per, and after another moment of dumb staring, the
girl took it and read aloud the message which Victor had dictated following
Sofia's flight to him from the Cafe des Exiles.

_"'To Michael Lanyard, Intelligence Division, the War Office,
Whitehall--'"_

"That is to say," Lanyard interpreted, "of the British Secret Service."

"You!"

He bowed in light irony. "One regrets one is at present unable to offer
better social standing. To-morrow, it may be ... But who knows?"

Sofia shook her head impatiently, and in a murmur of deepening amazement
resumed her reading of the note:

_"'Your daughter Sofia is now with me.. Your own intelligence must tell you
nothing could be more fatal than an attempt to communicate with her'"_

To the interrogation eloquent in her eyes Lanyard replied:

"Dictated by Victor to Karslake, who passed it on to me, the night he
brought you to the house from the Cafe des Exiles."

"You knew--you, who claim to be my father--yet permitted him--?"

"You were in the house before I knew I had a daughter; Karslake had no
chance to consult me before fetching you. Furthermore, if he had hesitated
to carry out Victor's orders just then, not only would he have nullified
all our preparations to secure evidence enough to convict the man, or at
least run him out of England--"

"Prince Victor? What was he doing, that you should--?"

"Dabbling in all manner of infamy, from financing a thieves' fence to
organizing an association of common criminals to bring it business; from
maintaining a corps of agitators to foment social discontent to fostering
this last, most imbecile scheme of all, which comes to naught to-night, an
attempt to overthrow the British Empire and set up in its stead a Soviet
England, with Victor Vassilyevski in the dual role of Trotsky and Lenine!"

The girl made a sign of bewilderment and incredulity.

"What are you telling me? Are you mad?"

"No--but Victor is, mad with lust for power, insane with illusions of
personal aggrandizement. You don't believe? Listen to me, then, appreciate
to what demoniac lengths he was prepared to go to flatter his insane
ambitions:"

"Sturm has invented a new poison gas, odourless, colourless, the most
deadly known, and easily manufactured in vast quantities by adding simple
ingredients to ordinary illuminating gas. Fanatic Bolshevist that he was,
Sturm offered his formula to Victor, to be used to clear the way for social
revolution; and Victor jumped