Sophy ordered the gondola, took Rosa with her, and went to the Grand
Hotel.
The head official at the bureau looked rather surprised by her
questions. Lady Wychcote? No, her ladyship was not there. She had been
there that morning, however. She had sent a message late the night
before--after twelve o'clock, in fact--to tell them to keep her luggage
at the hotel until further instructions, instead of sending it to 35 Rio
San Vio next day, as she had at first ordered.
"To keep her luggage?" Sophy interrupted blankly.
"_Si, Signora._ But I was about to explain," answered the clerk. "This
morning, about nine, Lady Wychcote came again with her railway tickets
so that we might check her luggage straight through to Paris...."
Sophy turned white.
"You must be mistaken!..." she said.
"_Ma, no, Signora--scusi_.... I am not mistaken," said the clerk
decidedly. "The tickets were through from Venice to Paris. Her ladyship
wished her luggage sent by the ten-thirty train this morning. I think
that she herself left by that train also. Shall I send for the head
porter? He will know."
"Yes, please," Sophy managed to murmur. She sank down into the nearest
chair.
The head porter came shortly. He had just returned from the station.
Yes. Lady Wychcote had left that morning on the through train for
Paris.
Sophy could not articulate for a moment. Then she said, her lips stiff
and dry:
"Was she ... was she ... alone?"
The porter replied that Miladi had been alone when he last saw her, as
she had insisted on being taken to the station an hour before the train
left. But that the tickets were for herself and her maid. So that he
supposed that the maid had joined her later. There happened to be no
other guests leaving on the through train for Paris that morning, and as
Miladi had insisted that he should not wait, he had returned to the
hotel. Miladi was very positive.
"You are sure there was not a ... a little boy with her?" Sophy asked.
Yes--the porter was quite sure that there had been no little boy with
Miladi.
Sophy's mind was working in terrible, clear flashes.
She turned to Rosa, who stood a little apart, rather scared, feeling
that something puzzling and dreadful was in the air, but only
understanding now and then a word of the English in which all were
speaking.
"You said that Lady Wychcote took her maid with her this morning, didn't
you?" Sophy asked.
Rosa replied that Anna had certainly started for Murano with Lady
Wychcote and Bobby.
It seemed to Sophy that she saw it all now. Her mother-in-law, afraid of
being traced too easily if she kept the boy with her, had left him
somewhere with Anna until a few minutes before the train started. Anna
was a clever, middle-aged Yorkshire woman who had been with her ladyship
some twenty years. She could be trusted to hold her tongue and act
intelligently in such a case. She was, oddly enough, devoted to her
mistress, and would never have thought of questioning her commands, no
matter how singular they might have appeared to her.
And yet--could Lady Wychcote really have dared to kidnap the boy--for it
was nothing less than kidnapping if she had taken him away with her in
that determined, secret fashion. But why? What excuse could she give?
And had she really done it! And, if not, where was Bobby? Where was her
little son at this late hour of the evening? She felt quite crazy and
witless for a few moments. What to do? How to act? And time was going.
If Bobby had really been stolen from her, then she must follow on the
next train, if possible. But where? Where would that relentless old
woman take him? If she (Sophy) went to Paris--she would have no further
clue on reaching it. Lady Wychcote might go on to England; she might
not. And why? Why?
Suddenly she knew. In a searing flash she knew just why it was that Lady
Wychcote had taken the boy--and that she had surely taken him. She
remembered that strange tone in her voice last night, when she had
spoken with her after Amaldi had left. Yes--that was it! She had thought
the worst of her late return in company with Amaldi. She would give that
as her reason for taking away the boy--his mother's unfitness to be his
guardian.
Something wild and potent sprang to life in her. She got to her feet.
She looked like another woman. Now she was asking when the next through
train left for Paris. At ten o'clock, they told her. It was now
twenty-five minutes past nine. She might make it if she went straight to
the station in the gown she wore, without stopping to get even a small
travelling-bag. But no--she was not sure enough that that was the best
thing to do. The through tickets that Lady Wychcote had bought to Paris
might be only a blind. She must be very certain when she acted to act in
the surest way. A favourite saying of Judge Macon's came into her mind.
"Be sure you're right--then go ahead." Besides, Amaldi might be at the
Rio San Vio by now. He would be sure to advise her in the sanest, most
clear-sighted way. He was the very man to stand firm in a crisis, not to
lose his head. Then, with a hot recoil of shame, she thought of what she
must tell him. She had not yet taken in what all this might also mean to
her and Amaldi. She could think only of Bobby, bewildered, unhappy,
rushing away from her on the night express to Paris in company with the
bitter old woman who had always hated her. She recalled the feeling of
his strong little body as he had snuggled close to her last night. A
fury of impotent love and rage shook her. The gondola seemed to crawl
over the light-jewelled water of the canal, though Lorenzo and Mario
were sending it along at racing speed. A gaily lighted barge filled with
singers and musicians passed them.
As they turned into the little Rio, by the Palace of Don Carlos,
another barge began burning Bengal lights. The dark, narrow water-way,
with its crowding houses and little bridges, flared red before her as in
some operatic scene. Why were things always so brutally ironical? Why
should there be a festival in Venice on the night that her boy had been
stolen from her?
When she reached her flat she found a wire from Amaldi, saying that he
would take the train from Cortola to Venice, and be with her by ten
o'clock. It was the quickest way that he could reach her. As she put
down the telegram she heard his voice on the stair, speaking to Lorenzo.
Then he came in alone. He took her in his arms, held her close a moment,
then led her to a sofa, and sat down beside her, keeping her hands in
his.
"Now tell me," he said.
She told him everything. As she spoke he kept muttering, "What
infamy!... What infamy!..." He was as convinced as she was of the truth
of her conjectures.
Her dark, tortured eyes made him wince with a double pain. It was only
her son that she was thinking of in those moments, not of him, her
lover--not of what this parting would mean to him and her. "What must I
do?" she kept asking him. "What must I do next? Ought I to have tried to
catch that ten o'clock train? Tell me, Marco ... for God's sake, tell me
what I'd best do...."
"Wait, dearest...." he said. "Give me time to think...."
He sat frowning down at the floor for a few moments. Then he turned to
her. He asked her about the Wychcotes' solicitor.
"Do you think this Mr. Surtees is really your friend?" he said when she
had told him all about her relations with the old lawyer.
"Yes. I'm sure he is," she said positively. "Why?"
"Because, in that case, it seems to me that the best thing would be for
you to wire him to meet you at Folkestone. You can then give him the
true facts and ask his help--before trying to see Lady Wychcote."
"You think she's taken Bobby to England, Marco?-- You feel sure of
that?"
"I don't think there's a doubt of it. She will go straight to Surtees
with her story; of that I feel positive."
Sophy coloured painfully.
"You mean that ... that she would want him to speak to ... the
trustees?" she asked in a low voice.
"Yes, I'm afraid so," he assented. What he really thought was that Lady
Wychcote would want to have the matter taken at once before the Court.
But he could not bring himself to tell her this. Her shamed flush had
hurt him horribly. It was intolerable that this revengeful old woman
should have the power to sully and cloud their relations. Then fear
seized him. What if Sophy were mistaken about the solicitor? What if he
were a tool of Lady Wychcote? The possibilities that this idea disclosed
appalled him. He went as white as Sophy had gone red.
"What is it? What are you thinking of now, Marco?" she urged anxiously,
scared by his expression.
"I was thinking how you could get to England in the shortest time," he
answered. "It's very vital that you should get there as soon as
possible."
"Yes, yes. By that first through train to Paris to-morrow morning."
"No. You needn't go to Paris," said Amaldi. "It will be more direct for
you to go from Venice straight to Boulogne via Laon. You'll save several
hours by taking that route."
"Oh--thank God!" she stammered. Then she caught up his hand to her
heart. "How good you are to me! Don't think I don't realise it--your
unselfishness.... You think only of me--and I can't think of anything
but my boy ... of how frightened and wretched he must be.... It's not
that my love for you is any less than my love for him ... but he's so
little ... he's my only son ... he needs me so...."
Amaldi felt like crying out, "And do I not need you?" but he choked down
this cry. What meaning had the love of lovers for Rachel mourning her
children? He drew her to him and kissed her loosened hair very gently.
"This is Bobby's hour," he said. "I can wait for my hour."
He left not long after, so that the servants might have no cause to
gossip. It had been decided between them that he would attend to
everything for her and that she and Rosa would be ready to leave by the
morning train.
"I will send men to fetch your boxes at nine," he said. "Your maid can
go with them. I will take you to the station myself."
"Thank you ... thank you, dearest...." she said.
Suddenly he caught her in his arms as on the day before in the Villa
garden.
"Don't forget that you are the blood of my soul...." he said in a
strangled voice.
She sobbed out his name--put up her arms about his neck. He kissed her
rather wildly and went without another word.
That strange phrase of his rang in her mind all night, mingled with her
frantic, confused thoughts of Bobby--and anguish of dread about what
Lady Wychcote might say and do before Mr. Surtees could hear the true
facts.
Amaldi had spoken in Italian as he nearly always did in moments of great
feeling. She could hear his choked voice saying those strange, intense
words ... "_sei il sangue del anima mia_"--the blood of his soul ... she
was that to him. And yet, as she lay on the bed that Bobby had shared
with her only last night, she felt as if her son were the true blood of
her own soul ... that if she lost him by any dreadful, unspeakable
chance--her soul would bleed away ... there would be no love left in her
for any one.... And she began to reproach herself bitterly through the
endless, sleepless night. She had been wrapped up in her own life ...
she had not thought as she should of the precious little life derived
from hers.... She should have foreseen. Knowing Lady Wychcote as she
knew her, she ought to have had such a possibility as this that had
happened always before her.
Then again she would think of Amaldi with a throb of pain and yearning.
How pale he had looked ... how worn. She could not sleep. Her head and
heart both were burning. Now Loring's face came before her. It blended
with Amaldi's, blurring it, blotting it out. Now it was Cecil who looked
straight at her with hard, angry eyes. "Where is my son, eh?... What
have you done with my son?" he seemed to say.
She rose from the bed finally, lighted a candle and began to pack her
travelling bags. As soon as daylight came, she asked Rosa to make her
some coffee. Then, in spite of the woman's protests, helped her with the
other packing. Once when they were folding Bobby's little garments, she
put down her head on Rosa's shoulder and began to sob. Then she
controlled herself again. She would need all her strength for the hours
and days that lay before her.