“I have led you into this. Do you think I shall desert you?”
“But countess——”
“Don’t protest. Besides, I can help you.” Her brain had worked as rapidly as her hands, and she had a plan in readiness. “I had this same idea for finding out about Borodin before I came here. So I prepared for my escape. I have bribed one of the servants. He is to have a horse and sleigh ready at a moment’s notice.”
“No, no, countess. I can’t let you run into this danger!”
“Not when I am the cause of the danger?”
“No, no, I cannot! But I must go.”
He started across the room. She followed him.
“But how will you escape?”
“I’ll say that I’ve been suddenly called away, and ask for a sleigh to the station,” he said as they entered the library. “I’ll be far away before they——”
He broke off. The countess gave a counterfeit cry of dismay. Before them stood the figure of Prince Berloff. The pale mask of cultured gentlemanliness was down, and all his relentless cruelty glared at Drexel in a scowl of dark, malignant passion.