“I will settle this at once,” I said. “Come back to your father while I search the rooms. If the Count is here I will find him. But I think it far more likely I shall light on the double who has frightened you.”
She clung to me as we made our way through the crowd to where her parents were sitting. So far no one in the least like Count Furello came under my notice, though I kept a sharp look-out on all sides. I gave General von Winterstein a hint of what had happened, and with a word of encouragement to Asta went off on my search.
It was vain. The thorough scrutiny I made in the rooms and all likely and unlikely places in the palace showed me no Count Furello or any one resembling him closely enough to have deceived Asta. One man, indeed, I pitched upon as being perhaps sufficiently near to the Count’s general appearance to have suggested that arch villain, especially when seen casually for a moment. But upon my pointing him out to Asta she was quite convinced that he was not the man she had seen, and that it had indeed been Furello.
The episode, mysterious and disquieting enough, seemed suddenly to plunge us from an unclouded happiness and confidence into fear. Not that there was any danger of open violence there. It was quite certain that if Furello was really among the guests, a word to the Prince would be enough to have him turned out not only of the palace but probably of the country. The worst part of it was, though, that the Count’s methods were essentially cunning and secret; had he been an open enemy there would have been little ground for fear.
I was inclined, however, to regard the whole affair as the effect of Asta’s unstrung nerves. Rallenstein was now practically hors de combat, and it was scarcely likely that the Count would have ventured to follow us with any sinister purpose on his own account. The idea in my mind was that he was somewhat of a coward who required the impelling will of a stronger man behind his fell enterprises.
For the rest of the time I stayed at the palace I did not cease to look about for the man; had he been there I certainly must have lighted upon him. The report of my fruitless search at last reassured Asta a little, and when I parted from her at her aunt’s house I was glad to see that she seemed to have got over the worst of her fear. We had arranged to meet Strode next day, and I turned towards my hotel full of pleasant anticipations.
When I arrived there it was past midnight; a sleepy porter let me in, and I went straight to my apartment, which consisted of a sitting-room, with a bedroom, en suite. Here I found a long letter awaiting me from Von Lindheim. Tired as I was, I lighted the candles on my table and began to read it, being eager to know what his plans were. This was the first letter of any length I had received from him; it was closely written, and contained an account of the incidents of his long journey, including some narrow escapes he had had from being detected and falling into the hands of Rallenstein’s emissaries. I had drawn a chair to the table and sat down to study the closely-written pages, when, in turning over one and raising my eyes to the beginning of the next, they caught on the opposite wall an arresting movement, a stirring of the shadow thrown by a full moon on the opposite wall. My back was to the window, and the phenomenon betokened that the drawn curtains behind me were being stealthily moved apart. Realizing this, I raised the letter to the level of my eyes, as though it were difficult to decipher. Looking over the paper, I watched the wall before me. Slowly the streak widened, and in the middle there appeared a shadow—the form, unmistakably, of a man’s head, framed, as it were, in the aperture.
Then, with a thrill, I knew that a crisis, the most desperate of all, had come. Assuredly nothing but sheer presence of mind was between me and death. This thought nerved me; every moment now was critical. A suspicious movement on my part would mean a bullet through me; before I could turn I should be a dead man. My one chance lay in taking my concealed enemy by surprise.
“Tchut! I do wish, my dear friend, you would write legibly,” I said aloud. “Was there ever such a fist! I shall have to get a reading-glass to you, mein Herr. Let’s see, there was one on this table.”
Muttering thus, always distinctly enough for my words to be heard, I moved away quickly and crossed to a little writing-table that stood in the corner of the room. By this I was somewhat out of that uncomfortable direct line of fire. The bell was at the other side of the room; to have attempted to reach it would have been madness. Making a pretence of seeking the glass among the nick-nacks on the writing-table I was able to get out my revolver, which events had now taught me never to be without.