"I"ll sit down for a month, if you"re--"
"_Ergo! Ergo!_" she reminded him.
"I had not gotten used to the unusual restriction" he exclaimed. "You"re the first woman ever I met or heard of who dislikes compliments."
"I don"t dislike compliments, Mr. Harleston; but compliments, it seems, are given in diplomacy for a purpose; and as I don"t understand anything of diplomacy we would better cut them out--until we have finished with diplomacy. Then you may offer as many as you like, and I"ll believe them or not as I"m minded."
"Have it as you wish!" he smiled, looking into the brown eyes with frank admiration.
"Compliments may be conveyed by looks as well as by words," she reproved.
"But of the feeling that prompts the look you can be in no doubt.
Moreover, a look is silent."
"Nonsense," said she. "Besides, I want to ask you a favour. You see, I"m prepared to go out--and I want you to go with me. Will you do it?"
"It will have to be mightily against my conscience to make me refuse _you_," Harleston replied.
"I"m glad you recognize a conscience," she remarked.
"I refer to my diplomatic conscience."
"And a diplomatic conscience is a minus quant.i.ty," she observed.
"What is it you would of me, dear lady?" he asked.
"I would that you should go with me to the French Amba.s.sador, and help me to explain the--now don"t say you won"t, Mr. Harleston--"
"My dear Mrs. Clephane, it is--" he began.
"It is _not_ impossible!" she declared. "Why won"t you do it?"
"For your sake as well as for my own," he explained. "America and France are not working together in this matter, and for me to accompany you would result simply in your being obliged to explain _me_ as well as the letter, besides leading to endless complications and countless suspicions. Didn"t I expound this last evening?"
"You did--also much more; but I"ve thought over it almost the whole night, and I simply must get this miserable letter off my mind. Perhaps Mrs. Spencer has forestalled me with the Amba.s.sador and has given him such a tale as will insure my being shown the door; nevertheless I"ll risk it."
"Why don"t you get in communication with your friend Madame Durrand,"
Harleston suggested "and have her, if she hasn"t done so already, identify you to the Marquis?"
"I shall, if the Marquis is sceptical. I"ll admit that I"m pitiably foolish, but I don"t want Mrs. Durrand to know how I"ve bungled her matter until the bungle is corrected."
"I can quite understand," said Harleston gently.
"Oh, I know you are right," she murmured, "yet I"m afraid to go alone."
"Take some other friend with you; some well-known man who can vouch for your ident.i.ty."
"I know no one in Washington except the friends at the Sh.o.r.eham, and they are not residents here."
"Are you acquainted with any prominent woman?"
"No! I"ve lived in Europe for years--and while I have met over there women from Washington it"s been only casually. They won"t recollect me, any more than I would them, for purposes of vouchment or identification."
"Then go alone."
"I will. It is the right thing to do. Yesterday I was thinking that you had the letter and could return it to me. I waited. Today I can appreciate your reason for withholding it--likewise the necessity for me to go to the Amba.s.sador with my story. And I shall tell him the _whole_ story; he may believe it or not as he is inclined. I"m only a volunteer in this affair, and I"ve decided that for me the course of discretion and frank honesty is much wiser than silently fighting back.
Furthermore, it does not estop me from fighting the Spencer gang."
"You have made a wise decision," Harleston commented. "Tell the Amba.s.sador, and be quit of the affair--and don"t fight the Spencer gang, Mrs. Clephane; it is not worth while."
She arose, and he went with her down the corridor and up the steps to the entrance.
"Every action is suspected and distrusted in diplomacy," he said, "therefore I may not accompany you. Someone would be sure to see us and report to the Emba.s.sy that I had brought you--the natural effect of which would be to make the Marquis disbelieve your tale. For you see, until we have translated the letter, we cannot a.s.sume that America is not concerned."
"And you will not think ill of me for disclosing your part in the affair?" she asked.
"Quite the contrary," he smiled. "Moreover, it is the course for you to pursue; to hold back a single thing as to me will result only in distrust. Indeed, implicating me will help substantiate your story."
"You"re very good and very thoughtful," she murmured--and once more suffered him to look deep into her eyes.
"I am very willing for you to think me both," he replied. "Now I"m going to call a taxi at the Fourteenth Street exit, and follow yours up Sixteenth Street until I see you at the French Emba.s.sy. Tell your chauffeur to drive down to Twelfth Street, up to H and then out to Sixteenth. My taxi will be loitering on Sixteenth and will pick up yours as it pa.s.ses and follow it to the Emba.s.sy. Once there you"re out of danger of the Spencer gang. And let me impress you with this fact: tell the story to someone of the staff. If you fail to get to the Amba.s.sador, get a Secretary or an Attache."
"I"ll try to find someone who will listen!" she laughed.
"And I rather fancy you will be successful," he smiled. "It would be a most unusual sort of man who won"t both listen and look."
"Careful, Mr. Harleston!" she reminded.
He put her in the taxi; bowed and turned back into the hotel--wondering why he had ever fancied Madeline Spencer.
Mrs. Clephane gave her orders to the chauffeur, ending with the injunction to drive slowly.
As they swung into Sixteenth Street, a taxi standing before St. John"s Episcopal Church followed them; and Mrs. Clephane recognized Harleston as its occupant.
At the French Emba.s.sy she descended and rang the bell, and was instantly admitted by a liveried footman.
"I wish to see his Excellency the Amba.s.sador!" she said, speaking in French.
The flunky took her card and bowed her into a small reception room.
After a moment or so a dapper young man entered, her card in his fingers.
"Messes Cleephane?" he inquired.
"I am Mrs. Clephane," she replied in French. "I wish to see his Excellency the Amba.s.sador on a most important matter."
"You have an appointment with his Excellency?" he asked, this time in French.