Pimpernel and Rosemary

"Then," he said coolly, "there is nothing left for me to do but to take my leave, and to deplore that you should have wasted so much of your valuable time in conversation with a clod."

He rose, and bowing low, he put out his hand in order to take hers, but Rosemary did not move.

"You cannot go, Monsieur le General," she said firmly, "without giving me a definite answer."

"I have given you a definite answer, dear lady. It is my misfortune that you choose to treat it as ludicrous."

"But surely you were not serious when you suggested—"

"When I suggested that the mischief wrought by two traitors should be remedied by one who takes an interest in them? What could be more serious?"

"You seriously think" she insisted, "that I would lend myself to such traffic? that I would put my name to statements which I could not verify, or to others that I should actually believe to be false? Ah ça, Monsieur le General, where did you get your conception of English women of letters, or of English journalists?"

Naniescu put his finger-tips to his breast, then spread out his hands with a broad gesture of protest.

"I was wrong," he said suavely, "utterly wrong. I admit it. Forgive me, and permit me to take my leave—"

"Monsieur le General—"

"At your service, dear lady."

"Young Imrey," she pleaded, "and Anna Heves!"

He shrugged his shoulders.

"I am truly sorry for them," he said unctuously; "but surely you do not think seriously that I would lend myself to any traffic where the safety of my country is concerned. Ah ça, dear lady," he went on, not only mocking the very words she had used, but even the inflexion of her voice. "Where did you get your conception of a Roumanian officer or of a Roumanian gentleman?"

"It is you who proposed an infamous traffic," she retorted, "not I."

"Pardon me," he protested. "All that I suggested was that the mischief done should be remedied in the simplest way, before those who had wrought it could hope for pardon. The mischief was done through the public Press; it can only be made good through the public Press, and only through the medium of one as influential as yourself. My suggestion has not met with your approval. Let us say no more about it."

Before she could prevent it he had taken her hand and raised it to his lips. She snatched it away as if her finger-tips had come in contact with something noxious; the indignation which she had tried so hard to keep under control flamed for an instant out of her eyes; and Naniescu, seeing it, gave a soft, guttural laugh.

"I had a suspicion," he said cynically, "that the situation was not entirely ludicrous. And now," he went on, "have I your permission to take my leave?"

He bowed once more, hand on breast, heels clicking, and was on the point of turning to go when an impulsive cry from Rosemary brought him to a halt.

"That is not your last word, General Naniescu?"

"Indeed," he replied with utmost gallantry, "but the last word rests with you, dear lady. I am ever at your service. Only," he continued very slowly and very deliberately, "let me assure you once and for all that young Imrey and Anna Heves will appear before the military courts on a charge of treason unless a series of articles written in the spirit I have had the honour to outline before you, and bearing your distinguished name, appear in-shall we say The Times?-within the next month. But, just to show you how greatly I value your regard, I will be as lenient as my duty permits. I will even allow those two young traitors to return, temporarily, to their homes. Philip Imrey and Anna Heves will be brought here in the course of a day or two. They will be free, within certain limitations, to move about among their friends. I need not add, dear lady, that you, on the other hand, are absolutely free, without any limitations, to come and go as you choose. On the day that the last of your brilliant articles will have appeared in The Times Imrey and his cousin will receive a free pardon from the Government which they have outraged."

He paused a moment, then raised one hairy, manicured finger and added with theatrical emphasis:

"But not before."

Rosemary had listened to his long speech without moving a muscle. She stood straight as a sapling, looking unflinchingly at the man, striving to shame him, yet knowing that in this she would not succeed. There was no room for shame or compunction in that bundle of conceit and depravity.

Fear, too, appeared to be one of the tortuous motives which had suggested this ignominious "either-or." How far the Roumanian Government was a party to the mishandling of Transylvania, Rosemary had not yet had the opportunity of ascertaining.