask questions whose answers he himself knew
perfectly well; gave answers which he knew to be incorrect. He did
not put these tests in any spirit of mockery; indeed, his respect for
this woman's intelligence grew from day to day.
At the same time, both were careful to preserve the integrity of
their business footing, and their precautions in this were all the
greater in proportion as his information assumed a more confidential
character. Scherer was pleased to note her aloofness, was delighted
with the way in which she deliberately closed all the avenues to a
more intimate approach. Yet as man of the world he could not ignore
the investigatory gaze of this woman who concealed her inner self
behind a veil of silence, while probing him to the core. It was her
capacity for judging men and things (a capacity which he felt her
exercising in regard to himself with just as fine a penetration as in
respect of other personalities) which led him to consolidate his
plans.
Yet this man who was bold enough to play with fate, scarcely realized
that the magnetic spell of a woman was driving him, all unconscious,
into ventures which, though they were not in Eros's realm, might
prove no less hazardous in other fields than love.
Diana guessed his plans. She knew that he had big financial
interests in the East. So much she had gathered from reports, from
letters dealing with company and banking concerns, about which she
was occasionally consulted--not always, of course, for she was not
Scherer's secretary. "He'll need me down there," she thought,
"perhaps he's going to send me...." When, after a while, she
realized that he could not dispense with her services, she slipped
him into the general machinery of her existence, and started to
reckon upon him as a factor in her life, doing so all the more coolly
seeing that she was not stirred by him as a man. The days following
that night of the opera flowed peacefully by. When she entered her
room late on the following day, she found a bunch of white carnations
awaiting her. Despite the ill success of his advances, the major
could not refrain from celebrating this happy meeting by sending her
the loveliest flowers he could find. He was also influenced in his
choice by the recollection of all that similar white carnations had
meant to him one winter day in a snow-storm. At that time they had
been her favourite flowers. His note ran:
"Don't be angry with me. Require of me that I await a sign from you,
but do not ask me to take you at your word, for that would rob me of
all hope of renewing the most beautiful days of my life. You have
fresh conquests to record, the homage of young men and old in the
East and in the West. I am turning grey, you saw as much quite
clearly when I bent to kiss your lovely hand and that infernal lamp
blazed down on me. You are more blooming than ever. I have asked
you to share my life and my name. True, my request was bluntly made;
I am nothing but a soldier. You have refused me. But I beg you to
remember that I shall always look upon myself as your friend. I
trust you to give me a chance to be of use to you. Believe me, in
any danger that may arise, your unchangeable
"FELIX."
To which she replied:
"Your white carnations are as lovely today as those you gave me years
ago. Thank you. I may be leaving before long. It would be nice to
take a drive somewhere together. You will be my first thought if
ever danger arises.
"DIANA."
As she slipped the note into its envelope and addressed it to him in
his new rank, she thought of all the talks they had enjoyed together,
talks which had lured him from his humdrum regimental occupations to
put his gifts to finer uses, talks which had plucked him from the
morass of stereotyped adventures, and, by stimulating his ambition,
had led him to more intellectual spheres of activity. "----, Major
on the General Staff." Surely that was better than an order, a
prize-cup for good horsemanship, or the daily billet-doux in the
scented envelope.
Diana loathed the idea of being a "general purveyor of happiness."
For her, kindness was not a law unto itself, a regulative principle
residing freely within her. Nay, rather, was it apprehended in a
lively understanding of things, and was, therefore, easier to lavish
upon animals and plants than upon mankind, for in the initial stages
of her acquaintance with human beings her combative instinct was
invariably aroused. Yet she had ever an urgent inclination towards
spurring on to the utmost the individuals with whom she came into
contact, and to this task she devoted herself with all the powers of
a lively imagination, cultivating it as a fine art.
She glanced from the letter to the flowers and back. Then she smiled
as she pondered the reasons for her brother's silence, for he had
made no move. Sidney was of an undemonstrative temperament, in
absolute contrast to the open-hearted candour of the major. This
quality in her brother was an echo of her own character; like her, he
was reluctant to show off his knowledge, preferred to withhold at
least a portion for his own intimate use, to have reserves in his
battle with the world. She knew that he, too, enjoyed observing
others while himself remaining unobserved. These cogitations aroused
a half-maternal sense of responsibility for Sidney, a feeling that
had slumbered in her heart for years since she had first realized all
the peril that life held for a man of his disposition. Thinking of
him made her wish to find him.
"He must belong to some club or other," she mused. "He could not
live without his club! There are four hundred clubs in the telephone
book, I'll have to engage a messenger boy to find out the one Sidney
belongs to...."
Her inquiry was not successful, and she was left troubled in her
mind; for his appearance the other night, his handsome face, his
elegance, showed him to be a man of leisure and of means. This
seemed to her, in view of his youth, to be full of dangerous
possibilities. She must, indeed, find his whereabouts.