“Perhaps to know what he knew.”
“Why should I wish to know?”
“Because he was on his way here—to this casa, Excellence.”
Gordon saw that he was trembling, it seemed with both fatigue and repressed excitement. “Tell me what you know,” he said.
Tita spoke rapidly, his words tumbling one against another:
“I heard Paolo send your valet after you to-day, Excellence, when no one had come from the villa. It did not seem right. I watched from the garden. I could see some one in this room—it was locked when you went. I climbed a tree. The master and one other—”
“Trevanion!”
“—I could not tell. They were carrying in boxes. When they left the casa, I got through the window and broke them open. They held bullets and cans of powder.”
Gordon swept a swift glance around the room. He was beginning to understand. Ammunition, presumably for the use of the insurrectionists, here in his rooms—evidence of complicity with the Carbonari. A military search at the proper moment—expulsion from Italy! He distinguished the outlines clearly.
“Yes, yes,” he said; “go on.”