Отель «Гранд Вавилон» / The Grand Babylon hotel

‘Ah! Perhaps, perhaps,’ he said. ‘But, dear Miss Racksole, why are you so sure?’

‘There are several reasons, and they are connected with Mr Dimmock. Did you ever suspect, your Highness, that that poor young man was not entirely loyal to you?’

‘He was absolutely loyal,’ said the Prince, with all the earnestness of conviction.

‘A thousand pardons, but he was not.’

‘Miss Racksole, if any other than yourself made that assertion, I would—I would—’

‘Consign them to the deepest dungeon in Posen?’ she laughed, lightly.

‘Listen.’ And she told him of the incidents which had occurred in the night preceding his arrival in the hotel.

‘Do you mean, Miss Racksole, that there was an understanding between poor Dimmock and this fellow Jules?’

‘There was an understanding.’

‘Impossible!’

‘Your Highness, the man who wishes to probe a mystery to its root never uses the word “impossible”. But I will say this for young Mr Dimmock. I think he repented, and I think that it was because he repented that he—er—died so suddenly, and that his body was spirited away.’

‘Why has no one told me these things before?’ Aribert exclaimed.

‘Princes seldom hear the truth,’ she said.

He was astonished at her coolness, her firmness of assertion, her air of complete acquaintance with the world.

‘Miss Racksole,’ he said, ‘if you will permit me to say it, I have never in my life met a woman like you. May I rely on your sympathy—your support?’