The Shadow of the Czar Part 5

"Only quinine, my lady."

In a moment Barbara was sitting up in manifest fear, her eyes large and ghost-like.

"You don't think I have caught malaria?"

"It is best to take precautions," replied Jacintha, evasively.

"Fever? I have been dreading that," exclaimed Barbara, clasping her hands. "And I must be at Zara to-morrow. If I linger here I shall be caught by--Give me the quinine; give me double, treble the ordinary draught, if it will act as an antidote."

Barbara, after taking the potion, fell asleep almost immediately, and Jacintha returned to the dining-hall, where in answer to her eager questioning Paul gave an account of the meeting in the forest and related all he knew concerning Barbara, which, in truth, was not very much.

"And now tell me, Jacintha," he said, when he had finished, "why did you start so on first seeing the signorina?"

Jacintha seemed absolutely terror-stricken at this question. The old Palicar who had been drinking somewhat freely of the maraschino turned upon his consort with a fierce frown, drew his yataghan and shook it furiously at her.

"If ever you let that matter out--you know what I mean--by G.o.d, I'll cut your throat. Be off, woman! Go to bed; and remember what I say."

And Jacintha, who evidently stood thoroughly in awe of the fiery little Greek, withdrew without a word.

"Captain Cressingham," continued Lambro in a quieter tone, "you may believe me or not, as you will, but it is a fact that Jacintha and myself have never seen the signorina till to-night."

"Nor her portrait?"

"Nor her portrait."

Something in his manner convinced Paul that the old Palicar was speaking the truth, which only made the matter more perplexing.

Despite the repudiation there was evidently some mystery connected with Barbara, a mystery known to Lambro and his consort. Paul intuitively felt that the Palicar's reticence could never be overcome, but he was not without hope of extracting the secret from Jacintha if he should have an opportunity of speaking with her alone.

"Paul Cressingham," he murmured, when he found himself left in the dining-hall for the night, "you came to Dalmatia in quest of the strange, the romantic, the wild. I am beginning to think you have found them." He drew his chair to the fire, composed himself for sleep, and dreamed of Barbara till morning gleamed through the cas.e.m.e.nt.

CHAPTER III

FEVER AND CONVALESCENCE

Of the four occupants of Castel Nuovo the first to awaken in the morning was Jacintha, who, after dressing, proceeded immediately to Barbara's room. Having tapped at the door, first softly, then loudly, and receiving no answer, she ventured to enter.

Barbara was awake, and talking to herself in a very odd manner.

She took no notice of the approach of Jacintha, and the latter perceived at once that her forebodings were realized.

Barbara, her dark hair lying in disorder on her pillow, a bright color burning in her cheek, the light of reason quenched in her eye, was in a high state of fever. She was not speaking in Italian, the language used by her the previous evening, but in another tongue altogether strange to Jacintha.

The latter returned quickly to her own room to make it known to Lambro, who had just struggled into his finery.

"What else could be expected after sleeping at night in a damp forest?" was his comment. "Fever! and she in that very chamber, too!

By G.o.d, if the Master should return and find her there!"

"Come and listen to her. She is talking in a strange language: she looks at me with piteous eyes as if making some request. Perhaps you can understand her."

The old Palicar followed her to Barbara's chamber. His roving life in the Balkan Peninsula had given him a knowledge, more or less imperfect, of all the languages spoken from the Danube to Maina, but he failed to identify the speech of Barbara with any one of these.

"It's not Romaic, nor Turkish, nor Albanian, nor--"

"Listen!" said Jacintha, in a startled voice.

Amid the plaintive flow of unintelligible sound there came at irregular intervals a recurrence of the same three syllables.

"_Rav-en-na!_" murmured Jacintha with white lips.

"She's thinking of Ravenna on the other side of the sea," said Lambro, indicating the direction with his hand. "Wishes to go there perhaps."

"No, no. Have you forgotten? Ravenna! That's what the last one said when she raved. 'O Ravenna, what have you done?' were her words."

Lambro stared dubiously at Jacintha. Then the eyes of both turned simultaneously to the violet sealing-wax on the wall, as if that had some connection with the name.

"I don't like this," muttered the old Palicar, turning away uneasily.

"There's something eerie about it. How has the signorina got hold of that name?"

Leaving Jacintha there he proceeded with subdued mien to the dining-hall, and aroused Paul from slumber with the question,--

"Have you ever had the malaria?"

"Can any one live in your cursed Greek climate, and not take it?" said Paul, somewhat resenting the rough shaking he had received.

"Then you run no risk of taking it again by staying here."

Paul was wide awake now, and sprang instantly to his feet.

"You mean that the signorina has caught the fever?"

"That is so. She'll not see Zara for some weeks--if indeed at all. You have done a nice thing for me, Captain Cressingham, for she cannot be removed now. And what will the Master say if he should return and find a fever-stricken person in his house? His was wise advice, after all.

'Admit no strangers in my absence, Lambro.' I have broken his orders, and this is the result."

It may have been selfish on the part of Paul, but his thoughts were too much set on Barbara to permit of commiseration for Lambro's position. Never had he been attracted by any maiden as he had been by Barbara, and now to learn that she was in a dangerous fever filled him with a feeling akin to horror.

"Where does the nearest doctor live? I must fetch him at once."

"She's a dead woman if you do. Leave her to Jacintha, and she may recover; trust her to a Dalmatian doctor, and she'll certainly die."

With which a.s.surance Lambro retired grumbling terribly, for inasmuch as all Jacintha's attention would be required by the patient, he foresaw that for the next month he would have to prepare his own meals, and likewise those of Paul, should the latter choose to remain at Castel Nuovo; and if there was aught that the old Palicar disliked it was work, even of the lightest sort.

In descending the stairs Paul was met by Jacintha.

"There is no use in disguising the truth," she said in answer to his eager questioning. "The signorina is in a very dangerous state. But leave her to me, and she shall recover. I was a nurse at Constantinople, remember; and in the matter of fever I know what to do as well as a doctor, perhaps better than any you will find in this uncivilized region."