Page:Vance--Terence O'Rourke.djvu/369

 so assured of the man's stupidity, nor so sure that in the end he would win to the side of Madame la Princesse, Beatrix de Grandlieu.

An hour later the Irishman left his compartment and stepped out upon the platform of the railway station at Montbar.

The midnight wind that rushed, shrieking, between the mountainous walls of the narrow, level valley which constitutes the major part of the principality of Grandlieu—an independent state with a total area of some sixty-nine square miles—was bitter cold and searching. The faces of the porters and railway officers, who were forced to attend to outdoor duties, were blue and immobile in its ice-laden breath; and upon the lighted windows of the station itself frost had formed, thick and white.

O'Rourke, noting these things, thought of the warmth of a bed in the Hôtel des Étrangers, and the comfort of a meal, with warm drinks, in the supper room of that hostelry, and was glad that he journeyed no farther that night.

Runners for the three most prominent hotels in the city besieged him with advice bearing upon the surpassing merits of their respective houses. O'Rourke listened to all alike stolidly, and apparently at random indicated him who represented the Hôtel des Etrangers, so avoiding all suspicion of having chosen Chambret's place of shelter with purpose aforethought.

Priding himself upon the neatness of this little strategy, he climbed into a hack and settled himself for what he was assured would be no more than a ten minutes' drive.

His eyes closed and he nodded, thinking dreamily of the fair face pictured in that miniature which rested above his heart. The hack plunged on through the night, rattling and