“Just a word of assurance now,” she went on after a moment.  “The Latin compact has been definitely given up; the plan has been dismissed, thanks to you; the peace of the world is unbroken.  And who am I?  I know you have wondered; I know your agents have scoured the world to find out.  I am the daughter of a former Italian ambassador to the Court of St. James.  My mother was an English woman.  I was born and received my early education in England, hence my perfect knowledge of that tongue.  In Rome I am, or have been, alas, the Countess Rosa d’Orsetti; now I am an exile with a price on my head.  That is all, except for several years I was a trusted agent of my government, and a friend of my queen.”

She rose and extended both hands graciously.  Mr. Grimm seized the slender white fingers and stood with eyes fixed upon hers.  Slowly a flush crept into her pallid cheeks, and she bowed her head.

“Wonderful woman!” he said softly.

“I shall ask a favor of you now,” she went on gently.  “Let all this that you have learned take the place of whatever you expected to learn, and go.  Believe me, there can only be one result if you meet—­if you meet the inventor of the wireless cap upon which so much was staked, and so much lost.”  She shuddered a little, then raised the blue-gray eyes beseechingly to his face.  “Please go.”

Go!  The word straightened Mr. Grimm in his tracks and he allowed her hands to fall limply.  Suddenly his face grew hard.  In the ecstasy of adoration he had momentarily forgotten his purpose here.  His eyes lost their ardor; his nerveless hands dropped beside him.

“No,” he said.

“You must—­you must,” she urged gently.  “I know what it means to you.  You feel it your duty to unravel the secret of the percussion cap?  You can’t; no man can.  No one knows the inventor more intimately than I, and even I couldn’t get it from him.  There are no plans for it in existence, and even if there were he would no more sell them than you would have accepted a fortune at the hands of Prince d’Abruzzi to remain silent.  The compact has failed; you did that.  The agents have scattered—­gone to other duties.  That is enough.”

“No,” said Mr. Grimm.  There was a strange fear tearing at his heart,—­“No one knows the inventor more intimately than I.”  “No,” he said again.  “I won from my government a promise to be made good upon a condition—­I must fulfil that condition.”

“But there is nothing, promotion, honor, reward, that would compensate you for the loss of your life,” she entreated.  “There is still time.”  She was pleading now, with her slim white hands resting on his shoulders, and the blue-gray eyes fixed upon his face.

“It’s more than all that,” he said.  “That condition is you—­your safety.”

“For me?” she repeated.  “For me?  Then, won’t you go for—­for my sake?”

“No.”

“Won’t you go if you know you will be killed,” and suddenly her face turned scarlet, “and that your life is dear to me?”