"The bearer, Francesco Marucci, is to be trusted implicitly.--Muriel Mortimer."
That was all. Surely no better credential could there be than the return of the treasured love-token which she had so ingeniously secured.
"Well?" he inquired, refolding the paper and replacing it in its envelope. "And your message? What is it?"
"A confidential one," replied the Tuscan. "The Signorina ordered me to find you at once, the instant that I reached London. I left Florence the day before yesterday and travelled straight through, by way of Milan and Bale. She gave me the address of that palazzo where you have been visiting, and I waited in the street until you came out."
"But you have told me that I am watched," said Dudley. "Who is taking an interest in my movements?"
"That is the reason why I am in London. As the signore is watched by the most practised and experienced secret agents, it was with difficulty that I succeeded in approaching him. If those men track me down and discover who I am, then all will be lost--everything."
The paper he held in his hand told him that this stranger could be trusted. He was essentially a man of the world, and was not in the habit of trusting those whom he did not know. And yet, what credential could be more convincing than that innocent-looking love-token of the past?
"But why are these men, whoever they are, watching me? What interest can they possibly have in my movements? The day of the Irish agitation is over," he said in a somewhat incredulous tone.
"The signorina in her message wishes to give you warning that you are in the deadliest peril," the man said in a low voice, bending towards him so that none should overhear.
"Speak in Italian, if you wish," Dudley suggested. "I can understand, and it will be safer."
The eyes of Francesco Marucci sparkled for a moment at this announcement, and he exclaimed in that soft Tuscan tongue which is so musical to English ears:
"Benissimo! I had no idea the signore knew Italian. The signorina did not tell me so."
It chanced that Chisholm knew Italian far better than French. As he had learnt it when, in his youth, he had spent two years in Siena, he spoke good Italian without that curious aspiration of the "c"s" which is so characteristically Tuscan.
"Perhaps the signorina did not know," he said in response.
"The signore is to be congratulated on speaking so well our language!"
the stranger exclaimed. "It makes things so much easier. Your English is so very difficult with its `w"s" and its Greek `i"s", and all the rest of the puzzles. We Italians can never speak it properly."
"But the message," demanded Dudley rather impatiently. "Tell me quickly, for in five minutes or so this place will be closed, and we shall be turned out into the street."
"The message of the signorina is a simple one," answered Marucci in Italian. "It is to warn you to leave England secretly and at once. To fly instantly--to-morrow--because the truth is known."
"The truth known!" he gasped, half rising from his seat, then dropping back and glaring fixedly at the stranger.
"Yes," the man replied. "It is unfortunately so."
"How do you know that?"
"How?" repeated the thin-faced Tuscan, bending towards Chisholm in a confidential manner. "Because I chance to be in the service of your enemies."
"What? You are in the British Secret Service?" cried the Under-Secretary, amazed by this revelation.
"Si, signore. I am under the Signor Capitano Cator."
"And you are also in the service of the Signorina Mortimer?"
"That is so," answered the man, smiling.
"You are actually one of Cator"s agents?"
"The signore is correct," he answered. "I am an agent in the service of the British Government, mainly employed in France and Belgium. Indeed, if the Signor Sotto-Secretario reflects, he will remember a report upon the Toulon defences which reached the Intelligence Department a few months ago, and about which a rather awkward question was asked in the House of Commons."
"Yes, I recollect. The elaborate report, which was produced confidentially, I myself saw at the time. It was by one Cuillini, if I remember right."
"Exactly! Benvenuto Cuillini and Francesco Marucci are one and the same person."
The young statesman sat speechless. This man Marucci was the most ingenious and faithful of all Cator"s secret agents, and the manner in which he had obtained the plans of the defences of Toulon was, he knew, considered by the Intelligence Department to be little short of miraculous. The report was a most detailed and elaborate one, actually accompanied by snapshot photographs and a ma.s.s of information which would be of the greatest service if ever England fought France in the Mediterranean.
"Then you, Signor Marucci, are really my friend?" he exclaimed at last.
"I am the friend of the Signorina Mortimer," he replied, correcting him.
"And who is the Signorina Mortimer," Chisholm demanded. "Who and what is she that you should be her intimate friend? Tell me."
CHAPTER TWENTY SIX.
SHOWS SIGNORI OF THE SUBURBS.
The wiry Italian with the bristly moustache glanced at him half suspiciously; then a smile lit up his face for an instant.
"The Signorina Mortimer is an English signorina whom I have known a long time. Francesco Marucci is a friend of all the English."
"I know. But in this matter you are actually working against the efforts of your own department."
"As I have already explained to the signore, I am but the signorina"s messenger," he declared, in a tone which showed him to be a past-master in the art of evasion. "She urges you to pay an immediate visit to a certain person here in London, and to leave for the Continent to-morrow morning--for Italy."
"To go to her? Why cannot she come to England?"
"Because just at present that is impossible," the man replied.
"And this visit you speak of. To whom is it?" The Italian drew from his pocket a small and shabby wallet, about six inches square, of the kind used in Italy to carry the paper money. From this he took a card, on which was written an address at Penge.
"She asks you to call at the house indicated immediately this card comes into your possession," he said. "As your visit is expected, you had better go to-night."
"For what reason?"
"For reasons known to her alone," replied the messenger. "I am not in the possession of the motives of the signorina in this affair."
"Speak candidly, Marucci," said Chisholm. "You, as confidential agent of the British Government, know all about this matter. You cannot deny that?"
"I know the facts only so far as it is necessary for me to know them,"
answered the Italian warily. He was still much impressed by the manner in which the Signor Sotto-Secretario had p.r.o.nounced his nationality.
"You know the object of my visit to Penge, eh?"
"No, signore, I a.s.sure you that I do not. I am merely obeying orders given me by the signorina, and I hope to leave Charing Cross at nine o"clock to-morrow morning on my return to Italy."