bring her to see you. She's so interested in you. You
don't mind?"

The quick thought that she was being made a show of caused a spasm to
flicker across Eileen's face. Almost instantly she regained her
composure, and for half an hour Mrs. Porter-Strangeways prattled on. The
other took little part in the conversation. Eileen could feel that the
Princess was watching her closely under her cast-down eyelashes. The
woman repelled and yet fascinated her. When the time came for
leave-taking she found herself giving a pressing invitation to the other
to call again. With a smile of satisfaction the Princess promised.

They had not been gone a quarter of an hour when the Princess was
announced alone. Eileen, a little astonished, received her
questioningly.

"I had to see you alone," explained the older woman. "I have something
of importance to say to you--that's why I made Mrs. Porter-Strangeways
bring me. I feared that you would not see me otherwise."

"To see me alone?" repeated Eileen, with the air of one completely
mystified. Then, as the other nodded grimly, she closed the door of the
room.

With a murmured "Pardon me" the Princess walked across the room and
turned the key. "It will be better so," she said. "What I have to say
must not be overheard. The life of a--some one may depend on secrecy."

Eileen had begun to wonder if her strange visitor were mad. There was
something, however, in her quiet, methodical manner that forbade the
assumption. The Princess Petrovska had settled herself gracefully in a
great arm-chair.

"No, I am not mad." She answered the unspoken question. "I am quite in
my senses, I assure you. I have come to you with a message from one you
think dead--from Robert Grell."

The room reeled before Eileen's eyes. She clutched the mantelpiece with
one hand to steady herself.

"From one I _think_ dead!" she repeated. "Bob _is_ dead." She gripped
the other woman fiercely by the shoulder and almost shook her in the
intensity of her emotion. "He is dead, I tell you. What do you mean? I
know he is dead. Do not lie to me. He is dead."

The Princess Petrovska glanced gravely up into the strained features of
the girl. Her own face was a mask.

"Calm yourself, Lady Eileen," she said. "You have been made the victim
of a wicked deceit. He is not dead--but a man wonderfully like him is. I
have come here at his request to relieve your mind." She dropped her
voice to a whisper. "At the same time, he is in g