While she soliloquized thus, the countess walked hurriedly through the room, with folded arms, fiery eyes, and on her lips a smile—but what a smile! Alone in that gorgeous apartment, with her sinister beauty and her angry, flashing jewels, she might have been mistaken for a malign spirit who had just left her kingdom of darkness to visit the earth with ruin!
"It is evident," said she, musing, "that the emperor meant to warn him; and it follows that as he has not fled to-day he is lost! And he SHALL be lost, for I must be free. I cannot afford to share my hardly-earned winnings with him. He must away to prison; it is my only chance for freedom."
"But if, after all, the emperor should connive at his escape! Or if he should be seized with a fit of suspicion, and return! Good Heaven! now that fortune favors me, I must snatch security while it lies within my grasp."
Here she rang so violently, that the valet, who was in the anteroom almost precipitated himself into her presence.
"If Count Podstadsky-Liechtenstein calls, say that I am not at home. Apprise the other servants, and add that be is never to find admittance into this house again. Whosoever, after this, admits him even to the vestibule, shall leave my service. Away with you!"
"And now," continued she, as the valet closed the door, "now to work." She went toward a mirror, and there unfastened her diadem, then her necklace, brooch, and bracelets. With her hands full of jewels, she flew to her dressing-room and deposited them in their respective cases. Then she opened a large, brass-bound casket, and counted her treasures.
The first thing that came to light was a necklace of diamond solitaires. "These three stars of the first magnitude," said she, contemplating the centre stones, "are the involuntary contribution of the Princess Garampi I borrowed her bracelet for a model, giving my word that it should not pass from my hands. Nor has it done so, for I have kept her brilliants and returned her—mine. She is never the wiser, and I am the richer thereby. For this string of pearls, with the superb ruby clasp, I am indebted to her highness the Princess Palm. One evening, as I welcomed her with an embrace, I made out to unfasten it while I related to her a piquant anecdote of her husband's mistress. Of course she was too much absorbed in my narrative to feel that her necklace was slipping, for I was not only entertaining, but very caressing on the occasion. There was music in the room, so that no one heard the treasure fall. The necklace, a perfect fortune, lay at my feet; I moved my train to cover it, and signed to Carlo, who, I must say, was always within call. He invited the princess to dance, and—the pearls found their way to my pocket. What a talk that loss made in Vienna! What offers of reward that poor woman made to recover her necklace! All in vain, and nobody condoled more affectionately with her than the charming, kind-hearted Countess Baillou. This sorrow—but, pshaw! what a child I am, to be gloating over my precious toys while time passes away, and I must be off to-night!"
She closed her boxes, replaced them in her strong, well-secured casket, and, having locked it, hung the key around her neck. "Here lies the price of a princely estate," said she, "and now I must attend to my ducats."
She stood upon a chair, and took from the wall a picture. Then, pressing a spring behind it a little door flew open, revealing a casket similar to the one containing her jewels. She took it down, and, placing it on the table, contemplated the two boxes with profound satisfaction.
"Twenty thousand lovers' eyes look out from this casket," said she, with a laugh; "all promising a future of triumphant joy. Twenty thousand ducats! The fruits of my savings! And dear old Szekuly has made economy very easy for some months past, for one-half of these ducats once belonged to him. To be sure, I gave him in return the deeds of an entail which I own in Italy, and which he can easily reconvert into money. At least he thinks so. Well—I owe him nothing. We made an exchange, and that is all."