The Great Impersonation by E. Phillips Oppenheim (books to read now txt) 📕

only made use of on important occasions. His name is Wolff⁠—Johann Wolff.”

“And this story of his?”

“You ought to be the best judge of that.”

“I am,” Dominey assented confidently. “Without the shadow of a doubt I threw the body of the man I killed into the Blue River and watched it sink.”

“Then the story is a fake,” Seaman decided. “For some reason or other we have come under the suspicion of our own secret service.”

Seaman, as they emerged into the hall, was summoned imperiously to her side by the Princess Eiderstrom. Dominey disappeared for a moment and returned presently, having discarded some of his soaked shooting garments. He was followed by his valet, bearing a note upon a silver tray.

“From the person in Mr. Parkins’ room⁠—to Mr. Seaman, sir,” the man announced, in a low tone.

Dominey took it from the salver with a little nod. Then he turned to where the youngest and most frivolous of his guests were in the act of rising from the tea table.

“A game of pills, Eddy,” he proposed. “They tell me that pool is one of your greatest accomplishments.”

“I’m pretty useful,” the young man confessed, with a satisfied chuckle. “Give you a black at snooker, what?”

Dominey took his arm and led him into the billiard-room.

“You will give me nothing, young fellow,” he replied. “Set them up, and I will show you how I made a living for two months at Johannesberg!”

XXII

The evening at Dominey hall was practically a repetition of the previous one, with a different set of guests from the outer world. After dinner, Dominey was absent for a few minutes and returned with Rosamund upon his arm. She received the congratulations of her neighbours charmingly, and a little court soon gathered around her. Doctor Harrison, who had been dining, remained upon the outskirts, listening to her lighthearted and at times almost brilliant chatter with grave and watchful interest. Dominey, satisfied that she was being entertained, obeyed Terniloff’s gestured behest and strolled with him to a distant corner of the hall.

“Let me now, my dear host,” the Prince began, with some eagerness in his tone, “continue and, I trust, conclude the conversation to which all that I said this morning was merely the prelude.”

“I am entirely at your service,” murmured his host.

“I have tried to make you understand that from my own point of view⁠—and I am in a position to know something⁠—the fear of war between this country and our own has passed. England is willing to make all reasonable sacrifices to ensure peace. She wants peace, she intends peace, therefore there will be peace. Therefore, I maintain, my young friend, it is far better for you to disappear at once from this false position.”

“I am scarcely my own master,” Dominey replied. “You yourself must know that. I am here as a servant under orders.”

“Join your protests with mine,” the Prince suggested. “I will make a report directly I get back to London. To my mind, the matter is urgent. If anything should lead to the discovery of your false position in this country, the friendship between us which has become a real pleasure to me must seriously undermine my own position.”

Dominey had risen to his feet and was standing on the hearthrug, in front of a fire of blazing logs. The Ambassador was sitting with crossed legs in a comfortable easy-chair, smoking one of the long, thin cigars which were his particular fancy.

“Your Excellency,” Dominey said, “there is just one fallacy in all that you have said.”

“A fallacy?”

“You have come to the absolute conclusion,” Dominey continued, “that because England wants peace there will be peace. I am of Seaman’s mind. I believe in the ultimate power of the military party of Germany. I believe that in time they will thrust their will upon the Kaiser, if he is not at the present moment secretly in league with them. Therefore, I believe that there will be war.”

“If I shared that belief with you, my friend,” the Ambassador said quietly, “I should consider my position here one of dishonour. My mandate is for peace, and my charge is from the Kaiser’s lips.”

Stephanie, with the air of one a little weary of the conversation, broke away from a distant group and came towards them. Her beautiful eyes seemed tired, she moved listlessly, and she even spoke with less than her usual assurance.

“Am I disturbing a serious conversation?” she asked. “Send me away if I am.”

“His Excellency and I,” Dominey observed, “have reached a cul-de-sac in our argument⁠—the blank wall of good-natured but fundamental disagreement.”

“Then I shall claim you for a while,” Stephanie declared, taking Dominey’s arm. “Lady Dominey has attracted all the men to her circle, and I am lonely.”

The Prince bowed.

“I deny the cul-de-sac,” he said, “but I yield our host! I shall seek my opponent at billiards.”

He turned away and Stephanie sank into his vacant place.

“So you and my cousin,” she remarked, as she made room for Dominey to sit by her side, “have come to a disagreement.”

“Not an unfriendly one,” her host assured her.

“That I am sure of. Maurice seems, indeed, to have taken a wonderful liking to you. I cannot remember that you ever met before, except for that day or two in Saxony?”

“That is so. The first time I exchanged any intimate conversation with the Prince was in London. I have the utmost respect and regard for him, but I cannot help feeling that the pleasant intimacy to which he has admitted me is to a large extent owing to the desire of our friends in Berlin. So far as I am concerned I have never met anyone, of any nation, whose character I admire more.”

“Maurice lives his life loftily. He is one of the few great aristocrats I have met who carries his nobility of birth into his simplest thought and action. There is just one thing,” she added, “which would break his heart.”

“And that?”

“The subject upon which you two disagree⁠—a war between Germany and