en is the next, and of the third I have still to discover the
whereabouts. Are you willing, Lord Dorminster, to let me act for you
abroad? I require no salary or remuneration of any sort. I am a wealthy
man, and investigations of this kind are my one hobby. I shall not move
without your permission, although I recognise, of course, that your own
position is entirely an unofficial one. If you will trust me, however, I
promise that all my energies shall be devoted to the interests of this
country."

Nigel held out his hand.

"It is a pact," he decided. "Before you leave, I will give you the whole
of my uncle's brief correspondence with Sidwell. You may be able to
gather from it what he was after. Sidwell, you remember, was stabbed in
a cafe in the slums of Petrograd."

"I remember quite well," Jesson admitted quietly. "I knew Sidwell. He
was a clever person in his way, but he relied too much upon disguises. I
fancy that I hear the voices of the ladies coming. I shall just have
time to tell you rather a curious coincidence."

The two men waited eagerly. Jesson touched with his forefinger the sheet
of paper which he had been studying.

"Sidwell," he concluded, "could not have been so far off the mark. The
man with whom he was spending the evening in that cafe was a mechanic
from Kroten."

CHAPTER IX

Naida, early one afternoon, a few days after the dinner at Belgrave
Square, raised herself on one elbow from the sofa on which she was
resting, glanced at the roses and the card which the maid had presented
for her inspection, and waved them impatiently away.

"The gentleman waits," the woman reminded her.

Naida glanced out of the window across a dull and apparently uninviting
prospect of roofs and chimneys, to where in the background a faint line
of silver and a wheeling flock of sea gulls became dimly visible through
the branches of the distant trees. The window itself was flung wide
open, but the slowly moving air had little of freshness in it. Sparrows
twittered around the window-sill, and a little patch of green shone out
from the Embankment Gardens. The radiance of spring here found few
opportunities.

"The gentleman waits," the serving woman repeated stolidly, speaking in
her native Russian.

"You can show him up," her mistress replied a little wearily.

Immelan entered, a few moments later, spruce and neat in a well-fitting
grey suit, and carrying a grey Homburg hat. He was redolent of soaps
and