CHAPTER X
Beatrice had not long to wait. Only a few minutes elapsed before the door flew open and Richford came out so gently that Beatrice had barely time to step into a friendly doorway. Her senses were quick and alert now in the face of this unknown danger, and the girl did not fail to note the pale face and agitated features of the man who had so grievously harmed her. Evidently Richford had been drinking no more, but certainly he had had some great shock, the effects of which had not passed away. He muttered something as he passed Beatrice, and looked at his watch. Directly he had disappeared down the corridor, Beatrice stepped into her room.
The Countess was standing by the dressing-table picking up the odds and ends there in a careless kind of way, but evidently in an attitude of deep attention. Beatrice's feeling of alarm became somewhat less as she saw that the case of diamonds on the dressing-table had not been touched. If anything like a robbery had been contemplated she was in time to prevent it. Just for the moment it occurred to Beatrice to demand coldly the reason for the intrusion, but she thought the better of that. Clearly there was some conspiracy on foot here, and it would be bad policy to suggest that she suspected anything. So Beatrice forced a little smile on her lips as she crossed the room.
"I shall have to give you in charge as being a sus
picious character," she said. "I shall begin to believe that your dressmaker only existed in your imagination."
The Countess gave a little scream, and her face paled somewhat under her rouge. But she recovered herself with marvellous quickness. Her lips had ceased to tremble, she smiled gaily.
"I am fairly caught," she said. "There is nothing for it but to plead guilty and throw myself on the mercy of the court. You see, I have not taken the diamonds, though I have looked at them."
It was all so admirably and coolly said, that it might have deceived anybody who did not know quite so much as Beatrice. But she had made up her mind that no suspicion of the truth should come out. Quite carelessly she opened the lid of the jewel cases so that she might see for herself that she was not the victim of this magnificent adventuress.
But the gems were there right enough. Their marvellous rays seemed to fill the room with livid fire. Beatrice glanced at her companion; the latter had caught her underlip fiercely between her teeth, her hands were clenched. And Beatrice knew that but for the intervention of that stranger in the drawing-room and the sudden flight of the General, she would never have seen those diamonds again. And yet Stephen Richford had been in the same room with this brilliant adventuress! Beatrice would have given a great deal to see to the bottom of the mystery.
"Oh, it is indeed a narrow escape that you have had," the Countess said. "I was not feeling very well, so I sent my maid to ask you to come to my room. She said you had already gone, so I took the liberty of coming here. Is not that so?"