The Intriguers

Nello was only too anxious that he should.

“I am waiting for that, Baron. Of course I can only guess at the contents that he has recommended me to you.”

“That he does in the warmest terms, and for the sake of our old friendship I am prepared to comply with his request. In this letter, which is not dated – he explains that by the fact that he does not know how soon his death will take place – he states that you are hoping to establish yourself as an artist, that he has already secured you a small, but fairly remunerative, engagement at the Parthenon.”

“That is quite true, sir.”

“Then, I take it, this letter was antecedent to your considerable success at the Covent Garden Concert. In that comparatively short space of time, your remuneration has gone up by leaps and bounds?”

Nello assented for the second time. “Perfectly correct, sir.”

“Then how do we stand? Of course, if you were quite a poor man, I would find you a post at once for the sake of my old friendship with Jean Villefort. But, candidly, do you want my assistance? I am not dissatisfied with my lot, Signor Corsini, I can assure you – ”

And Nello murmured, half under his breath: “I should think you were not, Baron, you a financier of European renown.”

A whimsical smile overspread the other man’s features. “And yet I will tell you a little secret. Music is a passion with me. I am a financier by profession, but art, art alone absorbs my soul. I have tried, oh how hard! to be an executant on more than one instrument. Signor Corsini, I would pay you a hundred thousand pounds to-morrow, if you could teach me to play that exquisite little romance as you played it last night. I feel every note in my soul, but when my feeble fingers touch the strings, they are powerless.”

Nello looked at him compassionately. There was in his composition the hard Latin fibre; but here was a new experience for him. Here was a man who had achieved eminence in one of the most difficult professions, a man who could write a cheque for one or two millions. And here he was, lamenting his incapacity to succeed in an art for which nature had given him no equipment.

“It is very sad, Baron,” breathed the young Italian softly. “But in your case, the gods have given so generously. Why should you complain that they have withheld this one small gift, the gift of the executant?”

“You call it a small gift, do you?” replied Salmoros in his deep, sonorous tones. “I call it the greatest gift of all.” He paused, reflected a second, and then became again the man of affairs.

“Now, Signor Corsini, to your immediate business. How can I help you for my good old Jean’s sake and your own? What are your own views as to the present situation? Are you satisfied, or not?”

Corsini was quite frank. “In a way, yes; in a way, no. Degraux and dear Papa Péron both gave me very good advice – ”

“The sum of which was – ?” interjected the white-haired Salmoros.

“That unless you make a very great success, the artistic career is of all the most uncertain.”

Salmoros nodded his massive head. “I quite agree. Poor dear old Jean was shrewder than I thought. And yet, how simple in some things. Why did he not apply to me instead of drawing his last breath in that miserable house? I would have given him an annuity for life.”

“I am sure you would, sir, but the dear old Papa was too proud to accept charity. Surely it was to his credit that he did not sponge on his old friends?”

“Just like him, just like him, a dear, kindly, impracticable creature. Well, now to your affairs. Do you want to stick to the artistic line, or not?”

“Not if there is anything better in prospect, Baron,” answered the shrewd Nello.

The Baron swept him with his keen glance.

“I am rather a judge of men. You seem just the sort of man who would make good. Let me think a little. There is something running in my mind. You might serve my immediate purposes, and at the same time, I might help you in your artistic career. You might have two strings to your bow. What do you think?”

“I am quite in your hands, Baron,” was Nello’s answer.

The mind of the great financier worked swiftly. He took up two letters, one in French, the other in Italian.

“Take these over to the table by the window, and translate the French into Italian and the Italian into French. Take your time, but do them well.”

Nello complied with his patron’s request. Salmoros was evidently a man who thought swiftly.

While Nello was engaged on his task, the Baron’s private secretary entered.

“The Prince Zouroff wishes to see you, sir.”

The Baron frowned. There were certain persons in the great world who were in his good books. The Russian Ambassador was certainly not. He knew a little too much about him.

He held up a warning finger to his secretary and crossed over to Nello.

“The Prince Zouroff is asking for an interview. You have played at the Russian Embassy; do you want to meet him?”

“No,” said Nello shortly; “I don’t think I do. I have heard that he is a bit of a brute.”

“Quite right, but, on account of his position, we have to cotton to him in a way. With your head over your desk you won’t see each other.”

The private secretary ushered in Prince Zouroff, the Russian Ambassador.

The Prince was a very overbearing and truculent personage; but he knew full well that even ambassadors have to preserve a modest demeanour, even as their sovereigns, in the presence of all-powerful financiers.

“Greetings to you, my dear Salmoros!” The Prince was always flamboyant. “The Czar has recalled me to St. Petersburg.”

Salmoros affected surprise. But he was not surprised in the least. He had received intimation of the news two days ago from the Russian Foreign Office itself.

“Ah, I have heard the rumour,” he said in his slow, suave accents. “You are to be Governor of Kieff, a post you have long been coveting, eh? I congratulate you, my dear Prince, although your friends in London will be very sorry to lose you.”

“You are mistaken,” replied the Ambassador shortly. “Though I have tried several times to obtain the governorship of Kieff my Imperial Master will not give it to me. It is my right by inheritance, because my estates are in that province. I hear that I may be appointed Governor of Archangel; in the meantime, I am to present myself at the Court of St. Petersburg.”

Salmoros did not betray by a flicker of the eyelid that the information was priceless to him.

Zouroff, after a brief sojourn at the Court of St. Petersburg, was to be advanced to the governorship of Archangel.

Salmoros knew what this meant. The Czar was as well aware of the fact as he was. Zouroff was a great nobleman, but also a traitor. The Government was going to proceed by easy steps. From Archangel to Siberia and life-long imprisonment would be a facile progression and create no great scandal, excite very little comment. Prince Zouroff would simply disappear, under this most autocratic of all autocratic governments.

After a short conversation the Baron held out his hand. In his heart he had a little sympathy for this truculent Ambassador, brute as he was, who was going to his doom, the victim of an iron and despotic Government. But perhaps his sympathy was wasted. Zouroff was a traitor, a man who would bite the hand that fed him.

When he had dismissed the Ambassador, he crossed over to the desk where Nello had just finished his translations.

“They are here, Baron. Will you read them?”

The Baron read them. “Very good, very good, indeed,” he said. “Now, Signor Corsini, I think you and I will have a little serious talk.”

CHAPTER VIII

The Baron led Nello from the desk where he had been writing and planted him in one of the numerous comfortable chairs scattered about the handsomely furnished room.

“Sit you down there, my young friend, while I talk to you. Now, these translations are very good, and they have started an idea in my mind which might result in something useful. But, in the first place, I should like to know something of your own views. Would you have any objection to leave England for a space, assuming that I could push your musical interests in another country?”

It did not take the young man long to consider. A musician is, or should be, cosmopolitan; to-day in London, next week in Paris, the week after in Vienna or Berlin.