Grant, you well enough understand that
though I do not group you in any way with the servants, the rule of
double salary applies to you too." As she spoke she extended her long,
fine-shaped hand, which the other took and then, raising it to her
lips, kissed it impressively with the freedom of an elder woman to a
younger. I could not but admire the generosity of her treatment of her
servants. In my mind I endorsed Mrs. Grant's sotto voce remark as she
left the room:

"No wonder the house is like a King's house, when the mistress is a
Princess!"

"A Princess!" That was it. The idea seemed to satisfy my mind, and to
bring back in a wave of light the first moment when she swept across my
vision at the ball in Belgrave Square. A queenly figure! tall and
slim, bending, swaying, undulating as the lily or the lotos. Clad in a
flowing gown of some filmy black material shot with gold. For ornament
in her hair she wore an old Egyptian jewel, a tiny crystal disk, set
between rising plumes carved in lapis lazuli. On her wrist was a broad
bangle or bracelet of antique work, in the shape of a pair of spreading
wings wrought in gold, with the feathers made of coloured gems. For
all her gracious bearing toward me, when our hostess introduced me, I
was then afraid of her. It was only when later, at the picnic on the
river, I had come to realise her sweet and gentle, that my awe changed
to something else.

For a while she sat, making some notes or memoranda. Then putting them
away, she sent for the faithful servants. I thought that she had
better have this interview alone, and so left her. When I came back
there were traces of tears in her eyes.

The next phase in which I had a part was even more disturbing, and
infinitely more painful. Late in the afternoon Sergeant Daw came into
the study where I was sitting. After closing the door carefully and
looking all round the room to make certain that we were alone, he came
close to me.

"What is it?" I asked him. "I see you wish to speak to me privately."

"Quite so, sir! May I speak in absolute confidence?"

"Of course you may. In anything that is for the good of Miss
Trelawny--and of course Mr. Trelawny--you may be perfectly frank. I
take it that we both want to serve them to the best of our powers." He
hesitated before replying:

"Of course you know that I have my duty to do; and I think you know me
well enough to know that I will do it. I am a policeman--a detec