Eleven o’clock was a very early hour at Ferida Palace, and the Archduke looked dubiously at the lighted windows and the flitting figures inside, with the music of the orchestra, in the main hall, throbbing out irregularly in bursts of rhythmic melody. It seemed rather absurd for five people to attempt a surreptitious entrance into such a place; and again he urged the Princess to return at least to the carriage, and await him there; but without success; and in deep misgiving he went on.
They gained the small door unseen, and, with a quiet word of warning, he knocked.
From within came an answering knock, to which he responded with two quick taps, twice repeated; the door opened a little way and Mrs. Spencer’s maid peered out; then, assured, she swung it back and curtsied them inside.
“Suivez de près, messieurs,” she whispered, finger on lips, and hurried down a narrow but rather brightly lighted passage, and up a stairway, and into a room on the second floor, where she prayed that they wait until she could announce them to Madame.
“And say to your mistress,” the Archduke ordered, “that it is our pleasure not to intrude upon her until everything is arranged as intended.”
“If Spencer will respect the request, it will be much easier for you, dear,” he said to Dehra; “when we are watching Lotzen, the boudoir will have to be in darkness, and I’ll take care that we leave the moment you have seen the Book.”
“Do you think she will recognize me?” the Princess asked.
“I don’t know; it’s hard even to think what she can do or will do.”
“At least, it has been easy thus far,” she laughed; “almost so easy as to indicate a trap.”
The same thought had naturally been in his mind, and he had hoped it would not occur to her.
“Everything has worked so smoothly it rather suggests the reverse,” he said confidently; “but whatever happen, you must keep with me or Moore.—Gentlemen, I neglected to say that you will retain your caps until I remove mine.—Lieutenant Marsov, will you oblige me by turning off all the side lights?”
Presently, from somewhere down the corridor, came the ripple of Madeline Spencer’s laugh, and the ring of her clear voice.
“Good-night, Monsieur le Comte! I thank you for the dance, and all the rest;”—then in quieter tones: “no, you may not come in; you have annoyed the Duke quite too much to-night, as it is—to-morrow? well, may be—tout à l’heure!” and the laugh again, and the closing of a door.