r
Bohemianism. Your Scotch friend is worthy, no doubt, but dull, and the
boy was too hopelessly in love to be amusing. And as for you--well--you
would do very nicely, no doubt, my dear Arnold, but you are too stuffed
up with principles for a girl of Isobel's antecedents. So she has cut
the Gordian knot herself! Well, I am sorry!"

"You are sorry!" I repeated. "Why?"

She smiled sweetly at me.

"Because my dear friend has promised me that wonderful emerald necklace
if I could get the child away from you, and I think that very soon, with
the help of that stupid boy, I should have succeeded," she said
regretfully. "Such emeralds, Arnold! and you know how anything green
suits me."

"You do not doubt, then, but that it is the Archduchess who has done
this?" I said.

Lady Delahaye lifted her eyebrows.

"Either the Archduchess, or Isobel has walked off of her own sweet
will," she remarked calmly. "In any case you have lost the child, and I
have lost my necklace. I positively cannot risk losing my dinner too,"
she added, with a glance at the clock, "so I am afraid--I am so sorry,
but I must ask you to go away. Come and see me again, won't you? Perhaps
we can be friends again now that this bone of contention is removed."

"I have never desired anything else, Lady Delahaye," I said. "But if my
friendship is really of any value to you, if you would care to earn my
deepest gratitude, you could easily do so."

"Really! In what manner?"

"By helping me to regain possession of the child."

She laughed at me, softly at first, and then without restraint. Finally
she rang the bell.

"My dear Arnold," she exclaimed, wiping her eyes, "you are really too
naive! You amuse me more than I can tell you. My maid will show you the
way downstairs. Do come and see me again soon. Good-bye!"

So that was the end of any hope we may have had of help from Lady
Delahaye. I called a hansom outside and drove at once to Blenheim House,
the temporary residence of the Archduchess and her suite. A footman
passed me on to a more important person who was sitting at a round table
in the hall with a visitor's book open before him. I explained to him my
desire to obtain a few moments' audience with the Archduchess, but he
only smiled and shook his head.

"It is quite impossible for her Highness to see anyone now before her
departure, sir," he said. "If you are connected with the Press, I can
only tell you what I have told all the others. We have re