"Come!" said the Deputy-Minister peremptorily to Ucelli. "Meanwhile, Mr.
Eversleigh, do you remain here till we return. I do not think you will
have to wait very long."
"Very well, signor," Gilbert replied, though he would have preferred
accompanying the two Italians.
"Come!" cried the Deputy once more to Ucelli.
But the Syndic had now found his tongue. He begged the Deputy to give
him a few moments' private conversation in the next room.
"You can say what you have to say here, surely. If you speak in our own
language, Mr. Eversleigh will not understand you, so you will be quite
safe."
Ucelli urged that Mr. Eversleigh was evidently a highly intelligent man,
and must have picked up some knowledge of Italian. Therefore, with all
respect to the Deputy-Minister, he ventured to think it possible Mr.
Eversleigh might understand. And again he requested a private interview,
which finally was granted to him.
The Deputy and the Syndic retired to an adjoining room, and left Gilbert
alone with his thoughts.
His thoughts were a strange jumble. In the fore-ground of them were
Silwood, James Russell, the Syndic, and the Deputy-Minister, but behind
them were his father, Kitty, and Harry Bennet. As he sat there, they all
presently seemed to mingle, to become obscure, as in some feverish
dream, and then to stand out sharp and clear again.
Perhaps half an hour had passed when there rang through the house the
report of a revolver, immediately followed by the sounds of a struggle
and the cries and shouts of those engaged in it.
Gilbert sprang to his feet at once, and ran into the next room, from
which the noise had come.
There, on the floor, were Ucelli, and above him the Deputy-Minister
holding him by the throat. A little distance away lay a revolver; there
was the smell of burnt powder in the air, while the furniture of the
apartment was in disorder.
"Get something," panted the Deputy, "with which we can bind and secure
him, Mr. Eversleigh. Take that table-cover and tear it up--that will
do."
Gilbert, who had of course easily grasped the situation, did as he was
bid, and in two or three minutes the Syndic was bound hand and foot.
"You are not hurt?" Gilbert inquired of the Deputy. "I heard the sound
of a shot."
"No; though it was not Ucelli's fault. He deliberately tried to kill me,
but I was too quick for him," said the Deputy, still gasping. "I will
tell you all when I have recovered a little."
And breathing heavily, he seated himself on a chair. Gilbert glanced at
Ucelli--the man's face was the colour of paper.
"First of all," said Signor Vinci, after an interval, "he tried to bribe
me, and failing in that, sought to kill me, though what he hoped to
gain by killing me I cannot understand."
"It was the act of a madman."
"You would say he was driven to it by despair? That, perhaps, is the
explanation; or it may be he expected to make good his escape. But you
see what all this means? It means you are correct in what you have
stated about Silwood. Ucelli has not made a confession--that is, a
direct confession--but his conduct can bear no other interpretation."
"Yes," assented Gilbert.
"Our next step must be to get the grave opened, and then the case will
be complete. But first I will give Ucelli the opportunity of making a
full confession."
The conversation between the Deputy-Minister and Gilbert had, up to this
point, been in English. Turning to the Syndic, Signor Vinci asked him in
his own language if he wished to make a statement.
"What is the use?" asked Ucelli. "I have done for myself--the game is
up!"
"That being so, why not make a clean breast of everything?"
"What good would that do me? You will, besides, lay a charge against me
of trying to murder you, and I shall be condemned to a life-sentence."
The Deputy thought for a few seconds.
"You are determined to say nothing?" he asked Ucelli.
"I will confess all--but only if you will promise me one thing on your
honour," said Ucelli, who had been thinking too.
"I cannot make terms with you."
"In this instance you can."
"To what do you refer?"
"If you will waive the charge against me of trying to kill you, I will
disclose everything. After all, I did not kill you; and if you will
withhold the charge of attempt to murder, I will open my lips."
"You ask a great deal!" cried Vinci, but he did not refuse the man. As
rapidly as he could, he told Gilbert of Ucelli's proposal, and said he
was disposed to accept it.
"You may be surprised," he said to Gilbert, who was indeed astonished.
"But I will tell you the reason. It is for your sake. If Ucelli makes a
full confession, you will learn all you desire to know. Naturally, I
have a desire that Ucelli should be punished for his attempt on my life,
but I am willing to forego it. By so doing, and in this way obtaining
the confession, I acknowledge and repay the obligation you have placed
the Ministry of Justice under, for you have put into our hands the means
of convicting Ucelli. I am sure this is what the Minister, His
Excellency Signor Fava, would have me do."
"It is noble of you," said Gilbert, warmly, "to give up wreaking
vengeance on your own account."
The Italian bowed and smiled pleasantly. He now addressed the Syndic,
who had been watching the faces of the two others as they conversed,
trying to gather from their expression what they were saying.
"I agree to your proposal," he said to Ucelli. "I will make no personal
charge against you. You, on your part, will tell us all--absolutely all
without equivocation."
"Yes, Excellency, absolutely all," replied the Syndic, a little colour
of hope coming into his pallid cheeks. "With your permission, I will
speak in French, which Mr. Eversleigh understands, as does your
Excellency, I doubt not."
"Let it be so," assented the Deputy. "Speak on!"
"I must go back some years, four or five," said Ucelli; "it was then
that Silwood first came to Camajore. He made a stay of several weeks, in
the course of which he became intimate with me; he often spent the
evenings here, playing chess, a game of which I am fond. His holiday at
an end, he went back to England. I did not see him again till last July.
I wondered at his coming when cholera was everywhere, but he had an
object in view--a scheme, which compelled him to run the risk."
Here the Syndic paused, as if to collect his thoughts.
"You saw him again?" prompted the Deputy.
"Alas, yes! He came to me and tempted me, and I succumbed. For a sum of
money I agreed to assist him in his scheme. I knew I was doing a
criminal act, but the bribe he offered me quieted all my scruples,"
Ucelli resumed. "I am a poor man, and I fell!"
"How much did he offer you?" demanded Vinci.
"It was fifty thousand liras," replied Ucelli. "Imagine, Excellency, the
temptation to a poor man like myself!"
"Fifty thousand liras!" exclaimed the Deputy. "It is a large sum of
money."
"Fifty thousand liras," thought Gilbert; "how much is that in English
money?" A mental calculation showed him that it was nearly two thousand
pounds. Where, he wondered, had Silwood got such a sum? But Ucelli was
speaking.
"Yes, he offered me fifty thousand liras," repeated the Syndic, "and I
swallowed the bait--like a fool. But I did not consent all at once. I
knew the proceeding he proposed was dangerous in the extreme; but he
allayed my fears by declaring it was impossible that it should ever be
found out."
The Syndic stopped, overcome with self-pity.
"Well," cried Vinci; "what next?"
"His proposal was that I should have him in my house here, and soon
after he was to pretend to be ill of cholera. After a short interval it
was to be given out that he had died, while I was to have an imaginary
body buried. There were so many deaths here at the time, and
consequently so much confusion, that there was no difficulty in carrying
out his plan."
"So you were right," said the Deputy to Gilbert.
"I issued a false certificate, and at Silwood's dictation penned the
letter sent to Mr. Eversleigh's father," went on the Syndic, now bent on
leaving nothing untold. "And it was he who arranged I should have in my
possession the letters, money, clothes, and other articles which
belonged to him."
"To give colour to the fiction of Silwood's death?" asked the Deputy.
"Precisely. I thought we had foreseen everything, and that discovery was
impossible. Alas! but we are blind fools! I hoped, when inquiries came,
I should be able to satisfy them easily. The two men who came to make
inquiries before Mr. Eversleigh, I had no difficulty with."
It was Gilbert's turn to be amazed.
"What?" he cried. "Two men before me! What do you mean?"
"Ah, you did not know of them?" said the Syndic. "One was a detective of
the English police, the other was a journalist, but they went empty
away."
"Do you know their names?"
"Am I likely to forget anything or anybody connected with this affair?"
asked Ucelli. "No; the name of the detective was Brydges, of Scotland
Yard; that of the other was Westgate, a man on the staff of a London
journal, the _Morning Call_."
The names conveyed no meaning to Gilbert, but he was filled with wonder.
Thinking it over later, he saw it must have been suspected by others
that Silwood was not dead, and he guessed these inquiries had been made
in connection with the finding of Thornton's body in Silwood's rooms in
Lincoln's Inn. The knowledge that the detective and the journalist had
been at Camajore, however, gave him a bad turn; he was afraid to think
what might have happened to his father if either of them had stumbled on
the truth.
"I know neither of them," said Gilbert to the Syndic.
"They got nothing from me," resumed Ucelli. "I felicitated myself on
getting rid of them without trouble. And then you came, Mr. Eversleigh,
and I imagined you were as satisfied as they had been. I was a blind
fool, a blind fool!"
"You see I was sure Silwood was not dead," remarked Gilbert.
"Do you know where he is?" eagerly inquired the Syndic.
"No, I don't; I hoped you would know."
The Syndic shook his head.
Signor Vinci darted an angry look at him.
"I don't know," persisted Ucelli, seeing the look.
"What occurred after the so-called death of Silwood?" asked the Deputy.
"How did he get out of the country? It's plain he did not go as Silwood.
If he had plenty of money, as I suppose his giving you fifty thousand
liras shows, he would be able to procure disguises, have his own
carriage, and journey as he liked."
"Mr. Silwood," replied Ucelli, "is undoubtedly a very rich man, as you
suggest. He had an abundance of money."
Gilbert startled the other two men by suddenly rising from his chair
with a vehement ejaculation.
"Silwood a rich man?" he cried.
"Beyond question, a very rich man."
Here was a new idea to Gilbert--new with a vengeance! Silwood rich!
Then what about Silwood's alleged losses on the Stock Exchange? he asked
himself. Were they fictitious too? Or--what?
"Silwood is rich," continued the Syndic, "but it took very little money
to get him out of the country, as it happened. His scheme had taken
account of that, and he brought with him a disguise--a disguise as
complete as any I ever saw; no one could have recognized him in it. By
taking off his wig, putting on a moustache, staining his face and hands,
and touching up his cheeks with some paint, he became another man
altogether. Then he had clothes with him--such clothes, he told me, as
any British workman might wear--and these he wore. The disguise was
perfect, and must have been carefully studied. In the night I guided him
out of Camajore, and set him on the way to Lucca, which he reached;
thence he went on to Genoa, where he took ship for England. But he was
delayed at Genoa--there was an accident; how it came about is not known,
but he was stabbed in the street."
"Stabbed in the street!" exclaimed Gilbert, on whom the full light was
now breaking.
"Yes; he telegraphed for me to go to him, and I went. He said that to
prosecute the man who had stabbed him would be fatal, and I arranged
there should be no prosecution. Besides, his wound was not serious; he
had merely to lie quiet for some days."
"Under what name did Silwood go when he was thus disguised?" asked
Gilbert, though he knew what the reply would be.
"James Russell," said the Syndic.