"Well, here I am, you see; so you can tell how much to believe of the rest."
"They said they had warrants for you, sir," put in Ellen. "They showed me some papers; and the Fräulein told me afterwards they had, and that she was going away in order to prevent any harm coming to you."
"Well, we'll soon have things all right again," I replied, and went off to change my clothes and view the results of the men's work.
I thought I could understand it all, I guessed that the man who had fired at me on the previous night had mistaken my fall for the result of his shot, and had accordingly reported that the attempt had been successful. With me out of his way, von Felsen had only to recover possession of the stolen paper, the keys and the confessions he had written, to find his hand once more on the controlling lever of everything so far as Althea was concerned.
That was what the search meant, and that it had been complete, the evidence of my own eyes showed. But it had not been successful, any the more for that. The stolen paper was safe in Brussels, and I had been in such a cyclone hurry to get after the Baron on the previous night, that I had not stayed to look the other things up, but had thrust them into the first place which had caught my eye. This had been the large upright iron stove in the hall among the kindling wood and paper. And there I found them.
Almost every other conceivable nook and cranny in the house which would have served for a hiding-place had been ransacked, and every desk and drawer opened and searched. It was a stupendous piece of luck.
A moment's reflection decided me to leave them where they were. My first task must be to find Althea. Her safety was much more to me than my own, and she was not safe for a single second of the time she was with von Felsen.
It was an easy guess that his failure to find what he had sought so drastically would put him in a very ugly mood, and even his belief in my death would not suffice to ease his mind. So long as that evidence of his crimes remained in existence, it was liable to fall into the hands of some one who would be able to use it with disastrous results to him.
I would have given much to know the story he had told to Althea. He would not say a word about my supposed death, and the servants' references to the warrants for my arrest suggested the line he had taken.
He would seek to prey upon her fears both for her father and myself, and pose as being still in a position to save us both. If he had done that I had no doubt that he would drive her to consent to marry him; and my fear was that, exasperated by not having found what he sought and needed so desperately, he would rush matters to a crisis at once.