mpany left
in touch with the enemy ...

'I go to Germany now,' he was saying. 'I want you to come with me--to
be my wife.'

He waited for an answer, and got it in the form of a startled question.

'To Germany? How?'

'It is easy,' he said, smiling. 'The car which is waiting outside is
the first stage of a system of travel which we have perfected.' Then he
told her about the Underground Railway--not as he had told it to me, to
scare, but as a proof of power and forethought.

His manner was perfect. He was respectful, devoted, thoughtful of all
things. He was the suppliant, not the master. He offered her power and
pride, a dazzling career, for he had deserved well of his country, the
devotion of the faithful lover. He would take her to his mother's
house, where she would be welcomed like a princess. I have no doubt he
was sincere, for he had many moods, and the libertine whom he had
revealed to me at the Pink Chalet had given place to the honourable
gentleman. He could play all parts well because he could believe in
himself in them all.

Then he spoke of danger, not so as to slight her courage, but to
emphasize his own thoughtfulness. The world in which she had lived was
crumbling, and he alone could offer a refuge. She felt the steel
gauntlet through the texture of the velvet glove.

All the while she had been furiously thinking, with her chin in her
hand in the old way ... She might refuse to go. He could compel her, no
doubt, for there was no help to be got from the old servants. But it
might be difficult to carry an unwilling woman over the first stages of
the Underground Railway. There might be chances ... Supposing he
accepted her refusal and left her. Then indeed he would be gone for
ever and our game would have closed with a fiasco. The great antagonist
of England would go home rejoicing, taking his sheaves with him.

At this time she had no personal fear of him. So curious a thing is the
human heart that her main preoccupation was with our mission, not with
her own fate. To fail utterly seemed too bitter. Supposing she went
with him. They had still to get out of Italy and cross Switzerland. If
she were with him she would be an emissary of the Allies in the enemy's
camp. She asked herself what could she do, and told herself 'Nothing.'
She felt like a small bird in a very large trap, and her chief
sensation was that of her own powerlessness. But she had learned
Blenkiron's gospel and knew that Heaven send