Part 58 (2/2)
She took a sheet of note-paper and hastily wrote a few words.
”I have need of your help. Will you be at Charing Cross at twelve o'clock prepared for a journey.--Lucille.”
The Prince took the letter from her and hastily folded it up.
”I will deliver it myself,” he announced. ”It will perhaps be safest.
Until I return, Lucille, do not stir from the house or see any one.
Muriel has given the servants orders to admit no one. All your life,” he added, after a moment's pause, ”you have been a little cruel to me, and this time also. I shall pray that you will relent before our next meeting.”
She rose to her feet and looked him full in the face. She seemed to be following out her own train of thought rather than taking note of his words.
”Even now,” she said thoughtfully, ”I am not sure that I can trust you.
I have a good mind to fight or scream my way out of this house, and go myself to see Victor.”
He shrugged his shoulders.
”The fighting or the screaming will not be necessary, dear Countess,” he said. ”The doors are open to you. But it is as clear as day that if you go to the hotel or near it you will at once be recognised, and recognition means arrest. There is a limit beyond which one cannot help a wilful woman. Take your life in your hands and go your own way, or trust in us who are doing our best to save you.”
”And what of Reginald Brott?” she asked.
”Brott?” the Prince repeated impatiently. ”Who cares what becomes of him? You have made him seem a fool, but, Lucille, to tell you the truth, I am sorry that we did not leave this country altogether alone. There is not the soil for intrigue here, or the possibility. Then, too, the police service is too stolid, too inaccessible. And even our friends, for whose aid we are here--well, you heard the Duke. The cast-iron Saxon idiocy of the man. The aristocracy here are what they call bucolic. It is their own fault. They have intermarried with parvenus and Americans for generations. They are a race by themselves. We others may shake ourselves free from them. I would work in any country of the globe for the good of our cause, but never again in England.”
Lucille s.h.i.+vered a little.
”I am not in the humour for argument,” she declared. ”If you would earn my grat.i.tude take that note to my husband. He is the only man I feel sure of--whom I know can protect me.”
The Prince bowed low.
”It is our farewell, Countess,” he said.
”I cannot pretend,” she answered, ”to regret it.”
Saxe Leinitzer left the room. There was a peculiar smile upon his lips as he crossed the hall. Brott was still awaiting for him.
”Mr. Brott,” he said, ”the Countess is, as I feared, too agitated to see you again for the present, or any one else. She sends you, however, this message.”
He took the folded paper from his waistcoat pocket and handed it to the other man. Brott read it through eagerly. His eyes shone.
”She accepts the situation, then?” he exclaimed.
”Precisely! Will you pardon me, my friend, if I venture upon one other word. Lucille is not an ordinary woman. She is not in the least like the majority of her s.e.x, especially, I might add, amongst us. The fact that her husband was living would seriously influence her consideration of any other man--as her lover. The present crisis, however, has changed everything. I do not think that you will have cause to complain of her lack of grat.i.tude.”
Brott walked out into the streets with the half sheet of note-paper twisted up between his fingers. For the first time for months he was conscious of a distinct and vivid sense of happiness. The terrible period of indecision was past. He knew now where he stood. Nor was his immediate departure from England altogether unpleasant to him. His political career was shattered--friends and enemies were alike cold to him. Such an act of cowardice as his, such pitiful shrinking back at the last fateful moment, was inexplicable and revolting. Even Letheringham was barely civil. It was certain that his place in the Cabinet would be intolerable. He yearned for escape from it all, and the means of escape were now at hand. In after years he knew very well that the shadow of his broken trust, the torture of his misused opportunities, would stand for ever between him and the light. But at that moment he was able to clear his mind of all such disquieting thoughts. He had won Lucille--never mind at what cost, at what peril! He had won Lucille!
He was deeply engrossed, and his name was spoken twice in his ear before he turned round. A small, somewhat shabby-looking man, with tired eyes and more than a day's growth of beard upon his chin, had accosted him.
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