“I might have been sent with them by way of China; the other half might have been sent direct by another person. Each of us would have known nothing of the other one. Understand?” “Yes. But what has that to do with their disappearance?” “I am merely endeavoring to impress upon you the care with which they were guarded, and would have been guarded to the end.” “Very well. I understand that.” “The documents were nearly complete, but not quite so. There remained one matter of importance to be accomplished, before the documents were forwarded, as I have described, to St. Petersburg.” “Yes.” “Well, sir, one of the halves of those prepared documents has disappeared from the place where the package was concealed. The ambassador instructed me to tell you that, so far as he is aware, no person other than himself knew where either of those packages was concealed. He wishes to have you go to Washington, to consult with him on the matter without delay, and he desires to impose entire secrecy concerning the affair upon you.” “Is that all?” “That, Mr. Carter, is the purport of my mission here. I was to tell you that much. I could not tell you more than that, for the reason that my own knowledge goes no farther. Whatever else there is to be told to you, the ambassador will tell you in person.” “You have no idea where the papers were concealed, colonel?” “Beyond the surmise that they were somewhere within the embassy, I have not even an idea concerning them; and even that much is only a surmise.” “Colonel Alexis Turnieff, in a matter of this kind, one has to ask plain questions—so plain that they are sometimes offensive,” said the detective, fixing his eyes upon the face of the man before him. “Yes, sir. I can understand the necessity for that. I am not thin-skinned, Mr. Carter. If your statement in any manner applies to me, I will say that you are at liberty to put any questions to me that occur to you. But I must assure you again that I have absolutely no knowledge as to the contents of those papers.” “But you do know that name of the government, other than the Russian government, that they concerned; eh?” “Yes; although I am not at liberty to tell you that. The ambassador——” “I don’t care to know it at the present time. What I do want to know—and this is one of the questions which might be offensive; particularly if you are entirely loyal to your chief—is this: Could the ambassador serve his own purposes, personal or otherwise, by making it appear that those papers had disappeared when in reality they had not done so?” “Do you mean, would he steal them himself?” demanded Turnieff, in amazement. “Words to that effect; yes.” “Impossible!”