were raiding it?"

"I should not have been in the room but for you," she said, "my
father----"

"It is about your father I want to speak," he said. "Irene, I am the
sole heir to your father's estate. Beyond the property which is settled
on you, you have nothing. My affection for you is known and approved at
Court."

"Your affection!" she laughed bitterly. "I'd as soon have the affection
of a wolf!"

"You could not have a more complete wolf than I," he said meaningly. "Do
you know what has happened to-night? An anarchist club in London has
been raided, and the Grand Duchess Irene Yaroslav has been found in the
company of men whose object is to destroy the monarchy."

She realized with a sickening sense of disaster all that it meant. She
knew as well as he in what bad odour her father stood at Court, and
guessed the steps which would be taken if this matter became public.

"I was brought here by a trick," she said steadily. "A letter came to
me, as I thought, from Israel Kensky----"

"It was from me," he interrupted.

"And you planned the raid, of course?"

He nodded.

"I planned the raid in the most promising circumstances," he said. "The
gentleman who offered to be your good knight is a well-known New York
gun-man. He is wanted by the police, who probably have him in their
custody at this moment. He was brought here to-night, and an offer was
made to him, an offer of a large sum of money, on condition that he
would destroy the Czar."

She gasped.

"You see, my little Irene, that when this gun-man's evidence is taken in
court, matters will look very bad for the Yaroslav family."

"What do you propose?" she asked.

"There are two alternatives," he said. "The first is that I should
arrest you and hand you over to the police. The second is that you
should undertake most solemnly to marry me, in which case I will take
you away from here."

She was silent.

"Is there a third possibility?" she asked, and he shook his head.

"My dear," he said familiarly as he flicked a speck of dust from his
sleeve. "I think you will take the easier way. None of these scum will
betray you, thinking that you are one of themselves--as I happen to
know, some of the best families in Russia are associated with plotters
of this type. As for the American, who might be inclined to talk, in a
few weeks he will be on his way to New York to serve a life sentence. I
have been looking up his record, and particularly drew the attentio