"Oh, no, sir," exclaimed Elise, blushing till her eyes were filled with
tears.
"What? Is this satchel not yours?"
"Oh, no, sir!--I mean--yes, sir," stuttered Elise.
Kamarowsky looked at her, and then at me. Seeing the expression of our
faces the laughter faded from his lips.
"Come, Elise; tell me whose it is, and what it contains."
I attempted to make a sign to her, but the tall, broad figure of Count
Kamarowsky stood between us.
I rose with a sigh of despair, acquiescing in my fate. Now--let happen
what may.
"What letters are they?" insisted Kamarowsky.
I heard the hapless Elise floundering in the quicksands of falsehood;
finally she let herself drift--a helpless wreck on the rock of truth.
"It is not letters, it is money," she said at last.
"Money? Money of yours?"
"No."
There was a brief silence. Then Kamarowsky said: "I do not believe you.
I wish to see what it contains."
No one answered him.
"Where is the key?"
Again there was silence.
I heard a slight jingling sound; Kamarowsky was searching in his pockets
for a penknife. Then he said to Elise: "You can go."
Elise went slowly and reluctantly from the room. Then I heard a faint
tearing and crackling: Kamarowsky had cut through the leather of the
satchel. Now the rustling of banknotes told me that he was smoothing
them out on the table, and counting them.
A few moments passed.
"Thirty-five thousand rubles," said Paul Kamarowsky slowly. "I cannot
understand why you should have told me you were penniless." There was an
icy coldness in his voice such as I had never heard before.
"The money is not mine," I said, in trembling tones.
"Whose is it?"
How was I to answer him? Could I betray Prilukoff? And, with him,
myself? I decided to tell what was, intrinsically, the truth.
"I do not know whom it belongs to."
Once more there was silence. I wondered what he would do? Would he
insult me? Would he raise his voice in bitter accusation and reproof?
No. The silence remained unbroken. Kamarowsky left the room without a
word.
Ah! I was still in the grip of the octopus; its tentacles bound and
crushed me still. Even from afar Prilukoff guided my destinies, drove my
frail barque into storm and disaster.
With trembling hands I gathered up the scattered banknotes and thrust
them back into the execrated leather bag. Ah, if only I could have freed
myself from this nightmare burden, if only I could have returned the
money to Prilukoff! But how? Where to? At the Bellevue, in Hyères, he
had called himself Zeiler. But now where was he? Under what name was he
hiding? How could I, without warning, send him such a sum of money?
Where could I write to him?
No; fate had doomed me to wander through the world carrying with me the
hated money in Elise's abominable satchel! At the bitterness of this
thought I dropped my face in my hands and wept.
I did not hear any one knock at the door; nor did I hear the door open.
When, still shaken with sobs, I raised my tear-stained face, I beheld
standing on the threshold a stranger--a slender, fair-haired youth. He
was gazing at me with compassionate eyes, full of confusion at having
found me in tears.
"Pardon me," he said, and his voice was soft and musical.
"Whom do you want?"
"I was looking for Count Kamarowsky," he replied. "He has invited me to
dine with him." There was a pause. "My name is Nicolas Naumoff."
"My name is Marie Tarnowska." And I gave him my hand.