AN OPPOSITION BOOTH IS SET UP IN THE MARKET PLACE
While Sansevero and Giovanni were in their imaginations refurbishing
their escutcheon, two other men, with the opposite intent, stood on the
front steps of the agency of "Thomas Cook and Sons." One was proclaimed
by the regulation "Cook's" badge on his cap to be a guide; the other, by
his military cloak, might have been recognized as an official of the
Italian government. Both had shown covert interest in the Princess
Sansevero, who, looking particularly lovely in her magnificent set of
sables, had crossed the sidewalk with the light, buoyant carriage
characteristic of her.
"There, you may see for yourself if it is I who speak the truth." This
was said by the guide.
The official looked at him askance as he drew his bushy brows together
and pulled at his beard. "I confess it looks serious--and strongly
favors your supposition."
"But what else? It is as plain as the nose on your face, I should say!
At Torre Sansevero they have been living on next to nothing--my cousin
is cook, and I know that every _soldo_ is counted. They come to Rome and
spend their savings. You will say they have done that for years; but
tell me this, should their savings in this year treble the savings of
other years?"
Triumphantly he looked at his companion and, throwing back his head, put
his hands on his hips. Then, with a return to his confidential manner,
he laid his finger against his nose. "I know it for a fact," he
continued--"Luigi heard it at the key-hole--that their excellencies
contemplated staying at Torre Sansevero all this winter! Her excellency
had the look--Maria, the maid, told the servants that much--that her
excellency always has when _signore_, the prince, has cut the strings
and left the purse empty."
"Furthermore?" The official twirled his mustache with an air of
incredulity.
"Furthermore, the great Raphael disappears! Her excellency's renovation
story was a little weak for my digestion, and, unless my eyes played me
false, she was well frightened. I'll take my oath she was at a loss what
to answer."
"You say you taxed her with it?"
"As I told you. She answered that the picture was being renovated. An
answer for an idiot--the picture is one of the best canvases extant; in
perfect repair."
"Did you tell her that?"
"Partially. I am sure she saw my suspicion."
"I should doubt her carrying out the sale after that. There is where
your story fails."
"Ah, but it had already gone! It was perhaps by then in the house of a
foreign millionaire. No, no, my story hangs together: The great picture
disappears! A month later--time exactly for its arrival in America and
the payment for it to be sent over here--her excellency of no money
comes out in such a motor-car as that! And sables! I have an eye for
furs. My father was in the business. The value of those she has on runs
easily into the seventy or eighty thousand _lire_. Here she comes now,
out of the banker's where American money is most often paid! Do you want
better evidence?"
He had been punctuating all he said with his fingers, and now, with a
final snap of arms and a shrug of shoulders, he looked up in keen
triumph at his companion.
The other--slower and less excited than the narrator (probably because
he was not the discoverer of the plot)--nevertheless showed lively
interest. "It is very grave," he admitted at last. "But the Sansevero
family is illustrious. We may not proceed against them without due
consideration. I shall report the case to the chief of our secret
service, and the prince must be----"
A tall, athletic young man who had been changing some foreign gold into
Italian, came into the open doorway of the office. A carriage, passing
at that moment close to the curb, had prevented the two men from hearing
the stranger's footfall, and as the latter stood on the top step,
searching in his pocket for matches, he happened to catch the name
"Sansevero." At once his attention was arrested, but as the conversation
was carried on in an undertone, he caught only vague, detached words.
Still, he was sure that he had heard "Raphael" after the name,
"Sansevero," "disappearance," and then something like "secret service."
But his presence evidently had become known, for as he passed on out
into the street the two in blue coats were talking loudly about the
excursion to Tivoli and the scenery _en route_.
Walking out into the middle of the square where the cabs stand, he
jumped into the first one, but he looked cautiously back toward the men
in front of Cook's, before telling the driver to take him to the Palazzo
Sansevero.
Here the _portiere_ in his morning clothes, very different from the
gorgeous apparel of afternoon, was sweeping out the courtyard. Holding
his broom handle with exactly the same dignity with which, later in the
day, he would hold his mace, he informed the stranger that his
excellency the prince was not at home--neither was her excellency the
princess. Upon being asked whether Miss Randolph were perhaps at home,
he altogether forgot his imperturbability. That a _signore_ should send
in his card to a _signorina_ was so far outside the range of his
experience that the man stood with his mouth open, unable even to think
what answer to give. As though he were a somnambulist, the man took the
card and slowly read the name on its face; then he looked the stranger
over from head to foot, read the name a second time, and finally entered
the palace.
The young man watched his retreating figure, and then, throwing back his
head, laughed long and heartily. After which he fell to studying the
details of the courtyard. He noted with keen interest the deep ruts worn
in the solid stone paving under the massive arches of the gateways, and
glanced up at the bas-reliefs between the windows. At the sound of
footsteps he turned and encountered Nina's maid, Celeste.
Mademoiselle had sent her to bid him mount to the _salon_. Through the
green baize doors--it was the shorter way--and then, if monsieur would
go straight on to the very last of the rooms-- His striding pace made
Celeste fairly trot along at his heels. He went through room after room.
Was there no end to them? At last Nina's slight, girlish figure was seen
silhouetted against a broad window at the end--the light at her back
hazing the gold of her hair, like a nimbus, about her face.
She ran toward him, both hands out. "Jack! Dear Jack! Is it you, really,
or am I dreaming? When did you come? Oh, I _am_ so glad to see you; but
what a surprise! Why did you not send word?"
For a moment a light leaped into Derby's eyes. It seemed as though Nina
was looking at him exactly as he, in his day dreams, had seen her. But
his prudence steadied his first impulse, and he put down her gladness as
merely the joy of a person who, far from home, sees suddenly a familiar
face in the midst of strangers; and they sat on the sofa just as they
had sat on the railing of the veranda in the country, ever since they
were children.
In Derby's account of himself, Nina could easily read the confidence
that had led her father to send him to Italy. But their talk had gone
little further than the barest outline of his mission when the prince
and princess returned. At the sight of Nina sitting alone with a man,
the princess came forward quickly with the question, "My child, what
does this mean?" as plainly asked in her eyes as it could have been by
spoken words. But at Nina's "John Derby, Aunt Eleanor!" the princess put
out her hand with all the grace in the world, and as she returned the
straight, frank look of his blue eyes, her whole expression became
youthful, as if reflecting some pleasant memory of her girlhood.
"I knew your uncle very, very well!" She smiled entrancingly. It was a
smile that irresistibly attracted to her all who ever saw it. "You are
like him." Then she added softly, dreamingly, as though half speaking to
herself, "You remind me of so many things--at home!"
The next minute she had turned to present Derby to her husband, and the
conversation became general. But, finally, in a pause, Nina said, "Jack,
tell Uncle Sandro what father sent you over to do. Or is it a secret?"
Derby looked toward Sansevero as though measuring the man. "It is no
great secret--but I would rather it was not spoken of yet."
"My ears are deaf, and my tongue is dumb." Sansevero put his hand over
his ear, his mouth, and finally his heart.
"I have come over to buy, or to lease--at all events, to work--sulphur
mines."
As though an electric current had been turned on, Sansevero sat up
straight, and his levity vanished. "To work sulphur mines! Will you tell
me more? I have a particular reason for wanting to know."
Derby answered willingly. "I can give you a general idea. I was forced
into inventing a new method of mining on account of the quicksands,
which are found all through our mines at home. Taking a suggestion from
the oil wells, I bored just such a well down into the sulphur beds.
Ordinarily the sulphur is brought up in powder or rock form, and refined
in vats on the surface, so that not only do the miners have to go down
into the sulphurous heat, but the caldrons in which the sulphur is
refined give out gases that are unendurable to human throats and lungs.
In our mines, the sulphur is now refined sixty or a hundred feet below
the surface of the ground, and pours out in an already purified state,
at the top of the well."
Sansevero looked incredulous. "But sulphur is almost impossible to
liquefy. Unlike metals, it congeals again when it has been heated beyond
the proper temperature. Also it corrodes any metal it touches, so that a
pipe would be eaten away immediately."
"To get over those difficulties is exactly what I am trying to do by my
new process," Derby answered. "The sulphur is melted by hot water sent
down the pipes, followed by sand, and then sawdust--the sand to carry
the heat to the cooler edges, and the wet sawdust to check the heat at
the center."
Even the princess drew nearer and laid her hand on her husband's arm as
Derby made his explanation. Sansevero trembled with excitement. "But
according to that," he cried, turning to his wife; "our mine would be
practicable!" Then to Derby: "I ought to explain to you that we have a
sulphur mine in Sicily, near Vencata. So far as I know, the sulphur
does, as you say, lie in a bed some twenty meters down. Above it are
rock and alluvial soil. The volcanic neighborhood makes the temperature
below ground higher than can be borne, yet we know that the sulphur
deposit is immense."
"Give me more details. From what you say, it sounds as though this mine
of yours might be exactly what we are looking for. Does Mr. Randolph
know of it, or that you are the owner?"
"No; no one knows it excepting one small group of sulphur owners. I
unwisely went into it on the advice of--some one who is very good at
all these things; yet the best are liable to mistake. Other mines in the
neighborhood, owned by friends of mine, have brought in a fortune. Ours
has, so far, been a failure."
The talk lasted until luncheon was served. Giovanni put in an
appearance, and Derby was pressed to stay. As di Valdo and the American
met, there was a barely perceptible coldness under the Italian's good
manners, while Derby's greeting showed a momentary curiosity. Two more
sharply contrasted beings could hardly have been brought together. But
gradually Giovanni also became interested in the mining plans, and, as
the reason for the American's coming to Europe very evidently was
business and not the pursuit of the heiress, Giovanni's affability
became genuine.
The end of the matter was that Derby agreed to take up the Sansevero
mine, commonly known as the "Little Devil"; to be worked on a "royalty"
basis. Derby, representing his company, was to pay all expenses, take
all responsibility, and to return to Sansevero a percentage of the
market price on every ton of sulphur taken out of it.
Furthermore, Sansevero insisted upon giving him a letter to the
Archbishop of Vencata, who lived about eight hours on muleback from the
mining settlement. The Sicilians, he declared, were a dangerous people
for strangers who tried to interfere in their established order of
things.
"So then I am likely to have adventures! It sounds exciting!" The
American laughed light-heartedly at the sport of it. However, he
accepted the letter to the archbishop.