By Wit of Woman

by Arthur W. Marchmont

I did not make the mistake of attempting to underrate my loss. I knew I had had to give up what I prized more than anything in life. I loved Karl with my whole heart; I knew indeed that I had never ceased to love him. The sweetest future which Fate could have offered me would have been to pass life by his side as his wife.

But the pain of knowing that this was impossible was now mingled with other emotions which tended to relieve it. There is always a pleasure in self-sacrifice, no matter how dear the thing renounced. I found a sort of subtle comfort now in the thought that I had been strong enough to do the right thing; to put away from me firmly the delights I would have given half my life to enjoy; to act from a higher motive than mere personal desire.

The sense of self-denial was thus my mental narcotic; and I sought with all my strength to dwell upon the intense gratification of the knowledge that I had been instrumental in helping Karl at the crucial crisis of his life. His country had need of him; and that he would now play his part manfully, would be in a degree my work. That was my consolation.

I could claim truthfully that no selfish motives had swayed me. The clearance of my father's good name had ceased now to be more than a solemn duty to him. The loss of Karl had rendered me indifferent to any considerations merely personal to myself.

In regard to Gareth, too, my chief desire was to see justice done her. Accident, or perhaps rather Fate, had put into my hands the weapons with which to fight the man who was menacing both her and me; and I could claim to have made no selfish use of them. The thought of her brought back with it the necessity to gather up the threads and carry my purpose to success. The end was not far off now.

I had first to anticipate what Count Gustav would do after the stroke he had meant to deal the previous night. I was convinced that he had plotted nothing less than that Colonel Katona should kill Karl under the belief that he had wronged Gareth.

I could follow the steps which had led to this. When, at Madame d'Artelle's, I had let Count Gustav see the Colonel alone, he had given a false message that I would send the information. Having thus prepared him to expect news, he had written him in my name that the man who had wronged Gareth was about to marry another woman, and had given such details of the elopement as would enable the Colonel to witness it and thus identify the man he sought.

This explained something that had puzzled me—why the pretence of the elopement had been persisted in when my apparent departure had destroyed the necessity for any such secrecy. The elopement had become a vital part of the subtle scheme to reveal Gareth's betrayer to her father.

Then to give countenance to it all, Count Gustav had sent as if from me the letter of Gareth's which the Colonel had brought with him and given to me. I read it now. It was to Count von Ostelen, of course; and in it Gareth poured out her tender heart to the husband she knew and addressed as Karl.

It was a cunningly planned scheme; and had Madame d'Artelle really come to the villa, it would almost certainly have succeeded. But the question now was—What would be Count Gustav's next move?