The chaplain stood at the foot of the stair when they descended. Seeing him waiting, the sharper pain reswept her. Only to bridge that time—to see Gordon again, if but for an instant, before she went. She stopped, searching his face.
“I should like a little while alone before I go. There is time for that, is there not?”
His grave face lighted, the authoritative merged instantly in the fatherly solicitude of the shepherd of souls. He thought she longed for the supreme consolation of prayer.
“A half-hour if you wish it, my daughter. The chapel—shall it not be?” He led the way. Elise sat weeping in a chair; as they passed she snatched Teresa’s hand and kissed it silently.
From the side steps a tunnelled yew walk curved to a door in one of the villa’s narrow wings. This wing, which had no connection with the rest of the house, had been added by Count Gamba as a chapel for Teresa’s mother. It was scrupulously kept, and during all the years since her death bowls of fresh flowers had scented it daily and two candles had been kept burning before the crucifix over its cushioned altar. The attic above Count Gamba had used as a laboratory for his unending chemical experiments. It was there the message had found him which had brought so cruel a result.
The churchman paused at the chapel door, and Teresa entered alone. He closed it behind her.
CHAPTER XLVI
THE POTION
The declining sun shone dimly through the painted windows. The chapel was in half-dark. Teresa went slowly to where the two candles winked yellowly. She had often knelt there, but she brought now no thought of prayer. Might Gordon come in time? Would his errand at the casa delay him? Could fate will that she should miss him by such a narrow margin? She crouched suddenly down on the altar cushions, dry, tearless sobs tearing at her throat.
She felt the book in her pocket and drew it out.
Only that morning she had found the letter written in it—only an hour ago their hands had touched together on its cover. How truly now Juliet’s plight seemed like her own! But she, alas! had no friendly monk nor magic elixir. There were no such potions nowadays. What was it Gordon had said? Mandragora—a drachm of mandragora? If she only had some now!