My story until now has dragged a lingering length along, but from this
point onward it moves swiftly to its close. In the haste I feel to reach
that close I strive to obliterate from my mind whatever came between the
hour of Hinge's revelation and the hour of the appointment. The task is
not easy, for the four-and-twenty hours that intervened were filled with
a suspense and anxiety of no common sort. The night passed, as even the
most anxious of nights will pass; the day succeeding it crawled on, as
even the dreariest of days will crawl; and at last the hour arrived.
When, aided by Hinge on one side and by a stout walking-stick on the
other, I left the hotel, the night was already dark, and once more a
heavy rain was falling. Hinge had secured a vehicle, which carried us
to within a hundred yards of our destination, and was there discharged.
There was a lamp at either end of the brief lane in which the river-side
cottage stood, and we could see that the road was diverted. There was
still a chance that the traitors who were plotting against us might keep
watch, and we slipped into the garden with some little trepidation. Once
within the gate, I made a circuit of the house to assure myself that
there was no chance of our being observed, and finding the whole field
clear, I climbed, with Hinge's aid, onto the balcony. We had found the
whole land in front of the house in darkness, and only a single room on
the river-side was illuminated. Hinge touched me on the elbow, and with
a forward finger indicated the lighted window, and motioned me on. I
went crouching with a stealthy step until I came on a level with the
window, and then, kneeling on the wet boards of the veranda, I found
within eyeshot Brunow, the baroness, Sacovitch, and Constance Pleyel.
The two men were smoking, wine was set out upon the table, and four
glasses were filled. The whole party had an air of Bohemian ease and
jollity. They were talking together, and I could see Sacovitch pacing
the room with great vehemence of gesture; but though I could hear the
deep murmur of his voice, and could even ascertain that he was speaking
in English with a foreign accent, I could not succeed, strain my ears as
I might, in making out the burden of a consecutive sentence. Hinge was
crouching at my side, his shoulder touching mine. The rain dripped from
the upper part of the house onto the shelving roof of the veranda with
a monotonous and incessant noise which drowned the voices within at
critical moments, so that we caught no more than detached words. All
of a sudden I felt Hinge's hand on my wrist, and at that second a step
crunched on the gravel between the gate and the door of the house. Then
a bell tinkled faintly, and we both saw the whole quartet turn with
varying expressions of waiting and attention. Then the door of the room
opened and a servant appeared, explaining in dumb show, so far as we
were concerned, but to our perfect understanding, that a visitor had
arrived. I saw Brunow wave permission to the visitor to enter, and
understood quite clearly what was going on, though at this moment the
pattering of the rain and the sudden sigh of the wind robbed my ears
of even the murmur of his voice. The servant retired, leaving the door
open, and the quartet of conspirators bent towards each other while
Sacovitch spoke. I watched the movement of his forefinger and the motion
of his lips. The glint of his eye, the elevation of his brow, and the
inclination of his head towards the open door all meant caution, and
I could tell as clearly as if I had heard his words that he was taking
upon himself the burden and responsibility of an approaching interview.
An instant later the servant reappeared, laying a needless hand upon the
door and swaying it open by a superfluous inch or two as he introduced
the visitor.
“Roncivalli!” whispered Hinge, in a tone of unutterable amazement as the
man came in.
I thought myself prepared for anything; but the presence of such a man
in such company astonished me profoundly. Roncivalli was one of the most
trusted of our committee, an Italian _pur sang_, a man whose family had
suffered from Austrian misrule for half a century back. He represented
a house which had been rich and noble, and had been persecuted into
nothingness. No man had been louder in denunciation of the Austrian
cruelty, no man apparently more sincere. There never lived a man who
had more reason for sincerity. My first impression was that he must
be spying upon the spies, for my opinion of his patriotism had been so
lofty, that next to the Count Rossano and poor old Ruffiano, whom Brunow
had betrayed, I should have counted him the last man in all the Italian
ranks to be bought by Austrian gold.
He came in, hat in hand, with a sweeping salute to the ladies, and
tossing his sombrero on the sofa, dripping wet as it was, unbuttoned
with both hands a paletot shining with rain, and displayed himself
in evening-dress, with a big jewel shining in the centre of his
shirt-front, after a fashion which became popular a score of years
later. Sacovitch stepped forward to help him divest himself of his
cloak; and when it was slipped from his shoulders he held it with one
hand, groping in the pockets from one side to the other, and in the
meantime nodded round with a smiling air, with an allusion which I
understood a second later when he held up a long Virginian cigar. Miss
Pleyel and the baroness bowed, and Roncivalli set his cigar over the
lamp until one end of it became incandescent. Then he began to smoke,
and at a wave from Miss Pleyel's hand took an arm-chair close to the
window. The baroness rose from her seat and poured out wine for
him. Motions of hand and eye, change of feature, and movement of lip
indicated an animated social converse, but not a word of it all reached
my ears. I was just meditating on Hinge's luck in the fact that on the
occasion of his watch the conspirators had thrown open the window as if
on purpose that he should secure a hearing of their deliberations, when
the baroness put her hand to her round white throat, with an exaggerated
gesture of oppression, and then waved it towards the window. Sacovitch
bowed and rose from his place. I laid a hand on Hinge, impelling him
downward as the Austrian police spy walked towards the window. We each
glued ourselves to the wall, and prostrated ourselves on the rainy
wood-work of the veranda walk. We heard the grating sound of the window
as it rose; and the mingled voices of the people inside--all _five_
speaking together--came out with a gush, and brought such anticipatory
joy and triumph to my heart as I had never felt before.
“Let us make sure,” said Roncivalli, in a laughing tone. “We have
important business to discuss--at least, I am advised so--and it would
be just as well to be certain that we are not overheard.” He raised
the Venetian blind by the cord, and for a moment the rattle sounded
as disturbing to the nerves as anything I can remember. But I heard
Sacovitch say:
“The veranda looks upon the river. There is nobody within hearing.”
“We will see, in any case,” Roncivalli responded, and with that he
thrust his head between the window-sill and the blind, and peeped out
into the river. The lamplight took him from behind and illuminated the
tips and edges of his hair, his beard, and his mustache, so that they
shone bright gold, though he was a man of darkish complexion. As he
turned his head sideways the white of his eye gleamed like an opal, and
bending suddenly he looked downward, seeming to stare me in the face
so intently that I did not even dare to breathe. I was so absolutely
certain that he would give an alarm that it came upon me with a shock of
relief beyond description when he drew his head back into the room, and
said that everything was clear.
“That is a relief,” said the baroness; “but with all you gentlemen
smoking, I was afraid that I should faint.”
“So?” said Sacovitch, with an altogether insolent disregard in his
inquiry. “Let us get to business.”
“I am ready,” Roncivalli answered, throwing himself anew into the
arm-chair.
“A moment,” said a voice, which I recognized as Constance Pleyel's; “it
is very well to have the window open, but all the same we need not catch
our death of cold. Will you be good enough, Signor Roncivalli, to lower
the blind.”
The signor arose and obeyed her, and as he did so I could see his long
figure between me and the whitewashed, lamplit ceiling of the room.
Before another word was spoken Hinge touched me again upon the elbow,
and I knew at once the meaning of his signal. We rose, both of us,
silently to our knees, and each found a crevice through which he could
command a view of the occupants of the room.
“The first thing, I take it,” said Sacovitch, “is to decide that the
negotiations we are about to conclude are not likely to be broken by any
betrayal on either side.”
“So far as I am concerned,” said Roncivalli, “my being here is guarantee
enough. I am not risking my life for nothing, or, if I am, I shall know
the reason why.”
At this moment Brunow broke in with an Italian-sounding phrase, and the
baroness interrupted him.
“Speak English,” she said. “Herr Sacovitch has no Italian, and Miss
Pleyel no German. English is the one language which is understood by all
of us, and we may just as well have everything open and above-board.”
With one eye glued to the lower interstice of the Venetian blind, I saw
the quintet all bowing and bobbing to each other at this with a Judas
politeness which was altogether charming to look at. Roncivalli, with
his back half turned towards me, was so near that I could have taken him
by the hair. A little removed from him, on the right, sat the baroness,
in a captivating little bonnet and gloves of pearl gray, smoothing one
hand over the other on her silk-clad knees with a purring satisfaction
in the charm of her own attire. At her side sat poor Constance Pleyel
with a wineglass in her left hand, looking into its last spot or two as
drearily as if she contemplated the dregs of her own wasted and
weary life. Beyond her again, and almost facing me, just seen across
Roncivalli's shoulders, sat Brunow, smoking at his ease, and toying with
his eyeglass with the fingers of both hands. Sacovitch stood upright,
his cigar balanced between his first and second fingers, dominating, or
seeking to dominate, the whole party.
“I especially desire,” he said, in his strong German accent, and ticking
off on his left forefinger every important syllable, with such emphasis
that he scattered the ashes of his cigar into his own wineglass--“I
especially desire that Signor Roncivalli should understand with extreme
definiteness that there is no escape from the position which he has
elected to assume.”
“No fear of me, my friend,” Roncivalli answered. The liquid Italian
played against the German guttural like the warble of a flute answering
the snarl of a violoncello. “I am doing what I know. Until our friend
Rossano came to England I had a place from which he was good enough
to depose me. You may say what you like, Herr Sacovitch, but the
independence of my country is secure. Italy wins; and I desire Italy to
win. I will help you to your Count Rossano if you want him, and if you
will pay me for it, because I hate him, and because he is in my way. But
Italy wins, all the same.”
There was a candor about this which I could appreciate, but Sacovitch
turned upon his purchased traitor with something very like a snarl.
“Understand,” he said, in his thick German-English, “that I buy you or I
do not buy you. Whether I buy you or not, you are sold already. Our last
talk was overheard by a fellow-committeeman of yours, who is in my pay,
and who will go back to his old patriotism, or come to me, exactly as I
tell him.”
“I am here for a service,” responded Roncivalli “I will do one thing for
you, as I have told you all along, and I will do no more. I will give
you the Count Rossano, who is in my way, and I will not give you any
real chance over Italy for anything you may offer me. I will take your
money because I want it, and I will serve your turn because it suits me.
How I reconcile these matters with my own conscience is my own affair.”
“Your conscience is your own,” Sacovitch answered; “the question of
your conduct is our consideration. I want you only to understand that
a single false move on either side--” He took a deep pull at his cigar
there, and made a purposed pause for effect. “I think, ladies and
gentlemen, you will agree with me that I do not exaggerate. Swerve an
inch to right or left,” he added, “and you lose your life.”
Roncivalli's flute-like voice followed the troubled grumble of the
German's threat.
“I know my business, Herr Sacovitch, as well as you know yours. I can
serve your turn and I can serve my own. Give me what I ask, and you may
have the Count Rossano. But if you think that in betraying the man who
has usurped my place I betray my cause, you are very much mistaken. So
long as Count Rossano is at liberty, it is not worth your while to trap
so inconsiderable a person as myself. When once he is in your hands I
shall be a great deal too wise to give you the chance of seizing me.
When I fight, I shall fight openly--against Austria,” he added, with a
laugh.
“Miss Rossano,” said Sacovitch, “drew the forty thousand pounds
yesterday, and it now lies in the hands of Lady Rollinson. You will go
to Southampton by the first train in the morning, accompanied by the
Baroness Bonnar, who will introduce you to her English ladyship. Lady
Rollinson is in direct communication with the Count Rossano, and will be
able to give you a meeting-place at which you will hand over the money
to the count. Mr. Brunow and the baroness will accompany you, and will
undertake to see that the money is delivered. Any one of you may act as
intermediaries between the Count Rossano and the forces on shore; but it
must be definitely understood that the count is, under no circumstances,
to be allowed to land until our own side is ready.”
“That is clear enough,” answered Roncivalli.
“Let me be clearer still,”--said Sacovitch, turning upon him with a
menacing look. “In a case like this, many things have to be provided
for. It is quite possible that it may seem worth your while to play for
forty thousand pounds.”
“Not at all,” said Roncivalli, tranquilly.
“It is assuredly not worth your while,” the Austrian returned. “This
enterprise is in my hands, and it has never been my practice to leave
any of my agents unwatched. I shall not tell you who will watch you,
or who in turn will watch him; but it will save possible trouble if you
should understand that from the moment at which you leave, until the
Count Rossano is in our hands, you will be under my observation and
control as definitely as you are at this moment.”
“All this,” replied Roncivalli, “is a waste of words. I have undertaken
this piece of work for my own purpose, and for my own purpose I shall
carry it through. When the work is done I shall go my own way, as I have
always told you. I am to have the pleasure of your society, madame,” he
continued, turning to the baroness. “That is charming, and will beguile
a journey which might otherwise be tedious. What is the hour of the
train's departure?”
Sacovitch drew out a pocket-book, and, extracting a loose leaf from it,
handed it to him.
“You will find all your instructions there: the train, the hotel
at which Lady Rollinson is staying, and the boat. Mr. Brunow has my
certificate to the captain of the boat, who will place himself at your
service at any hour.”
“_Buono!_” said the Italian, folding the paper with a flourish, and
bestowing it in his breast-pocket. “Is there anything more?”
“That is all,” said Sacovitch. “I think we understand each other, and we
could do no more than that if we talked till midnight.”
“In that case,” said Roncivalli, rising, “until tomorrow, madame. Until
to-morrow, Mr. Brunow.” He took up his paletot from the chair onto which
he had thrown it on his entrance, and threw it over his shoulder. Then
he took his hat, and with a half-theatrical bow all round, and a smile
at Sacovitch, he left the room. The hall-door banged a few seconds
later, and his footstep sounded on the gravel of the path and then died
away.
“I am not quite sure that I trust that fellow,” Sacovitch said a minute
later. “It will be your business to keep a strict eye upon him.”
“Have no fear,” said the baroness. “He shall be well watched.”
There was more talk, but it had no interest for me, though I still
listened intently in the hope of learning more. In a quarter of an hour
or thereabouts the servant was called in, and received instructions to
bring the baroness's carriage, which appeared to be put up at a hotel
while the conference was being held. She and Brunow and Constance were,
it appeared, going back to town together, and I learned incidentally
that the cottage had been rented by Sacovitch for his own purposes, as
affording a more convenient and secret meeting-place than any he could
find in London. Directly the servant had received his orders I gave
Hinge a sign, and with infinite precautions we climbed from the veranda
to the garden, and thence made our way on tip-toe, like a pair of
thieves, to the roadway.
“They're a nice old lot, sir, ain't they?” said Hinge, when we had
walked a hundred yards in silence.
I quieted him by returning no answer, and we walked on without another
word until I had reached my own chamber. By this time I had quite made
up my mind as to the line it was my duty to adopt, and wheresoever it
led me I was resolved to follow. I gave Hinge my purse, and instructed
him to pay the bill, to pack up my belongings, and to be ready to catch
the first train into town. He was full of wonderment and conjecture,
but, like the old soldier he was, he obeyed without inquiry. When I
arrived at my own rooms I sat down and wrote a statement of the whole
truth, as brief and concise as I could make it, and copied it four
or five times over; and armed with these documents, I drove to the
addresses of such men as I knew where to find among our _sociétaires_.
Under ordinary circumstances, since the count's departure and the
betrayal of poor old Ruffiano, I should have gone to Roncivalli; but
now that he was turned traitor I had to rely upon my own limited
information, which served me very awkwardly. I had calculated beforehand
on the chance that I might not find any one of the men I sought at home,
and my worst forebodings were fulfilled. I left in each case my written
statement, and before I returned to my own rooms I had delivered them
all. The unfortunate part of the business was, as I knew full well, that
hardly a man among them could read English, and in almost every case the
recipient of my letter would have to seek a translator before he could
find me. I knew, on the other hand, that if once the statement I had
made reached the intelligence of any one Italian patriot, the news would
spread like wildfire, and that, if I needed them, a hundred men would be
at my disposal to check the treason meditated by Roncivalli and Brunow.
In each epistle I besought the receiver to follow me without delay to
Southampton, and I undertook to wire to each the address at which I
might be found, and begged him, in case he should follow immediately, to
make arrangements to have that address rewired.
All this being done, I sat down and wrote out a fuller statement of the
case for Violet's reading, if ever I should again be so happy as to find
the chance of placing it in her hands. This occupied me until an hour
after midnight. I went to bed, leaving with Hinge the responsibility of
awaking me in time for the first train next morning to Southampton.
When we reached the railway station I caught a glimpse of Roncivalli and
Brunow and the baroness; but this was no more than I had expected, and
it cost me but little trouble to evade them. We reached Southampton
without adventure, and I kept my place in the railway carriage until
Hinge reported to me that they had left the platform. Then I ventured
after them in a fly, and having seen them all enter a hotel together, I
made a note of its name and position in my mind, and took a little drive
into the country before returning. When I got back and procured rooms,
my heart leaped as I signed the visitors' book, for at the top of the
page on which I wrote I saw the names of Lady Rollinson, Miss Rossano
and maid. It cost me an effort to put the question with untroubled face
and voice, but I asked the servant who conducted me to my room if Miss
Rossano were still staying in the house. He answered uninterestedly that
he did not know the lady. But when I mentioned her as Lady Rollinson's
companion, he recalled her to mind.
“No, sir,” he said; “the lady stayed in the house the night before
last, but she went away with her maid yesterday morning.”
As to when she would return, or as to the direction she had taken at the
time of her departure, he could tell me nothing. And so, as fate would
have it, I was left in the ignorance and uncertainty which had perplexed
me from the first. A minute's interview with Violet would, of course,
have put an end to the danger of the situation, but in her absence I
felt as powerless here as I had been in London. I was on the scene of
action, but so long as Lady Rollinson retained her absurd suspicions,
I could not approach the actors and actresses in the scene of tragedy
which grew every moment more threatening and more imminent.
Hinge was so far in my confidence already that I had not much difficulty
in laying before him all my hopes and fears. I wrote an urgent note to
Lady Rollinson, and sent it by his hand, instructing him to deliver it
to her ladyship personally. I read it over to him when it was completed,
and at the end of every sentence he nodded assent to it.
“Dear Lady Rollinson,” I wrote, “you have engaged to pay into the hands
of Signor Roncivalli a sum of forty thousand pounds, to be handed to
Count Rossano. Before you do this I beseech you solemnly to give me a
moment's interview. The payment of that money will result in the count's
betrayal to the Austrians. You know what he has suffered already, and
you know how little mercy he can look for at their hands if they should
once more succeed in getting hold of him. I beg you, for his sake, and
for the sake of Violet, whom I know you love, to give me an interview
of five minutes only. You may question the bearer of this note, who will
tell you everything, and you may rely upon his knowledge and discretion.
If you are still determined not to see me, I shall be quite content that
you should learn the truth from him. But I beg you, by everything you
hold dear, not to disregard my warning. Count Rossano is in peril of the
gravest sort, and if you should hand Miss Ros-sano's gift to him
without inquiry, you may sign his death-warrant, and will certainly give
yourself grounds for the bitterest self-reproaches you have ever known.”
Hinge undertook, with a full sense of the responsibility which rested
upon him, to deliver this letter, and went away with it; but in ten
minutes he came back with the envelope unopened.
“_I_ got to 'er ladyship,” he said; “but the minute I told 'er where I
came from she threw the letter on the table and told me to bring it back
again. I tried my best, sir, but she wouldn't listen to me. She ordered
me out of the room, sir; and when I tried to tell 'er what the matter
was, she rung the bell and walked out. You can't follow a lady into 'er
bedroom, sir; and say what I would I couldn't get 'er to let me get
a word in edgeways. A servant comes up in answer to the ring, and 'er
ladyship, from inside 'er bedroom, says, 'Waiter, request that man to
leave my room, and see as 'e don't trouble me no more.'”
“Where are Lady Rollinson's rooms?” I asked him, desperately.
“They're in this corridor, sir,” Hinge answered; “at the far end,
numbers 38, 39, and 40.”
I snatched up the letter, strode along the corridor, and knocked at the
middle door of the suite. Lady Rollinson herself answered my summons,
and before I could speak a word slammed the door indignantly in my face
and turned the key. I heard the bolt shoot in the lock, and a second
later an angry peal at the bell sounded. I stood there, altogether
irresolute and disconsolate. A waiter came flying up the stairs, and,
bustling past me, knocked at the door.
“Who's there?” cried her ladyship's voice from within. “Send the manager
to me. Tell him that I am being persecuted, and that I demand his
protection.”
What was a man to do in a case of that kind? I could simply retire to
my own apartments; but I did it in such a passion of wrath and impotence
that I could have taken that stupid and credulous old woman by the
shoulders and shaken her to reason. I was too angry and disheartened to
speak a word; but while I was pacing up and down the room, and wondering
what my next move should be, the manager of the hotel presented himself,
with a message from Lady Rollinson.
“It is no affair of mine, sir,” said the man, who was extremely polite
and business-like; “but the lady declares that she will not see you on
any account, or receive any communication from you. I am to tell you
that if you persist in attempting to see her she will leave the hotel.
I can't afford to have my customers troubled in this way, and I must ask
you to go.”
I told him I should decline to go. I asked him to sit down, and I
related to him the whole story, so far as it was necessary that any
outside person should hear it, in order that he might judge of the
situation. The man became interested, and even in a way sympathetic.
“It's a very curious case; sir,” he admitted; “but I can't allow my
customers to be disturbed, all the same. If I were in your place, sir,”
he added, “I should appeal to the police.”
This advice was so hopelessly astray from the point that I dismissed the
man, though I had to promise him that Lady Rollinson should suffer no
further annoyance. Hinge was hard to pacify, for in his loyalty to me
and the affection that had grown up between us, he was almost as much
interested as I was, and he kept breaking in with a “Look 'ere, sir,
this is Captain Fyffe, my master. It was him as rescued Count Rossano
from the fortress of Itzia--you must have seen it in the papers.” The
man was got rid of at last, and the promise was given. And now there was
nothing to be done but to await the arrival of some one or two of the
patriotic _sociétaires_ from London. Even in the extremity at which
things had arrived, I more than half dreaded their coming. If they came
at all, they would come with a full knowledge of the facts, and their
arrival meant nothing less than murder. It would have been the wildest
of dreams to suppose for an instant that any one of them would allow
his beloved chief to be handed over to the Austrians at any cost; and
though I was willing to pay almost any price to save the count, I had a
horror of bloodshed in a case like that.
“Let us leave no stone unturned,” I said to Hinge.
“I will go to the railway station to meet any friends of mine that may
arrive, and in the meantime you can go to the docks and ascertain what
vessels sail for any Italian port to-morrow. Find out if it is possible
for me to get berths aboard the boat by which Brunow and Roncivalli
sail.”
“You trust me, sir,” Hinge returned; “I'll do my best.”
We parted for an hour or so. My waiting at the station came to nothing,
and when Hinge returned he had no news worth the telling. The regular
liners were all known, and had been easy enough to find. He had learned
by cunning inquiry that luggage had been taken that evening aboard a
craft whose destination v was unknown, and he had had her pointed out to
him. When he had pulled out into the harbor to speak the craft, he had
been warned away by a man who either could not understand him or refused
to do so. It was not in itself a suspicious or remarkable thing that
a stranger should not have been allowed to board a foreign craft after
dark, but in the circumstances it was enough to make me believe that
this was the ship by which the traitorous party was to sail. To be
so near, to know so much, and yet to be so helpless was downright
maddening.
“Once the money is in the hands of those wretches,” I said, “once they
are away, the count is doomed. That headstrong old woman is throwing
away her niece's fortune to betray her niece's father; and if she knew
what she was doing she would sooner put her own right hand in the fire.”
“If I was you, sir,” Hinge responded, “I shouldn't let her do it.”
“You wouldn't?” I responded.
“No, sir,” said Hinge; “I wouldn't.”
“And how would you prevent it?” I asked. I spoke eagerly, for I could
not help thinking he had some scheme in mind.
“I don't know, sir,” said Hinge; “but I shouldn't let 'er do it. I'd
rouse the town agen 'em. Do you mean to tell me, sir, as any set of
English people 'ud let a lot of scoundrels like them go off to sell the
life of an innocent gentleman? I don't believe it. I should rouse the
town.”
I bade him hold his tongue and go, and for two or three hours I sat by
myself, raging at my own helplessness. There is nothing so intolerable
to an active mind as the sense of urgent duty confronted by impotence.
And if ever circumstance in the whole history of the world yet justified
a man, sane and sober, in a madman's act, I felt myself justified when
the last desperate resort occurred to me.