y your telegram. All I could make out was that you found our man.'

'Yes, I found him, and passed several hours in his company.'

'Was the fellow very much out at elbows, as usual?'

'No, my lord--thriving, and likely to thrive. He has just been named envoy
to the Ottoman Court.'

'Bah!' was all the reply his incredulity could permit.

'True, I assure you. Such is the estimation he is held in at Athens,
the Greeks declare he has not his equal. You are aware that his name is
Spiridion Kostalergi, and he claims to be Prince of Delos.'

'With all my heart. Our Hellenic friends never quarrel over their nobility.
There are titles and to spare for every one. Will he give us our papers?'

'Yes; but not without high terms. He declares, in fact, my lord, that you
can no more return to the Bosporus without _him_ than he can go there
without _you_.'

'Is the fellow insolent enough to take this ground?'

'That is he. In fact, he presumes to talk as your lordship's colleague, and
hints at the several points in which you may act in concert.'

'It is very Greek all this.'

'His terms are ten thousand pounds in cash, and--'

'There, there, that will do. Why not fifty--why not a hundred thousand?'

'He affects a desire to be moderate, my lord.'

'I hope you withdrew at once after such a proposal? I trust you did not
prolong the interview a moment longer?'

'I arose, indeed, and declared that the mere mention of such terms was like
a refusal to treat at all.'

'And you retired?'

'I gained the door, when he detained me. He has, I must admit, a marvellous
plausibility, for though at first he seemed to rely on the all-importance
of these documents to your lordship--how far they would compromise you
in the past and impede you for the future, how they would impair your
influence, and excite the animosity of many who were freely canvassed and
discussed in them--yet he abandoned all that at the end of our interview,
and restricted himself to the plea that the sum, if a large one, could not
be a serious difficulty to a great English noble, and would be the
crowning fortune of a poor Greek gentleman, who merely desired to secure a
marriage-portion for his only daughter.'

'And you believed this?'

'I so far believed him that I have his pledge in writing that, when he has
your lordship's assurance that you will comply with his terms--and he only
asks that much--he will deposit the papers in the hands of the Minister at
Athen