“But what you say only confirms my opinion—that by doing what is asked I should not help you,” I said.
Her eyes signalled assent, but her lips uttered a quite emotional protest. “Is my safety nothing to you, then? If I beg and implore you to do what I have asked; if I tell you, as I do, that my liberty, and probably my life, depend upon your decision, is this all nothing to you?”
Her look explained the double meaning of her words. She believed that not only my safety, but her own, depended upon my doing what she had asked—but asked not in words, but by her looks and whispered English asides.
“You distress me more than I can say,” I replied, adopting a similar equivocation. “If it were possible I would tell you precisely how I feel.”
“You appear to think you can set these men at defiance with impunity, and that they will not harm you or me so long as you refuse!” A swift interchange of glances told me that this was actually her belief. Then she added with passion: “How can you be so infatuated, so mad, so reckless? You will pay for refusal with your life.” Once more the significant gesture of the head denied the truth of her words.
“What you have said has moved me deeply. Heaven knows, I have no thought in all this but to save you from harm. I must make you understand that. I have already told Dr. Barosa that if he will put you and me across the frontier, I will do what he asks and keep silent about everything. In that way your safety would be assured. But he refused, believing that he can force me to agree to his terms. He cannot. I have so arranged that even if he took my life—as indeed he all but did to-day—he cannot tear his companions from my grip, and will have to answer for my murder in addition to these other charges. There are two beside myself who know everything about last night’s attempt—they helped me in it—and they will hand over the prisoners I took. Aye, and more than that. They know of his hatred of me; and should anything happen to me they will not rest until they have hunted him down and avenged me. No; it is useless to plead longer,” I exclaimed, as if she had been going to do so, while in fact she had listened with mounting interest and pleasure to every word.
“But I must,” she broke in, taking the cue readily. “I beg——”
“I cannot listen to you. I have stated my terms. The moment you are out of the country, or on my yacht and in safety, I will do what is wanted; but until then neither entreaties nor threats shall make me yield.”
She gave me a last bright glance of encouragement, her heart in her eyes, and then burying her face in her hands she cried despairingly: “You do not care, you do not care. You will ruin us all in your madness;” and as if overwhelmed by her emotions, she rushed out of the room.