Chapter XVII: The Droshky Driver

Inside were two officials busily engaged in a systematic search of my effects. Truly the secret police had lost no time!

I had already decided on the attitude I must adopt. It was improbable that they would arrest me openly; that would have involved trouble with the Embassies, but they could, if they chose, conduct me to the frontier or give me twenty-four hours' notice to quit Russia, as they had to Von Eckhardt, and that was the very last thing I desired just now.

"Good evening, gentlemen," I said amiably. "You seem to be pretty busy here. Can I give you any assistance?"

I spoke in French, as I didn't want to air my Russian for their edification, though I had improved a good deal in it.

One of them, who seemed boss, looked up and said brusquely, though not exactly uncivilly: "Ah, Monsieur, you have returned somewhat sooner than we expected. We have a warrant to search your apartment."

"That's all right; pray continue, though I give you my word you won't find anything treasonable. I'm a foreigner, as of course you know; and I haven't the least wish or intention to mix myself up with Russian affairs."

"And yet you correspond with the Grand Duke Loris," he said dryly.

"I don't!" I answered promptly. "I've never written a line to that gentleman in my life, nor he to me."

"There are other ways of corresponding than by writing," he retorted. I guessed I had been watched to the cafe after all, but I maintained an air of innocent unconcern, and, after all, his remark might be merely a "feeler." I rather think now that it was. One can never be sure how much the Russian Secret Police do, or do not, know; and one of their pet tricks is to bluff people into giving themselves away.

So I ignored his remark, selected a cigarette, and, seeing that he had just finished his--I've wondered sometimes if a Russian official sleeps with a cigarette between his lips, for I fear he wouldn't sleep comfortably without!--handed him the case, with an apology for my remissness. He accepted both the apology and the cigarette, and looked at me hard.

"I said, Monsieur, that there are other ways of corresponding than by writing!" he repeated with emphasis.

"Of course there are," I assented cheerfully. "But I don't see what that has to do with me in the present instance. I only know the Grand Duke very slightly. I was hurt in that railway accident last month, and his Highness was good enough to order one of his servants to look after me; and he also called to see me at an hotel in Dunaburg. I thought it very condescending of him. Though I don't suppose I'd have the chance of meeting him again, as there are no Court festivities now; or if there are, we outsiders aren't invited to them. Won't your friend accept one of my cigarettes?"

This was addressed to the other man, who seemed to be doing all the work, and was puzzling over some pencil notes in English which he had picked out of my waste-paper basket. They were the draft of my yesterday's despatch to the _Courier_, a perfectly innocuous communication that I had sent openly; it didn't matter whether it arrived at its destination or not. As I have said, Petersburg was quiet to stagnation just now; though one never knew when the material for some first-class sensational copy might turn up.

"I'll translate that for you right now, if you like," I said politely. "Or you can take it away with you!"

I think they were both baffled by my apparent candor and nonchalance; but the man who was bossing the show returned to the charge persistently.

"Ah, that railway accident. Yes. But surely you have made a slight mistake, Monsieur? You incurred your injuries, from which, I perceive, you have so happily recovered."

He bowed, and I bowed. If I hadn't known all that lay behind, this exchange of words and courtesy--a kind of fencing, with both of us pretending that the buttons were on the foils--would have tickled me immensely. Even as it was I could appreciate the funny side of it. I was playing a part in a comedy,--a grim comedy, a mere interlude in tragedy,--but still comic.

"You incurred these, I say, not in the accident, but while gallantly defending the Grand Duke from the dastards who assailed him later!"

I worked up a modest blush; or I tried to.

"I see that it is useless to attempt to conceal anything from you, Monsieur; you know too much!" I confessed, laughing. "But I'm a modest man; besides, I didn't do very much, and his Highness seemed quite capable of taking care of himself."

I saw a queer glint in his eyes, and I guessed then that the attempt on the life of the Grand Duke had been engineered by the police themselves, and not, as I had first imagined, by the revolutionists.

My antagonist waved his hand with an airy gesture of protestation.

"You underrate your services, Monsieur Wynn! I wonder if you would have devoted them so readily to his Highness if--"

He paused portentously.

"If?" I inquired blandly. "Do have another cigarette!"

"If you had known of his connection with the woman who is known as _La Mort_?"

That wasn't precisely what he said. I don't choose to write the words in any language; but I wanted to knock his yellow teeth down his throat; to choke the life out of him for the vile suggestion his words contained! I dared not look at him; my eyes would have betrayed everything that he was seeking to discover. I looked at the end of the cigarette I was lighting, and wondered how I managed to steady the hand that held the match.

"I really do not understand you!" I asserted blandly.

"Perhaps you may know her as Anna Petrovna?" he suggested.

"Anna Petrovna!" I repeated. "Now, that's the second time to-day I've heard the lady's name; and I can't think why you gentlemen should imagine it means anything to me. Who is she, anyhow?"

I looked at him now, fair and square; met and held the gimlet gaze of his eyes with one of calm, interested inquiry. We were fighting a duel, to which a mere physical fight is child's play; and--I meant to win!

"You do not know?" he asked.

"I do not; though I'd like to. The officer at the bureau this morning--I don't suppose I need tell you that I was arrested and detained for a time--seemed to think I should know her; but he wouldn't give me any information. You've managed to rouse my curiosity pretty smartly between you!"

"I fear it must remain unsatisfied, Monsieur, so far as I am concerned," he said suavely. "Well, we will relieve you of our presence. I congratulate you on the admirable order in which you keep your papers."

His subordinate had risen, with an expressive shrug of his shoulders. I knew their search must be futile, since I had fortunately destroyed Mary Cayley's letter the day I received it; and there was nothing among my papers referring either directly or indirectly to Anne.

"You'll want to see this, of course," I suggested, tendering my passport. He glanced through it perfunctorily, and handed it back with a ceremonious bow. So far as manners went, he certainly was an improvement on the official at the bureau; and of course he already knew that my personal papers were all right.

He gave me a courteous "good evening," and the other man, who hadn't uttered a syllable the whole time, saluted me in silence. I heard one of them give an order to the guards outside, and then the heavy tramp of their feet descending the staircase.

I started tidying up; it would help to pass the time until I might expect some message from the Grand Duke. Mishka had said nine o'clock, and it was not yet seven.

Presently there came a knock at my door. I wondered if this might be another police visitation; but it was only one of the hotel servants to say a droshky driver was below, demanding to see me. He produced a dirty scrap of paper with my name and address scrawled on it, which the man had brought. I thought at once of the man who had driven me in the morning, and wondered how on earth he got my name and address. I was sure it must be he when I heard that he declared "the excellency had told him to call for payment." This was awkward; the fellow must be another police spy, probably doing a bit of blackmailing on his own account. Well, I'd better see him, anyhow. I told the man to bring him up.

"He is a dangerous looking fellow," he demurred.

"That's my lookout and not yours," I said. "If he wants to see me he's got to come up. I'm certainly not going down to him."

He went off unwillingly, and a minute or two later returned, showing in my queer visitor, a big burly chap who seemed civil and harmless enough.

I didn't think at first sight he was the man who drove me, but they all look so much alike in their filthy greatcoats and low-crowned hats. He had a big grizzled beard and a thatch of matted hair, from which his little swinish eyes peered out with a leer. Yes, he looked exactly like any other of his class, but--

As he entered behind the servant, touched his greasy hat, and growled a guttural greeting, he opened his eyes full and looked at me for barely a second, but it was sufficient.

"Oh, it is you, Ivan; why didn't you send your name up?" I said roughly. "How much is it I owe you? Here, wait a minute; as you are here, you can take a message for me. Wait here while I write it. It's all right; I know the fellow," I added to the servant. "You needn't wait."

He went out, and for a minute my visitor and I stood silently regarding each other. His disguise was perfect; I should never have penetrated it but for the warning he had flashed from those bright blue eyes, that now, leering and nearly closed, looked dark and pig-like again.

The droshky driver was the Grand Duke Loris himself.