Deane looked for a moment annoyed.

“I am afraid,” he said, “that I cannot answer you that question.”

“If you advise him one way or the other,” Phineas Duge said, “you give the lie to your own statement, that in diplomacy there are no politics.  Your advice will show on which side you intend to stand.”

“I have not given any advice,” Deane replied.

“Nor must you,” Phineas Duge said pleasantly enough.  “It is not your affair at all, Mr. Deane.  I grant your cleverness, your shrewdness, even your common sense, but all three are academic.  They have no direct relation to the actual things of the world.  Wealth is one of those forces which only strong fingers can gather, a stream which if you like you can divert, but you cannot dam.  I want to tell you, Mr. Deane, that if you advise Norris Vine at all, you must see to it that you advise him to place that paper upon the fire, or to restore it from whence it was stolen.”

“I am afraid, Mr. Duge,” the ambassador said, “that I cannot recognize you as possessed of such authority as to justify the use of the word ‘must.’  I am in the habit of doing what I think right and well.”

Phineas Duge bowed his head.

“I will only remind you, Mr. Deane,” he said, “of the facts which led to the withdrawal of our ministers from Lisbon and Paris and Vienna.  I am not proud of the power which undoubtedly lies in the palm of my right hand.  On the other hand, I should be foolish if I did not remind you of these things at a time like this.  I only ask you to take up a passive attitude.  You escape in that way all trouble, and if you fancy that the climate of Paris would suit you or Mrs. Deane better than London, it would be a matter of a few months only; but—­you must not advise the other way!”

The ambassador was distinctly uneasy.  Duge saw his embarrassment and hastened on.

“I ask you for no reply, Mr. Deane,” he said; “not even for an expression of opinion.  I have said all that I came to say.  Apart from any question of self-interest, I can assure you, as a man who sees as clearly as his neighbours, that you could do no good, but much evil, by advising Norris Vine to hold up these men to the ridicule and contempt of the world.  He might sell a million copies of his paper, but he would create an enmity which in the end, I think, would swamp him.  Mrs. Deane, I trust, is well?”

“She is in excellent health,” the ambassador answered.  “What can I do for you during your stay?  I presume you know that anything you desire is open to you?  You represent, you see, a great uncrowned royalty, to whom all the world bows.  Will you come to Court?”

“Not I,” Duge answered.  “Those things are for another type of man.  There was a further question which I wished to ask you.  I have a niece who came over here on a foolish errand, a Miss Virginia Longworth.  Do you happen to have seen or heard anything of her?”