Mr. Sabin rose.
"You are expecting, perhaps," he said, "one of my friends from the--"
She interrupted him.
"It is true," she declared. "He may be here at any instant. The time is already up. Oh, monsieur, indeed, indeed it would not do for him to find you."
Mr. Sabin moved towards the door.
"You are perhaps right," he said regretfully, "although I should much like to hear about this little matter of life insurance while I am here."
"Indeed, monsieur," Annette declared, "I know nothing. There is nothing which I can tell monsieur."
Mr. Sabin suddenly leaned forward. His gaze was compelling. His tone was low but terrible.
"Annette," he said, "obey me. Send Emil here."
The woman trembled, but she did not move. Mr. Sabin lifted his forefinger and pointed slowly to the door. The woman"s lips parted, but she seemed to have lost the power of speech.
"Send Emil here!" Mr. Sabin repeated slowly.
Annette turned and left the room, groping her way to the door as though her eyesight had become uncertain. Mr. Sabin lit a cigarette and looked for a moment carefully into the small liqueur gla.s.s out of which he had drunk.
"That was unwise," he said softly to himself. "Just such a blunder might have cost me everything."
He held it up to the light and satisfied himself that no dregs remained.
Then he took from his pocket a tiny little revolver, and placing it on the table before him, covered it with his handkerchief. Almost immediately a door at the farther end of the room opened and closed.
A man in dark clothes, small, unnaturally pale, with deep-set eyes and nervous, twitching mouth, stood before him. Mr. Sabin smiled a welcome at him.
"Good-morning, Emil Sachs," he said. "I am glad that you have shown discretion. Stand there in the light, please, and fold your arms.
Thanks. Do not think that I am afraid of you, but I like to talk comfortably."
"I am at monsieur"s service," the man said in a low tone.
"Exactly. Now, Emil, before starting to visit you I left a little note behind addressed to the chief of the police here--no, you need not start--to be sent to him only if my return were unduly delayed. You can guess what that note contained. It is not necessary for us to revert to--unpleasant subjects."
The man moistened his dry lips.
"It is not necessary," he repeated. "Monsieur is as safe here--from me--as at his own hotel."
"Excellent!" Mr. Sabin said. "Now listen, Emil. It has pleased me chiefly, as you know, for the sake of your wife, the good Annette, to be very merciful to you as regards the past. But I do not propose to allow you to run a poison bureau for the advantage of the Prince of Saxe Leinitzer and his friends--more especially, perhaps, as I am at present upon his list of superfluous persons."
The man trembled.
"Monsieur," he said, "the Prince knows as much as you know, and he has not the mercy that one shows to a dog."
"You will find," Mr. Sabin said, "that if you do not obey me, I myself can develop a similar disposition. Now answer me this! You have within the last few days supplied several people with that marvelous powder for the preparation of which you are so justly famed."
"Several--no, monsieur! Two only."
"Their names?"
The man trembled.
"If they should know!"
"They will not, Emil. I will see to that."
"The first I supplied to the order of the Prince."
"Good! And the second?"
"To a lady whose name I do not know."
Mr. Sabin raised his eyebrows.
"Is not that," he remarked, "a little irregular?"
"The lady wrote her request before me in the yellow crayon. It was sufficient."
"And you do not know her name, Emil?"
"No, monsieur. She was dark and tall, and closely veiled. She was here but a few minutes since."
"Dark and tall!" Mr. Sabin repeated to himself thoughtfully. "Emil, you are telling me the truth?"
"I do not dare to tell you anything else, monsieur," the man answered.
Mr. Sabin did not continue his interrogations for a few moments.
Suddenly he looked up.
"Has that lady left the place yet, Emil?"
"No, monsieur!"
Mr. Sabin smiled.
"Have you a back exit?" he asked.
"None that the lady would know of," Emil answered. "She must pa.s.s along the pa.s.sage which borders this apartment, and enter the bar by a door from behind. If monsieur desires it, it is impossible for her to leave un.o.bserved."
"That is excellent, Emil," Mr. Sabin said. "Now there is one more question--quite a harmless one. Annette spoke of my life being in some way insured."
"It is true, monsieur," Emil admitted. "A lady who also possessed the yellow crayon came here the day that--that monsieur incurred the displeasure of--of his friends. She tried to bribe me to blow up my laboratory and leave the country, or that I should subst.i.tute a harmless powder for any required by the Prince. I was obliged to refuse."
"And then?"
"Then she promised me a large sum if you were alive in six months, and made me at once a payment.