“He called a petty officer and said a few words in an undertone....  In a minute a radiant young woman with springing steps glided gracefully down the deck....  She was not, in her present attire, much different from Maria ... but as she drew near I noted the difference at a glance....  She came forward quickly and held out her hand.  ‘Congratulations, Mr. Fox!’ she said smiling....  The Metropole!’ I gasped,—­’what brings YOU here?’ ‘Still asking questions!’ she coquetted prettily.  ’I merely called, of course, to inform you that the sapphire is in America!’...  I thought hard for more than a minute....  Then it occurred to me that I had seen her in a dozen disguises shadowing me from Buckingham to the room upstairs on Downing Street,—­to charm me later at The Hague—­to disappear like a will-o’-the-wisp,—­then to fascinate me at the Metropole.’...

“Well, the commander of the vessel tells me that it is fourteen hundred miles down stream to Woosung and that the voyage will take seven days from there....  With his code word still ringing in my ears to be repeated to one man at Berlin, to another man in England, another in Japan, and to a dignitary in Italy, the mission I have undertaken shall have been successfully discharged, so far as history and public policy is concerned....  But there is another mission that I shall, some day, undertake that will be enshrined in lovely memories and lively fancies until that day shall come.”

PART TWO

RESCUING THE CZAR

INTRODUCTION

The daring reference by Fox, in the foregoing, to personages and events, to locations and the life incident thereto, that may easily be confuted are they false in any of their details, leads to but one conclusion.

Yet there are other incidents that reinforce that conclusion, that are only casually touched upon by Fox.  The references to “the Performer at the Metropole” who “is a Baroness sure enough” and to the person named as “Syvorotka,” in whom the Baroness is interested, display an unconscious connection between the mysterious underground diplomats and the Secret Agents who were acting independently in the rescue, and supplementing the activities of Fox, will be found to be fully authenticated in the vivid incidents recorded by the diarist of Part Two.

This diarist was doubtless a Russian gentleman of the official class, of elevated standing with the former Government, and of pronounced aristocratic sentiments.  His previous official connections seem to have been with the High Administration, the Ministry of Finance, or with the Council of Ministers.  Like many others of his class in the old regime, when the Revolution broke, he was forced to degrade himself and mingle with the evil elements that were bent on loot and rapine.  By May, 1918, he appears to