“How could I, in such a gale as was blowing? It all looks dreadfully likely and quite possible, and the Professor is convinced that your stepfather has done some worse things.”
“Worse?”
“Yes, because he did not fail in doing them, as he did when he tried to kill you.”
“But what must such a man be?” cried Marcello, suddenly breaking out in anger. “What must his life have been in all the years before my mother married him?”
“He was a kind of adventurer in South America. I don’t quite know what he did there, but Professor Kalmon has found out a great deal about him from the Argentine Republic, where he lived until he killed somebody and had to escape to Europe. If I were you I would go and see the Professor, since he is in Rome. He lives at No. 16, Via Sicilia. He will tell you a great deal about that man when he knows that you have parted for good.”
“I’ll go and see him. Thank you. I cannot imagine that he could tell me anything worse than I have already heard.”
“Perhaps he may,” Aurora answered very gravely.
Then she was silent, and Marcello could not help looking at her as she leaned back in the corner of the sofa. Of all things, at that moment, he dreaded lest he should lose command of himself under the unexpected influence of her beauty, of old memories, of the failing light, of the tender shadows that still lingered under her eyes, of that exquisite small hand that lay idly on the sofa beside her, just within his reach. He rose abruptly, no longer trusting himself.
“I must be going,” he said.
“Already? Why?” She looked up at him and their eyes met.
“Because I cannot be alone with you any longer. I do not trust myself.”
“Yes, you do. You are a man now, and I trust you.”
He had spoken roughly and harshly in his momentary self-contempt, but her words were clear and quiet, and rang true. He stood still in silence for a moment.
“And besides,” she added softly, “she trusts you too.”
There was a little emphasis on the word “she” and in her tone that was a reproach, and he looked at her in wonder.
“We cannot talk of her, you and I,” she said, turning her eyes to the fire, “but you know what I mean, Marcello. It is not enough to be kind. We women do not think so much of that as you men fancy. You must be true as well.”
“I know it,” Marcello answered, bending his head a little. “Good-bye, Aurora.”
“No. Not good-bye, for you will come again soon, and then again, and often.”
“Shall I?”
“Yes, because we can trust each other, though we are fond of each other. We are not children any longer, as we used to be.”
“Then I will come sometimes.”
He took her hand, trying not to feel that it was in his, and he left her sitting by the rather dreary little fire, in the rather shabby room, in the grey twilight.
As he drove through the wet streets, he went over all she had said, went over it again and again, till he knew her words by heart. But he did not try, or dare to try, to examine what he felt, and was going to feel. The manliness that had at last come to its full growth in him clung to the word “true” as she had meant it.
But she, being left alone, leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees and clasping her hands as she gazed at the smouldering remains of the fire. She had known well enough that she had loved him before he had come; she had known it too well when he had told her how he had driven Folco out of his house for having spoken of her too carelessly. Then the blood had rushed to her throat, beating hard, and if she had not gone quickly to the window she felt that she must have cried for joy. She was far too proud to let him guess that, but she was not too proud to love him, in spite of everything, though it meant that she compared herself with the peasant girl, and envied her, and in all maiden innocence would have changed places with her if she could.
CHAPTER XVII
IT WAS LATE in the evening when Marcello reached the villa, and was told that his stepfather had left suddenly with his valet, before sunset, taking a good deal of luggage with him. The coachman had driven him to the station and had seen no more of him. He had not left any message or note for Marcello. This was as it should be, and Marcello did not care to know whither he had gone, since he was out of the house. He was glad, however, that he had left Rome at once instead of going to an hotel, which would have made an interesting topic of conversation for gossips.
Marcello vaguely wondered why Folco had told a perfectly gratuitous falsehood about Aurora, and whether he could possibly have lied merely for the sake of hurting him. If so, he had got his deserts. It mattered very little now, and it was a waste of thought to think of him at all.
The young man had a big fire built in the library, and sat down in his favourite leathern chair under the shaded light. He was tired, but not sleepy, and he was glad to be alone at last, for he had felt Corbario’s evil presence in the house, though they had met little of late, and it was a great relief to know that he would never return.
He was glad to be alone, and yet he felt lonely, for the one condition did not make the other impossible. He was glad to be able to think in peace, but when he did think, he longed for some companionship in his thoughts, and he found that he was wishing himself back in the room that looked down upon the Forum of Trajan, with Aurora, and that she was telling him again that she could trust him; and yet the very thought seemed to mean that he was not to be trusted.
Psychological problems are only interesting when they concern other people than ourselves, for there can be no problem where there is not a difficulty, and where the inner self is concerned there can be no difficulty that does not demand immediate solution if we are to find peace. Some men of very strong and thoughtful character are conscious of a sort of second self within themselves, to which they appeal in trouble as Socrates to his Dæmon; but most men, in trouble and alone, would turn to a friend if there were one at hand.
Marcello had none, and he felt horribly lonely in his great house, as the faces of two women rose before him, on the right and left.
But he was a man now, and as he sat there he determined to face the problem bravely and to solve it once and for ever by doing what was right, wheresoever he could convince himself that right lay, and without any regard for his own inclinations.
He told himself that this must be possible, because where right and wrong were concerned it was never possible to hesitate long. A man is never so convinced that right is easy to distinguish and to do as when he has lately made up his mind to reform. Indeed, the weakness as well as the strength of all reformers lies in their blind conviction that whatever strikes them as right must be done immediately, with a haste that strongly resembles hurry, and with no regard for consequences. You might as well try, when an express train is running at full speed on the wrong track, to heave it over to the right one without stopping it and without killing the passengers. Yet most reformers of themselves and others, from the smallest to the greatest, seem to believe that this can be done, ought to be done, and must be done at once.
Marcello was just then a reformer of this sort. He had become aware in the course of that afternoon that something was seriously wrong, and as his own will and character had served him well of late, he trusted both beforehand and set to work to find out the right track, with the distinct intention of violently transferring the train of his existence to it as soon as it had been discovered. He was very sure of the result.
Besides, he had been brought up by a very religious woman, and a strong foundation of belief remained in him, and was really the basis of all his thinking about himself. He had been careless, thoughtless, reckless, since his mother had died, but he had never lost that something to which a man may best go back in trouble. Sometimes it hurt him, sometimes it comforted him vaguely, but he was always conscious that it was there, and had been there through all his wildest days. It was not a very reasoning belief, for he was not an intellectual man, but it was unchangeabl
e and solid still in spite of all his past weakness. It bade him do right, blindly, and only because right was right; but it did not open his eyes to the terrible truth that whereas right is right, the Supreme Power, which is always in the right, does not take human life into consideration at all, and that a man is under all circumstances bound to consider the value of life to others, and sometimes its value to himself, when others depend upon him for their happiness, or safety, or welfare.
Animated by the most sincere wish to find the right direction and follow it — perhaps because Aurora had said that she trusted him — yet blind to the dangers that beset his path, there is no knowing how many lives Marcello might not have wrecked by acting on the resolutions he certainly would have made if he had been left to himself another hour.
He was deep in thought, his feet stretched out to the fire, his head leaning back against the leathern cushion of his chair, his eyes half closed, feeling that he was quite alone and beyond the reach of every one, if he chose to sit there until morning wrestling with his psychological problem.
He was roused by the sharp buzz of the telephone instrument which stood on the writing-table. It was very annoying, and he wished he had turned it off before he had sat down, but since some one was calling he got up reluctantly to learn who wanted him at that hour. He glanced at the clock, and saw that it was nearly half-past ten. The instrument buzzed again as he reached the table.
“I want to see Signor Consalvi at once; is it too late?” asked a man’s voice anxiously.
“I am Consalvi. Who are you, please?” asked Marcello.
“Kalmon. Is it true that Corbario has left the villa?”
“Yes. He left this afternoon.”
“Where is he now?”
“He drove to the railway station. I don’t know where he is gone. He left no address.”
“ — railway station — no address—” Marcello heard the words as Kalmon spoke to some other person at his elbow, wherever he was.
“May I come at once?” Kalmon asked.
“Yes. I am alone. I’ll have the lower gate opened.”
“Thanks. I shall be at the gate in twenty minutes. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye.”
Marcello hung up the receiver, rang the bell, and gave the order for the gate, adding that the gentleman who came was to be shown in at once. Then he sat down and waited.
It was clear that Kalmon had learned of Corbario’s departure from Aurora, perhaps through her mother. He had probably dined with them, for he was intimate at the house, and Aurora had spoken of Marcello’s visit. There was no reason why she should not have done so, and yet Marcello wished that she had kept it to herself a little longer. It had meant so much to him, and it suddenly seemed as if it had meant nothing at all to her. She had perhaps repeated to her mother everything that had been said, or almost everything, for she was very fond of her.
Marcello told himself roughly that since he had no right to love her, and was determined not to, he had no claim upon such little delicacies of discretion and silence on her part; and his problem stuck up its head again out of the deep water in which it lived, and glared at him, and shot out all sorts of questions like the wriggling tentacles of an octopus, inviting him to wrestle with them, if only to see how useless all wrestling must be. He rose again impatiently, took a cigar from a big mahogany box on the table, lit it and smoked savagely, walking up and down.
It was half finished when the door opened and Kalmon was ushered in. He held out his hand as he came forward, with the air of a man who has no time to lose.
“I am glad to see you,” Marcello said.
“And I am exceedingly glad that you were at home when I called you up,” Kalmon answered. “Have you really no idea where Corbario is?”
“Not the slightest. I am only too glad to get rid of him. I suppose the Contessa told you—”
“Yes. I was dining there. But she only told me half an hour ago, just as I was coming away, and I rushed home to get at the telephone.”
It occurred to Marcello that Kalmon need not have driven all the way to Via Sicilia from the Forum of Trajan merely for the sake of telephoning.
“But what is the hurry?” asked Marcello. “Do sit down and explain! I heard this afternoon that you had strong suspicions as to Folco’s part in what happened to me.”
“Something more than suspicions now,” Kalmon answered, settling his big frame in a deep chair before the tire; “but I am afraid he has escaped.”
“Escaped? He has not the slightest idea that he is suspected!”
“How do you know? Don’t you see that as he is guilty, he must have soon begun to think that the change in your manner toward him was due to the fact that you suspected him, and that you turned him out because you guessed the truth, though you could not prove it?”
“Perhaps,” Marcello admitted, in a rather preoccupied tone. “The young lady seems to have repeated to her mother everything I said this afternoon,” he added with evident annoyance. “Did the Contessa tell you why I quarrelled with Folco to-day?”
“No. She merely said that there had been angry words and that you had asked him to leave the house. She herself was surprised, she said, and wondered what could have brought matters to a crisis at last.”
Marcello’s face cleared instantly. Aurora had not told any one that he had quarrelled with his stepfather about her; that was quite evident, for there were not two more truthful people in the world than the Contessa and Kalmon, whose bright brown eyes were at that moment quietly studying his face.
“Not that the fact matters in the least,” said the Professor, resting his feet on the fender and exposing the broad soles of his wet walking-boots to the flame. “The important fact is that the man has escaped, and we must catch him.”
“But how are you so sure that it was he that attacked me? You cannot arrest a man on suspicion, without going through a great many formalities. You cannot possibly have got an eye-witness to the fact, and so it must be a matter of suspicion after all, founded on a certain amount of rather weak circumstantial evidence. Now, if it was he that tried to kill me, he failed, for I am alive, and perfectly well. Why not let him alone, since I have got rid of him?”
“For a very good reason, which I think I had better not tell you.”
“Why not?”
“I am not sure what you would do if you were told it suddenly. Are your nerves pretty good? You used to be a delicate boy, though I confess that you look much stronger now.”
“You need not fear for my nerves,” Marcello answered with a short laugh. “If they are sound after what I have been through in the last two years they will stand anything!”
“Yes. Perhaps you had better know, though I warn you that what I am going to say will be a shock to you, of which you do not dream.”
“You must be exaggerating!” Marcello smiled incredulously. “You had better tell me at once, or I shall imagine it is much worse than it is.”
“It could not be,” Kalmon answered. “It is hard even to tell, and not only because what happened was in a distant way my fault.”
“Your fault? For heaven’s sake tell me what the matter is, and let us be done with it!”
“Corbario wanted to get possession of your whole fortune. That is why he tried to kill you.”
“Yes. Is that all? You have made me understand that already.”
“He had conceived the plan before your mother’s death,” said Kalmon.
“That would not surprise me either. But how do you know it?”
“Do you remember that discovery of mine, that I called ‘the sleeping death’?”
“Yes. What has that to do with it?” Marcello’s expression changed.
“Corbario stole one of the tablets from the tube in my pocket, while I was asleep that night.”
“What?” Marcello began to grow pale.
“Your mother died asleep,” said Kalmon in a very low voice.
Marcello was transfixed with horror, and grasped t
he arms of his chair. His face was livid. Kalmon watched him, and continued.
“Yes. Corbario did it. Your mother used to take phenacetine tablets when she had headaches. They were very like the tablets of my poison in size and shape. Corbario stole into my room when I was sound asleep, took one of mine, and dropped in one of hers. Then he put mine amongst the phenacetine ones. She took it, slept, and died.”
Marcello gasped for breath, his eyes starting from his head.
“You see,” Kalmon went on, “it was long before I found that my tablets had been tampered with. There had been seven in the tube. I knew that, and when I glanced at the tube next day there were seven still. The tube was of rather thick blue glass, if you remember, so that the very small difference between the one tablet and the rest could not be seen through it. I went to Milan almost immediately, and when I got home I locked up the tube in a strong-box. It was not until long afterwards, when I wanted to make an experiment, that I opened the tube and emptied the contents into a glass dish. Then I saw that one tablet was unlike the rest. I saw that it had been made by a chemist and not by myself. I analysed it and found five grains of phenacetine.”
Marcello leaned back, listening intently, and still deadly pale.
“You did not know that I was trying to find out how you had been hurt, that I was in communication with the police from the first, that I came to Rome and visited you in the hospital before you recovered your memory. The Contessa was very anxious to know the truth about her old friend’s son, and I did what I could. That was natural. Something told me that Corbario had tried to kill you, and I suspected him, but it is only lately that I have got all the evidence we need. There is not a link lacking. Well, when I came to Rome that time, it chanced that I met Corbario at the station. He had come by the same train, and was looking dreadfully ill. That increased my suspicion, for I knew that his anxiety must be frightful, since you might have seen him when he struck you, and might recognise him, and accuse him. Yet he could not possibly avoid meeting you. Imagine what that man must have felt. He tried to smile when he saw me, and said he wished he had one of those sleeping tablets of mine. You understand. He thought I had already missed the one he had taken, though I had not, and that he had better disarm any possible suspicion by speaking of the poison carelessly. Then his face turned almost yellow, and he nearly fainted. He said it was the heat, and I helped him to his carriage. He looked like a man terrified out of his senses, and I remembered the fact afterwards, when I found that one tablet had been stolen; but at the time I attributed it all to his fear of facing you. Now we know the truth. He tried to murder you, and on the same day he poisoned your mother.”
Complete Works of F Marion Crawford Page 1095
