He stumbled over to the table, feeling his way, clutching the soft thing by the arm, the shoulder.
"It is you, Kaya, tell me, it is you! Damn the match, it is damp, how it sputters!—Put your face close, let me see it. Kaya! Is it you, yourself?"
The two faces stared at one another in the flickering light, almost touching; then the other sprang back with a cry of dismay.
"You are a gypsey, you are not Velasco! The voice is his,—Dieu! And the eyes—they are his, and the brows! Let me go! Don't laugh—let me go!"
"No—no, Kaya, come back! It is I. They told me you were chained with a gang; and were walking through the snow and the cold to the mines. How did you escape; how could you escape?"
"Yes—it is you," said the girl, "I see now. It was the costume, and your hair is all cut. I thought you had gone in the train to Germany." She shuddered and clung to his hand. "Why do you wear that? Why aren't you gone? The Studio was vacant, I thought—deserted, or I shouldn't have come!"
Velasco gazed at her, chafing the cold, soft fingers between his own. "Oh God, how I have suffered! I tried to reach you, I did everything, and then I shut myself up here waiting—I was nearly mad. Kaya—you escaped from the fortress alone, by yourself? Did they hurt you? You cried out; it rings in my ears—that cry! It has never left me! I shut myself up and paced the floor. Did they hurt you?"
The girl looked over her shoulder: "It was horrible, alone," she breathed, "Some of the guards, the sentinels, belong to us. Hush—no one knows; it must never be guessed. To-night, after dark, someone whistled—one was waiting for me in the corridor with the keys; the others were drugged. They handed me on to someone outside; I was dropped like a pebble over the wall. Then I ran—straight here I ran."
She put her hand to her breast. "Why aren't you gone? Go now, to-night. Leave me here. As soon as it is light I shall be missed, and then—" She shuddered and her hand trembled in his, like a bird that is caught, soft and quivering.
Velasco looked at her again and then he looked away at the candle: "I won't leave you," he said, "and the railroad is useless. They would track us at once. When I put this on—" He began smoothing the scarf. "I meant to follow you through the snow and the cold to the mines, like a beggar musician."