a better course to put an end to his hopeless lot
by chloroforming him into a painless and peaceful death."

"Monsieur, I cannot follow you, you speak in riddles."

"I deal in riddles, count; you must wait for the solution of them, I'm
afraid."

"I wish I could grasp the solution of one which puzzles me a great deal,
monsieur. What is it that has happened to your countenance? You have
done nothing to put on a disguise; yet, since we left the train and
entered the landau, some subtle change has occurred. What is it? How
has it come about? The night before last, when I saw you for the first
time, your face was one that impressed me with a sense of familiarity,
now, monsieur, you are like a different man.'"

"I am a different man, count. Like this puppy here, I am a waif and a
stray; yet, at the same time, I have my purpose and am part of a
carefully laid scheme."

The count made no reply. He could not comprehend the man at all, and at
times, but for the world-wide reputation of him, he would have believed
him insane. Not a question as to the great and important case he was on,
but merely incomprehensible remarks, trifling fancies, apparently
aimless whims! Two nights ago a pot of beef extract; to-day a mongrel
puppy; and all the time the hopes of a kingdom, the future of a monarch
resting in his hands!

For twenty minutes longer the landau rolled on; then it came to a halt
under the broad porte-cochere of the Villa Irma, and two minutes after
that Cleek and the count stood in the presence of Madame Tcharnovetski,
her purblind associate, and her retinue of servant-guards.

A handsome woman, this madame, a woman of about two-and-thirty, with the
tar-black eyes and the twilight-coloured tresses of Northern Russia;
bold as brass, flippant as a French cocotte, steel-nerved and
calm-blooded as a professional gambler. It had been her whim that all
the women of the count's family should be banished from the house during
her stay; that the great salon of the villa, a wondrous apartment, hung
in blue and silver, and lit by a huge crystal chandelier, should be put
at her disposal night and day; that the electric lights should be
replaced with dozens of wax candles (after the manner of the ballrooms
of her native Russia); that her one-eyed companion, with his wicker cage
of screeching parakeets should come and go when and where and how he
listed, and that an electric alarm bell be connected with her sleeping
apartment and hi