“You bet he is--as he would say himself. The story of your Mission is all over the world by this time, and Hicks and the proprietor of the ‘Crier’ are raking in the shekels like so much dust. Upon my word, it is rather rough on you. But for that illness of yours, you would have carried the whole thing through yourself, and now you have lost the biggest advertisement you were ever within an ace of getting. Stratford is the popular hero from end to end of the Empire, and no one else will have a look-in beside him.” “You would not wish me to rob Mr Stratford of the honour which is due to him?” inquired Sir Dugald, raising his eyebrows. “If I know him at all, he will owe Hicks just as much thanks for his advertisement as I should in his place, and that is--nothing. He is so touchy on the subject of his visit to the Palace that I have scarcely yet been able to mention it to him myself. Still, it is a little disappointing to find that we have been forestalled in the announcement of our great _coup_. You agree with me, Mr Stratford?” and Sir Dugald turned partially round in his saddle, and cast a side-glance at the guilty Stratford, who looked extremely unlike a popular hero at the moment. He muttered something unintelligible in reply to his leader’s question, and Sir Dugald smiled and changed the subject as he rode on with the Commandant. In the bustle and confusion of arriving at the Fort, Stratford heard no more of his attempted deception until late that evening, when he and Fitz, who had been dining with the officers at mess, walked over to the verandah in front of the Haighs’ old quarters to say good-night. Sir Dugald had employed the interval in catechising Lady Haigh and Georgia, as well as in collecting stray pieces of information from Dick and Kustendjian, so that he was now well acquainted with the history of all that had passed on the eventful day when the treaty had been signed. “Sit down, Stratford, and don’t be in such a hurry,” he said, as they came up the steps, divining Stratford’s evident intention of seeking safety in flight to his own quarters as soon as the requisite farewells had been exchanged. “We may not have the chance of being together again without any strangers present. Do you know that you have been plotting all this time to play me a very shabby trick--to make a fool of me, in fact, in the eyes of everybody?” “Pray don’t think that I agree with your description of our aims, Sir Dugald, when I say that I can only wish they had succeeded.” “And left me at the mercy of our friend Hicks? Don’t you see that as soon as he gave his version of your proceedings, I should be suspected either of concealing the facts or of being ignorant of them? I have no particular fancy for either alternative.” “Unfortunately, we had all left Hicks out of our calculations.”