The Yellow Crayon
silent-abjectly silent.
He came a little closer to her, and the strength of the man was manifest
in his intense self-restraint. His words were measured, his tone quiet.
Yet both somehow gave evidence of the smouldering fires beneath.
“Lucille,” he said, “I find you hard to understand to-day. You have
made me your slave, you came once more into my life at its most critical
moment, and for your sake I have betrayed a great trust. My conscience,
my faith, and although that counts for little, my political career, were
in the balance against my love for you. You know which conquered. At
your bidding I have made myself the jest of every man who buys the
halfpenny paper and calls himself a politician. My friends heap abuse
upon me, my enemies derision. I cannot hold my position in this new
Cabinet. I had gone too far for compromise. I wonder if you quite
understand what has happened?”
“Oh, I have heard too much,” she cried. “Spare me the rest.”
He continued as though he had not heard her.
“Men who have been my intimate associates for many years, and whose
friendship was dear to me, cross the road to avoid: meeting me, day by
day I am besieged with visitors and letters from the suffering people
to whom my word had been pledged, imploring me for some explanation, for
one word of denial. Life has become a hell for me, a pestilent, militant
hell! Yet, Lucille, unless you break faith with me I make no complaint.
I am content.”
“I am very sorry,” she said. “I do not think that you have properly
understood me. I have never made you any promise.”
For a moment he lost control of himself. She shrank back at the blaze
of indignation, half scornful, half incredulous, which lit up his clear,
grey eyes.
“It is a lie!” he answered. “Between you and me it can be no question
of words. You were always very careful of your pledges, but there are
limits even to your caution--as to my forbearance. A woman does not ask
a man who is pleading to her for her love to give up everything else
he cares for in life without hope of reward. It is monstrous! I never
sought you under false pretenses. I never asked you for your friendship.
I wanted you. I told you so plainly. You won’t deny that you gave me
hope--encouraged me? You can’t even deny that I am within my rights if I
claim now at this instant the reward for my apostasy.”
Her hands were suddenly locked in his. She felt herself being drawn into
his arms. With a desperate effort she avoided his embrace. He still held
her left wrist, and his face was dark with passion.
“Let me go!” she pleaded.
“Not I!” he answered, with an odd, choked little laugh. “You belong to
me. I have paid the price. I, too, am amongst the long list of those
poor fools who have sold their gods and their honour for a woman’s kiss.
But I will not be left wholly destitute. You shall pay me for what I
have lost.”
“Oh, you are mad!” she answered. “How could you have deceived yourself
so? Don’t you know that my husband is in London?”
“The man who calls himself Mr. Sabin?” he answered roughly. “What has
that to do with it? You are living apart. Saxe Leinitzer and the Duchess
have both told me the history of your married life. Or is the whole
thing a monstrous lie?” he cried, with a sudden dawning sense of the
truth. “Nonsense! I won’t believe it. Lucille! You’re not afraid! I
shall be good to you. You don’t doubt that. Sabin will divorce you of
course. You won’t lose your friends. I--”
There was a sudden loud tapping at the door. Brott dropped her wrist
and turned round with an exclamation of anger. To Lucille it was a
Heaven-sent interposition. The Prince entered, pale, and with signs of
hurry and disorder about his usually immaculate person.
“You are both here,” he exclaimed. “Good! Lucille, I must speak with you
urgently in five minutes. Brott, come this way with me.”
Lucille sank into a chair with a little murmur of relief. The Prince led
Brott into another room, and closed the door carefully behind him.
“Mr. Brott,” he said, “can I speak to you as a friend of Lucille’s?”
Brott, who distrusted the Prince, looked him steadily in the face. Saxe
Leinitzer’s agitation was too apparent to be wholly assumed. He had all
the appearance of being a man desperately in earnest.
“I have always considered myself one,” Brott answered. “I am
beginning to doubt, however, whether the Countess holds me in the same
estimation.”
“You found her hysterical, unreasonable, overwrought!” the Prince
exclaimed. “That is so, eh?”
The Prince drew a long breath.
“Brott,” he said, “I am forced to confide in you. Lucille is in terrible
danger. I am not sure that there is anybody who can effectually help
her but you. Are you prepared to make a great sacrifice for her sake--to
leave England at once, to take her to the uttermost part of the world?”
Brott’s eyes were suddenly bright. The Prince quailed before the
fierceness of his gaze.
“She would not go!” he exclaimed sharply.
“She will,” the Prince answered. “She must! Not only that, but you will
earn her eternal gratitude. Listen, I must tell you the predicament in
which we find ourselves. It places Lucille’s life in your hands.”
“What?”
The exclamation came like a pistol shot. The Prince held up his hand.
“Do not interrupt. Let me speak. Every moment is very valuable. You
heard without doubt of the sudden death at the Carlton Hotel. It took
place in Mr. Sabin’s sitting-room. The victim was Mr. Sabin’s servant.
The inquest was this afternoon. The verdict was death from the effect
of poison. The police are hot upon the case. There was no evidence as
to the person by whom the poison was administered, but by a hideous
combination of circumstances one person before many hours have passed
will be under the surveillance of the police.”
“And that person?” Brott asked.
The Prince looked round and lowered his voice, although the room was
empty.
“Lucille,” he whispered hoarsely.
Brott stepped backwards as though he were shot.
“What damned folly!” he exclaimed.
“It is possible that you may not think so directly,” Saxe Leinitzer
continued. “The day it happened Lucille bought this same poison, and it
is a rare one, from a man who has absconded. An hour before this man was
found dead, she called at the hotel, left no name, but went upstairs
to Mr. Sabin’s room, and was alone there for five minutes, The man died
from a single grain of poison which had been introduced into Mr. Sabin’s
special liqueur glass, out of which he was accustomed to drink three or
four times a day. All these are absolute facts, which at any moment may
be discovered by the police. Added to that she is living apart from her
husband, and is known to be on bad terms with him.”
Brott as gripping the back of a chair. He was white to the lips.
“You don’t think,” he cried hoarsely. “You can’t believe--”
“No” the Prince answered quickly, “I don’t believe anything of the sort.
I will tell you as man to man that I believe she wished Mr. Sabin dead.
You yourself should know why. But no, I don’t believe she went so far
as that. It was an accident. But what we have to do is to save her. Will
you help?”
“Yes.”
“She must cross to the Continent to-night before the police get on the
scent. Afterwards she must double back to Havre and take the Bordlaise
for New York on Saturday. Once there I can guarantee her protection.”
“Well?”
“She cannot go alone.”
“You mean that I should go with her?”
“Yes! Get her right away, and I will employ special detectives and have
the matter cleared up, if ever it can be. But if she remains here I
fear that nothing can save her from the horror of an arrest, even if
afterwards we are able to save her. You yourself risk much, Brott. The
only question that remains is, will you do it?”
“At her bidding--yes!” Brott declared.
“Wait here,” the Prince answered.
CHAPTER XXXIX
Saxe Leinitzer returned to the morning-room, and taking the key from his
pocket unlocked the door. Inside Lucille was pale with fury.
“What! I am a prisoner, then!” she exclaimed. “How dare you lock me
in? This is not your house. Let me pass! I am tired of all this stupid
espionage.”
The Prince stood with his back to the door.
“It is for your own sake, Lucille. The house is watched.”
She sank into a low chair, trembling. The Prince had all the appearance
of a man himself seriously disturbed.
“Lucille,” he said, “we will do what we can for you. The whole thing is
horribly unfortunate. You must leave England to-night. Muriel will go
with you. Her presence will help to divert suspicion. Once you can
reach Paris I can assure you of safety. But in this country I am almost
powerless.”
“I must see Victor,” she said in a low tone. “I will not go without.”
The Prince nodded.
“I have thought of that. There is no reason, Lucille, why he should not
be the one to lead you into safety.”
“You mean that?” she cried.
“I mean it,” the Prince answered. “After what has happened you are of
course of no further use to us. I am inclined to think, too, that we
have been somewhat exacting. I will send a messenger to Souspennier to
meet you at Charing Cross to-night.”
She sprang up.
“Let me write it myself.”
“Very well,” he agreed, with a shrug of the shoulders. “But do not
address or sign it. There is danger in any communication between you.”
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 shivered a little.
“I am not in the humour for argument,” she declared. “If you would earn
my gratitude 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.