Chapter Fifteen. The Shadow.

In an old and easy dressing-gown, Gemma was idling over her tea and toast in her room on the morning after her lover had been shooting down in Berkshire, when one of the precocious messenger-lads delivered a note to her.

At first she believed it to be from Armytage, but, on opening it, found scribbled in pencil on a piece of paper, the address, “73, St. James’s Street, second floor;” while enclosed were a few words in Italian inviting her to call at that address on the first opportunity she could do so secretly, without the knowledge of her lover. The note was from Tristram.

With a cry of anger that he should have already discovered her presence in London, she cast the letter from her and stamped her tiny foot, crying, in her own tongue—

“Diavolo! Then ill luck has followed me—even here!” For a long time she sat, stirring her tea thoughtfully, and gazing blankly at her rings.

“No,” she murmured aloud in a harsh, broken voice; “I won’t see this man. Let him act as he thinks fit. He cannot wreck my happiness more completely than it is already. Major Maitland is a friend of the man I love. Is not that fact in itself sufficient to show me that happiness can never be mine; that it is sheer madness to anticipate a calm, peaceful life with Charles Armytage, as my husband? But Dio! Was it not always so?” she sighed, as hot tears rose in her clear blue eyes, and slowly coursed down her cheeks. “I have sinned; and this, alas! is my punishment.” Again she was silent. Her breast heaved and fell convulsively, and with hair disordered and unbound she presented an utterly forlorn appearance. Her small white hands were clenched, her lips tightly compressed and in her eyes was an intense expression as if before her had arisen some scene so terrible that it froze her senses.

At last the striking of the clock aroused her, and she slowly commenced to dress. She looked at herself long and earnestly in the mirror, and saw how deathly pale she had become, and how red were her eyes.

Presently, as she crossed the room, she noticed the letter, and, snatching it up, slipped the paper with the address into her purse, tearing up the note into tiny fragments.

It was past eleven when she descended to the great hall, and there found her lover seated on one of the lounges, smoking and patiently awaiting her.

They sat together in the hall for a few minutes, then took a taxi and drove about the West End. Armytage did not fail to observe how Gemma’s beauty and foreign chic were everywhere remarked. In the streets men stared at her admiringly, and women scanned her handsome dresses with envious eyes; while in the hotel there were many low whisperings of admiration. Yet he could not conceal from himself the fact that she was as mysterious as she was beautiful.

While passing across Grosvenor Square, she had been suddenly seized with excitement, for her quick eyes caught sight of a red, white, and green flag, hanging limp and motionless from a flagstaff upon one of the largest houses.

“Look! There’s our Italian flag! Why is it there?” she cried, thrilled at sight of her own national colours.

“That’s the Embassy,” he replied. “I suppose to-day is some anniversary or other in Italy.”

“The Embassy!” she repeated, turning again to look at it. “Is that where Count Castellani lives?”

“Yes. He’s your Ambassador. Do you know him?”

“I met him once in Florence. He was at a ball at the Strossi Palace.”

“Then you know Prince Strossi?” he exclaimed.

“Quite well,” she answered. “The Strossis and my family have long been acquainted.”

Her prompt reply made it apparent to him that she had moved in the most exclusive set in Florence. She had never before mentioned that she was acquainted with people of note. But next instant he recollected the strange story which the Florentine Doctor had told him on the previous afternoon. Had not Malvano declared that her family was an undesirable one to know? What, he wondered, was the reason of this curious denunciation?

Again she fixed her eyes upon the Embassy, and seemed as though she were taking careful observation of its appearance and position.

“Did you go much into society in Florence?” he inquired presently.

“Only when I was forced to,” she answered ambiguously. “I do not care for it.”

“Then you will not fret even if, after our marriage, you know only a few people?”

The word “marriage” caused her to start. It brought back to her the hideous truth that even now, after he had brought her to England, their union was impossible.

“No,” she answered, glancing at him with eyes full of love and tenderness. “I should always be happy with you alone, Nino. I should want no other companion.”

“You would soon grow dull, I fear,” he said, taking her hand in his.

“No, never—never,” she declared. “You know well how I love you, Nino.”

“And I adore you, darling,” he answered. Then, after looking at her in hesitation for a moment, he added. “But you speak as though you still fear that we shall not marry. Why is that?” He had not failed to notice her sudden change of manner when he had spoken of marriage.

“I really don’t know,” she answered, with a forced laugh. “I suppose it is but a foolish fancy, yet sometimes I think that this happiness is too complete to be lasting.”

“What causes you to fear this?” he asked earnestly.

“When I reflect upon the unhappiness of the past,” she said with a sigh—“when I remember how bitter was my life, how utterly blank and hopeless was the world prior to our meeting, I cannot rid myself of the apprehension that my plans, like all my others, will be thwarted by the one great secret of my past; that all my castles are merely air-built; that your love for me, Nino, will soon wane, and we shall part.”

“No, no, piccina,” he cried, placing his arm tenderly around her waist, beneath the warm cape she wore. “It is foolish—very foolish to speak like that. You surely have no reason to doubt me?”

“I do not doubt your love, Nino. I doubt, however, whether you have sufficient confidence in me to await the elucidation of the strange mystery which envelops me—a mystery which even I myself cannot penetrate.”

“Have I not already shown myself patient?” he asked with a reproachful look.

“Yes, yes, mio adorato,” she hastened to reassure him. “You are good and kind and generous, and I love you. Only—only I fear the future. I fear you—I fear myself.”

“Why do you fear me, little one?” he asked. “Surely I’m not so monstrous—eh?”

The hand he held trembled.

“I distrust the future—because I know the fate cruel and terrible—which, sooner or later, must befall me,” she exclaimed, with heart-sinking.

“You steadily decline to tell me anything,” he said. “If you would only confide in me, we might together find some means to combat this mysterious catastrophe.”

“I cannot! I dare not!”

“But you must!” he cried. “You shall!”

“I refuse?” she answered fiercely.

“You shall not suffer this constant terror merely because of a foolish determination to preserve your secret. After all, I suppose it is only some curious and unfounded dread which holds you awe-stricken, when you could afford to laugh it all to scorn.”

“You will never wring confession from me, Nino—never!”

Her eyes met his fixedly, determinedly. On her countenance was an expression as if she were haunted by a shadow of evil, as if even then she saw before her the dire disaster which she had declared must ere long wreck her life, and extinguish all hope of happiness. No further word passed her lips, and a silence fell between them until the cab drew up at the hotel.

The afternoon being bright and sunny, they went down to the Crystal Palace.

To Gemma, all was fresh and full of interest; she even found in the plaster imitations of well-known statues something to criticise and admire, although she admitted that, living within a stone’s throw of the world-famed Uffizi Gallery, she had never entered the Tribuna there, nor seen the Satyr, the Wrestlers, or the Medici Venus.

After spending an hour in the Palace, they emerged into the grounds, and, descending the many flights of steps, passed the great fountains, and strolled down the long, broad walk towards Penge, it being their intention to return to town from that station. The sun was going down, a grey mist was rising, and the chill wind of evening whisked the dead leaves in their path. The spacious grounds were silent, deserted, cheerless.

She had taken his arm, and they were walking in silence beneath the fast-baring branches through the half-light of the fading day, when suddenly he turned to her, saying—“I’ve been thinking, Gemma—thinking very deeply upon all you told me this morning. I must tell you the truth—the truth that it is impossible for me to have complete confidence in you if you have none in me. The more I reflect upon this strange secret, the more am I filled with suspicion. I cannot help it. I have struggled against all my doubts and fears—but—”

“You do not trust me?” she cried hoarsely. “Did I not express fear only this morning that you would be impatient, and grow tired of the steady refusals I am compelled to give you when you demand the truth?”

“Having carefully considered all the facts, I can see no reason—absolutely none—why you should not explain the whole truth,” he said rather brusquely.

“The facts you have considered are those only within your own knowledge,” she observed. “There are others which you can never know. If you could only understand the situation aright, you would at once see plainly the reason that I am prepared for any sacrifice—even to lose your love, the most precious gift that Heaven has accorded me—in order to preserve my secret.”

“Then you are ready to wish me farewell if I still press for the truth?” he cried, dismayed; for the earnestness of her words impressed him forcibly.

“I am,” she answered in a low, intense voice.

They had halted in the broad, gravelled walk, and were alone.

“Listen!” he cried fiercely, as a sudden resolve seized him. “This cannot go on longer, Gemma. I have brought you here to London because I love you, because I hoped to make you my you wife. But you seem determined to keep all the story of your past from me.” Then, recollecting Malvano’s words when they had been shooting together, he added, “If you still refuse to tell me anything, then, much as it grieves me, we must part.”

“Part!” she echoed wildly. “Ah yes, Nino! I knew you would say that. Did I not tell you long, long ago, that it would be impossible for us to marry in the present circumstances? You doubt me? Well, I am scarcely surprised!” and she shuddered pale as death.

“I doubt you because you are never frank with me.”

“I love you, Nino,” she protested with all the ardour of her hot Italian blood as she caught his hand suddenly and raised it to her fevered lips. “You are my very life, for I have no other friend in the world. Surely you have been convinced that my affection is genuine, but I have not deceived you in this!”

“I believe you love me,” he answered coldly, in a half-dubious tone nevertheless.

“Ah no, caro!” she lisped softly, reproachfully, in her soft Tuscan. “Do not speak like that. I cannot bear it. If you can trust me no longer, then let us part. I—I will go back to Italy again.” And she burst into a torrent of hot tears.

“You’ll go back and face the mysterious charge against you?” he asked, with a twinge of sarcasm in his voice, as he drew his hand firmly from hers.

His words caused her to start. She looked him fiercely in the face for an instant, a strange light in her beautiful, tearful eyes, then cried huskily—

“Yes, if you cast me from you, Nino, I care no longer to live. I cannot live without your love.”