“It would be the trial of the century.”
“Quite. Thanks for coming in. Look here, by-the-bye,” Gastineau reached to the table that stood by him, and took up some pages of manuscript. “I have got out a peroration for your speech in Rullington, supposing it comes to that stage. I got my mind full of the case, and I can’t help making speeches as I lie here. I think it is rather taking, if I may say so.”
“You need not say so, at any rate,” Herriard laughed. “It would not be your speech if it wasn’t effective.”
“Ah, well, it is just the sort of thing that used to go down with them. There’s your part.” He tossed the papers towards Herriard. “Take it and learn it. And now, good-night. By the way,” he added, with a half yawn as Herriard pressed his hand and turned to go, “you can’t recollect the name of the German medico you met to-night?”
“I’m afraid I don’t,” the other answered. “Why?”
“Oh, nothing. A sick man’s trivial curiosity, a failing I never had time for when I lived in the busy world. Good-night. A demain.”
As the door closed upon Herriard, a strange look of suspicion had come over Gastineau’s face.
CHAPTER VII
THE FIERY ORDEAL
BEFORE many days had passed Countess Alexia had reason to know that the enemy she had made and defied was at work against her. Her instinctive judgment of her unwelcome admirer’s character had surely prepared her for this. And in truth Aubrey Playford was one of those men whose chivalry is but skin-deep: it is merely the veneer of their education and breeding, the mask which covers a malignant and unscrupulous soul. The man could be trusted to act according to the recognized codes of honour and propriety so long as his own interest and feelings were not deeply touched; when passion, developing into a spirit of vindictiveness, clashed with the code, the mask shrivelled away and the real man showed his face.
But in this matter he had worked quietly, unostentatiously, knowing well how small a spark of scandal it takes to kindle a great fire. It had been enough for him to drop a few well-placed hints, of course under a strict and purposely futile enjoinment to secrecy, and the mischief was done. The whispers spread, growing in tone and freedom, till at last Countess Alexia von Rohnburg began to be openly pointed at in serious connection with the Vaux House tragedy. From personal to journalistic accusation was but a step and that an inevitable one. The allusions to a young lady of great beauty, a well-known and popular figure in society, closely connected with the diplomatic world, were markedly obvious, and the question was discussed, under a thinly veiled indication of identity, whether, being protected by the law governing foreign embassies, she would be amenable to justice were the crime brought home to her.