"I feel pretty well convinced of it," Hope said. "But how long is this to go on, Jessie?"
"Till Miss Galloway comes back dressed in the fashion of the Bond Street shop-girl. Then we shall change dresses, and I shall be free to depart."
Hope whispered something sweet, and the colour came to Jessie's cheeks. She was feeling resolute and brave enough now. As she turned and glanced at the upstairs window she saw the light spring up and the blind pulled aside. Then a man, stripped to his shirt and trousers, threw up the window and stood upon the parapet waving his arms wildly and gesticulating the while. A stifled cry came from Jessie's lips. If the man fell to the ground he would fall on the stone terrace and be killed on the spot.
[Illustration: "_A stifled cry came from Jessie's lips._"]
But he did not fall; somebody gripped him from behind, the window was shut, and the blind fell. There was darkness for a few seconds, and then the two flashes of the signal came once more, sharp and imperative.
Puzzled, vaguely alarmed, and nervous as she was, Jessie had been still more deeply thrilled could she have seen into the room from whence the signal came. She had escorted the Queen of Asturia there, and subsequently the man known as General Maxgregor, but why they came and why that secret meeting Jessie did not know.
In some vague way Jessie connected the mystery with the hapless creature whom she knew now to be the King of Asturia. Nor was she far wrong. In the dressing-room beyond the larger room where that strange interview was to take place, the hapless man lay on a bed. He might have been dead, so silent was he and so still his breathing. He lay there in his evening dress, but there was nothing about him to speak of his exalted rank. He wore no collar or star or any decoration; he might have been no more than a drunken waiter tossed contemptuously out of the way to lie in a sodden sleep till the effects of his potations passed.
The sleeper was small of size and mean of face, the weak lips hidden with a ragged red moustache; a thin crop of the same flame-coloured hair was on his head. In fine contrast stood the Queen of Asturia, regally beautiful, perfectly dressed and flashing with diamonds. There was every inch of a queen. But her face was bitter and hard, her dark eyes flashed.