and biscuits, or rolls, or anything that is to be had at that hour. And please don't trouble further. I am very thankful to you, but will express myself better later on."
With this the editor had to be content, and was shortly on his way to his own well-earned rest. To Jennie it seemed but a moment after he had gone, that the porter placed coffee and rolls on the desk beside her saying, "Seven o'clock, miss!"
The coffee refreshed the girl, and as she passed through the editorial rooms she noted their forlorn, dishevelled appearance, which all places show when seen at an unaccustomed hour, their time of activity and bustle past. The rooms were littered with torn papers; waste-baskets overflowing; looking silent, scrappy, and abandoned in the grey morning light which seemed intrusive, usurping the place of the usual artificial illumination, and betraying a bareness which the other concealed. Jennie recognized a relationship between her own up-all-night feeling and the spirit of the deserted rooms.
At the railway station she found her maid waiting for her, surrounded by luggage.
"Have you got your ticket?"
"Yes, my lady."
"I have changed my mind, and will not go to Paris just now. Ask a porter to put those trunks in the left-luggage office, and bring me the keys and the receipt."
When this was done and money matters had been adjusted between them, Jennie gave the girl five pounds more than was due to her, and saw her into the railway carriage, well pleased with the reward. A hansom brought Jennie to her flat, and so ended the exhausting episode of the Duchess of Chiselhurst's ball.
Yet an event, like a malady, leaves numerous consequences in its train, extending, who shall say, how far into the future? The first symptom of these consequences was a correspondence, and, as there is no reading more dreary than a series of letters, merely their substance is given here. When Jennie was herself again, she wrote a long letter to the Princess von Steinheimer, detailing the particulars of her impersonation, and begging pardon for what she had done, while giving her reasons for doing it; but, perhaps because it did not occur to her, she made not the slightest reference to Lord Donal Stirling. Two answers came to this—one a registered packet containing the diamonds which the Princess had previously offered to her; the other a letter from the Princess's own hand. The glitter of the diamonds showed Jennie that she had been speedily forgiven, and the letter corroborated this. In fact, the Princess upbraided her for not letting her into the secret earlier. "It is just the jolly kind of thing I should have delighted in," wrote her Highness. "And then, if I had known, I should not have sent that unlucky telegram. It serves you right for not taking me into your confidence, and I am glad you had a fright. Think of it coming in at that inopportune moment, just as telegrams do at a play! But, Jennie, are you sure you told me everything? A letter came from London the day before yours arrived, and it bewildered me dreadfully at first. Don Stirling, whom I used to know at Washington (a conceited young fellow he was then—I hope he has improved since), wrote to say that he had met a girl at the Duchess of Chiselhurst's ball who had a letter inviting the Princess von Steinheimer to the festivity. He thought at first she was the Princess (which is very complimentary to each of us), but found later that she wasn't. Now he wants to know, you know, and thinks, quite reasonably, that I must have some inkling who that girl was, and he begs me, by our old friendship, etc., etc., etc. He is a nice young man, if a trifle confident (these young diplomatists think they hold the reins of the universe in their hands), and I should like to oblige him, but I thought first I would hear what you had to say about it. I am to address him care of the Embassy at St. Petersburg; so I suppose he's stationed there now. By the way, how did he get your glove, or is that merely brag on his part? He says that it is the only clue he has, and he is going to trace you from that, it seems, if I do not tell him who you are and send him your address. Now, what am I to say when I write to St. Petersburg?"
In reply to this, Jennie sent a somewhat incoherent letter, very different from her usual style of writing. She had not mentioned the young man in her former communication, she said, because she had been trying to forget the incident in which he was the central figure. In no circumstances could she meet him again, and she implored the Princess not to disclose her identity to him even by a hint. She explained the glove episode exactly as it happened; she was compelled to sacrifice the glove to release her hand. He had been very kind in helping her to escape from a false position, but it would be too humiliating for her ever to see him or speak with him again.
When this letter reached the Schloss at Meran, the Princess telegraphed to London, "Send me the other glove," and Jennie sent it. A few days later came a further communication from the Princess.
"I have puzzled our young man quite effectually, I think, clever as he imagines himself to be. I wrote him a semi-indignant letter to St. Petersburg, and said I thought all along he had not really recognized me at the ball, in spite of his protestations at first. Then I saw how easily he was deluded into the belief that I was some other woman, and so the temptation to cozen him further was irresistible. Am I not a good actress? I asked him. I went on to say, with some show of anger, that a quiet flirtation in the gallery was all very well in its way, but when it came to a young man rushing in a frenzy bare-headed into the street after a respectable married woman who had just got into her carriage and was about to drive away, it was too much altogether, and thus he came into possession of the glove. As the remaining glove was of no use to me, I had great pleasure in sending it to him, but warned him that if the story of the gloves ever came to the ears of my husband, I should deny having either owned or worn them. I should like to see Don's amazed look when the other glove drops out of my letter, which was a bulky package and cost ever so much in postage. I think the sending of the glove was an inspiration. I fancy his lordship will be now completely deluded, and that you need have no further fear of his finding you."
Jennie read this letter over once or twice, and in spite of her friendly feeling for the Princess, there was something in the epistle that jarred on her. Nevertheless she wrote and thanked the Princess for what she had done, and then she tried to forget all about everything pertaining to the ball. However, she was not allowed to erase all thought of Lord Donal from her mind, even if she could have accomplished this task unimpeded. There shortly arrived a brief note from the Princess enclosing a letter the young diplomatist at St. Petersburg had written.
"DEAR PRINCESS" (it ran),—"I am very much obliged to you for the companion glove, as I am thus enabled to keep one and use the other as a clue. I see you not only know who the mysterious young lady is, but that you have since met her, or at least have been in correspondence with her. If the glove does not lead me to the hand, I shall pay a visit to you in the hope that you will atone for your present cruelty by telling me where to find the owner of both glove and hand."
With regard to this note the Princess had written, "Don is not such a fool as I took him to be. He must have improved during the last few years. I wish you would write and tell me exactly what he said to you that evening."
But with this wish Jennie did not comply. She merely again urged the Princess never to divulge the secret.
For many days Jennie heard nothing more from any of the actors in the little comedy, and the episode began to take on in her thoughts that air of unreality which remote events seem to gather round them. She went on with her daily work to the satisfaction of her employers and the augmentation of her own banking account, although no experience worthy of record occurred in her routine for several weeks. But a lull in a newspaper office is seldom of long duration.
One afternoon Mr. Hardwick came to the desk at which Jennie was at work, and said to her,—
"Cadbury Taylor called here yesterday, and was very anxious to see you. Has he been in again this afternoon?"
"You mean the detective? No, I haven't seen him since that day at the Schloss Steinheimer. What did he want with me?"
"As far as I was able to understand, he has a very important case on hand—a sort of romance in high life; and I think he wants your assistance to unravel it; it seems to be baffling him."
"It is not very difficult to baffle Mr. Cadbury Taylor," said the girl, looking up at her employer with a merry twinkle in her eye.
"Well, he appears to be in a fog now, and he