"Excuse me," said Gianelli, defending himself, "my source is the most authentic. I will answer for its correctness, and Signor Rinaldo will be obliged to confirm it."
"Impossible!" repeated Beatrice, still quite without her self-possession. "This apparition his wife! I saw her formerly, of course, although only for a few minutes. Was I then blind?"
"Or was he so?" completed Gianelli to himself; but he said aloud, "I am inconsolable to have excited you so, Signora; you will give me credit for not wishing to speak, but you regularly forced this information from me. I regret this exceedingly."
His words restored Beatrice somewhat to consciousness. She felt what she had to expect from the pity of the man who had played the spy on her behalf.
"Certainly not!" replied she in a hasty but vain attempt to recover her self-control. "I--I thank you, Signor. I am merely surprised, nothing more."
The maestro saw that he could not do better than retire, but as he prepared to leave, he laid his hand assuringly upon his heart--
"You know, Signora, that I am quite at your commands, and if you deem it necessary to insist upon my unconditional silence in this affair, no assurance is needed that this also is at your service. Quite at your commands."
He left the room with a low bow; he was in earnest with the last words. Gianelli was too good a reckoner not to consider as a valuable secret, something which sooner or later might be employed against the hated Rinaldo. If he were to make the piquant story public in society, nothing more could be done with it; in his sole possession, on the contrary, it might be very useful. At present it ensured him influence over Beatrice, and, indirectly, even over Rinaldo, to whom it could, at the very least, not be agreeable that his family affairs should become generally known.
In the best of humours the maestro passed through the saloon, and entered the antechamber, where at that moment the sailor Jonas was alone. Captain Almbach had sent him to his brother with some message; he supposed the latter to be with Signora Biancona. Reinhold, however, was at the manager's, but was expected every moment. Jonas learned this from some servant who had gone into Beatrice's service from that of the same manager who had taken the Italian Opera Company to Germany, and as a trophy of his northern journey was able to maltreat a few words of German. As the sailor had received orders to give his master's note to the latter's brother himself, nothing else remained for him than to wait; he therefore took up his position in the ante-room, through which Reinhold was sure to pass. He had certainly remarked that the door of one of the back rooms stood open, and that some one was in there, apparently one of the Signora's lady's maids, who was occupied with a dress of her mistress. However, as this somebody was a woman, she naturally did not exist for Jonas, who, dissatisfied and silent as usual, withdrew into one of the window recesses, and remained there above a quarter of an hour without taking the slightest notice of his neighbour.
Signor Gianelli, as regards women, seemed to entertain the most opposite views; he had barely discovered the open door and the young girl, before he immediately altered his course, and steered in that direction. Jonas naturally did not understand any of the conversation, conducted in Italian, which now took place between the two, but so much was clear to him, that the maestro endeavoured to play the agreeable, apparently without particular success, as he only received short, and rather defiant-sounding replies, and at the same time the heavy silken folds were so adroitly draped that he could not come nearer without crumpling the light satin. This lasted a few minutes, then Signor Gianelli appeared to try and make some serious attempt, as a cry of annoyance was heard, followed by the angry stamping of a little foot. The dress flew aside, and the young girl fled into the ante-room, where she stood still with arms folded defiantly and eyes sparkling with rage. But the maestro had followed her, and without being intimidated in the least by the opposition, gave signs of trying to enforce the kiss which evidently had been refused him before, when he stumbled upon a most unexpected obstacle. A powerful hand caught him suddenly by the collar, and a strange voice said impressively--