rk water--"I acted in a good many capacities.
Kind of general utility, as it were. Doing this, that, and the other!"

"'The other', I should surmise." Contemptuously.

Mr. Heatherbloom moved; the curtain had moved again. "Where are you
going?" he asked a little wildly. "You see I might have important
business on shore." Foolish talk,--yet it fitted in as well as anything.

The prince, for his part, did not at first seem to catch the other's
words; when he did he laughed loudly, sardonically. "That is good;
excellent! _You_ have 'important business'!"

"Yes; important," repeated Mr. Heatherbloom. "I--" He got no further.
His eyes met another's at the window, rested a moment on a woman's face
which then suddenly vanished. But not before he realized that she, too,
had seen him--seen and recognized. He had caught in that fleeting
instant, wonder, irony, incredulity--a growing understanding! Then he
heard a soft laugh--a musical but devilish laugh--Sonia Turgeinov's!

CHAPTER XV

THE SWORD OF DAMOCLES

Mr. Heatherbloom stood as if stunned, his face very pale. For the
instant all his suppressed emotion concentrated on this woman--his evil
genius--who had betrayed him before and who would betray him again, now.
He waited, breathing hard. Why did she not appear? Why did not the blow
fall? He could not understand that interval--nothing happening. Was she
but playing with him? The prince had abruptly turned; apparently he had
not heard that very low laugh. Bored, no doubt, by the interview, he had
started to walk away, almost at the same time Mr. Heatherbloom had
caught sight of the face at the window. As in a dream Mr. Heatherbloom
now heard his excellency's brusk voice addressing a command to the
officer, listened to the latter a moment or two later, addressing him.

"Come along!" The officer's English was labored and guttural.

Mr. Heatherbloom's eyes swung swiftly from the near-by door through
which he had momentarily expected the woman to emerge. Involuntarily he
would have stepped after the vanishing figure of the prince--what to do,
he knew not, when--

"_Non, non_," said the officer, intervening. "Hees excellenz dislikes to
be--importuned." The last word cost the speaker an effort; to the
listener it was hardly intelligible, but the officer's manner indicated
plainly his meaning. Mr. Heatherbloom managed to hold himself still; he
seemed standing in the center of a vortex. The prince had by this time
gon