To Win the Love He Sought Part 6

"Odd sort of bandits," he remarked. "Why, they hadn't the pluck of a chicken between them, especially this one."

He touched the prostrate figure with his foot, and the two girls shuddered.

"He is--is not dead, is he?" Margharita asked.

"Not he. I shouldn't say that he was very badly hurt either," the Englishman declared, bending down and listening to his breathing. "More frightened than anything. He'll get up and be off directly we leave. You will let me see you home?" he continued, speaking to Adrienne.

She looked up at him with a gleam of humor in her wet eyes.

"You don't imagine that we should let you go and leave us here?" she said. "Come, Margharita."

The Englishman looked at the other girl, almost for the first time, as she came up and joined them. Her dark eyes were full of tears and her face was troubled. There was very little relief or thankfulness for her escape in her expression. The Englishman was no physiognomist, but he was a little puzzled.

"There is no danger now, Signorina," he said rea.s.suringly. "To-morrow I will go to the police, and I dare say that we shall get to the bottom of the whole affair."

She shuddered, but made no reply, walking on by their side, but a little distance apart. As for the Englishman, he was in paradise. To all intents and purposes, he was alone with Adrienne Cartuccio, listening to her low voice, and every now and then stealing a glance downward into those wonderful eyes, just then very soft and sweet. That walk through the scented darkness, with the far-off murmur of the sea always in their ears, was like the dawning of a new era in his life.

It was she who talked most, and he who listened. Yet he was very happy; and when they reached her villa, and he left them at the door, she gave him a white flower which he had found courage to beg for.

"May I call on you to-morrow?" he asked, trembling for the answer.

"If you would like to, yes," she answered readily. "Come early if you have nothing to do, and we will give you afternoon tea _a l'Anglaise_.

By the bye," she added, a little shyly, "is there not something which you have forgotten?"

He divined her meaning at once.

"Of course, I ought to have told you my name!" he exclaimed hastily.

"How stupid of me. It is St. Maurice--Lord St Maurice."

"Lord St Maurice! Then are you not the fortunate possessor of that delightful little yacht in the harbor?"

"Yes, if you mean the _Pandora_, she's mine. Do you like sailing? Will you come for a sail?" he asked eagerly.

"We'll talk about it to-morrow," she laughed, holding out her hand.

"Good-night."

He let her hand go. If he held it a moment longer, and a little more firmly than was absolutely necessary, was he much to blame?

"Good-night," he said. "Good-night, Signorina," he added, bowing to Margharita. "I shall come to-morrow afternoon."

Then he turned away, and walked with long swinging steps back to the hotel.

CHAPTER VI

"THE BITTER SPRINGS OF ANGER AND FEAR"

"Margharita!"

She had found her way into a lonely corner of the villa grounds, and, with her head resting upon her hands, she was gazing across the blue sunlit waters of the bay. Below, hidden by the thickly-growing shrubs, was the white, dusty road, and the voice which disturbed her thoughts seemed to come from it. She pushed the white flowering rhododendrons on one side, and peered through.

"Leonardo!" she exclaimed. "Leonardo!"

She seemed surprised to see him standing there, pale, dusty, and with a great weariness shining out of his black eyes, and it did not occur to her to offer him any greeting. She could not say that she was glad to see him, and yet her heart ached when she looked into his pale, sorrowful face. So she was silent.

"Are you alone?" he asked.

"Yes. Adrienne is in the house, I believe."

"Then I am coming in."

She looked troubled, but she could not send him away. He clambered over the low paling, and, pushing back the boughs of the shrubs which grew between them, made his way up the bank to her side.

"Have you been away?" she asked.

"Yes, I have been home. Home," he repeated bitterly. "I have wandered through the woods, and I have climbed the hills where we spent our childhood. I have looked upon the old scenes, and my heart is broken."

Her eyes filled with tears. For a moment her thoughts, too, went back to the days when they had been children together, and he had been her hero brother. How time had changed them both, and how far apart they had drifted. They could never be the same again. She knew it quite well.

There had grown up a great barrier between them. She could not even pretend to sympathize with him, although her heart was still full of pity.

"Leonardo, I am sorry," she whispered. "How is it, I wonder, that all through life you seem to have set your heart upon things which are impossible."

"It is fate!"

"Fate! But you are a man, and man should control fate."

"Have I not tried?" he answered bitterly. "Tell me, do I so easily relinquish my great desire? Why am I here? Because I have said to myself that I will not be denied. Adrienne shall be mine!"

She looked at him steadily.

"We have not met, Leonardo, since the night after the concert. Do you know that we had an adventure on the way home?"

"Tell me about it," he answered, looking away.

"Is there any need, Leonardo?"

A faint tinge of color stole into his olive cheek.

"You guessed then," he said. "Tell me, does she know? Has she any idea?"

"None."

"She does not suspect me at all?"

"No; she thinks that it was an ordinary attack by robbers, and that the carriage was to take us a little way into the interior, so that they might hold us and demand a ransom. It was her own idea; I said nothing.