She was not free. That meant Poltavo! Could it be true that in truth she loved him, then? For a while, he gave himself to the full bitterness of the idea. Before his mind there arose, vividly, the picture of the two at the opera—Poltavo, elegant, distinguished, speaking in low eager tones, and Doris bending toward him with parted lips, a divine light in her blue eyes. As he pondered all the recent circumstances, he felt the waters of despair pour over his soul. His head still throbbed from the bruise; he felt feverish and agitated, full of a burning turmoil, and a longing that knows but one solace.
Again he turned to the letter, seeking, unconsciously, for some word of comfort to his troubled spirit, and reread it, slowly.
This time her sweet sympathy shone out at him, like the sun behind storm-clouds. He remarked, also, the note of despairing sadness. She was not free! That hinted not of love, but of compulsion, of an iron necessity laid upon her soul. In a flash of intuition, the young man glimpsed the real situation. She had bound herself to the count, in order to save her father!
What had it not cost her to assume that heavy burden? For the first time he realised something of what the girl, with her high spirit, and her passionate adoration of her father, must have suffered at learning that he had perpetrated such a monstrous fraud on the public; that he was, in truth, a cheat, an outlaw, and a criminal. Was it any wonder that her cheeks had lost their colour, her eyes their light, and her figure its youthful buoyancy and charm? He recalled, with a sharp pang, the pitiful droop of the slender, black-robed figure when he had last seen her; her pallor, and the shadow which lay deep in her eyes. Fear had looked out of those eyes, fear had trembled in her voice, as she bade him be careful! ... And she had esteemed him too dear to entangle in her dark fate! ... A flood of infinite tenderness welled up in his breast, a tenderness and an exquisite yearning which thrilled the young man's soul to the point of pain. He burned with the desire to stand between her and her troubles, to carry her off bodily from her enemies, to conquer a kingdom, or subdue a dragon—to do any wild, rash thing to prove his love.
Such moments rarely endure. They pass, these mountain-heights of exaltation and emotion, but to have experienced them however briefly, to have loved a woman with such passion and pure fervour, leaves no man as he was before.
Van Ingen returned to the problem. She had bound herself to the count.
But Poltavo, according to the detective's theory, was the master-mind of the conspiracy. How, then, had he tricked her so completely? How had he gulled them all, he wondered savagely. Even his chief, the American ambassador, and a judge of men, had been completely fascinated by the charm of his personality, and would not hear a word against him.
As for women—he knew the silly ardent creatures went down like nine-pins before the smiling glance of his eyes and the unfailing courtesy of his manners. There was Lady Angela, the Duke of Manchester's daughter, a slender dryad-girl, with soft eyes and a halo of pale golden hair, whom the count had sketched upon a recent visit to their country-house, and whom, it was reported, he might have any day, for the asking.
"Why don't he ask her, then?" he growled aloud.
The detective, who lounged opposite him, warm coils of smoke ascending from his briar pipe, regarded him with humorous eyes.