Wallace Intervenes by Alexander Wilson

wonder!’
    â€˜Your instinct has not played you false,’ he murmured, ‘but you talk as though you are in danger, or, at least, in trouble. Is it so?’
    She laughed almost harshly.
    â€˜I am in deadly danger,’ she declared, looking him full in the eyes. ‘Sometimes I am afraid, but not often. I am not quite sure what it is I fear.’
    At once he had moved his chair closer to hers.
    â€˜Tell me what it is,’ he urged earnestly, ‘and I swear to you, Baroness, I will do my utmost to protect you.’
    She leant across and gently took his hand in hers.
    â€˜There are things,’ she told him, ‘of which I cannot speak – at least not yet. Perhaps someday I will tell you. I am happy to receive your assurance that you will protect me if the necessity arises. I fear that I am only a very cowardly woman after all, and I had thought that I was different from the rest. It is very comforting to know that I have now a protector in the real sense. Since my husband died, there has been no man to whom I could turn for advice and assistance. I am afraid poor Kurt was not of much use. He was thirty years older than I, and rather self-centred. Ours was not exactly a love match, but he was my husband. Since his death, there has been no man in my life at all.’
    A wave of sheer relief and delight flowed through Foster. No man in her life at all! Then his fears were groundless – the fears that had entered his heart as a result of the conversation he had overheard the night before. The Supreme Marshal of State might be in love with her, but he was not her lover. It did not enter his head to doubt, for a moment, her words. She might be a very clever woman, experienced in international intrigue, and playing a part in the political world, but she was frank and honest. Of that he was absolutely certain. She could have no possible object in asking for his friendship, except the very natural one of a woman in trouble desiring the support and protection of a man on whom she felt she could rely.
    â€˜I cannot tell you,’ he proclaimed, ‘how glad I am that you have chosen me as your friend. You will never regret it, Baroness – at least, I hope you will not,’ he added as an afterthought, his profession and his duty flashing into his mind with uncomfortable emphasis at that moment.
    â€˜Regret it!’ she echoed. ‘Of course I shall not. I confided in Elsa how badly I needed a friend. I am indebted to her for bringing you to me.’
    Inwardly Foster felt inclined to curse Elsa, but decided at once that his feelings were unjustified. Surely he could be a real friend to the baroness and, at the same time, do the job that had been set him. Would he, after all, be betraying her, if he learnt from her the secrets she possessed and imparted them to his chief? In that way he would perhaps be helping to prevent another ghastly war, and she herself had declared to him that she was against war, asserting that another would be too terrible to contemplate. Foster suddenly felt that he was beginning to see daylight. It was conceivable that the plans of the Supreme Marshal had been told to her; that she had declared herself against them and, though too staunch to divulge them, was now in danger, because the man who was reported to be her lover feared that she might. That would explain why she was being watched. The reflection made him feel a great deal happier in his mind; he was perhaps not such a Judas after all. He decided to attempt to find out, if he could, what relationship, if any, actually existed between her and the Supreme Marshal.
    â€˜You have a friend – a man friend,’ he remarked quietly, ‘who is also extremely powerful. Have you forgotten him?’
    She eyed him questioningly, her brows meeting together in a little frown.
    â€˜To whom do you refer?’ she asked.
    â€˜The Supreme Marshal of State! Did you not admit that he was a friend of