"It was a coincidence," I said lamely.
Seizing my hands, she actually fell on her knees before me, flashing into my eyes all the loveliness of her pallid, upturned face.
"It was not a coincidence!" she pa.s.sionately sobbed. "Why can"t you be frank with me, and tell me how it is that I have killed him? He said long ago--do you not remember?--that I was fatal to him. He was getting better--you yourself said so--till I came, and then he died."
What could I reply? The girl was uttering the thoughts which had haunted me for days.
I tried to smile a rea.s.surance, and raising her as gently as I could, I led her back to her chair. It was on my part a feeble performance.
"You are suffering from a nervous crisis," I said, "and I must prescribe for you. My first prescription is that we do not talk about Alresca"s death."
I endeavored to be perfectly matter-of-fact in tone, and gradually she grew calmer.
"I have not slept since that night," she murmured wearily. "Then you will not tell me?"
"What have I to tell you, except that you are ill? Stop a moment. I have an item of news, after all. Poor Alresca has made me his heir."
"That was like his kind heart."
"Yes, indeed. But I can"t imagine why he did it!"
"It was just grat.i.tude," said she.
"A rare kind of grat.i.tude," I replied.
"Is no reason given in the will?"
"Not a word."
I remembered the packet which I had just received from the lawyer, and I mentioned it to her.
"Open it now," she said. "I am interested--if you do not think me too inquisitive."
I tore the envelope. It contained another envelope, sealed, and a letter. I scanned the letter.
"It is nothing," I said with false casualness, and was returning it to my pocket. The worst of me is that I have no histrionic instinct; I cannot act a part.
"Wait!" she cried sharply, and I hesitated before the appeal in her tragic voice. "You cannot deceive me, Mr. Foster. It is something. I entreat you to read to me that letter. Does it not occur to you that I have the right to demand this from you? Why should he beat about the bush? You know, and I know that you know, that there is a mystery in this dreadful death. Be frank with me, my friend. I have suffered much these last days."
We looked at each other silently, I with the letter in my hand. Why, indeed, should I treat her as a child, this woman with the compelling eyes, the firm, commanding forehead? Why should I pursue the silly game of pretence?
"I will read it," I said. "There is, certainly, a mystery in connection with Alresca"s death, and we may be on the eve of solving it."
The letter was dated concurrently with Alresca"s will--that is to say, a few days before our arrival in Bruges--and it ran thus:
"My dear Friend:--It seems to me that I am to die, and from a strange cause--for I believe I have guessed the cause. The nature of my guess and all the circ.u.mstances I have written out at length, and the doc.u.ment is in the sealed packet which accompanies this. My reason for making such a record is a peculiar one. I should desire that no eye might ever read that doc.u.ment. But I have an idea that some time or other the record may be of use to you--possibly soon. You, Carl, may be the heir of more than my goods. If matters should so fall out, then break the seal, and read what I have written. If not, I beg of you, after five years have elapsed, to destroy the packet unread. I do not care to be more precise.
Always yours, "Alresca."
"That is all?" asked Rosa, when I had finished reading it.
I pa.s.sed her the letter to read for herself. Her hand shook as she returned it to me.
And we both blushed. We were both confused, and each avoided the glance of the other. The silence between us was difficult to bear. I broke it.
"The question is, What am I to do? Alresca is dead. Shall I respect his wish, or shall I open the packet now? If he could have foreseen your anxiety, he probably would not have made these conditions.
Besides, who can say that the circ.u.mstances he hints at have not already arisen? Who can say"--I uttered the words with an emphasis the daring of which astounded even myself--"that I am not already the heir of more than Alresca"s goods?"
I imagined, after achieving this piece of audacity, that I was perfectly calm, but within me there must have raged such a tumult of love and dark foreboding that in reality I could scarcely have known what I was about.
Rosa"s eyes fixed themselves upon me, but I sustained that gaze. She stretched forth a hand as if to take the packet.
"You shall decide," I said. "Am I to open it, or am I not to open it?"
"Open it," she whispered. "He will forgive us."
I began to break the seal.
"No, no!" she screamed, standing up again with clenched hands. "I was wrong. Leave it, for G.o.d"s sake! I could not bear to know the truth."
I, too, sprang up, electrified by that terrible outburst. Grasping tight the envelope, I walked to and fro in the room, stamping on the carpet, and wondering all the time (in one part of my brain) why I should be making such a noise with my feet. At length I faced her. She had not moved. She stood like a statue, her black tea-gown falling about her, and her two hands under her white drawn face.
"It shall be as you wish," I said. "I won"t open it."
And I put the envelope back into my pocket.
We both sat down.
"Let us have some tea, eh?" said Rosa. She had resumed her self-control more quickly than I could. I was unable to answer her matter-of-fact remark. She rang the bell, and the maid entered with tea. The girl"s features struck me; they showed both wit and cunning.
"What splendid tea!" I said, when the refection was in progress. We had both found it convenient to shelter our feelings behind small talk. "I"d no idea you could get tea like this in Bruges."
"You can"t," Rosa smiled. "I never travel without my own brand. It is one of Yvette"s special cares not to forget it."
"Your maid?"
"Yes."
"She seems not quite the ordinary maid," I ventured.
"Yvette? No! I should think not. She has served half the sopranos in Europe--she won"t go to contraltos. I possess her because I outbid all rivals for her services. As a hairdresser she is unequalled. And it"s so much nicer not being forced to call in a coiffeur in every town! It was she who invented my "Elsa" coiffure. Perhaps you remember it?"
"Perfectly. By the way, when do you recommence your engagements?"
She smiled nervously. "I--I haven"t decided."
Nothing with any particle of significance pa.s.sed during the remainder of our interview. Telling her that I was leaving for England the next day, I bade good-by to Rosa. She did not express the hope of seeing me again, and for some obscure reason, buried in the mysteries of love"s psychology, I dared not express the hope to her. And so we parted, with a thousand things unsaid, on a note of ineffectuality, of suspense, of vague indefiniteness.