"I cannot tell you how delighted I am to see you, my dear Sir Richard," said Nikola as he seated himself. "I understood that you had returned to Venice."
Having out-grown the desire to learn how Nikola had become aware of anything, I merely agreed that we had returned, and then took the chair he offered me.
When all the circumstances are taken into consideration, I really think that that moment was certainly the most embarrassing of my life. Nikola's eyes were fixed steadily upon mine, and I could see in them what was almost an expression of malicious amusement. As usual he was making capital out of my awkwardness, and as I knew that I could do no good, I felt that there was nothing for it but for me to submit. Then the miserable Spaniard's face rose before my mind's eye, and I felt that I could not abandon him, without an effort, to what I knew would be his fate. Nikola brought me up to the mark even quicker than I expected.
"It is very plain," he said, with a satirical smile playing round his thin lips, "that you have come with the intention of saying something important to me. What is it?"
At this I rose from my chair and went across the room to where he was sitting. Placing my hand upon his shoulder I looked down into his face, took courage, and began.
"Doctor Nikola," I said, "you and I have known each other for many years now. We have seen some strange things together, one of us perhaps less willingly than the other. But I venture to think, however, that we have never stood on stranger or more dangerous ground than we do to-night."
"I am afraid I am scarcely able to follow your meaning," he replied.
I knew that this was not the case, but I was equally convinced that to argue the question with him would be worse than useless.
"Do you remember the night on which you told me that story concerning the woman who lived in this house, who was betrayed by the Spaniard, and who died on that Spanish island?" I asked.
He rose hurriedly from his chair and went to the window. I heard him catch his breath, and knew that I had moved him at last.