ughed.

Mr. Sabin shrugged his shoulders.

"In either case I congratulate you. This man Brott. He interests me."

"He interests every one. Why not? He is a great personality."

"Politically," Mr. Sabin said, "the gauge of his success is of course
the measure of the man. But he himself--what manner of a man is he?"

She tapped with her fingers upon the little table by their side.

"He is rich," she said, "and an uncommon mixture of the student and the
man of society. He refuses many more invitations than he accepts, he
entertains very seldom but very magnificently. He has never been known
to pay marked attentions to any woman, even the scandal of the clubs has
passed him by. What else can I say about him, I wonder?" she continued
reflectively. "Nothing, I think, except this. He is a strong man. You
know that that counts for much."

Mr. Sabin was silent. Perhaps he was measuring his strength in some
imagined encounter with this man. Something in his face alarmed Helene.
She suddenly leaned forward and looked at him more closely.

"UNCLE," she exclaimed in a low voice, "there is something on your mind.
Do not tell me that once more you are in the maze, that again you have
schemes against this country."

He smiled at her sadly enough, but she was reassured.

"You need have no fear," he told her. "With politics--I have finished.
Why I am here, what I am here for I will tell you very soon. It is to
find one whom I have lost--and who is dear to me. Forgive me if for
to-day I say no more. Come, if you will you shall drive me to my hotel."

He offered his arm with the courtly grace which he knew so well how to
assume. Together they passed out to her carriage.

CHAPTER XII

"After all," Lady Carey sighed, throwing down a racing calendar
and lighting a cigarette, "London is the only thoroughly civilized
Anglo-Saxon capital in the world. Please don't look at me like that,
Duchess. I know--this is your holy of holies, but the Duke smokes
here--I've seen him. My cigarettes are very tiny and very harmless."

The Duchess, who wore gold-rimmed spectacles, and was a person of
weight in the councils of the Primrose League, went calmly on with her
knitting.

"My dear Muriel," she said, "if my approval or disapproval was of the
slightest moment to you, it is not your smoking of which I should first
complain. I know, however, that you consider yourself a privileged
person. Pray do exactly as you like, but don't drop the