nfessed demurely. "Marie took so much
trouble with my hair. We had the most delightful coupe all to
ourselves. Fancy, we are back again in London! I have been to Italy, I
have spoken to kings and prime ministers, and I am back again with you.
And queerly enough, not until to-morrow shall I see the one person who
really rules Italy."

"Who is that?" he asked.

"I am not sure that I shall tell you everything," she decided. "You have
not opened your mouth to me yet. I shall wait until supper-time. Have you
changed your mind since I went away?"

"I shall never change it," he assured her eagerly. "We are in a taxicab
and I know it's most unusual and improper, but--"

"If you hadn't kissed me," she declared a moment later as she
leaned forward to look in the glass, "I should not have eaten a
mouthful of supper."

They drove to the Milan Grill. It was a little early for the theatre
people, and they were almost alone in the place. Anna drew a great sigh
of content as she settled down in her chair.

"I think I must have been lonely for a long time," she whispered, "for
it is so delightful to get back and be with you. Tell me what you have
been doing?"

"I have been promoted," Norgate announced. "My prospective alliance with
you has completed Selingman's confidence in me. I have been entrusted
with several commissions."

He told her of his adventures. She listened breathlessly to the account
of his dinner in Soho.

"It is queer how all this is working out," she observed. "I knew before
that the trouble was to come through Austria. The Emperor was very
anxious indeed that it should not. He wanted to have his country brought
reluctantly into the struggle. Even at this moment I believe that if he
thought there was the slightest chance of England becoming embroiled, he
would travel to Berlin himself to plead with the Kaiser. I really don't
know why, but the one thing in Austria which would be thoroughly
unpopular would be a war with England."

"Tell me about your mission?" he asked.

"To a certain point," she confessed, with a little grimace, "it was
unsuccessful. I have brought a reply to the personal letter I took over
to the King. I have talked with Guillamo, the Secretary of State for
Foreign Affairs, with whom, of course, everything is supposed to rest.
What I have brought with me, however, and what I heard from Guillamo, are
nothing but a repetition of the assurances given to our Ambassador. The
few private words