ed him, "I was up all night sending
reports home--very interesting reports, too. I got them away all right,
but there's no denying the fact that there are certain people in Monte
Carlo at the present moment who suspect my presence here, and who would
go to any lengths whatever to get rid of me. It isn't the actual harm I
might do, but they have to deal with a very delicate problem and to make
a bargain with a very sensitive person, and they are terribly afraid
that my presence here, and a meeting between me and that person, might
render all their schemes abortive."

Richard's face was a study in astonishment.

"Well," he exclaimed, "this beats everything! I've read of such things,
of course, but one only half believes them. Right under our very noses,
too! Say, what are you going to do about it, Sir Henry?"

"There is only one thing I can do," Hunterleys replied grimly. "I am
bound to keep my place here. They'll drive me out if they can. I am
convinced that the polite warning I have received to leave Monaco this
afternoon because of last night's affair, is part of the conspiracy. In
plain words, I've got to stick it out."

"But what good are you doing here, anyway?"

Hunterleys smiled and glanced carefully around the room. They were still
free from any risk of being overheard.

"Well," he said, "perhaps you will understand my meaning more clearly if
I tell you that I am the brains of a counterplot. The English Secret
Service has a permanent agent here under the guise of a newspaper
correspondent, who is in daily touch with me, and he in his turn has
several spies at work. I am, however, the dangerous person. The others
are only servants. They make their reports, but they don't understand
their true significance. If these people could remove me before any one
else could arrive to take my place, their chances of bringing off their
coup here would be immensely improved."

"I suppose it's useless for me to ask if there's anything I can do to
help?" Richard enquired.

"You've helped already," Hunterleys replied. "I have been nearly three
months without being able to open my lips to a soul. People call me
secretive, but I feel very human sometimes. I know that not a word of
what I have said will pass your lips."

"Not a chance of it," Richard promised earnestly. "But look here, can't
I do something? If I am not an Englishman, I'm all for the Anglo-Saxons.
I hate these foreigners--that is to say the men," he correcte