Part 37 (1/2)
Paying no heed to the compliment, Keralio went on:
”What did Handsome say?”
”He is puzzled himself and can't understand. Everyone's up in the air.
They think it is a discharged maid who did it for spite.”
”The next time Mrs. Traynor receives a sudden message about her baby it will not be a hoax.”
The valet looked up in surprise.
”What do you mean?”
Keralio did not answer the question immediately, but sat nervously twisting his fingers, a moody sullen look in his pale saturnine face.
At last, breaking the heavy silence, he said:
”That woman insulted me. You saw it. You were there----”
The valet nodded.
”You mean she put you out--ah, _oui_, she has a _diable_ of a temper when angry.”
Keralio nodded.
”Yes--that I can never forgive. She shall ask my pardon on her knees.
I will break her spirit, humiliate her pride. I have been taxing my brain how to do it. At last I have hit on a plan--one that cannot fail and you shall help me.”
”In what way _s'il vous plait_?”
Bending forward, his black eyes flas.h.i.+ng, Keralio said earnestly:
”That woman is devoted to only two beings in this world--her husband and her baby. Sooner or later, perhaps only in a few days, she will discover that Handsome is an impostor. He is such a fool that exposure is inevitable. The blow will almost kill her. Above all, it will humiliate her pride to know that unwittingly she has allowed that drunken brute, that poor counterfeit of her husband, to caress and fondle her. Next in her affections comes her baby. If any danger threatened the child, she would stop at nothing, she would make any sacrifice to ward off the danger. I propose to bring about just that situation----”
The valet half started up from his chair. Hardened and callous as he was in crime, he was hardly prepared to go to that extreme.
”Death?” he exclaimed, horror stricken, ”you would kill ze child?”
”No fool--not kill the child. I'll kidnap it--that's all. We'll bring the child here and, then I'll write the mother, telling her where it is and to come to it, but warning her that if she values the child's life, she must tell no one, and must come here unaccompanied. Once she is here, I will take care of the rest. Do you understand?”
The valet breathed more freely.
”So you will that I----”
His chief nodded.
”Precisely. You'll take the flyer to Philadelphia. Say you come from the mother. They'll have no suspicion. Take the child and come here at once. Understand?”
”_Oui_, monsieur.”
Keralio rose. In commanding tones, he said: