“The witness, Stevens,” she whispered. “He must not see us together. There are many reasons why it is inadvisable that he should learn the truth. The other man looks like Silva; only it is difficult to be sure after all these years. Let me stand in this doorway till you have managed to get rid of Stevens.”
The Countess nodded her approval, and Maria Delahay slipped into the shadow of the door. From where she stood it was quite possible to see what was going on. She saw her sister approach the two men. She did not fail to note Stevens start as he recognised, or thought he recognised, the woman who was known to him as Maria Delahay. On the still air she could catch a word or two.
“Very well,” she heard Silva say sullenly. “I have one or two things to say to my friend here, and then I’ll come back to you.”
The two men came past where the woman was standing in the doorway. They were conversing in deep whispers, so that the listener could catch only a word or two, yet those words filled her with vague apprehension. She caught the name of Ravenspur as it came hissing from Silva’s lips. Then there was something she could not follow, and, finally, clearly enunciated the one word “tonight.” A moment later and Stevens was shuffling off down the street, while Silva returned to Countess Flavio. As Mrs. Delahay joined them, the little Italian glanced from one to the other.
“So you are both here,” he said.
There was something in the insolence of his manner that moved Mrs. Delahay to anger.
“I should hardly have known you,” she said; “certainly I should not have known you from the tone in which you are addressing us. Have you quite forgotten what you owe to your late master’s children?”
“I have forgotten nothing,” Silva said. “Why do you come here persecuting me like this? Why cannot you let me alone? But for me your sister would have been in a dishonoured grave by now. I saved her life. I saved the good name of the family. And how am I repaid? What does she care so long as she saves herself. And yet I remember her a sweet and innocent child, just as I remember her own little one. Ah, I was fond of her, and she was fond of me. I could never have gone off and hidden myself, and left little Vera to the tender mercies of the world. I, a man, no relation, couldn’t have done that. But that her mother could have done such a thing—ah, it seems unnatural, unwomanly.”
“You will find her for me?” the Countess said timidly.
“I have found her,” Silva whispered fiercely. “But whether I have found her for you or not is quite another matter. I was your good friend once. I was your devoted slave and servant. I would have laid down my life for you both, and you know it. But all that I felt for you was as nothing compared to my love for your little one. And when you told me that you had left her without another thought, my blood fairly boiled with passion. I thought you had taken her with you. I fondly imagined that you were devoting the rest of your life to her welfare and happiness. And then, one day, you come coolly to me and ask me where you can find your child. You go your own way, and leave me to go mine. I suppose you have found out that I come this way home, and so have waylaid me. But you will never get me to raise a finger on your behalf again. Still, it does not much matter. I know where the child is. I shall know how to act when the time comes. My vengeance is ready, when I care to stretch out my hand to take it.”
The words poured from the speaker’s lips in a torrent of passionate vehemence. He fairly quivered with rage. He seemed to be beside himself with anger. There was something almost akin to madness in his eyes.
“Oh, calm yourself,” the Countess said. “My good Silva, I make every allowance for your feelings, but you are going altogether too far. You, above all men, ought to know how I longed to get away from anything that reminded me of my husband. Don’t forget that she was his child as well as mine, and that she had her father’s eyes and charm of expression. Besides, I was barely responsible for my actions then. Consider what I had had to go through. Consider my mental torture and degradation. And yet you say it was my duty day by day to watch my child and see the hateful pleasantness of her father’s smile looking at me from behind her innocent features. Oh, I couldn’t do it. I tried to persuade myself that it was my duty, but all to no avail. I was in such a state of nervous exhaustion then, so near the borderland of insanity, that I believe I should have taken the life of the child if she had gone with me. And, naturally, I thought that she was with friends. I knew that you would see that she was all right. And, in addition to all this, she was her father’s heiress.”
“But who was interested in taking her away?” Mrs. Delahay asked. “I don’t see how anybody could gain anything by saddling themselves with a child like that.”
XXI
To Be in Time
“It is plain enough to me,” Silva growled; “but then I am acquainted with the facts of which you two know nothing. With all his faults, Count Flavio was passionately attached to his little girl. Through her he could see a means of stabbing his wife to the heart, and he was never the
