Part 11 (2/2)
”She told me nothing. She refused to speak.”
”Ah!” my idol gasped, and I saw the light of hope at once die from her countenance. ”As I expected! Just as I feared!”
”She says she cannot yet tell the truth,” I hastened to explain. ”But I have made a compact with her.”
”How?”
Then I explained how I had discovered the house in Britten Street watched by the police; and how I had been able to give the Frenchwoman warning.
”But,” I said, ”will you pardon me, Lolita, if I remark upon one most peculiar circ.u.mstance?”
She started visibly and held her breath, for the tragedy had never been mentioned between us, and it seemed as though she feared I would broach it.
”You will recollect,” I went on, ”that when I met you early yesterday morning you were accompanied by a man who--”
”Ah, you saw him, then!” she gasped, interrupting me.
”I did. And moreover I met that same man in Mademoiselle's company last night.”
”With her!” she cried. ”Never! Why, he doesn't know her.”
”I met them walking together on the Chelsea Embankment,” I persisted in a quiet tone, wondering the reason of her utter amazement.
”How? Where? Tell me all about it?” she urged quickly. ”There's mystery here.”
In obedience to her wish I explained the circ.u.mstances just as I have already recorded them; how I had first implored her to divulge her secret, and then in order to threaten her, had called the police, afterwards making a solemn compact with her and allowing them both to escape.
She heard me in silence to the end, nervously pulling her veil beneath her chin and twisting it to keep it tight. Then sighing, she remarked, turning her wonderful eyes upon me--
”She is not the woman to keep any promise, Willoughby. It is just as I feared! She is afraid to tell the truth lest she herself should suffer.
Her words only confirm that.”
I recalled what she had said, and was bound to agree.
”But surely,” I cried, ”the outlook is not so black as you antic.i.p.ate?
If this woman, in order to safeguard herself, refuses to speak, are there not other means by which the truth could be revealed?”
”No--none!” was her despairing answer as she shook her head.
”Perhaps I acted unwisely in allowing them to slip through the fingers of the police?” I suggested.
”No. It was wise, very wise. Had they been arrested they would both have sought to seriously incriminate me--and--and the blow would have fallen. I--I should have killed myself to avoid arrest,” she added in the low hoa.r.s.e voice of a woman absolutely desperate.
”Oh, don't speak like that, Lolita,” I urged earnestly. ”Recollect you have at least in me a true and loyal friend. I will defend you by every means in my power. You refuse to tell me this strange secret of yours; nevertheless I am ready to serve you without seeking to penetrate the mystery which you are so determined to withhold.”
”I would tell you everything if I dared,” she a.s.sured me with a sweet grateful look upon her countenance, and I saw that upon her veil a teardrop glistened. I saw too how agitated she was, and how she longed to take me entirely into her confidence--yet dared not do so. Why, I wondered, had she made no remark upon the tragedy or upon the Coroner's verdict that morning. Was that, too, a subject which she dare not mention?
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