“It looks as though they had been seized and carried off somewhere without being allowed to take anything with them,” said Zoe. “Can it be Strio after all? But it seems such needless cruelty on the Prince’s part not to let them take their things.”
“Well, I should almost have thought they must have been abducted by some one else who objected to the way in which the Prince spent his time; but why they should take all the servants I don’t know,” said Armitage. “It seems unnecessary trouble, for if it was merely to ensure secrecy, I don’t suppose they would have stuck at killing them. But the Cavaliere seems to have agreed with you. He was remarkably lucky, for just as he was coming out of the house, he saw some one in the garden. It was a tall man, wandering up and down on the lawn in front, throwing his arms about and groaning. He guessed immediately—which is more than I should have done—that it was Prince Romanos, tormented by remorse, and he went for him at once, and demanded what he had done with his wife and child. It really was Romanos, and he seems to have behaved rather well, all things considered. He didn’t appear to mind Pazzi’s dropping in upon him, and explained, with suitable expressions of grief, that all the inhabitants of the house, Donna Olimpia, the baby, and three servants, had been carried off by diphtheria in the space of two days. How does that strike you?”
“As remarkable, to say the least.”
“So the Cavaliere thinks. He tried to corner Romanos in every possible way—about the letters especially. But he stuck to it that the first few were really written during his wife’s illness, and contained her messages. The long one, which was supposed to have been dictated, he gave up at once, confessing that he had made it up in terror lest the Cavaliere should insist on coming to Therma, and add a public scandal to his private grief. Well, it seemed so impossible to shake his story, and he displayed such a friendly wish to keep his father-in-law in sight while he remained in the city, that the Cavaliere smothered his suspicions and accepted the story. They even visited Donna Olimpia’s grave together the next day, and Pazzi might have come away satisfied if Prince Romanos had not made a bad slip. Something he let drop suggested to the Cavaliere that there was some uncertainty about the child’s death, and he nailed him there and then. Bit by bit it came out that the little boy had not died with his mother. His nurse had snatched him up in a fit of delirium and carried him off, and was believed to have thrown herself and him into the harbour from the quay that same night. Their bodies had not been recovered, but a woman with a child in her arms was known to have drowned herself, and if those were not they, where are they?”
“You know,” said Zoe inconsequently, “that I see a likeness in little Janni to Prince Romanos. What if he and Kalliopé were the missing child and nurse?”
Armitage started. “If it could be!” he said. “But no. You remember, Princess, that you thought Kalliopé also was like the Prince. But there is nothing to account for that. And the Cavaliere says somewhere that the nurse was an elderly woman—a Roumi, by the description he has of her.”
“It is a most curious coincidence,” said Zoe.
“But nothing more, I imagine. Well, do you wonder it made old Pazzi suspicious? However, he didn’t show it, but the moment he could shake off his affectionate son-in-law he went straight to Professor Panagiotis, who has promised to get at the rights of the matter by hook or by crook. So now the fat’s in the fire.”
“This may be very dreadful,” said Zoe, after a pause of dismay. “I don’t think the Cavaliere ought to have spoken to the Professor before consulting us. Maurice and Graham would have gone to Therma and helped him to bring Prince Romanos to book. He would probably tell the truth when he found they knew so much, and were only anxious to help him. But now—oh, do warn the Cavaliere to take no open steps, whatever he may discover, before letting Maurice know. One can never tell what Professor Panagiotis will do. I suppose he has an ideal in his mind, and goes straight for it, he cuts off so many corners that anyone else would have to go round. I only hope the Cavaliere’s letter has not been read on the way. We never consider the post here safe, you know.”
“Pazzi waited until your brother’s own messenger was coming out, and sent the letter by him. That accounts for our not having heard from him before, I suppose. Oh, I will warn him till all is blue, but I should doubt if Prince Romanos will come through this time.”