Part 56 (2/2)
”It will be well taken care of from now, I promise you,” Laverick declared.
The cas.h.i.+er and his clerk led the way into the inner office. At their invitation Laverick and his solicitor followed, and a few yards behind came the two plain-clothes policemen, Bellamy, and the superintendent. The safe was opened and the packet placed in Laverick's hands. He pa.s.sed it on at once to Bellamy, and immediately afterwards the doorway behind was thronged with men, apparently ordinary loiterers around the hotel. They made a slow and exceedingly cautious exit. Once outside, Bellamy turned to Laverick with outstretched hand.
”Au revoir and good luck, old chap!” he said heartily. ”I think you'll find things go your way all right to-morrow morning.”
He departed, forming one of a somewhat singular cavalcade--two of his friends on either side, two in front, and two behind. It had almost the appearance of a procession. The whole party stepped into a closed motor-car. Three or four men were lounging on the pavement and there was some excited whispering, but no one actually interfered. As soon as they had left the courtyard, Laverick and his solicitor, with his own guard, re-entered the motor-car in which they had arrived, and drove back to Bow Street. Very few words were exchanged during the short journey. His solicitor, however, bade him good-night cheerfully, and Laverick's bearing was by no means the bearing of a man in despair.
In Downing Street, within the next half-an-hour, a somewhat remarkable little gathering took place. The two men chiefly responsible for the destinies of the nation--the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs--sat side by side before a small table. Facing them was Bellamy, and spread out in front were those few pages of foolscap, released from their envelope a few minutes ago for the first time since the hand of the great Chancellor himself had pressed down the seal. The Foreign Minister had just finished a translation for the benefit of his colleague, and the two men were silent, as men are in the presence of big events.
”Bellamy,” the Prime Minister said slowly, ”you are willing to stake, I presume, your reputation upon the authenticity of this doc.u.ment?”
”My honor and my life, if you will,” Bellamy answered earnestly.
”That is no copy which you have there. On the contrary, the handwriting is the handwriting of the Chancellor himself.”
The Prime Minister turned silently towards his colleague. The latter, whose eyes still seemed glued to those fateful words, looked up.
”All I can say is this,” he remarked impressively, ”that never in my time have I seen written words possessed of so much significance.
One moment, if you please.”
He touched the bell, and his private secretary entered at once from an adjoining room.
”Anthony,” he said, ”telephone to the Great Western Railway Company at Paddington. Ask for the station master in my name, and see that a special train is held ready to depart for Windsor in half-an-hour.
Tell the station-master that all ordinary traffic must be held up, but that the destination of the special is not to be divulged.”
The young man bowed and withdrew.
”The more I consider this matter,” the Foreign Minister went on, ”the more miraculous does the appearance of this doc.u.ment seem.
We know now why the Czar is struggling so frantically to curtail his visit--why he came, as it were, under protest, and seeks everywhere for an opportunity to leave before the appointed time.
His health is all right. He has had a hint from Vienna that there has been a leakage. His special mission only reached Paris this morning. The President is in the country and their audience is not fixed until to-morrow. Rawson will go over with a copy of these papers and a dispatch from His Majesty by the nine o'clock train.
It is not often that we have had the chance of such a 'coup' as this.”
He drew his chief a few steps away. They whispered together for several moments. When they returned, the Foreign Minister rang the bell again for his secretary.
”Anthony,” he said, ”Sir James and I will be leaving in a few minutes for Windsor. Go round yourself to General Hamilton, telephone to Aldershot for Lord Neville, and call round at the Admiralty Board for Sir John Harrison. Tell them all to be here at ten o'clock tonight. If I am not back, they must wait. If either of them have royal commands, you need only repeat the word 'Finisterre.' They will understand.”
The young man once more withdrew. The Prime Minister turned back to the papers.
”It will be worth a great deal,” he remarked, with a grim smile, ”to see His Majesty's face when he reads this.”
”It would be worth a great deal more,” his fellow statesman answered dryly, ”to be with his August cousin at the interview which will follow. A month ago, the thought that war might come under our administration was a continual terror to me. To-day things are entirely different. To-day it really seems that if war does come, it may be the most glorious happening for England of this century. You saw the last report from Kiel?”
Sir James nodded.
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