Act Three, Part One ~~~

Once another group of guards had passed out of hearing, Jim stole out into the hall again and began to move on. And at that point, he heard a voice hiss out his name. "Mr West!"

Jim whirled to see a panel of the wall sliding open, and within it was the baroness' son. With a big grin on his face, the boy waved his arm at the American, bidding him to come near.

Jim strode over, pulled the boy inside the wall, slid the panel shut again, and said, "I told you to stay put!"

The boy at least had the grace to look sheepish. "Dasda. I know you did, and I chose to disobey. I am sorry, Mr West."

Jim now looked around. Unlike the kitchen-cum-laboratory he'd just seen in the baroness' suite upstairs, this hidden area was not a room. It extended off in either direction parallel to the hall he'd just left. "What is this, a secret passageway?"

"Oh yes, Mr West!" said the boy brightly. "Vachko had them built. You remember, I said he did not trust Mushche."

"Right." And apparently the baron had had good reason not to trust his wife. "Where does this lead?" Jim asked the boy.

"Oh, all over! There are three hidden passageways, and they connect up at different points. This one, as well as one from the reception hall, and one from Vachko's office. I, ah, I was spying in Mushche's office and well, I decided I did not wish to use the regular halls to get back to the nursery."

"So you're saying that the secret passage we're in right now will take me to your mother's office, and also to the nursery?"

"Dasda. Yes, Vachko made sure one of the passages would allow Mireje and me to leave the building entirely if we needed to."

"I see." Jim took a pad of paper and a pencil from his pocket. "Draw me a map, Andreshko. I want to know all of your father's secret passages. And then," and Jim gave the kid a very stern look, "I want you to go right back up to your bedroom and stay there for the rest of the night. Do you hear me?"

"Dasda," sighed the boy. And he took the paper and began to draw.

A woman on horseback, her clothing the livery of the Ptervonian consulate guards, road through the night toward the city of San Francisco.

It was harder to descend the hidden stairway with his arms tied behind his back, Artie found. Catalina's arms were tied as well, and the cadre of guards who were hauling them down to the clandestine office were being none too gentle with either of their prisoners.

At length they reached the bottom of the stairs and entered the underground office. The baroness swept past them all to seat herself at her desk where she leaned back and steepled her fingers, coldly regarding the governess and her suitor. "Why were you in the closet?" she demanded.

Don Pablo smiled toothily. "Where better to find a little privacy to indulge in a little of, ah, what the Americans call 'necking,' hmm?"

Anger filled the baroness' face, and she made a small gesture with her head that translated into Colonel Nevje backhanding the man across the face. He stared back into the chief guard's beady eyes and said, "Ah. I understand now from whence mi querida Catalina received the gift of the bruise upon her cheek. Jealousy perhaps?"

Nevje's lip curled into a snarl. "Jealous of what? Of her, over a man? Ha!" And she raised her hand to strike him again.

A word from the baroness quelled that. "Bring me his jacket," she said.

Artie had to be untied for the order to be obeyed, and he quietly folded his hands behind his back after they stripped him of his suit jacket in the hopes that his stance would help them forget to bind his arms again. Meanwhile, as Catalina looked on in growing apprehension, the baroness felt in the inside pockets of the jacket one by one, shortly producing from one of them a damning piece of paper.

Following the boy's map, Jim found his way into the baroness' first floor office. He went immediately to the woman's desk and checked it, but there was nothing of… Ah! Here was a piece of blotting paper, freshly used. Jim carried it to the mirror above the fireplace and held it up. Not all of the words were legible, but there was enough there to let Jim know that the note this had blotted would bring the prince out to the consulate as soon as he received it. Stepanko was in danger; if only Jim knew precisely what that danger was to be!

He returned the blotting paper to the desk, since he would not need it as evidence; the actual note which was on its way to the crown prince would be evidence enough. His hands on his hips, Jim glanced around the room. What else might be here?

And now his eyes lit on a carafe on the liquor stand. He recognized the distinctive heart-shaped label tied to its neck. It was the same carafe the baroness had received from the weird old woman in the hidden room. What was in this carafe? Jim was sure it was important. He took a step toward the stand to inspect the carafe.

And the door opened.

A maid entered. Unaware of the man who had just hidden himself behind a set of curtains, the maid crossed to the liquor stand and, following orders, took up the carafe with the heart-shaped tag and bore it away.

Mireje was sitting in the nursery suite quite alone reading her Tolstoy when she heard a creak. Looking up, she gave a squeak of alarm and clutched at her heart. One of the bookcases in the classroom had just swung out from the wall!

From the darkness behind that hidden door, her brother stepped out.

Mireje let loose a less-than-polite exclamation in Pterovnian. "Andreshko! Where did you come from? How did you do that?" she demanded.

"Oh, Vachko had this built. He had the architect include a few hidden passageways into the consulate."

"He did what?"

The boy shrugged. "He did not trust Mushche. He told me that he wanted you and me to have a way to escape the building just in case."

"He told you? Why did he not tell me?"

Again the boy shrugged. "I do not know."

"And why did you not tell me?" she added crossly.

Now he grinned. "Oh, but it was fun to know something you didn't! I could have crept up on you at any time!"

"You did creep up on me, Dreshko!"

Happily he nodded. "Dasda! And you should have seen your face!"

She folded her arms and stared at him coldly. "Well," she said at last, "at least you are back now. You have given up on spying?"

"Well… perhaps. At any rate, I spoke to Mr West again and he told me to go back to our rooms and not come out until morning."

"Merinko West is exactly right. It is time for bed and for sleep. Although…" and she glanced about, "I do wonder what has become of our governess?"

"Oh," said the boy casually, pleased to have a bit of gossip to pass on. "She has a suitor. He came to visit her tonight, that is all."

"A suitor!" Mireje exclaimed, her eyes wide. "When did that happen?"

"I just told you. He came tonight."

"But… but why has she never said anything of him before now?"

Andreshko shrugged. "I do not know. Maybe she is afraid of Mushche. Maybe she did not wish her to know."

His sister nodded. "Dasda, that makes sense. If I had a suitor, I would not want Mushche to know of him either."

He grinned. "Oh no, Mushche would not like that. But then, Mushche would not like it that you kissed Mr West tonight either, would she?"

Mireje gaped at him. "I did not kiss Merinko West! He kissed me. It was all his idea!" She paused before adding, "But please say nothing of this to Mushche. She will not care whose idea it was to kiss whom. You will keep quiet about it, won't you, dear brother?"

"Sure, of course I will," he said. And as she gave a sigh of relief, he added, "As long as you agree to never ever ever call me 'dear brother' again!"

"You have a deal."

The baroness unfolded the paper, looked it over, then rose up elegantly from her desk and strolled over to Don Pablo. Rolling up the paper, she tapped it against her palm. "How curious," said she. "This document belongs to me. It was locked away in the lower drawer of my desk. How did it come to be in your possession, I wonder?"

He shrugged, an expression of supreme dignity never leaving his face. "I suppose I picked it up somewhere. Perhaps it was thrown away and you were not aware."

"Thrown away? From a locked drawer?"

"Stranger things have happened, señora."

"That is in fact true. Stranger things have happened. Strange things such as the pair of you being discovered kissing inside a closet that is always kept locked. Curious how the presence of a lock seemed to make no difference when you are around, señor."

He smiled modestly. "It is a knack."

"It may well be, but it will do you no good any longer. I have a place for you where the lock will be well out of your reach. Colonel Nevje!"

"Yes, my lady?"

"To the oubliette with him!"

"At once, my lady!" Then, stepping closer, the colonel asked softly, "And what of Reyes?"

The baroness regarded her governess coldly. "Your discretion, Nevje."

The bulldog eyes crinkled with satisfaction as a slow smile spread across her features. "Thank you, my lady! Thank you very much!"

At the hotel, a bellhop knocked at the door of the prince's suite. When Captain Koloshko answered, the young man held out an envelope to him. "A letter for Prince Stepanko," said the messenger boy.

The captain accepted the note and pressed a coin into the bellhop's palm before closing the door. "My prince!" he said.

Stepanko came from his bedroom. "Has something happened, Koloshko? The Americans have returned from their visit of intrigue at the consulate?"

"You have received a message." The captain slit open the envelope, extracted the contents, then glanced over them and frowned.

The prince took the note from the captain's hand and read it over. "Oh! It is from Mr West. He and Mr Gordon, having spent some time at the consulate, are fully convinced that all is safe there. He urges me to make no delay in visiting the baron that I may be presented with the evidence against the conspirators who assassinated Vachko. How marvelous!"

"Marvelous, yes," Koloshko echoed.

"Well, well! Go and make the arrangements at once, my dear captain!" said the prince happily. "I shall require a carriage, of course, and… Oh! I am so relieved!"

The captain bowed. "At once, my prince."

Stepanko headed back to his bedroom, gabbling on blithely to himself. "What a delight to know that there is no danger at the consulate! Ah, and now I must choose which ensemble to wear. The blue, I think…"

The captain went down to the front desk to make suitable arrangements for the prince's transportation. And as he descended the stairs, he thought, but kept the thought to himself, that it was a peculiar thing for a note from Mr West to carry with it the flowery fragrance of a woman's perfume.

Colonel Nevje bowed to the baroness, who swept from the office to return upstairs. The colonel crossed to the opposite wall and tugged on a gas sconce just above her head. Immediately that wall swung open into darkness. The colonel gave an order, and her women grabbed hold of the prisoners, hauling them from the beautiful office out into the dirt-walled darkness beyond.

A stack of torches lay just outside the office door, and the guards took up several of these and lit them. Then, compelling the prisoners before them, they set out walking through the rough-hewn tunnel.

Catalina soon felt completely lost, but Artie paid close attention to where they were being taken, counting footsteps and matching them with directions. Soon they came to a locked gate. The colonel unlocked this, fastening it back again once they had all passed through. A second gate was dealt with in the same manner, then a third.

Soon after this, the colonel led the way into a side passage where, by the flickering light of the torches, Artie and the governess could see that before them at their feet lay a gaping hole in the ground with a heavy iron grid covering it. It was a pit some twenty feet in diameter. How deep it might be was hard to gauge in this Stygian gloom; it looked mostly like a great black mouth yawning before them, hungry and yearning.

Colonel Nevje unlocked a small door in the iron gridwork, flinging it open. "In you go!" she cried, and one of her guards, with a gleeful grin on her face, shoved the supposed Don Pablo over the edge into the pit.

Artie was very glad now that no one had remembered to tie his hands up again. He recalled some of Jim's lessons on how to take a fall and tried to twist himself in the air so that he would land well. Oof!

He lay there for a moment, stunned, then blinked and took inventory. Everything seemed to be working. He dragged himself to his feet, happy to find that he could. He looked up at the torches still clustered by the edge some, what, fifteen feet up? He could hear Catalina's voice arguing with the colonel, demanding that Don Pablo be hauled back up out of that terrible hole at once.

"You really don't understand the concept of an oubliette, do you, Reyes?" the colonel's voice said. "It is a place you put someone to forget about him. Or her."

There was a shriek, and a dark shape plummeted toward Artie. Automatically he braced himself to try to break the figure's fall. Oof again!

The colonel laughed. "You and your man were looking for a bit of seclusion off by yourselves? Well, now you have all the seclusion you could wish for! Adios, Reyes. Adios forever." The women closed the door over the pit again with a clang and relocked it. She then gathered her subordinates and they filed away, taking the light with them.

Into the gloom, Artie asked, "Cat? Are you all right?"

", I… I think so. Gracias, Señor Gordon, for catching me. You are all right as well?"

"Oh yes, don't worry about me." Working as quickly as he could in the dark, he untied the ropes binding her hands, then gently massaged her abraded wrists. "But you're calling me by the wrong name again," he said.

"Lo siento, Pablo. I am sorry."

He chuckled. "Oh, there's no point in that now, is there? You might as well just call me Artemus."

"All right, ah, Artemus." She fell silent, then said, "What are we going to do now?"

"Ah, well, nil desperandum, dear lady! Where there's a will, there's a way, hmm? Although…"

"Although?"

"Well, we don't want to escape too quickly."

"We don't?" She turned that over in her head for a moment, but not coming up with a reason, she asked, "Why not?"

Again he chuckled. "Why, it's simple, sweet Cat: if we escape too quickly, the guards will still be close by. We don't want to run right back into them, so we'll wait just a bit first." His voice dropping to a whisper, he added, "And in the meantime…"

He drew her close and kissed her again. It was still a bit of a shock to her that he should do so, and yet… and yet it was a lovely experience, to have a man's arms around her again, to feel the press of his lips against hers. For a moment, there in the dark, she thought of José and surrendered herself to the kiss.

Then she pushed him away. "Why are you doing this?"

"I'm your suitor, aren't I?" His arms began to pull her close again.

"You just said there was no point in pretending here. There is no one here to see us, for we are alone, just the two of us. So why are you kissing me?"

"I…" He paused, then slowly released her. "I… don't know. I keep… I start to concentrate on my work as usual, and the next thing I know, I want to pull you into my arms and start kissin' on you." Even in the dark, she knew his face was puzzled. "That's not like me. I don't let a woman distract me. What's going on?"

"My wife would know."

Both Artie and Catalina jumped nearly a foot in the air. "What…?"

There came the scratch of a match, and the resulting flame was applied to a candle. In that wavering light, a man's face peered at them. An old man he was, with a long beard streaked with gray. "Hello," he said. "I am Vachko Petroshko. What did you two do to get tossed into the oubliette?"