"Save you!" In his bewilderment he could only confusedly echo her words. She moved a pace nearer to him.
"Yes, save me. Last night you said you loved me; but I do not plead to you for that. I plead because I am a woman, alone, friendless, lost without your aid. Sir, will you give it—will you save me?"
"From whom? From what?"
"From the hands of the police, who are now, as I speak, on my track; from the Russian Government, to which I shall be delivered; from the death, or worth than death, which their sleuth-hounds will mete out to me."
"Death! Good heavens, what have you been doing?"
She laughed, glanced round the room, caught up the paper which lay where he had put it down, and pointed to the column which he had read.
"That!" she cried.
"That? What do you mean?"
"I mean that I killed that man," she answered, deliberately. "I placed the infernal machine by his door, and so took the vengeance which I swore to take a year ago, when he took prisoner and gave to torture and death my lover. I failed once, I failed twice; last night I succeeded. He is dead!"
"You murdered this man?