"This is not altogether an accidental meeting, Miss Miller," I confessed
at once to her. "The fact is I have waited in vain for your return to
Granville Gardens, and at length have thought it wise to come here in
search of you."
"Who told you that we lived here?" she inquired breathlessly.
"No one told me, I discovered the fact quite accidentally," was my
answer. "Remember that your family is an old one, and in Debrett,
therefore it was easy to find out the home of the Dorsetshire Millers."
My rather plausible explanation apparently satisfied her, for looking
sharply around, she said:--
"If we are to talk, Mr Leaf, let us cross yonder stile and slip across
the fields. We shall not be seen there." So I helped her over the
stile she indicated and we passed together along a steep path beside a
high hawthorn hedge, and a few minutes later descended into the hollow
where the village and sea were lost to view.
"I certainly expected you to return," I said, half reproachfully. "I
believed that you would wish to hear something further regarding the
dead man. You refused to tell me his name, but I have discovered it.
He was Nardini, the absconding ex-Minister of Justice in Rome."
"Who told you so?" she inquired, looking at me with considerable
suspicion.
"I took possession of his papers. They explained everything," I replied
simply. "And now," I added, "the reason I am here is to inquire if I
can assist you in any way, and to repeat my readiness to do so."
"No," she answered, shaking her head sadly. "No assistance that you
could render me, Mr Leaf, would, I regret to say, be of any avail," and
I saw tears welling in her eyes.
"But you must not give up like this," I urged. "You must endeavour to
shield yourself, even if you fail, after all. The man is dead; his
mouth is closed."
"Ah, yes. That is just it. If he lived he might, perhaps, have had
compassion upon me."
"He refused to tell the truth--that you were at his villa at Tivoli on
that evening, and therefore could not have been in Rome, eh?"
She halted, glaring at me open-mouthed. She saw that I knew the truth,
and after a few moments' silence with her eyes fixed upon mine, she
exclaimed in a low, hoarse voice:--
"He preserved silence because he dared not tell the truth. He was a cur
and a coward."
"And also a thief, it would seem," I added.
"Yes--you have seen what the papers are saying about him, I suppose?
The police are searching for him all over Europe. They have no idea
that he is already dead and buried."
"Perhaps it is as well; otherwise the papers would have fallen into
their hands. As it is I took possession of them all and restored them
to the Italian Embassy--all but this," and I drew out her letter of
appeal, and, opening it, handed it to her.
She glanced at it, crushed it in her hand with a sigh, her dark eyes
still fixed upon mine, as though she were trying to read my innermost
thoughts.
"Who are your enemies?" I asked in a kindly tone of sympathy. "Tell
me, Miss Miller, what have they alleged against you?"
Her brows again contracted. She set her lips hard but remained silent,
determined not to satisfy me regarding the charge against her.