"All right, my friend. Forewarned is forearmed; I'll give you the slip directly," I thought, and went on with my meal, affecting to be absorbed in a German newspaper, which I asked the waiter to bring me.
In the ordinary course I should have met people I knew, for the café was frequented by most of the foreign journalists in Petersburg, but the hour was early for _déjeuner_, and the spy and I had the place to ourselves for the present.
I knew that I should communicate the fact that Anne was in Petersburg to the Grand Duke Loris as soon as possible; in the hope that he might know or guess who were her captors, and where they were taking her; but it was imperative that I should exercise the utmost caution.
After we reached Petersburg, and before he left me, Mishka had, as his master had promised, given me instructions as to how I was to send a private message to the Duke in case of necessity. He took me to a house in a mean street near the Ismailskaia Prospekt--not half a mile from the place where I was arrested this morning--of which the ground floor was a poor class café frequented chiefly by workmen and students.
"You will go to the place I shall show you," he had informed me beforehand, "and call for a glass of tea, just like any one else. Then as you pay for it, you drop a coin,--so. You will pick it up, or the waiter will,--it is all one, that; any one may drop a coin accidentally! Now, if you were just an ordinary customer, nothing more would happen; the waiter would keep near your table for a minute or two, and that is all. But if you are on business you will ask him, 'Is Nicolai Stefanovitch here to-day?' Or you may say any name you think of,--a common one is best. He will answer, 'At what hour should he be here?' and you say, 'I do not know when he returns--from his work.' Or 'from Wilna,' or elsewhere; that is unimportant, like the name. But the questions must be put so, and there must be the pause, between the two words 'returns from' just for one beat of the clock as it were, or while one blows one's nose, or lights a cigarette. Then he will know you are one of us, and will go away; and presently one will come and sit at the table, and say, 'I am so and so,--' the name you mentioned. He will drink his tea, and you will go out together; and if it is a note you will pass it to him, so that none shall see; or if it is a message, you will tell it him very quietly."