“I shall,” Sofia announced with decision.  “When am I to see him?  To-night?”

“Of course.  That is, I presume you will.  I mean to say, Prince Victor wasn’t at home when I left, but if I know him he’s sure to be when we arrive.  And I’m taking you there as directly as a motor can travel in this blessed town.”

Sofia looked out of the window.  The car, having turned down Regent Street from Piccadilly Circus, was now traversing sedate Pall Mall; and in another moment it swung into the passage between St. James’s Palace and Marlborough House Chapel; and then they were in The Mall, with the Victoria Memorial ahead, glowing against the dingy backing of Buckingham Palace.

Now, since all Sofia’s reading had inculcated the belief that the enterprising kidnapper always made off with his victim by way of dark bystreets and unsavoury neighbourhoods, she felt somewhat reassured.

“Have we very far to go?”

“We’re almost there now—­Queen Anne’s Gate.”

A good enough address.  Though that proved nothing.  There was still plenty of time, anything might happen....

Sofia shrugged, and settled back to await developments.

But there was nothing to warrant misgivings in the aspect of the dwelling before which the car presently drew up.  If it wasn’t the palace Sofia had unconsciously been looking forward to, it owned a solid, dull-faced dignity that suited well the town-house of a person of quality, it measured up quite acceptably to Sofia’s notion of what was becoming to the condition of a prince in exile—­who naturally would live quietly, in view of the recent revolution in Russia.

Without augmented fears, then, though still on the alert for anything that might seem questionable, and more agitated with excitement than she let him suspect, Sofia permitted Mr. Karslake to conduct her to the door.

He had barely touched the bell-button when this door opened, revealing a vista of spacious entrance-hall.

To one side stood a manservant to whom Sofia paid no attention till the sound of his name on Karslake’s tongue struck an echo from her memory.  “Thanks, Nogam.  Prince Victor home yet?”

“Not yet, sir.”

“Tell him, please, when he comes in, we’re waiting in the study.”

“’Nk-you, sir.”

The servant was the man whom Karslake had met in the Cafe des Exiles only a few hours before.  Catching Sofia’s quick, questioning glance, Nogam paused at respectful attention.  And, even then, she was struck again with his fidelity to the role in the social system for which Life had cast him.  In the cafe, that afternoon, he had cut a mildly incongruous figure, unpretending but alien to that atmosphere; here, in the plain evening-dress livery of his station, he blended perfectly into the picture.

Karslake gave his hat and stick to the man, then opened one wing of a great double doorway, and with a bow invited Sofia to precede him.  She faltered, hazily conceiving that threshold in the guise of an inglorious Rubicon.  But she had already gone too far into this adventure to draw back now without forfeiting her self-respect.  With a deceptively firm step she entered a room to wonder at.