"No," she answered at last. "It is not likely that I should do that. Baron Domiloff, I will show you the way to my brother's room."
He touched her arm. She drew it away with an angry exclamation. Domiloff was not without vanity, and his personal repugnance to her, which she was at no pains to hide, galled him. For a moment he dared not trust himself to speak.
"Will you be so good as to remember," she said, with cutting force, "that my toleration of you is on account of Theos, and Theos only. Personally, I hate all conspirators and plotters. The idea of this sort of thing and everybody connected with it is loathsome to me."
He bowed low. It was as well that she could not see his face.
"Countess," he said, "you will excuse my familiarity, but there was a matter--an urgent matter--which I had yet to mention to you. There is a man who must die unless he leaves Theos in four-and-twenty hours. I have heard him called your friend--else he were a dead man at this moment."
"No! I mean Walter Brand, the English journalist."
She started. Domiloff watched her keenly.
"What has he not done. You remember his first appearance here?"
"I remember it very well," she answered. "He was bold enough to befool the wily Baron Domiloff--to play with him and beat him at his own game. Yes, his first coming I remember very well indeed."
The darkness hid Domiloff's face. His voice was under perfect control.
"I bear him no special grudge for that," Domiloff said, "but it was only the beginning. He has done his very best to oppose us throughout. He is the King's most intimate friend, he is our most dangerous enemy. His letters from here are influencing the whole European Press. In England they have created a sensation, and in Germany also. They have been translated into every language, and copied everywhere. The time has come when they must cease."
She felt the significance of his words. She was not altogether unmoved under his close scrutiny.
"He is an Englishman," she said, "and it is dangerous to interfere with Englishmen."
"Nevertheless it must be done," he declared. "To-night it has become a matter of urgency."
"Because, not content with the mischief which he has already done, he must needs play the spy upon one or both of us. To-night he was at the Café Metropolitan and overheard some part of my conversation with your brother."