Free A Dangerous Disguise by Barbara Cartland Page B

longer than he has. You're a spy. The only question is – for whom? You'll tell me sooner or later, so why not save us all a lot of time?"
    "But it's not true," she cried, rising from her seat. "I've told you the truth."
    "Who do you work for?"
    "I'm not a spy," she insisted.
    "Who do you work for?"
    "But you said you understood – "
    "Who do you work for?"
    Terror overcame her. She ran to the door and tried to pull it open, but it was now locked.
    "Let me out!" she screamed, hammering on the door. "John! John!"
    "He's gone," said Sir Bernard. "He won't come back for you."
    "John!" she screamed again. "Where are you?"
    "You stupid girl, what are you expecting? He's done his part in getting you here quietly and without a fuss. You won't see him again."
    She turned horrified eyes on him.
    "His part?" she whispered.
    "The Duke saw through you the first day and reported to me, since when you've been under surveillance. He has questioned you on my behalf to try to gauge the extent of your activities, and finally he brought you to us."
    "I don't believe you," she choked.
    "Don't you? Let me tell you something about those meetings when you were weaving your arts about him. You thought he was coming under your spell, didn't you? But last night the Duke stood in this very room and said to me, 'I was doing my duty to my country, keeping a suspicious person under observation.'"
    "He wouldn't betray me like that," she choked.
    Sir Bernard gave an unpleasant bark of laughter.
    "Betray you? Madam, is it possible to betray you? A spy, a deceiver, a trickster? It is you who betray, and now you have been found out. His Grace is totally loyal to the British throne, so abandon any further idea of ensnaring him with your wiles."
    "No!" she screamed. "It isn't true. I'm not a spy."
    "You are a spy, madam, and you're probably an assassin too. Oh yes, Camborne told me how often you asked to see the Queen, but always from a safe distance. How big a distance, I wonder. Not too far for an accurate shot at Her Majesty. And then, of course, you'd have had to dispose of poor Camborne himself. But on whose behalf?"
    "It's not true, it's not true." The words were barely audible. Darkness was engulfing her.
    "Sooner or later you will tell me who you work for. Unless your confederate breaks first."
    "My – confederate?"
    "The woman posing as your lady-in-waiting, whom you have so obligingly named as Greta Lanso. I'm obliged to you for that, as she has refused to say a word since her arrest."
    "Arrest?"
    "She was picked up at your hotel an hour ago and is now behind bars. She will talk, and you will talk. You can take my word for that."
    She knew then that the nightmare was real.
    *
    At Buckingham Palace the Duke went straight to Lord Baisley's office.
    "I came as soon as I received your message," he said.
    "Message? I sent no message."
    "Surely you did. I was with Sir Bernard and someone came in to say – " his voice ran down and a look of horror came into his eyes.
    "I don't believe it," he said. "It isn't possible."
    "What isn't possible?" asked Lord Baisley.
    But he was talking to thin air. The Duke had left the room at a run.
    He found a cab quickly and shouted, "As fast as you can go." It seemed an eternity until he reached Whitehall, and for all that time he was telling himself that there must have been a mistake.
    But in his heart he knew that there had been no mistake. Suddenly he recalled tales of how Sir Bernard's bluff amiability was a mask hiding something more sinister. He had never seen that side of the man himself, regarding him as a bit of a buffoon. Now he saw how he had been duped into leaving Ola alone with him. But he might still be wrong.
    Until the last moment he clung to the hope that he would arrive to find that all was well. That hope died in the first moment of seeing Danson's face.
    "What have you done with her?" the Duke demanded savagely.
    "Put her behind bars, where she belongs. Forgive me for that little stratagem, but it