This was the truth; but it sounded like a preposterous lie—as the truth sometimes will.
“And that was just at the moment when you were all hurry-scurrying for your lives on our arrival. Of course you don’t know who the woman was, any more than why you came sneaking down the stairs in the pitch darkness with her revolver ready to put a bullet into any one who prevented your escape.”
“What I tell you is absolutely true. I was trying to get away, of course, and came down in the dark fearing some trick on the part of those who had imprisoned me.”
“You know whose house this is?”
“Oh, yes. The Contesse Inglesia’s.”
“Oh come, you know something,” he sneered. “I suppose she is a friend of yours—just in a social way?”
“I was presented to her at the house of the Marquis de Pinsara just after my arrival in Lisbon. I came to Lisbon on a mission of considerable importance in which the Marquis and others of his friends are greatly interested.”
“Do you include His Majesty the King in your circle of friends?”
I disregarded the sneer and replied gravely, “No, but I can give you a list of those who are interested in my affairs;” and beginning with M. Volheno, I rattled off a number of names. It was no good having well-placed acquaintances without making some use of them.
“You are an impudent scoundrel,” was the hot reply. “Why did you come to this house to-day?”