He who gives up the smallest part of a secret has the
rest no longer in his power.--JEAN PAUL.
The Marchesa's confession made a great and immediate sensation
throughout Italy. Everyone who had known Michael, and a great many who
had not, proclaimed with one consent that his innocence was no news to
them. The possibility that he might be shielding someone had been
discussed at the time of the trial, but had found no shred of
confirmation.
And now the mystery was solved at last, and in the most romantic manner.
Michael had come out with flying colours.
To many minds the romance was enhanced by the fact that the Marchesa was
a gentle, middle-aged, grey-haired woman in no way attractive, whose
whole interest in life centred in her daughter. Michael's transcendent
act of chivalry towards the Marchesa, dramatically acknowledged by her
at last upon her deathbed, appealed even to the most unimaginative
natures. He became the hero of the hour. Telegrams of congratulation
poured in from every quarter. Letters snowed in on him. Even before
Wentworth could reach him enthusiastic strangers had tried to force
their way into his cell. Determined young reporters came out in
gondolas, and it was all the warders and the doctor could do to protect
Michael from invasion.
He sat apparently stunned in his cell, the only person unmoved. Every
servant and warder in that dreary establishment had come to offer him
their congratulations. The other convicts had sent messages. The man in
the next cell, slowly dying of gangrene, had crawled from his pallet to
beat a tattoo on the wall. The doctor was beside himself with joy.
"You must keep calm," he kept saying in wild excitement. "Your brother
will be here to-morrow morning. I implore you to be calm."
And he brought Michael his best pipe, and some of his most cherished
tobacco, and a weird suit of black clothes, and urged him to spend the
evening with him in his own sitting-room.
But Michael shook his head. He had no hatred of his striped blouse. He
was accustomed to it. He said he would prefer to await his brother's
arrival in his cell. He was accustomed to that, too. He felt as if he
could not bear to have everything torn from him at once, as if he should
be lost if all his landmarks were changed. He sat hour by hour, smoking,
and every now and then reading Wentworth's telegram.
He tried to realise it. He said to himself over and over again: "I am
free. I am going away. Wentworth is coming to take me home." But it was
no good. His mind would not take hold.
He looked for the twentieth time at Wentworth's telegram. Wentworth was
hurrying towards him at this moment, would be travelling all night,
would reach him in the morning. Dear, dear Wenty, he would be happy
again now.
Michael groaned.
"It's no kind of use. I _can't_ believe it."
He tried to think of Fay. He should see _her_ soon, touch her hand, hear
her voice. Poor little darling! She had not the courage of a mouse.
Perhaps she was a little glad at his release. Yes. No doubt she had been
pleased to hear it. He hoped she would not feel shy of him at seeing him
again. He hoped she would not thank him.
The door, no longer locked, was suddenly opened, and the head warder
deferentially ushered in a visitor.
A tall, dark man in a tri-coloured sash came in, and the warder
withdrew.
The man bowed and looked with fixity at Michael, who stared back at him,
dazed and confused. Where had he seen that face before?
Ah! _He remembered!_
"I perceive that you have not forgotten me," said the Delegato. "It was
I who arrested you. It was to me that you confessed to the murder of the
Marchese di Maltagliala."
"I remember."
"I never was able to reach any certainty that you were really guilty,"
continued the Delegato. "I was not even convinced that you had had a
quarrel with the Marchese."
"I had no quarrel with him."
"I knew that. That you might be shielding someone occurred forcibly to
my mind. _But who?_"
Michael looked steadily at the official.
"And there was blood upon your hand and sleeve when you confessed."
"There was."
"It was not the Marchese's blood," said the Delegato, drawing a sallow
finger across a blue chin. "It remained a mystery. I will own that it
had not crossed my mind that that fragile and timid lady had killed her
husband, and that as she at last confesses you were shielding her." The
Delegato looked piercingly at Michael.
Michael was silent.
"You have always been silent. Is not the moment come to speak?"
Michael shook his head.
The Delegato bowed.
"I came to ask you to discuss the affair openly," he said, "to relieve
my perplexity as a matter of courtesy. But you will not speak. Then I
will speak instead. When first I read the Marchesa's confession it came
into my mind that the Marchesa, who I believe was your friend, might for
some reason, possibly the sentimental devotion of an older woman for a
young man--such things have been--that she _might_ have confessed on her
deathbed to a crime which she had not committed in order to save you
from--_this_"--he touched the wall of the cell. "I doubted that she
really murdered her husband. _But she did._ I sought out the maid who
had been with her when the Marchese died, and she, before the confession
was published, informed me that she had not undressed the Marchesa on
her return from the Colle Alto party. And that next morning part of the
cloak which was not hers, and part of her gown were found to be burnt as
stated in her confession. It was indeed necessary to burn them. The
Marchesa murdered the Marchese."
There was a long silence.
"I cannot tell whether you witnessed the crime or not. At first I
thought the blood on your hands and clothes might have come from helping
her to drag the body into the garden. But it was not so. At the time I
attached a great importance to the garden door being unlocked. Too
great. It led me astray. The gardener, in spite of his oath that he had
locked it, had probably left it unlocked. We now know from the Marchesa
that the murder took place within the garden, and the locking and
unlocking of the door was an accident which looked like a clue.... But,
if you witnessed the murder, and wished to retire without raising an
alarm, or denouncing that unhappy lady, I ask myself why did you not
open the garden door from within--the key was in the lock, I saw it--and
pass out on to the high road. Why did you, instead, try so hard to
escape over the wall behind the ilexes that you tore your hands on the
cut glass on the top? I found the place next day. There was blood on it.
When you were struggling to escape over that wall you were not anxious
to take the Marchesa's guilt upon yourself. When you were hiding behind
the screen in the Duchess' apartment you were not--_at that
moment_--very determined to shield the Marchesa from the consequences of
her deed. All Italy is ringing with your quixotic, your chivalrous, your
superb action. _Nevertheless_, if I had quitted the Duchess' apartment,
if my natural and trained acuteness had not made one last effort
respecting the screen, _I do not think you would have followed me into
the garden to denounce yourself_."
The Delegato paused.
Michael was quite unmoved. Everything reached him dimly as through a
mist. He partly saw the difficulty in the official's mind, but it did
not interest him. He was cleared. That was enough.
"In two years much is forgotten," said the Delegato, sententiously, "and
it is, perhaps, I alone who recall the more minute details of the case,
because I was present and my interest was overwhelming. I have not
spoken of this to anyone but yourself. I shall not speak of it again. I
have taken a journey to discuss it with you because I had hoped you
would understand my professional interest in unravelling that which
remains still obscure, a mystery, which is daily becoming to me a
greater mystery than before the Marchesa's confession. You have it in
your power to gratify my natural desire for elucidation by an
explanation which can no longer injure you in any way. You are innocent.
It is proved. But even now you will not speak. You prefer to preserve
your attitude of silence to the end. Good! I will intrude on you no
longer. I offer you my congratulations. I deplore your inevitable
imprisonment. I withdraw."
The Delegato bowed yet again and went to the door.
"That of which you will not speak was known to your friend the Duke of
Colle Alto," he said. "_The Duke knew._"
"The Duke is dead," said Michael.
"I am aware of that," said the Delegato, frigidly. He bowed for the last
time, and left the cell, gently closing the door.