intriguing for the princess, no doubt you carry letters to, as well as from
her, and hold your tongue about that too?"

"If I should deliver letters they'd be secret or they'd have gone through
the mail. I'd risk my job each time I did it. Would I risk it worse by talking?
Once the maharajah heard a whisper--"

"Well--I'll be careful not to drop a hint to his highness. As you say, it
might imperil your job. And, ah--" (again the monocle,) "--the initials r. s.--
in small letters, not capitals, in the bottom left-hand corner of a small
white envelope would--ah--you understand?--you'd see that she received it, eh?"

Tom Tripe bridled visibly. Neither the implied threat nor the proposal
to make use of him without acknowledging the service afterward, escaped
him. Samson, who believed among other things in keeping all inferiors
thoroughly in their place decided on the instant to rub home the lesson
while it smarted.

"You'd find it profitable. You'd be paid whatever the situation called for.
You needn't doubt that."

Tess, talking with a group of guests some little distance off, observed
a look of battle in Tom Tripe's eye, and smiled two seconds later as
the commissioner let fall his monocle. Two things she was certain of
at once: Tom Tripe would tell her at the first opportunity exactly what
had happened, and Samson would lie about it glibly if provoked. She
promised herself she would provoke him. As a matter of fact Tom
gave her two or three versions afterward of what his words had been,
their grandeur increasing as imagination flourished in the comfortable
warmth of confidence. But the first account came from a fresh memory: