The prince frowned at this typical piece of shifty Russian diplomacy.     

       "How is your Highness getting on with your Highness's roller-skating?" he enquired guardedly.     

       The Russian smiled a subtle smile.     

       "Poorly," he said, "poorly. The last time I tried the outside edge I thought somebody had thrown the building at me."     

       Prince Otto flushed. He was a plain, blunt man, and he hated this beating about the bush.     

       "Why does a chicken cross the road?" he demanded, almost angrily.     

       The Russian raised his eyebrows, and smiled, but made no reply. The prince, resolved to give him no chance of wriggling away from the point, pressed him hotly.     

       "Think of a number," he cried. "Double it. Add ten. Take away the number you first thought of. Divide it by three, and what is the result?"     

       There was an awed silence. Surely the Russian, expert at evasion as he was, could not parry so direct a challenge as this.     

       He threw away his cigarette and lit a cigar.     

       "I understand," he said, with a tinkle of defiance in his voice, "that the Suffragettes, as a last resource, propose to capture Mr. Asquith and sing the Suffragette Anthem to him."     

       A startled gasp ran round the table.     

       "Because the higher he flies, the fewer?" asked Prince Otto, with sinister calm.     

       "Because the higher he flies, the fewer," said the Russian smoothly, but with the smoothness of a treacherous sea.     

       There was another gasp. The situation was becoming alarmingly tense.     

       "You are plain-spoken, your Highness," said Prince Otto slowly.     

       At this moment the tension was relieved by the Young Turk falling off his chair with a crash on to the floor. Everyone jumped up startled. Raisuli took advantage of the confusion to pocket a silver ash-tray.     

 Prev. P 20/55 next