Chapter Forty. The Story of Captain Solaro.

At last there was a light footstep out in the hall. The door opened, and she entered, radiant in her wonderful bridal gown and orange-blossoms, her long sweeping train behind, but without her veil, of course, her beautiful face revealed in all its haggard pallor.

Dubard sprang forward to welcome her; but ere he could take her hand he fell back in utter dismay, for behind her, silhouetted in the doorway, stood the figure of a man in a grey felt hat and a light overcoat.

“Great heavens!” gasped Macbean, who at the same moment recognised the new-comer. “Solaro! Felice Solaro!”

“Yes,” replied the other, in a quiet, distinct voice, as he came into the room behind the Minister’s daughter in her rustling silks. “I am fortunately here, not by His Excellency’s decree, but by the generous clemency of the king himself, who, on the occasion of his birthday, three days ago, and in consequence of a petition of my family, gave me my liberty with others. I heard what was in progress, and so I have travelled here to ascertain the truth, and to clear myself of the base and scandalous charges those men who stand there have brought against me,” and he raised his finger and pointed to the Sicilian and the Frenchman, both of whose faces had, on the instant of recognising him, become entirely changed.

“It seems, signorina,” he said in Italian, turning his pale, emaciated face to Mary, who stood in the centre of the room utterly dumbfounded at the dramatic scene, “it seems that by good fortune I am here in order to save you, your father, and the Signor Macbean from these two men who have so very cleverly plotted your father’s ruin, your own marriage, the disgrace of the Signor Englishman, and my own imprisonment.”

“Do you allege that they conspired to obtain the conviction against you?” cried the Minister, amazed.

“Listen, and I will tell you everything. Then you yourself shall take what steps against them that you desire.”

“I shall not remain to hear that traitor’s insults!” cried the Sicilian, moving quickly towards the door; but Solaro, noticing his action, stepped back, locked the door behind him, and placed the key in his pocket, saying, “You will remain, general. You have to answer to me.” Then, after a brief pause, he commenced—

“It may be news to you all, except the Under-secretary, that Jules Dubard is not a member of the French nobility at all, but a person who, while posing as a count, is one of the secret agents of the French Minister of War. It was for this reason that he desired to be married in England, as the unwelcome truth would have been shown upon his papers.”

“A spy!” gasped the bride, standing open-mouthed on the eve of her deliverance.

“That is the vulgar term for such persons,” Solaro said. “It happened about four years ago that Borselli and he met, and the former, finding him a shrewd and clever adventurer, resolved to make use of him to gain a triumph over the Minister Morini. Borselli had also met General Sazarac at the Jockey Club in Paris, and had won from him several large sums at cards, accepting from him a number of promissory notes. Having done this, he discovered, to his delight, that Sazarac was actually in command of the Alpine frontier of France, therefore he proceeded with slow deliberation to win over Dubard from the French service, by promises of position when the Minister Morini was overthrown, and to unfold a plot which is a good specimen of his amazing ingenuity. Briefly, it was to place the promissory notes in the hands of some unscrupulous Jews in Antwerp, in order that they should press for payment, and when they did so, Dubard, who was attached to Sazarac’s division of the French army, should suggest a course out of the difficulty—namely, to sell to the Italian Ministry of War certain plans of the frontier defences which we were very anxious to obtain. This was done. Sazarac, in desperate straits for money, listened to his friend Dubard’s evil counsel, and agreed to allow the plans of the whole of the defences from Mount Pelvoux to the sea to be copied for a sum of two hundred thousand francs. These were the secrets which we had desired for many years to know, and the first I knew of the matter was a summons to the Ministry in Rome, where I saw Borselli, who introduced me to Dubard, and instructed me, because I spoke French perfectly and was a good draughtsman, to go to Mentone, take quarters at the Hôtel National, and make copies in secret of certain documents which Dubard would hand me from time to time.”

“You were in our service!” declared the Sicilian.

“Certainly,” he answered; and then proceeding he said, “I went to Mentone, and commenced the work of copying those plans which the general allowed Dubard to abstract from the safe at headquarters and bring to me in secret. While there we both became on friendly terms with the Englishman Macbean, who was secretary to the French general’s brother-in-law, and who was of course in entire ignorance of what was in progress. After about two months, during which Dubard and I led the life of wealthy idlers on the Riviera, the copying was complete, I had sent the last batch of tracings to Rome by the official of the Ministry who came specially to convey them, and was awaiting further instructions, when one evening, after we had seen Macbean and the general going out for a ride together, Dubard entered the hotel and said he had heard in a café the startling report of the general’s sudden death. We at once went round to the Villa Puget, and there sure enough he was lying dead, with madame inconsolable with grief. The doctors had declared death due to natural causes, as he had long been an invalid, and had been warned against riding too far. But Dubard took me aside in the garden and told me that he held a distinct suspicion that the general had been poisoned. The sum agreed to be paid for the plans had, he said, been paid on the previous day, and probably he had some of it upon him, which might serve as a motive for the crime. He suggested poison, and declared that he had suspicion of Macbean. At first I refused to entertain such a theory, but he persisted in it, and at his suggestion I accompanied him when he openly charged the Englishman with the crime. Macbean at once offered us every facility for the analysing of the cognac and the contents of his flask, sealed them up with his own seal, and packed them before our eyes, addressing them to a well-known chemist in the Rue Rivoli in Paris, and I despatched them. The report came back that there was an arsenical poison in both the bottle and the flask. It seemed that Macbean had tried to bluff us to the very last, but the most damning fact was that on searching his effects I discovered a draft on the Credit Lyonnais for fifty thousand francs from a firm in Genoa, but really emanating from our Ministry of War, and part of the agreed payment for the plans. This was concealed in the flap of his writing-case.”

“So the natural conclusion was that Mr Macbean was a poisoner!” remarked Mary, standing dumbfounded.

“Of course,” he said. “I certainly believed that he was, and that he was only allowed his liberty through Dubard’s clemency, until about three months after the affair, when Dubard and I being together at the Grand Hotel in Venice, my curiosity was one day aroused, and I pried into his despatch-box during his absence. Among other papers I found this letter,” he said, producing one from his pocket. “It is undated and unsigned, but it suggests that if some secret means were employed to induce S’s (meaning Sazarac, of course) fatal illness, two ends would be achieved. France would never suspect that he had sold the plans, and the payment of two hundred thousand francs need not be made.”

“Fifty thousand francs of that money Borselli handed back to me,” the Minister admitted.

“And he kept the remainder himself,” declared Solaro. “This letter is in his handwriting—and is in itself evidence that he instigated the general’s death, and that this man, who is his accomplice, carried it out so cleverly that the whole of the evidence pointed to Macbean. Indeed, this is proved by recent events, and by the manner in which the pair have sought to close my mouth regarding the ugly affair. Last summer I was suddenly arrested, and was amazed to discover how very neatly the man Dubard, whom I thought my friend, had had me watched in Paris and in Bologna, had bogus plans of the Tresenta prepared and sent to Filoména Nodari, and how these and other documents—one purporting to be the mobilisation scheme itself—passed through that woman’s hands into those of a French agent. Evidence—foul lies, all of it—was given against me; I was condemned as a traitor—I, the man who had copied all the plans of France in the interests of my own country—and then I realised how cleverly Borselli and Dubard, the ex-agent of France, were acting in conjunction, and that whoever was guilty of poor Sazarac’s assassination it certainly was not the Englishman. I had, before my arrest, mentioned the death of Sazarac casually to Dubard, and inquired of the whereabouts of Macbean. It was this remark of mine which apparently aroused his suspicions, and which caused both he and Borselli to secure my imprisonment for a twofold reason: first, to ensure my silence; and secondly, so as to give the Socialists a weapon by which they might hound your Excellency from office for countenancing a traitor. This was the only way in which your Excellency’s popularity and power could be undermined; but so craftily did they go to work, and so cleverly was every detail of the conspiracy thought out, even to the opening of your safe at San Donato with a key made from the impression of the original key taken by Borselli two years before. You made away with the key, hoping to conceal the evidences of your peculations; but their ingenuity was simply marvellous, for they were playing with the safety and prosperity of a kingdom.”

“But General Borselli asked me recently to induce my father to release you,” said Mary.

“In order to still further incite the popular feeling against His Excellency. He probably believed that I dared not denounce him as the instigator of the assassination of Sazarac, and that with my release his coup could be effected against your father after your marriage with his accomplice. It is, indeed, intended to strike the blow at the first sitting of the Chamber next month.”

“Then I think we are now fully prepared to combat it,” remarked the tall, grey-haired Minister in a cool tone, as he glanced at the Sicilian. “When I received the fifty thousand francs of the sum which was to have been paid from the secret service fund to General Sazarac, I was led to believe that, owing to a certain plan not being forthcoming, only half the sum had been paid to him. I had no knowledge of a tragedy until long afterwards, when, to my horror, I discovered for myself that there had been some foul play, and that I was morally responsible as an accessory.”

“I am not to blame altogether,” declared the Frenchman desperately. “Borselli sent me the cognac from Rome already prepared, and according to his directions I substituted the bottle in the Englishman’s room and at the same time abstracted the general’s flask from his holster. I also concealed, at Angelo’s suggestion, the banker’s draft in Macbean’s writing-case.”

“You scoundrel!” cried George, turning upon the white-faced criminal whom his well-beloved had so narrowly escaped. “And you, Borselli, have sent your spy, that woman Nodari, to investigate Mr Morgan-Mason’s papers because you fear he holds something that incriminates you?”

“Silence!” cried the Minister, holding up his hand. “There must be no recriminations here in my house. I have been misled by Borselli as to this man’s position and antecedents. The wedding will not take place, after these scandalous revelations, but there is still one duty before me, as Minister of War,” and turning to his writing-table he took two sheets of paper, and upon each he scribbled some hurried words. One he handed to Borselli, who glanced at it and threw it from him with an imprecation.

It was his dismissal from the office of Under-Secretary of War.

The other, which he handed to Solaro, caused him to cry aloud with joy, for it was his reinstatement in the army and a declaration of his innocence of the crime of which he had been charged.

Then Solaro unlocked the door, and turning to the Sicilian and Dubard, who were standing together pale, crestfallen, and ashamed, he said—

“Go, you pair of assassins. Don’t either of you put foot in Italy again, or I’ll take it upon myself to prosecute you for your vile plot and my own false imprisonment. Then, at your trial, the whole affair will come out. You hear?”

“Yes!” muttered Dubard, with flashing eyes. “We hear your threats.”

And in silence both the elegant bridegroom and his dark-faced friend passed from the study and out of the house, never to re-enter it.

Then, when they had gone, Mary, a pale, tragic figure in her bridal dress, flung herself into George’s ready arms, crying—

“You have saved me—saved me!” and she burst into tears of joy, the outpourings of an overburdened heart.

For the first time Camillo Morini guessed the truth, yet then and there, before Felice Solaro, whose statement had liberated both of them, George Macbean openly confessed his great passion for her, a declaration of purest and strongest affection, of which she, by her own action, had already acknowledged reciprocation.

And so the Minister, on recovering from his surprise, gladly gave the hand of his daughter to the gallant, upright man who had placed himself in such jeopardy in order to save her and to unmask the conspirators, while Felice Solaro was the first to offer the pair his hearty congratulations. Hand in hand they stood, content in each other’s love.

In order to preserve appearances, it was arranged that Mary should feign a sudden illness to necessitate the postponement of the wedding, and while there was great disappointment among the guests and the curious crowds of villagers, there was, in secret, a great rejoicing in Madame Morini’s little boudoir when the glad news was revealed to her.

The pealing bells were stopped. Mary had thrown off her wedding-gown merrily, and when she tossed her orange-blossoms into the grate of the boudoir, she said to George laughingly—

“When we marry privately in London next month, I shall require no white satin—a travelling gown will be sufficient, will it not?”

“Yes, dearest,” he said, kissing her fondly upon the lips, now that she was really his very own. “The dress does not matter when the union of our hearts is so firm and true. You know how fondly and passionately I love you, and how I have suffered in silence at the thought of your terrible sacrifice.”

“I know,” she answered softly, looking up into his eyes trustingly. “I know, George—only too well! Ah! you cannot think how happy I am, now that it is all past—and you are mine?” And then she raised her sweet face and kissed him of her own accord upon the cheek.