All was bewildering. Why had I been invited to that stately dinner, at
which I had made such a confounded fool of myself by unbalancing my
chair, and afterwards asking where I was?
To keep my mouth shut and to observe closely was the best course. All
was so strange, so unreal. True, I held a post at the Foreign Office,
but my duties did not take me abroad. Why, therefore, was I a guest at
the same table where, sitting on His Excellency’s right hand, was the
Duce, the Dictator of Italy, the greatest post-war figure in Europe,
Mussolini?
Bull-headed, with his strong, commanding countenance, and wearing
plain evening-dress, he was chatting with a young girl in pale-yellow,
and laughing the while. I recognized him from the many photographs in
the Press, and I remember wondering whether beneath his dress-shirt he
wore his famous coat of mail.
The many attempts to assassinate him had left him so cold that he had
openly defied Fate, declaring that he led such a charmed life, that no
plot could ever cause his undoing or his death. There sat the demigod
of the Fascists at his ease, in the intimacy of the dinner-table!
Was it any wonder that such a scene held me entranced? Was I really
dreaming?
My table companions spoke to me--on one side in English and, on the
other, in Italian. I had not the slightest knowledge of who either of
them was, and what I replied I know not until this day.
At last the State dinner ended, and we passed into a great ballroom
with gilded ceiling and magnificent crystal electroliers. Already a
number of people had assembled, and the entrance of His Brittanic
Majesty’s representative, accompanied by the Duce, was the signal for
much bowing and hand shaking. It was a brilliant, cosmopolitan crowd,
such as, in these post-war days, could only assemble in the Eternal
City.
The long windows of the great salon stood open to a glorious, shady
garden and let in the balmy, flower-scented air, delightfully
refreshing after the rather close atmosphere of the dining-room.
Alone I stood, agape. How came I there? Had I been wafted to Rome upon
the fairy carpet of the Arabian story? Or was it actual reality?
The orchestra struck up a lively fox-trot quite unfamiliar to me. I am
rather fond of dancing, and with Joan as partner, knew most of the
popular tunes. Yet, the one in question was entirely unfamiliar. I
went back to the wall, and, standing near the door, watched the
brilliant spectacle of uniformed and decorated men and bejeweled
women. Diplomatic representatives of nearly every country in the world
were there; and, as always, the reception of the British
representative to the Quirinale was a spectacle perhaps unequaled in
Europe.
I stood astounded amid the brilliant throng, the dance-inspiring
rhythm in my ears, my senses bewildered, watching the cosmopolitan
dancers, yet not knowing a soul except old Dickie Kingscliffe and his
wife.
As members of many of the best dance-clubs in London, Joan and I had
made our peregrinations and knew the qualities of the various floors
from the Florida to the Cosmo. But where was she? The dance orchestra
brought her back vividly to my mind, causing me to reflect on our
meeting the last time I had seen her. As I stood there watching, her
sweet face slowly rose, distinct and lovable, in a pale-grey mist, her
adored countenance with that sweet smile on it. Yet a few seconds
later, before I could realize it, the faint vision faded and the mist
grew darkened into night.
My brain was in a whirl, in an abnormal condition.
A sense of absolute boredom at once overcame me.
The pretty little Contessina, with the brown eyes and shingled
hair--just a trifle too light for an Italian, I thought--was dancing
with the tall French military attaché; while my other table
companion, the elderly Englishwoman, had as partner a somewhat obese
Italian, perhaps a deputy, because of his cross of Cavaliere of the
Order of the Crown of Italy.
My attention was centred on the Little Countess. She presented a smart
figure of perfect line and graceful movement, charming in
pale-fuchsia, with a necklet of pearls and a magnificent bracelet of
rubies and diamonds. Once, as she passed, she caught my eye and smiled
over the shoulder of her elegant and lavishly decorated partner.
While standing there, Her Excellency Lady Kingscliffe approached me
and we stood to gossip. After her husband’s return from the Legation
at Brussels, before my strange adventure in Camberwell, I had known
her ladyship well in London. Dickie Kingscliffe had had a long and
distinguished career at the Foreign Office. He was the kind of man who
had secured rapid promotion by being dumped into any vacancy abroad
that occurred. Before the Sovereign had conferred on him the Knight
Commandership of St. Michael and George, Kingscliffe had spent many
weary years in the Do-nothing Department at Downing Street. Later, he
had been sent out--because he dressed well, entertained well, and was
able to see without seeing, and speak without saying anything,
according to true Foreign Office traditions--first to Constantinople
as second secretary, then to Paris as first secretary, and after the
war he had drifted along as Minister at Lisbon. Later on, again, he
had been sent to Copenhagen and to Brussels, until apparently now he
had fallen into one of the best-paid posts as full-fledged Envoy
Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the gay Court of the
Quirinale.
“Well, my dear Lionel,” exclaimed Her Excellency, “I hope you don’t
feel too fatigued after your journey from London? It was awfully kind
of you to bring me those things from Bronley’s in the bag. My maid
gave them to me just as I was dressing.”
I bowed, expressing delight at being able to do any little service for
her, yet entirely in ignorance of having brought anything from London,
or of ever traveling to Rome.
“By the way,” she went on, “how is your father? I haven’t seen him for
ages. I see that he often speaks in the House.”
I replied that, as I traveled a great deal, I saw very little of him,
but, as far as I knew, he was quite well. At that instant there
flashed through my brain the memory of that last dramatic midnight
interview in the fog at Denmark Hill station.
What had occurred since then? All was a perfect blank.
Twice the Contessina re-passed me as I stood with Her Excellency, and
each time she gave me a sunny smile of recognition. The pretty girl
intrigued me. There was some curious feature about her; one that I
could no more fathom than the depths of mystery into which I had been
plunged.
Somehow I felt confident that we had met before; but where, I could
not recall. The smile that played about her lips seemed familiar. In a
hazy sort of way I felt that she was my intimate friend and that she
was enjoying my failure to recognize her.
Presently I asked Her Excellency:
“Who is the little lady who sat next to me at dinner? Look! She’s over
there with the French military attaché.”
“Oh, the Contessina! We met her a few weeks ago at the
Spaniard’s”--meaning the Spanish Embassy. “She was with a Baroness
Boin, her chaperon. She seems to be well known and popular, for she
goes everywhere in Rome. Her name is Angela Ugostini, daughter of
Count Ugostini of Ravenna.”
“She is very charming. Don’t you think so, Excellenza?” I said, as my
eyes wandered around the great ballroom after her.
“What!” cried the Ambassador’s wife in feigned protest. “Don’t you
remember once in London you told me that you thought no man who
carried dispatches should ever marry? And yet you are admiring a
pretty girl. Well, my dear Lionel, I’m really surprised! I admit that
you held that opinion before you knew Joan.”
Joan! The name stirred highly strung chords within my memory. Joan! My
beloved! Though torn by emotion, I strove frantically to remain
unconcerned.
“Two years ago I first met her--at your house, Lady Kingscliffe,” I
remarked. “My declaration was made before that.”
“My dear Lionel, your idea of time is most erratic! Why, what are you
thinking of? Are you dreaming? We’ve been here in Rome nearly two
years. It must have been over four years ago.”
I remained silent. If what Her Excellency said was correct, then I had
lost all knowledge of about two years of my life--of where I had been,
of what acts I had committed, or of what friendships or enmities I had
made. I had a blank in my life of two whole years to fill.
“You know nowadays, my dear boy, you are always a little vague on some
points. Joan has told me so. I wonder why it is? Perhaps so much
traveling is affecting you,” she remarked.
“What has Joan said?” I asked, wondering what had happened to me
during those lost two years.
“Oh, she’s such a sweet girl, Lionel, I really wonder that you treat
her as you do,” said Lady Kingscliffe reproachfully. “But there, I
suppose it is no affair of mine, so let’s talk of something else.”
“Will you dance?” I asked.
“I’d rather not,” she declared gracefully. “I’m a trifle tired.
To-morrow night there is the State ball at the Quirinale. You were at
the last one two months ago. I see the Minister of the Household, the
Marquis Visconti, over there! I’ll ask him to send you a command to
the Excelsior.”
I thanked her profusely. She was quite unaware that she had
unconsciously given me information of which I had been sorely in
need--namely, the name of the hotel in which I was staying.
“You recollect that dainty little Marchesa Pozzoli--you had supper
with her at the last State ball--she’s just died very mysteriously in
Palermo--poor little woman! All Rome is talking of it. Foul play is
hinted at. Her husband soon afterwards went off to Paris with La
Fafala the dancer,” she added significantly.
“How very tragic!” I replied. Then, as the name slowly brought forth
memories, I remembered her, for I had known Italy and Switzerland
fairly well. A black-eyed, dark-haired, merry little woman of
twenty-five, she had been a most graceful dancer and a cheery
companion. Before her marriage she had been one of the Strozzis of
Florence; since her union with Pozzoli she had been a particularly
bright personage in Rome society, and her receptions at the Palace
Pozzoli, in the Via Babuno, had been among the most brilliant in the
winter season.
“Do they think Enrico murdered her?” I whispered.
“H’sh!” she whispered in turn, warningly. “One must not dare suggest
such a thing, but I happen to know that Ghelardi, chief of the
Pubblica Sicurézza, is making searching inquiries. The Duce told
Richard so two days ago. Of course, that is strictly _entre nous_,”
she added, bending and speaking in a low tone.
Mussolini strode past, and suddenly halted, laughing, to speak with
the Ambassadress; hence I left her side, and a moment later found the
Little Countess, who had just been conducted back to her seat by a
young attaché who had been her partner.
“Won’t you dance, Contessina?” I asked her in French. With that sweet
smile I seemed to recognize in the misty vista of the past, she
replied gaily in the affirmative.
Conversation was rendered difficult for me because each moment in my
bewilderment I feared making some _faux pas_. Now that I was at her
side, the sweeter and more charming she appeared. To Lady Kingscliffe
I suppose I had unconsciously betrayed an infatuation; for, I
recollected her reproachful words concerning Joan.
Joan! She was only a shadow in the mist, a half-effaced memory of
long-forgotten days. That night, amid the brilliant scene of
jewel-bedecked women and uniformed men, I had awakened to a new
existence and had begun life afresh.
I was infatuated with the Contessina Angela. I confess to it. Her
beauty, her grace, her charm, her soft speech, overwhelmed me.
While we were dancing I complimented her on her steps, which were
indeed new to me, though I found I could dance them. But, among
several things which struck me as curious concerning her was that,
though she spoke Italian, it was with a decided foreign accent.
Neither was the softness of her features that of an Italian; yet
perhaps that might be accounted for if her mother had been a
foreigner. Besides, there are, I argued, many people, brought up
abroad in childhood and youth, who cannot speak their own language
properly.
As I held her while we danced, she greatly intrigued me, especially
after what Lady Kingscliffe had told me. She and her companion, the
Baroness Boin, it seemed, had suddenly appeared in Roman society and,
so charming was the little Contessina, and so cleverly had she
“climbed,” that the exclusive society in the Eternal City had quickly
accepted her.
“I suppose you are going to the Quirinale to-morrow night?” she asked
me just before the fox-trot ended.
I replied in the affirmative and expressed a profound hope that we
should meet there.
“I sincerely trust that we shall,” she replied in a voice which struck
me as extremely curious. “Perhaps before. Who knows?” And she laughed.
“Really, Contessina, I don’t quite understand you!” I said, much
puzzled, as I bowed her to her seat.
“Nowadays you don’t understand many things it appears, Signor
Hipwell,” was her reply as she smiled, turning to greet a newcomer who
came to invite her for the next dance.
Ten minutes later I got my hat and coat. A flunkey had called a taxi,
and I drove to the great _hôtel-de-luxe_ the Excelsior, in which, by
mere chance, I had ascertained I had my temporary abode.
After I had ascended the broad, blue-carpeted marble stairs, not
knowing the number of my room I went to the _concierge_ and asked for
my key.
I was given it, and on it was the number of a second-floor apartment,
large luxurious quarters with all the appointments of a modern hotel
of the first class.
I saw the dark-grey clothes I had unconsciously worn that day, neatly
folded, upon a chair. Upon a stand was a battered suit-case completely
covered with labels of Continental hotels, a small hand-bag was upon a
chair, and upon the writing-table was a letter addressed to me.
Apparently it had been delivered that evening. The stamp was a Swiss
one.
I tore it open. Written in an educated hand, there was a brief letter
dated from an address in Lausanne, Switzerland, as follows:
“My Adored Lionel,--I have waited hourly for two whole weeks for a
reply to the urgent message I sent you to London. I can bear the awful
suspense no longer. I am in grave peril, with enemies surrounding me,
and am alone and defenseless. Be extremely careful of your dear self
on your journeys. They will not hesitate to kill you, as I have
already proved to you. I am leaving for London to-morrow, if I
consider it safe, and will call on you. Meanwhile, wire me your
decision to my club in London and also here. I shall then know how to
act. All my fondest love, dear heart, from your devoted wife,
“Illona.”
_My wife Illona!!_ Who was she?
In the two years of my unconsciousness I had evidently married!
CHAPTER SEVEN.
THE AWAKENING
What could it all mean?
I had suddenly awakened to a new world, one familiar enough to me
before my sudden unconsciousness, but in which two whole years had
been blotted out. Of my life or actions during that lost period I had
absolutely no recollection. My mind was a perfect blank.
As I stood there I tried to recall; but my last remembrance was that
horror when the girl Hatten had taken me, fettered and powerless, into
that shabby little room in order to render me blind.
Happily I could still see. I gazed around the luxurious bedroom, with
its rose-pink carpet, curtains, and handsome toilet fittings. I walked
to the long mirror. But when I saw my reflection, I experienced a
shock. I was certainly myself, but looked fully ten years older than
on that night of my sinister adventure in Bloomsbury when the criminal
known as Monkey Dick--so called because of his agility in climbing to
upper windows--had attacked me and been accidentally shot in our
struggle. I walked to the window and stood upon the balcony. The pale,
pearly dawn was rising over Rome. The great piazza, with its palms,
its ilexes, and flowers, was deserted, and no sound broke the quiet,
save the plashing of the fountain.
Yes, the Eternal City was just the same as I had known it in my youth,
when, with the dear old governor, I had spent nearly a year at the
Russie, afterwards paying several visits to the capital again. I took
a deep breath of the flower-scented air, refreshing after the crowded
ballroom I had left; and then, returning into my room, I made a tour
of it, and with curiosity examined my possessions. They were not many,
scarcely anything I recognized.
On the little finger of my left hand was a fine signet-ring of
lapis-lazuli. Upon it was the crest of the Hipwells--a dragon’s head.
I removed it for examination, and inside found an inscription in
facsimile of the same handwriting as the letter, which read: “From
Illona. 3.8.24.”
The third of August, 1924! What could it commemorate? My marriage to
my unknown wife? Was that possible?--for the date was within my lost
years.
I replaced it upon my finger in utter bewilderment. Then I turned to
the contents of my suit-case, which I emptied upon the bed.
Amid the miscellaneous collection which always accumulates in the kit
of every man who is a constant traveler, almost the first thing that
met my eye was a small leather case. On opening it, I found to my
amazement that it was a drug-taker’s outfit! Surely I was not in the
habit of taking morphine! I closed the little case and tossed it into
the waste-paper basket, hoping that in my newly awakened state I
should never handle it again. A case containing tie-pins and
cuff-links--several sets with diamonds--was the next I opened. Among
the pins was one of two square-cut diamonds with an emerald between,
which I knew Joan had given me for my birthday, and a pair of
red-enameled links with diamond centres were the ones I had long
possessed. But my clothes were all unfamiliar, though they were smart
enough, and, from the tabs, had been made by my usual tailor in
Conduit Street.
In the pocket in the lid of the suit-case were some letters. These I
took out, and, sitting at the writing table, I proceeded to examine
them. There were hotel bills from Madrid, Brussels, and Athens, cities
which I supposed I had visited in the course of my journeying as a
King’s Foreign Service Messenger. That was, no doubt, my position;
for, I had already found my _laisser-passer_ which claimed
international courtesy, so that my luggage was exempt from Customs
examination on all the frontiers of Europe. There was, too, my
official badge, the little silver greyhound.
As, one after the other, I opened the letters, I became the more
puzzled. Three were in French, couched in cryptic language, and dated
from an address in Toulouse, demanding that I should disclose the
identity of “the person to whose name it is needless to refer,” and
apparently containing veiled threats.
Had the threats any connection with the urgent warning contained in
the letter from Illona, my mysterious wife?
I realized that I was powerless to acknowledge receipt of her letter
as I had no knowledge of her address in Lausanne, or of the name of
her club in London. Yet she demanded an urgent response telegraphed to
both addresses. She awaited my decision. On what point?
Suddenly I saw Joan’s familiar handwriting on an envelope addressed to
“Lionel Hipwell, Esq., care of His Britannic Majesty’s Embassy,
Madrid,” and, taking out the letter, I observed that it had been
written from Queen’s Gate on the fifteenth of March.
When I had obtained my key from the _concierge_ I had seen by the big
calendar hanging in his bureau that the date was the twenty-third of
April. Hence a little more than a month ago I must have been in
Madrid, and there received the letter from my adored one.
It was sad and full of reproaches.
“You were in London two whole days after your return from Athens,” she
wrote. “Yet you had no time to come and see me, or to ring me up. You
seem so taken up with your new friends, and especially with another
woman, that you have no time for me nowadays. I saw you with my own
eyes dining with her at the Berkeley. I watched you both, but you did
not see me. Next morning I called at Sackville Street, but your new
man told me you had left again for Madrid half an hour before.
“Is this treatment fair to me, Lionel? I do not upbraid you if you
have transferred your love to this Woman from Nowhere and find her
more attractive than myself. Probably she is. Anyhow, she appeared to
be very amusing and witty. But at least tell me the truth. Do not
continue to mislead me into the belief that you are still mine, I beg
of you. A woman’s heart may suffer much, but there is a breaking
strain--and mine is very near it!
“You wired from Vienna promising to come and see me instantly on your
arrival, yet, instead, you prefer the society of your newly-found
charmer. I know that while you are absent we cannot meet and discuss
the future. If you wish to break our engagement, please tell me so. Do
not be afraid. I can stand the shock, for I am now inured to your
neglect and indifference. I shall know when you return from Madrid,
and if you do not come to see me then I shall regard your silence as
breaking our engagement, and that I myself shall be free, with only
the bitter memory of one whom I have loved and still devotedly love.
“Your broken-hearted
“Joan.”
Twice I re-read the letter, and divined in it the poignant suffering
of a woman’s soul.
What foolish act had I committed? Was I actually wedded to the
mysterious Illona, the husband of a woman I could not remember? In my
lost existence I had evidently enacted certain follies of which I held
no recollection. What were they? One--the inexcusable vice of
drug-taking--I had established beyond doubt. How many other
ill-advised and irresponsible acts had I performed? Of how many
foolish indiscretions had I been culpable?
In my perplexity I stood confused, perhaps half deranged.
Vainly I sought to disentangle the astounding situation, but the more
I strove to remember, the darker and more inscrutable the past became.
The mystery of it all was incomprehensible. For over two years I had
evidently been leading a normal life, with few suspecting that my
brain had become unbalanced or that my memory of the past was a blank.
I had resolved on mental reservation from the first moment when the
shock of my fall in the Embassy dining-room had aroused me to a sense
of consciousness of things about me. I dared not make inquiry
concerning anything lest my friends should believe me to be mad.
Without doubt the fearful horror of that never-to-be-forgotten night
at Camberwell was responsible for the inconceivable state of my mind.
Already some unfortunate facts were only too clear. I had not replied
to Joan’s appeal. Hence by my silence our engagement, I supposed, had
been broken. But in what circumstances had I married the mysterious
Illona, of whose address I was in ignorance and whom I had never seen?
I must have married in secret, for Joan had not mentioned it, though
she had watched me dining with someone at the Berkeley. Could the
woman have been my wife?
What excuse could I make to Joan, tender memories of whom had arisen
within me, and whom I loved with all my soul? How could I explain my
marriage and my cruel betrayal? The complications were so many that I
was frantic with uncertainty and bewilderment.
I renewed the search among my papers. There was a letter dated from
Sackville Street signed “Edward Bruce.” Its servile tone showed it to
be from my “new man,” as Joan called him. What was he like, I
wondered? I pictured a tall, thin, grey-haired servant in morning-coat
and grey trousers, very obsequious and discreet. What had become of
the faithful Bolland?
Another paper was an account in my own handwriting of some expenses or
other amounting to about ninety pounds, while my check-book showed
that I had been spending a considerable sum of money, of late, with
some furnishing firm in Paris.
Was it possible that I had set up an apartment for my unknown wife,
Illona?
I subjected every object I possessed to the most careful scrutiny.
Most things puzzled me. Even my clothes I had never set eyes on
before. Yet the memoranda I had were written in a firm handwriting,
evidently my own.
My brain was, indeed, in a whirl. I felt myself going mad. Therefore,
I put on my clothes again, with a light coat over them, and,
descending, went out into the silent, deserted street, past the great
fountain, the waters of which awakened the echoes, until I found
myself at last in that long, straight street, one of the greatest
thoroughfares in the world, the famous Corso.
I detected it in the pale-grey light of the morning. The big electric
lights were still flaring, and as I passed a silent policeman he
politely wished me _buon giorno_.
I wandered past the Hôtel Russie, and higher up the hill till Rome
lay at my feet. It was growing lighter every moment--a pearly-grey
light tinged with rose-pink. At last, after my wanderings, I stood--as
one day in my long-past youth--upon the site of the ancient Torris
Maecentis in the beautiful garden of the Palazzo Colonna and looked
around on the extensive view of the towers and cupolas, the palaces
and monuments, which, on the seven hills, are modern Rome.
Suddenly I recollected that my father had taken me to that spot when I
was about eighteen, to see Rome at dawn.
Again I stood there, to wonder and to think. Below me, bathed in the
pale-gold of the rising sun, lay the red roofs of the Eternal City,
picturesque, mysterious, the capital of a kingdom. It was a city
which, from half effacement consequent on war, led by an
ex-revolutionary, had risen to grandeur and prosperity, to a powerful
place in Europe. I gazed on the wonderful dome of St. Peter’s, and
beside it the colossal tower of Sant’ Angelo, with the winding Tiber
and its bridges--Rome--the changeless city since the Christian era.
I knew Rome, but not with the superficiality that the tourist knows
it. The modern traveler, swept from his home upon a _voyage à
forfait_ by a tourist agency, enjoys the best views, experience, and
comfort in the six days allotted to him--often four, alas!--and yet to
see Rome even superficially it takes a month. Some, of course, care
nothing for ancient monuments, the Coliseum, the Forum, the catacombs,
or the haunts of Nero or Tiberius. They like, rather, to take their
_apéritif_ at the Aregno, their lunch out at Tivoli, and dine and
dance a their hotel, for too often sightseeing is a bore, and one does
not believe in the throwing of coppers into the fountain.
Rome is Rome, after all, always the most impressionable capital of
Europe. And, it will continue to be that, through all the ages.
In my state of mind these thoughts ran through my bewildered brain.
Why, I know not.
If I had forsaken Joan Gell, what had occurred? I realized that, with
my father’s fierce hatred of her father, it had been impossible to
openly declare my love. We had both agreed on this, and our actions,
until that fatal night in Camberwell, had been the acme of discretion.
Yet I had indisputable evidence that I had married somebody named
Illona; and further, my check-books showed heavy payments to form a
home for the latter.
The one part, however, which gripped my brain and dulled my senses,
was my admiration for the girl Angela. I knew that we had met before,
and, further, I was conscious that she held me as clay in her hands.
Her beauty was in my eyes diabolical, her laugh that of a Bacchante,
and yet she was entirely irresistible. She was drawing me towards her
as surely as a magnet draws a needle.
And I had promised to meet her at the State ball, at the Quirinale,
that night.
I tried to resist; but, poor fool that I was, it was useless. Perhaps
I may be forgiven on account of the unstable condition of my
disordered brain. My mind, I think, had awakened, as I stood there
leaning over that lichen-covered stone parapet, gazing across the
Eternal City, over which was rising the pale rose and gold of morning.
But my soul was still asleep. I was as yet as a man half drugged by a
long sleep, in which two years of consciousness had been entirely
blotted out.
It was seven o’clock in the morning before I returned to my bedroom at
the Excelsior. Without taking off my evening-clothes, I sank upon the
bed to sleep, tired and worn, with my brain wrapped still in
cotton-wool.
At eleven I was awakened by the telephone ringing; and I answered it.