“But now,” she said, brightening a little, “with this man’s discovery, Gastineau’s power for evil is surely at an end? You have only to inform the authorities that he is alive, and they will arrest him.”
Herriard shook his head. “I doubt if they would have a case. My experience of the law, my working with Gastineau, have taught me that moral proof positive may fall very far short of the legal evidence necessary for a successful prosecution. No: it is quite convincing to us—to you, to me and Quickjohn; but, I fear, it is a noose that a less clever man than Paul Gastineau would have little difficulty in slipping out of. No one knows what happened in that room between the time of your leaving it and the discovery of Martindale’s death, except the one man whom we believed to have killed him.”
“And he would kill you, Geoffrey,” she said, in terror at the thought.
He shook his head reassuringly. “I think not,” he said. “For one thing, I am on my guard and can take care of myself, and, besides, I do not think he will attempt to attack me again. He knows I can, at least, invoke the aid of the law there, and he would scarcely care, in his present position, to run that risk.”
Alexia seemed to take comfort from his assumption of confidence. He knew, however, all the same, that nothing was more likely than that Gastineau was meditating another attack, and that his own life, except as far as he could protect it, might scarcely be worth a day’s purchase.
Herriard, feeling in little humour for his own company that night, was glad to sit and smoke with Count Prosper till a late hour. It had been arranged before Alexia had left them that the marriage should take place almost immediately and that a long honeymoon should be spent on the Count’s estate in Moravia. One thing intervened, and that was an engagement Herriard had made to give his annual address to his constituents at Bradbury. This was an annoying hindrance, but it was a binding obligation on Herriard, and, after all, it meant but a week’s extra delay, which would give little more time than was needed for him to make a temporary wind-up of his business, legal and parliamentary. With the deadly point hanging over him, however, every moment seemed to count now against the chance of finally securing his happiness: to his impatience already, even, the inevitable interval seemed a gulf that he could scarcely hope to cross.
However, their plans were, so far, settled satisfactorily, even happily. Count Prosper gave his guest a glowing account of his Austrian home, with the promise of much romantic scenery and good sport. At length Herriard bade him good-night and strolled off towards his rooms, his mind a vortex of doubt, of joy, of fear. What would be Gastineau’s next move? He had declared in his masterful fashion that he would not be robbed of that treasure which was never his, Alexia. Still, with a man of Gastineau’s resource and strength of will to covet was to possess. In the days of their partnership, now, it seemed, an age back, he had often declared that to a man of abnormal will-power, once in deadly earnest, to desire was to have; whatever the object to be attained might be, however high it might seem above his reach. And that force was working now against him; what could his own devoted love count in opposition to the tremendous energy of that tenacious, unconquerable will?
Depressed with these thoughts, he had reached his door, when a man suddenly emerging from the shadow of a portico confronted him. He was sure, before he recognized him, that it was the man in his thoughts, Paul Gastineau. Happily he had taken the precaution to borrow, on a plausible excuse, Count Prosper’s revolver, resolving to buy one for himself next day. At the sight of Gastineau he whipped it out and held it outstretched before him. Gastineau laughed. As the light of a street lamp fell on his face he seemed in quite a pleasant, even jocular, mood; no trace remained of the devilish countenance that had looked down at Herriard a few hours before with murder written plain upon it. Now the smile was not even cynical.
“My dear Geoffrey,” he exclaimed, “please don’t be so truculent. I hope we have both recovered from our late madness. I have been waiting for you here, having forfeited the right to expect you to receive me indoors.”
“You could hardly expect that,” replied Herriard, regarding with repugnant wonder the almost incredible assurance of the callous, insouciant incarnation of malignity who stood smiling before him. “I wish to have nothing more to say to you.”