in the near future I may bring you good news."
"He will become nothing or the most desperate man in Europe."
"Admitted."
"He is a scholar, too."
"All the more interesting."
"As a student in Munich he has fought his three duels. He has been a war correspondent under fire. He is a great fencer, a fine shot, a daring rider."
"And penniless. What a country they have over there beyond the Rhine! He would never have troubled his head about it, had they not harried him. To stir up France, to wound her if possible! He will be a man of great courage and resource," said the secret agent, drawing the palms of his hands together.
"In the end, then, Germany will offer him money?"
"That is the possible outlook."
"But, suppose he went to work on his own responsibility?"
"In that case one would be justified in locking him up as a madman. Do you know anything about Alpine butterflies?"
"Very little," confessed the minister.
"There is often great danger in getting at them; but the pleasure is commensurate."
"Are there not rare butterflies in the Amazonian swamps?" cynically.
"Ah, but this man has good blood in him; and if he flies at all he will fly high. Think of this man fifty years ago; what a possibility he would have been! But it is out of fashion to-day. Well, monsieur, I must be off. There is an old manuscript at the Bibliothèque I wish to inspect."
"Concerning this matter?"
"Butterflies," softly; "or, I should say, chrysalides."
The subtle inference passed by the minister. There were many other things to-ing and fro-ing in the busy corridors of his brain. "I shall hear from you frequently?"
"As often as the situation requires. By the way, I have an idea. When I cable you the word butterfly, prepare yourself accordingly. It will mean that the bomb is ready."
"Good luck attend you, my savant," said the minister, with a friendliness which was deep and genuine. He had known Monsieur Ferraud in other days. "And, above all, take care of yourself."
"Trust me, Count." And the secret agent departed, to appear again in these chambers only when his work was done.
"A strange man," mused the minister when he was alone. "A still stranger business for a genuine scholar. Is he really poor? Does he do this work to afford him ease and time for his studies? Or, better still, does he hide a great and singular patriotism under butterfly wings? Patriotism? More and more it becomes self-interest. It is only when a foreign mob starts to tear down your house, that you become a patriot."
Now the subject of these desultory musings went directly to the Bibliothèque Nationale. The study he pursued was of deep interest to him; it concerned a butterfly of vast proportions and kaleidoscopic in color, long ago pinned away and labeled among others of lesser brilliancy. It had cast a fine shadow in its brief flight. But the species was now extinct, at least so the historian of this particular butterfly declared. Hybrid? Such a contingency was always possible.
"Suppose it does exist, as I and a few others very well know it does; what a fine joke it would be to see it fly into Paris! But, no. Idle dream! Still, I shall wait and watch. And now, suppose we pay a visit to Berlin and use blunt facts in place of diplomacy? It will surprise them."
Each German chancellor has become, in turn, the repository of such political secrets as fell under the eyes of his predecessor; and the chancellor who walked up and down before Monsieur Ferraud, possessed several which did not rest heavily upon his soul simply because he was incredulous, or affected that he was.
"The thing is preposterous."
"As your excellency has already declared."
"What has it to do with France?"
"Much or little. It depends upon this side of the Rhine."
"What imagination! But for your credentials, Monsieur Ferraud, I should not listen to you one moment."
"I have seen some documents."
"Forgeries!" contemptuously.
"Not in the least," suavely. "They are in every part genuine. They are his own."
The chancellor paused, frowning. "Well, even then?"
Monsieur Ferraud shrugged.
"This fellow, who was forced to resign from the navy because of his tricks at cards, why I doubt if he could stir up a brawl in a tavern. Really, if there was a word of truth in the affair, we should have acted before this. It is all idle newspaper talk that Germany wishes war; far from it. Still, we lose no point to fortify ourselves against the possibility of it. Some one has been telling you old-wives' tales."
"Ten thousand marks," almost inaudibly.
"What was that you said?" cried the chancellor, whirling round abruptly, for the words startled him.
"Pardon me! I was thinking out loud about a sum of money."
"Ah!" And yet the chancellor realized that the other was telling him as plainly as he dared that the German government had offered such a sum to forward the very intrigue which he was so emphatically denying. "Why not turn the matter over to your own ambassador here?"
The secret agent laughed. "Publicity is what neither your government nor mine desires. Thank you."
"I am sorry not to be of some service to you."
"I can readily believe that, your excellency," not to be outdone in the matter of duplicity. "I thank you for your time."
"I hadn't the least idea that you were in the service; butterflies and diplomacy!" with a hearty laugh.
"It is only temporary."
"Your Alpine Butterflies compares favorably with The Life of the Bee."
"That is a very great compliment!"
And with this the interview, extraordinary in all ways, came to an end. Neither man had fooled the other, neither had made any mistake in his logical deductions; and, in a way, both were satisfied. The chancellor resumed his more definite labors, and the secret agent hurried away to the nearest telegraph office.
"So I am to stand on these two feet?" Monsieur Ferraud ruminated, as he took the seat by the window in the second-class carriage for Munich. "All the finer the sport. Ten thousand marks! He forgot himself for a moment. And I might have gone further and said that ninety thousand marks would be added to those ten thousand if the bribe was accepted and the promise fulfilled."
Ah, it would be beautiful to untangle this snarl all alone. It would be the finest chase that had ever fallen to his lot. No grain of sand, however small, should escape him. There were fools in Berlin as well as in Paris; and he knew what he knew. "Never a move shall he make that I shan't make the same; and in one thing I shall move first. Two million francs! Handsome! It is I who must find this treasure, this fulcrum to the lever which is going to upheave France. There will be no difficulty then in pricking the pretty bubble. In the meantime we shall proceed to Munich and carefully inquire into the affairs of the grand opera singer, Hildegarde von Mitter."
He extracted a wallet from an inner pocket and opened it across his knees. It was full of butterflies.
CHAPTER III
A PLASTER STATUETTE
Fitzgerald's view from his club window afforded the same impersonal outlook as from a window in a car. It was the two living currents, moving in opposite directions,