her majesty was in the hall as jessie had anticipated. she was chatting quite gaily with lady merehaven as the girl came up. she flashed jessie a significant glance.
"your aunt has been pleased to accede to my whim," she said. "and so you are coming with me, vera. i understand your maid is sending everything to our hotel. good-night, lady merehaven, and please do not allow those people to play cards too long. my dear child, come along."
"it is a very great honour for the child," lady merehaven murmured. "good-night, madame, good-night."
the queen swept jessie into the brougham before her. there was a tiny electric lamp behind the queen's head so that it shone full on jessie's face. jessie felt the latter's eyes going all over her.
"now tell me your story," she said. "tell me freely and don't be afraid. i shall be your good friend."
"you give me courage to proceed," jessie murmured. "in the first place i'll tell you why i so dreaded passing the night at merehaven house. i should certainly have been found out in the morning and then everything would have been ruined. not that i cared for myself, but for the sake of others. madame, is it possible that you fail to see that i am not miss galloway at all?"
[205]
the queen fairly gasped with astonishment. those dark eyes of hers took in jessie's identity. it was a long time before she spoke again.
"you are quite right," she said slowly and thoughtfully. "i notice little subtle differences now you mention it. and yet the likeness is wonderful. my dear, you are a lady."
"i am a lady, yes. my father was colonel harcourt, in fact i am a connection of the merehavens. there has been nothing vulgar about my adventure to-night."
"that i am absolutely certain of. really, the likeness is marvellous. and i have been talking to you and confiding in you all the evening as if you were my friend vera galloway."
"instead of your friend jessie harcourt," the girl said with a wistful smile. "believe me, i am as devoted to your interests as is the one whose part i play. i have given proof of it enough to-night. i might have gone on deceiving you to the end but i could not do it."
"i see, i see. you are telling the truth, you are making me love you. and why did you do this for one who a little time ago was a perfect stranger to you? if you know anything of our cause——"
"but i do now—and you can command me in any way. perhaps i had better begin at the beginning. it was vera galloway who took me up. she came to me at a moment when i was absolutely desperate. it is strange how the warp of fate has dragged me into this business!"
"you cannot tell how deeply i am interested," the queen said softly.
"it is very good of your majesty. miss galloway came to me. she had heard of me, evidently.[206] she came to me at the very moment when i was dismissed from my situation. i had been accused of a disgraceful flirtation with the son of one of the shop customers. as a matter of fact the coward had tried to kiss me and he let all the blame rest on my shoulders. i was dismissed without any chance of a further situation, i had only a few shillings in the world and an invalid sister partially dependent upon me. at that moment i was desperate enough for anything. quite early the complication began. the name of the coward who brought all this trouble on me was prince boris mazaroff."
"i am not surprised," the queen said with just a touch of weary scorn in her voice. "we are all creatures of fate. i know that i am. but the coincidence is a little strange."
"miss galloway wrote me a letter and asked me to call upon her in my working dress. when i saw her i could not but be struck by the amazing likeness between us. then she unfolded her plan—the plan that we were to change places for a little time. someone whom she cared for was in trouble and it was impossible that she should get away without being suspected. your majesty may guess that the somebody in trouble was no other than mr. charles maxwell and at the bottom of the trouble was the missing papers relating to asturia."
the queen nodded, her dark eyes gleaming in the light of the lamp.
"i see," she exclaimed. "those papers that found their way into the hands of the countess saens. the papers that she was robbed of almost as soon as she had obtained possession of them. what an amazing daring thing to do. i seem to see quite clearly now. miss galloway slipped off and stole[207] them while all the time her friends and relations thought that she was in the house of her uncle! ah, what will not a woman do for the sake of the man she loves! and she was quite successful!"
"quite. we know that by the scene made by the countess' maid at merehaven house. i did not guess until the maid looked at me and said that i was the thief. of course everybody who heard it laughed, but the woman stuck to her story. the statement was a flood of light to me, when i heard it i knew then exactly what had happened as well as if i had been present and seen the robbery."
"vera galloway saved asturia and her lover at the same time," the queen said. "but why did not miss galloway come back and resume her proper place?"
"oh, that is the unfortunate part of it," jessie said sadly. "she was so overcome with her good fortune that she walked down piccadilly in a dazed state. then she was run over by a cab and taken to charing cross hospital. she is there at this moment."
a cry of passionate anger broke from the queen. her hands were clasped together closely.
"of all the misfortunes!" she gasped. "will nothing ever come right here? go on and tell me the worst."
"the worst is that vera lost the papers," jessie resumed. "when the news of the accident came to me, i slipped out and with great risk went to the hospital. dr. varney gave me a permit. vera had lost the papers, she had not the least idea what had become of them. but that is not all. countess saens has found out that a girl answering to my description had been taken to the hospital and she[208] went there. fortunately she was refused admission. but she will get this in the morning and that is why i want to go out so early. the suspicions of the countess are aroused, she begins to understand. and there is prince mazaroff."
"what can he possibly have to do with it?" the queen asked.
"your majesty is forgetting that prince mazaroff knows both vera galloway and jessie harcourt, the shop girl whom he honoured with his hated attentions. he knows that there is a girl in london identical in looks to miss galloway, he heard what countess saens's maid said. indeed he went so far to-night to hint to lord merehaven that a trick was being played upon her ladyship. there is only one thing that prevented his discovery outright."
"and what was that?" the queen asked. "why should he hesitate?"
"because he was not absolutely sure of his ground," jessie said. "he knew the shop girl jessie harcourt. but he was puzzled because he did not imagine that a shop girl would be so wonderfully at ease in good society and have all the manners of it at her fingers' ends. he did not know that the bond street girl was of gentle birth, and he was puzzled. do you see my point?"
the queen saw the point perfectly well and admitted that it was a very clever one.
"i am more than glad that you have told me all this," she said in a thrilling voice. "your frankness may save the situation in the long run. one thing is certain, we must get vera out of the hospital and back again here without delay. and for the time being you must disappear. i seem to have as many enemies here as i have in asturia, only they[209] are cleverer ones. these people are all in the pay of russia. countess saens must be baffled at any cost. wait a moment."
the carriage had pulled up, but the footman did not dismount from the box. so far as jessie could judge, the carriage had stopped nowhere near the queen of asturia's headquarters. she smiled as jessie looked up with a questioning eye.
"you are wondering why we are here," she said. "it is imperative before i sleep to-night that i should have a few words with general maxgregor. i understand that he has a suite of rooms in the big block of flats. i fancy those are his windows on the second floor, those with the lights up. somebody has just come in and looked out of the window. my child, who is that?"
the queen's voice changed suddenly, her tones were harsh and rasping. a man in evening dress stood in one of the lighted windows looking out.
"you saw what happened at lady merehaven's," the queen went on. "we left the king there with the faithful alexis behind his chair. we have come direct here. the whole thing is maddening. who do you reckon that man to be who was looking out of the window?"
jessie looked up with bewildered eyes. the old dreamy feeling was coming over her again. she gazed steadily at the figure framed in the flood of light.
"there is no mistake about it," she gasped. "that is his majesty the king of asturia!"
