21 Greatest Spy Thrillers in One Premium Edition (Mystery & Espionage Series) - E. Phillips Oppenheim

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well know, not a day has passed that I have not sent you some little word of gossip or information—the gossip of the navy and the gossip of the army—and there is always some truth underneath what these young men say. It is what you desire, is it not?”

      “Without a doubt,” Selingman assented. “Your work, my dear Helda, has been excellent. I commend you. I think with fervour of the day when first we talked together, and the scheme presented itself to me. Continue to play Aspasia in such a fashion to the young soldiers and sailors of this country, and your villa at Monte Carlo next year is assured.”

      The woman shrugged her shoulders.

      “I will not say that you are not generous,” she declared, “for that would be untrue, but sometimes you forget that these young men have very little money, and the chief profit from their friendship, therefore, must come to us in other ways.”

      “You want a larger allowance?” Selingman asked slowly.

      “Not at present, but I want to warn you that the time may come when I shall need more. A salon in Pimlico, dear friend, is an expensive thing to maintain. These young men tell their friends of our hospitality, the music, our entertainment. We become almost too much the fashion, and it costs money.”

      Selingman held up his champagne glass, gazed at the wine for a moment, and slowly drank it.

      “I am not of those,” he announced, “who expect service for nothing, especially good service such as yours. Watch for the postman, dear lady. Any morning this week there may come for you a pleasant little surprise.”

      She leaned over and patted his arm.

      “You are a prince,” she murmured. “But tell me, who is the grave-looking young man?”

      Selingman glanced up. Norgate, who had been standing at the bar with Baring, was passing a few feet away.

      “The rake’s progress,” the former quoted solemnly.

      Selingman raised his glass.

      “Come and join us,” he invited.

      Norgate shook his head slightly and passed on. Selingman leaned a little forward, watching his departing figure. The buoyant good-nature seemed to have faded out of his face.

      “If you could get that young man to talk, now, Helda,” he muttered, “it would be an achievement.”

      She glanced after him, “To me,” she declared, “he looks one of the difficult sort.”

      “He is an Englishman with a grievance,” Selingman continued. “If the grievance cuts deep enough, he may—But we gossip.”

      “The other was a navy man,” the girl remarked. “His name is Baring.”

      Selingman nodded.

      “You need not bother about him,” he said. “If it is possible for him to be of use, that is arranged for in another quarter. So! Let us finish our wine and separate. That letter shall surely come. Have no fear.”

      Selingman strolled away, a few minutes later. Baring had returned to Mrs. Paston Benedek, and Norgate had resumed his place in the box. Selingman, with a gold-topped cane under his arm, a fresh cigar between his lips, and a broad smile of good-fellowship upon his face, strolled down one of the wings of the Promenade. Suddenly he came to a standstill. In the box opposite to him, Norgate and Hebblethwaite were seated side by side. Selingman regarded them for a moment steadfastly.

      “A friend of Hebblethwaite’s!” he muttered. “Hebblethwaite—the one man whom Berlin doubts!”

      He withdrew a little into the shadows, his eyes fixed upon the box. A little way off, in the stalls, Mrs. Paston Benedek was whispering to Baring. Further back in the Promenade, Helda was entertaining a little party of friends. Selingman’s eyes remained fixed upon Norgate.

      CHAPTER XII

       Table of Contents

      Mrs. Paston Benedek, on the following afternoon, sat in one corner of the very comfortable lounge set with its back to the light in her charming drawing-room. Norgate sat in the other.

      “I think it is perfectly sweet of you to come,” she declared. “I do not care how many enemies I make—I will certainly dine with you to-night. How I shall manage it I do not yet know. You shall call for me here at eight o’clock—or say a quarter past, then we need not hurry away too early from the club. If Captain Baring is there, perhaps it would be better if you did not speak of our engagement.”

      Norgate sighed.

      “What is the wonderful attraction about Baring?” he asked discontentedly.

      “Really, there isn’t any,” she replied. “I like to be kind, that is all. I do not like to hurt anybody’s feelings, and I know that Captain Baring would like very much to dine with me to-night himself. I was obliged to throw him over last night because of Mr. Selingman’s arrival.”

      “You have not always been so considerate,” he persisted. “Why this especial care for Baring’s feelings?”

      She turned her head a little towards him. She was leaning back in her corner of the lounge, her hands clasped behind her head. There was an elaborate carelessness about her pose which she numbered among her best effects.

      “Perhaps,” she retorted, “I, too, find your sudden attraction for me a little remarkable. On those few occasions when you did honour us at the club before you left for Berlin, you were agreeable enough, but I do not remember that you once asked me to dine with you. There was no Captain Baring then.”

      “The truth is,” Norgate confessed, “since I returned, I have felt rather like hiding myself. I don’t care about going to my own club or visiting my own friends. I came to the St. James’s as a sort of compromise.”

      “You are not very flattering,” she complained.

      “Wouldn’t you rather I were truthful?” asked Norgate. “One’s friends, one’s real friends, are scarcely likely to be found at a mixed bridge club.”

      “After that,” she sighed, “I am going to telephone to Captain Baring. He, at any rate, is in love with me, and I need something to restore my self-respect.”

      “In love with you, perhaps, but are you in love with him?”

      She laughed, softly at first, but with an ever more insistent note of satire underlying her mirth.

      “The woman,” she said, “who expects to get anything out of life worth having, doesn’t fall in love. She may give a good deal, she may seem to give everything, but if she is wise, she keeps her heart.”

      “Poor Baring!”

      “Are you sure,” she asked, fixing her brilliant eyes upon him, “that he needs your sympathy? He is very much in love with me, and there are times when I could almost persuade myself that I am in love with him. At any rate, he attracts me.”

      Norgate was momentarily sententious. “The psychology of love,” he murmured, looking into the fire, “is a queer study.”

      Once more she laughed at him.

      “Before you went to Berlin,” she said, “you used not to talk of the psychology of love. Your methods, so far as I remember them, were a little different. Confess now—you fell in love in Berlin.”

      Norgate stifled a sudden desire to confide in his companion.

      “At my age!” he exclaimed.

      “It is true that it is not a susceptible age,” Mrs. Benedek admitted. “You are in what I call your mid-youth. Mid-youth, as a rule, is an age of cynicism. As you grow older, you will appreciate more the luxury of emotion. But tell me, was it the little Baroness who fascinated you? She is a great beauty,

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