Part 13 (2/2)

When Marie Victor threw open the double doors of the reception room, on its threshold stood the towering form of the man whom Alixe Delavigne had known in other years as Hugh Fraser, the man whose pallid face told her that he knew at last that he was under the sword of Damocles! Clad in white linen, his sun helmet in his hand, steadying himself with a jeweled bamboo crutch-handled stick, the old Anglo-Indian waited until Berthe Louison's voice rang out, as clear as a silver bell: ”Marie! I am not to be interrupted.” she calmly said. ”You may wait beyond, in the ante-room!”

The woman who had emerged from the dark penumbra of a dead Past, to torture the embryo Baronet, gazed silently at the stern old man glowering there.

Striding up to her, the insolent habit of years was, strong upon him, as he hoa.r.s.ely said: ”What juggling fiend of h.e.l.l brings you here?”

Without a tremor in her voice, the lady of Jitomir replied:

”I came here to undo the work of years! To teach an orphaned girl to know that a love which hallows and which blesses, can reach her from the grave in which your cold brutality buried the only being I ever loved!

She shall know her mother, from my lips, and not wither in the gray h.e.l.l of your egoism. I have searched the world over, and found you, at last, together!”

”By G.o.d! You shall never even see her face, you she-devil!” cried the infuriated old man, nearing the defiant woman. ”You were the go-between for your worthless sister and that Russian cur, Troubetskoi!”

”You lie! Hugh Fraser, you lie!” cried Berthe, in a ringing voice. ”You crushed the flower that Fate had drifted within your reach! You turned her into the streets of London to starve! You robbed her of her child, all this to feed your own flinty-hearted tyrant vanity! She was divorced from you by a Royal Russian Decree, before she married the man whose heart broke when she was laid in the tomb. She rests with the princes of his line, and her tomb bears the name of wife!”

The old nabob crept nearer, growling:

”You shall never see the child's face!”

Then, Alixe Delavigne sprang up and faced him: ”There she is! on my heart! Just what her mother was, before you sent her to an early grave.

Valerie died hungering for one sight of that child's face!” Throwing the picture of Nadine Johnstone on the table, the lady of Jitomir said: ”Pierre Troubetskoi left to me the wealth which makes me your equal. I fear you not! I shall see Nadine to-morrow!”

”Never!” roared Hugh Johnstone, now beyond all control. ”I defy you!

Beware how you approach my threshold!” His eyes were murderous in their steely blue gleam, and, yet, he met a glance as steady as his own.

”Listen,” said Berthe Louison, sinking back into her chair, ”I will tell you a little story.” Hugh Johnstone was now gazing at the photograph, which trembled in his hand. ”Once upon a time a man secreted a vast deposit of jewels, really the spoil of a deposed king, and, rightly, the property of the victorious British Government!” The photograph fell to the floor as the old man sprang up from the chair, into which he had dropped. ”This paper, the receipt for the deposit, once delivered to the Viceroy of India--and the Baronetcy which is to be your life crown is lost for ever.” The old man's hands knotted themselves in anger. ”The lying story that the deposit was stolen by an underling will bring you, Hugh Johnstone, to the felon's cell! You shall live to wear the convict's chain! The Government is partly aware of the facts. It rests for me to give the Viceroy the receipt for your private deposit. The private bank vault in Calcutta has hidden your shame for twenty years.

You know the condition of your settlement with the Government. Now, shall I see my sister's child? I hold your very existence here--in the hollow of my hand!” The dauntless woman drew forth a yellowed envelope from her breast. There was a smothered shriek, a crash and a groan, as Jules Victor, springing from his concealment, hurled the infuriated man to the floor!

With a knee on the panting nabob's breast, he hissed:

”Move, and you are a dead man!”

”Take the paper, Madame,” calmly said the victorious Jules. Then Alixe Delavigne laughed scornfully.

”Let the fool arise. The contents are only blank paper. The doc.u.ment is where I can find it for use. Remain here, Jules,” concluded the triumphant woman, as she replaced the photograph in her bosom. ”Take the envelope--you know it, Hugh Fraser. I stole it the night you drove the sister I loved from our miserly lodgings in London.” The furious onslaught had failed, and the old nabob was only a cowering, cringing prisoner at will. He dared not even cry out.

Hugh Johnstone groaned as his eyes turned from the woman, now laughing him to scorn, to the stern-faced Frenchman, who was covering the baffled a.s.sailant with the grim Lefacheux revolver.

”Send this man away. Let us talk, Alixe,” muttered the astounded Johnstone. Then a mocking laugh rang out in the room.

”I am in no hurry now. I can wait. I like Delhi, and I shall find my way to Nadine's side, and she shall know the story of a mother's love. One signal from me, by telegraph, and the doc.u.ment goes to the Viceroy. So, I fear you not, my would-be strangler! It is for me to make conditions!

Listen! I will send my carriage and my man to your house to-morrow morning at ten. You will have made up your mind then. I have friends all around me, here, at Allahabad, and in Calcutta. If you practice any treachery on me you die the death of a dog, even here, in your robber nest!”

”I will come! I will come!” faltered Johnstone.

”Ah!” smiled the lady. ”Jules, show Sir Hugh Johnstone to his carriage.”

And then turning her back in disdain, she vanished without a word.

CHAPTER VII. THE PRICE OF SAFETY.

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