Evidently relations between Nyla and the Colonel had ripened prosperously during their outing. The President having gone off for his much-needed nap, these two explored the old north tower, and on the dark stairway the Colonel's arm stole protectively round her. The famous Purple Room, so-called from its rich wine-coloured hangings, was lighted only by a narrow casement in the six-foot stone fortification; it was a funereal place with a stale flavour of ancient orgy. The painted dado, perhaps fortunately, was scarcely visible in the dim light. The Colonel struck a match, but after one glimpse of Paphian distempers he extinguished it hastily. Always sensitive to psychic influences, he seemed a little depressed, and spoke gloomily of the difficulties of his career as an agent of international amenity.
"The trouble with this League of Nations work is, it's so uncertain. Here to-day and gone to-morrow."
"Don't say that," replied Nyla gently. "Besides, this is to-day."
"Geneva is so capricious. Sometimes I'll barely get started on a job when orders will come to buzz off somewhere else. You never know when some delicate situation will arise that needs expert attention. They push you round so suddenly, sometimes you don't even have time to say good-bye."
There was just room for two to lean side by side, rather close, in the wedge-shaped recess of the window, looking out across the quiet water to the groves of the park. Nyla sympathetically returned the pressure of his hand, and looked admiringly at his handsome clear-cut features, now clouded with melancholy. This was a new phase of the volatile Colonel. Evidently beneath his frolic humour there was a deeper side.
"One hardly has time to put down roots anywhere, really become attached to—to places or people—before he's moved on. And I have great capacities for putting down roots," he continued wistfully.
"But where there are roots there are flowers," said Nyla, hardly knowing what she said. This softness in a strong character moved her strangely.
"Not always. Sometimes just weeds, or poison ivy."
"But even if you had to go back to Geneva, that isn't so terribly far. The League would let you run up and spend a week-end with us now and then."
The Colonel shook his head hopelessly.
"They usually send me a long way off—Poland, Greece, Armenia where the massacres are. Even to North America."
"There must be some mistake. They wouldn't send you to places like that if they knew the sort of man you are," said Nyla adoringly. "Or perhaps they're jealous of you at headquarters. Probably some of the people there are afraid you'll get their jobs."
"Darling," replied the Colonel.
"It's surprising," he added presently, "how small-minded people can be. Some of those department heads at Geneva would deny my very existence if it suited them to do so. That's what bureaucracy leads to. But whatever happens, you must always think tenderly of—of the League," he said generously. "It is a very noble and complicated organization."
Poor Nyla was almost in tears.
"Gene, don't talk like that about—the League. You have put down roots; I can feel them growing."
The Colonel was not anxious to linger unduly in the Purple Room, lest the Grand Duke's murals become too visible.
"Let's see if we can find that secret passage," he suggested when she was a little comforted.
The door to the cellar of the tower was locked, but only with a padlock on a rusty hasp.
"No need to bother Romsteck," he said. "He might not like our snooping about." He fetched a poker from the fireplace in the Purple Room and easily snapped the fixture.
The cellar, at the foot of a winding stair, had probably once been a guard room or storage place. The Colonel was amused to find carefully laid away several dozen of the old Burgundies which, according to Karl's manifests, had been exhausted by visiting plenipotentiaries.
"Ha," he said. "This entry can be regarded as legitimate inspection. I suppose I really should report it to the League; sequestration of supplies, contrary to the Treaty. However, we'll be lenient. You see, alas, why international agents grow cynical."
The safety valve, as the Grand Duke always called his secret passage, was so cunningly concealed that a less ingenious investigator might have missed it. They tapped and sounded the walls without success, but then the Colonel fell to studying the coat of arms, elaborately carved and painted, high over the huge fireplace. It was surmounted by a visored helmet.
"There's something queer about that visor," he said. Climbing on a chair he reached up to it with the poker. The piece worked on a hinge, he pushed it upward, and with a soft rumble the iron fireback in the hearth slid aside. Behind was a tunnelled opening.
"Fine stuff!" he cried triumphantly. "Forward, adventurers! Look out for your dress, Nyla, it's a bit sooty. Hang onto my coat-tail." He pulled out his mouth-organ and gave a lively rendition of the moating song.
The passage, solidly lined with stone, was pitch dark, moist, and draughty, but there was an old candle on the mantelpiece which he managed to shield with his hands. They groped cautiously through with no more mishap than a few mudstains. Eventually they reached a flight of stone steps where a crack of brightness showed above. A little vigorous pushing and the Colonel burst through a trap door. They were in a small summerhouse, discreetly screened by rhododendrons. Two hundred feet away, beyond the moat, lifted the old silvery masonry of the north tower.
"Excellent," he said, rubbing the earth from his palms. "A little grimy for ladies, I fear. Now we'll go back and cover up our traces."
Nyla was eager to tell her father of their discovery, but Cointreau suggested that the President already had too much on his mind. "Let's keep this our secret, for the moment," he said. "People who work for the League are always stuffed with secrets. Now I think I had better go and try on that uniform."