She shrugged her shoulders.

"You agree with that great Frenchman," she observed, "that no ambassador
can remain a gentleman--politically."

"Well, I have never been a diplomat, so I cannot say," Dominey replied.

"You have many qualifications, I should think," she observed cuttingly.

"Such as?"

"You are absolutely callous, absolutely without heart or sympathy where
your work is concerned."

"I do not admit it," he protested.

"I go back to London to-morrow," she continued, "a very miserable and
unhappy woman. I take with me the letter which should have brought me
happiness. The love for which I have sacrificed my life has failed me.
Not even the whip of a royal command, not even all that I have to offer,
can give me even five seconds of happiness."

"All that I have pleaded for," Dominey reminded her earnestly, "is
delay."

"And what delay do you think," she asked, with a sudden note of passion
in her tone, "would the Leopold Von Ragastein of six years ago have
pleaded for? Delay! He found words then which would have melted an
iceberg. He found words the memory of which comes to me sometimes in the