The Double Traitor

"My friend," she said, "when we first met--I am ashamed, considering that I dine alone with you to-night, to reflect how short a time ago--you spoke of your removal here from Pa...

Norgate, during his month's stay in Berlin, had already adopted regular habits. On the following morning he was called at eight o'clock and rode for two hours in the fashionable...

Faithful to his insular prejudices, Norgate, on finding that the other seat in his coupé was engaged, started out to find the train attendant with a view to changing his place....

Norgate dozed fitfully as the train sped on through the darkness. He woke once to find Herr Selingman in close confabulation with his agent on the opposite side of the compartme...

There was a babel of voices as the long train came to a stand-still in the harbour station at Ostend. Selingman, with characteristic forcefulness, pushed his way down the narrow...

Norgate spent an utterly fruitless morning on the day after his arrival in London. After a lengthy but entirely unsatisfactory visit to the Foreign Office, he presented himself...

Norgate sat, the following afternoon, upon the leather-stuffed fender of a fashionable mixed bridge club in the neighbourhood of Berkeley Square, exchanging greetings with such...

Selingman had the air of a man who returns after a long absence to some familiar spot where he expects to find friends and where his welcome is assured. Mrs. Paston Benedek slip...

Norgate had chosen, for many reasons, to return to London as a visitor. His somewhat luxurious rooms in Albemarle Street were still locked up. He had taken a small flat in the M...

The Right Honourable John Hebblethwaite, M.P., since he had become a Cabinet Minister and had even been mentioned as the possible candidate for supreme office, had lost a great...

"My position as a Cabinet Minister," Mr. Hebblethwaite declared, with a sigh, "renders my presence in the Promenade undesirable. If you want to stroll around, Norgate, don't bot...

Mrs. Paston Benedek, on the following afternoon, sat in one corner of the very comfortable lounge set with its back to the light in her charming drawing-room. Norgate sat in the...

Norgate found Selingman in the little drawing-room of the club, reclining in an easy-chair, a small cup of black coffee by his side. He appeared to be exceedingly irate at the p...

Selingman and Norgate dined together that evening in a corner of a large, popular grill-room near the Strand. They were still suffering from the shock of the recent tragedy. The...

Selingman's supper party was in some respects both distinctive and unusual. Norgate, looking around him, thought that he had never in his life been among such a motley assemblag...

Throughout those weeks and months of tangled, lurid sensations, of amazing happenings which were yet to come, Norgate never once forgot that illuminative rush of fierce yet swee...

"Dear friend," he exclaimed, as he held out his hands, "I am distressed to keep you waiting! Such zeal in our affairs must, however, not remain unnoticed. I will remember it in...

As Norgate entered the premises of Selingman, Horsfal and Company a little later on the same morning he looked around him in some surprise. He had expected to find a deserted wa...

Norgate found Anna waiting for him in the hall of the smaller hotel, a little further westward, to which she had moved. He looked admiringly at her cool white muslin gown and th...

The Right Honourable John William Hebblethwaite strolled along by the rails of the polo ground, exchanging greetings with friends, feeling very well content with himself and the...

Norgate, after leaving Anna at her hotel, drove on to the club, where he arrived a few minutes before seven. Selingman was there with Prince Edward, and half a dozen others. Sel...

Mr. Hebblethwaite was undoubtedly annoyed. He found himself regretting more than ever the good nature which had prompted him to give this visitor an audience at a most unusual h...

Anna was seated, a few days later, with her dearest friend, the Princess of Thurm, in a corner of the royal enclosure at Ascot. For the first time since their arrival they found...

Back from the dusty roads, the heat and noise of the long day, Anna was resting on the couch in her sitting-room. A bowl of roses and a note which she had read three or four tim...

"Confess," Anna exclaimed, as she leaned back in her chair, "that my idea was excellent! Your little restaurant was in its way perfection, but the heat--does one feel it anywher...

"It is something more than gross lucre," a young man declared, who had just strolled up. "I believe that it is a good fat appointment. Rome, perhaps, where every one of you fell...

Later on that evening, Norgate walked up and down the platform at Charing-Cross with Anna. Her arm rested upon his; her expression was animated and she talked almost eagerly. No...

"I am sorry for the apparent mystery," Norgate said, as he took the seat to which he was invited. "I will make up for it by being very brief. I have come on behalf of a certain...

Mr. Hebblethwaite turned into Pall Mall, his hands behind his back, his expression a little less indicative of bland good humour than usual. He had forgotten to light his custom...

"I had no objection," Norgate remarked, a few hours later, "to lunching with you at the Berkeley--very good lunch it was, too--but to dine with you in Soho certainly seems to re...

Anna almost threw herself from the railway carriage into Norgate's arms. She kissed him on both cheeks, held him for a moment away from her, then passed her arm affectionately t...

They paused at last, breathless, and walked out of the most wonderful ballroom in London into the gardens, aglow with fairy lanterns whose brilliance was already fading before t...

Norgate pushed his way through a confused medley of crates which had just been unloaded and made his way up the warehouse to Selingman's office. Selingman was engaged for a few...

Norgate walked into the club rather late that afternoon. Selingman and Prince Lenemaur were talking together in the little drawing-room. They called him in, and a few minutes la...

Norgate took a cigarette from an open box, tapped it against the table and lit it. He was fascinated, however, by the appearance of the man who stood respectfully in the backgro...

"My mind is absolutely made up," she declared firmly. "I adore shopping, I love Bond Street, and I rather like you, but I will have no more trifles, as you call them. If you do...

"Selingman is down-stairs," he announced. "I rather expected I should see something of him as I didn't go to the club this afternoon. You won't mind if he comes up?"

Mr. Hebblethwaite permitted himself a single moment of abstraction. He sat at the head of the table in his own remarkably well-appointed dining-room. His guests--there were eigh...

Norgate found himself in an atmosphere of strange excitement during his two hours' waiting at the House of Commons on the following day. He was ushered at last into Mr. Hebbleth...

The card-rooms at the St. James's Club were crowded, but very few people seemed inclined to play. They were standing or sitting about in little groups. A great many of them were...

Mr. Selingman's influence over his fellows had never been more marked than on that gloomiest of all afternoons. They gathered around him as he sat on the cushioned fender, a cup...