It was nearly half an hour after Volkonsky had arrived that Pembroke came in looking hurried and flushed. He did not mind at all crushing Volkonsky, and could with pleasure have kicked him into the street, but he was not disposed to the small revenges, like keeping an enemy waiting. He said at once: “Pray excuse my delay. I apologize--” “No apology is required,” answered Volkonsky haughtily; “I have this instant myself arrived. I have been in attendance upon his royal highness, the Grand Duke Alexis, who has just reached town.” “And I,” responded Pembroke bowing, “have been in attendance upon his excellency, the President of the United States--which of course, obliges me to postpone any other appointment.” Volkonsky fancied a lurking smile in the corners of Pembroke’s mouth. These incomprehensible Americans, he thought bitterly, never tell people when they are joking. But Pembroke was in no joking mood. He sat down by a little table between them, and looked Volkonsky full in the eye. “I have been with the President and the Secretary of State, and it is upon your affairs that we met.” Volkonsky shifted uneasily in his chair. These terrible Americans. They outraged all diplomacy. “And may I ask the result of that conference?” he inquired. “Certainly. That if you will agree to go quietly, you may.” Volkonsky drew himself up. Pembroke remembered a similar gesture and attitude in a country road, some years before. “And if I decline?” Pembroke nodded gravely. “Then the President, through the State Department will feel compelled to notify your government of the correspondence of yours which came into the hands of the Department, and was upon my request presented to the Foreign Affairs sub-committee. This is enough, you understand, for your recall, and perhaps dismissal. But I thought proper to inform the President of what _I_ knew personally regarding you--and I also informed him that your wife was entitled to some consideration of which you were totally unworthy. So you had best take advantage of the President’s leniency in allowing you to go, without a peremptory demand for your recall.”