“An enterprising lot, those lackeys of yours, madame,” he said, when he returned from tying the dog up in the stable and rejoined her in the salon.  “It will be an added pleasure to get the better of them, I can assure you.”

“Oui! if you can!” she answered, with a mocking laugh.  “Clopin, cher ami, your poor little parakeets are safe for the night—­unless monsieur grows desperate and eats them for himself.”

“Even that, if it were necessary to get the pearl, madame,” said Cleek, with the utmost sang-froid.  “Faugh!” looking at his watch, “a good twenty minutes wasted by the zealousness of those idiotic searchers of yours.  Ten minutes to ten!  Just time for one brief song.  Let us make hay while the sun lasts, madame, for it goes down suddenly in Mauravania; and for some of us—­it never comes up again!” Then, throwing himself upon the piano-seat, he ran his fingers across the keys and broke into the stately measures of the national anthem.  And, of a sudden, while the song was yet in progress, the clock in the corridor jingled its musical chimes and struck the first note of the hour.

He jumped to his feet and lifted both hands above his head.

“Mauravania!” he cried.  “Oh, Mauravania!  For you!  For you!” Then jumped to the mantelpiece, and catching up a lighted candle, flashed it twice across the window’s width, and broke again into the national hymn.

“Monsieur,” cried out madame, “monsieur, what is the meaning of that?  Have you lost your wits?  You give a signal!  For what?  To whom?”

“To the guards of Mauravania’s king, madame, in honour of his safe escape from you!” he made reply; then twitched back the window curtains until the whole expanse of glass was bared.  “Look! do you see them—­do you, madame?  His Majesty of Mauravania sends Madame Tcharnovetski a command to leave his kingdom, since he no longer has cause to fear a wasp whose sting has been plucked out.”

Her swift glance flashed to the fireplace, then to the corner where Clopin still sat with his jabbering parakeets, then flashed back to Cleek, and—­she laughed in his face.

“I think not, monsieur,” she said, with a swaggering air.  “Truly, I think not, my excellent friend.”

“What a pity you only think so, madame!  As for me—­Ah, welcome, Count, welcome a thousand times.  The paper, my friend; you have brought it?  Good!  Give it to me.  Madame, your passport—­yours and your associates’.  You leave Mauravania by the midnight train, and you have but little time to pack your effects.  Your passport, madame, and—­your bedroom candle.  Oh, yes, the paper is still round it—­see!” slipping off a sheet of note paper that was wrapped round the full length of the candle from top to bottom, “but if you will examine it, madame, you will find it is blank.  I burned the real letter the night before last when I put this in its place.”

“You what?” she snapped; then caught the tube-shaped covering he had stripped from the candle, uncurled it, and—­screamed.