"We come here. And here we find that a great sensation has been created by a lady who is dubbed the lady of the ru—I mean the queen of the diamonds. She is the wife of the great financier my master and I have been so recently interviewing. Remember he is old and senile, and dotes on her. It is inevitable that he has lent her the great diamond as a kind of glorious finish to her toilette." "In fact, we may assume that you have seen it blazing on her—shall we say forehead?" Rashburn asked. "You have guessed it exactly, my lord," Harold went on. "Here, then, is a beautiful complication—my master has to get the gem back, and incidentally is ready to commit murder to do so; here is the host who may come along at any time, and recognise the gem. That is as far as I have developed the story as yet, but I might at this point bring in yourself and your Government and make an international matter of it. If this thing leaks out, the Shan, who is favourable to England, goes, and his cousin, who is from Russia, steps on to the throne. Would it be fair to ask the Government to lend my master two hundred thousand pounds under the circumstances?" Lord Rashburn glanced admiringly into the face of his companion, and shook his head. "It would be a foolish thing to mention the affair directly to the Foreign Secretary at all. Officially I could not listen to you for a moment. I can only listen to you now because I am interested in stories of any light kind. But if you are asking my advice purely to get your local colour right——" "That’s it," Harold said eagerly. "If it were true, which is the proper course to pursue?" "I see you are a born novelist," Rashburn smiled shrewdly. "Well, in these matters there are intermediaries, rich men who are ready to sacrifice their purse for their country. Most of these men have strong claims on the Government of the day. Some of them become Commissioners, of this, that, and the other, and have letters after their names. Some become baronets, or even members of the Upper House. There is Mr. Gerald Parkford, for instance. He is over there talking to the lady in the yellow satin. I understand that he is deeply interested in problems of this kind, and has frequently done the State some service, at a considerable loss to himself. Some day his wife will wear a coronet. Purely out of regard for your story I will introduce you to Parkford, and then you will be able to bring the tale to a logical conclusion. Of course you will see that if this were anything but fiction it would have been a gross impertinence of you to have mentioned it to me." "Of course, my lord," Harold said humbly, and carefully avoiding Rashburn’s eyes. "If your lordship will be so kind as to make me known to Mr. Parkford——" "I will do that with the greatest possible pleasure. I shall catch his eye presently. Ah, I thought so."