“Not in words, I own, but it was implied, in return for the gift I hoped to bring you, and have now brought. Listen, Olimpia; I am in a very difficult position. Theophanis and his brother-in-law have made this week a perfect hell to me. The shifts and excuses to which I have been driven to baulk their curiosity are really humiliating to look back upon. I am compelled—simply for the sake of averting the suspicions I saw beginning to spring up in their minds—to appear to fall in with their scheme for the railway route. Of course it is exactly opposite to the one on which your hopes—our hopes—depend, but I must throw them off the scent for a week or two, or until I can get things definitely settled. Theophanis and Glafko are returning home fairly satisfied, but to make things quite smooth I was obliged to volunteer to go part of the way with them, to see a place where there would be difficulty in getting the line through. It is a Moslem colony—evkaf [or wakf, land set apart for religious uses] land, a mosque and a cemetery—and any sensible person would have seen at once that it was an insuperable obstacle to their pet route, but they want to negociate about it, relying on Glafko’s influence with the Roumis, I suppose, and—in a moment of thoughtlessness, I confess—I proposed enthusiastically to go with them and see what could be done.”
“Which means that you will be away from Therma—how long?”
“Four days, not more; three, if I am lucky.”
“And you have never gone away before without sending Janni and me into safety at Thamnos first!”
“My dear Olimpia, this is such a short time. And the notice was so brief; I start with them to-day, and there was no time to arrange anything. Then consider what is to be gained—the fulfilment of our dearest hopes. You on the throne beside me, Janni acknowledged heir of Emathia—safety and recognition, in short, if I can only keep those two meddlesome Englishmen in the dark till my great coup is made.”
“And your police are not capable of protecting this house against the mob, even with the help of the soldiers outside?”
“It is not the mob I am afraid of, but those who are your—our—enemies for political, dynastic reasons.”
She raised her eyebrows. “The Theophanis family?”
“Let me beg you not to consider me altogether a fool, Olimpia. No, not the Theophanis family. But you are aware that your existence is not entirely unknown in the city; you have often complained to me of the fact. I have reason to believe that it has reached the knowledge of the very people with whom I am carrying on my secret negociations. They may not know your real position, but they are quite capable of seeing in you and Janni a possible obstacle to the realisation of their aims, and in that case you and Janni would be sentenced to disappear. Now do you see what I mean? I may have been brutal, but you have forced me to speak plainly.”
The Lady frowned, paying little attention to his excuses. “In plain words, then, you think that opportunity will be taken of your absence to murder your wife and son?”