"Can you think," she resumed, pressing her hand on her heart to still its struggles for relief in sobs—"can you think that I could have watched, and thought, and tasked my poor mind so constantly, to conjecture what might best soothe or please you, and not seen, long since, that you have secrets known to your daughter—your servant—not to me? Fear not—the secrets cannot be evil, or you would not tell them to your innocent child. Besides, do I not know your nature? and do I not love you because I know it?—it is for something connected with these secrets that you leave your home. You think that I should be incautious—imprudent. You will not take me with you. Be it so. I go to prepare for your departure. Forgive me if I have displeased you, husband."
Mrs. Riccabocca turned away; but a soft hand touched the Italian's arm.
"O father, can you resist this? Trust her!—trust her! I am a woman like her! I answer for her woman's faith. Be yourself—ever nobler than all others, my own father."
"Diavolo! Never one door shuts but another opens," groaned Riccabocca. "Are you a fool, child? Don't you see that it was for your sake only I feared—and would be cautious?"
"For mine! O then, do not make me deem myself mean, and the cause of meanness. For mine! Am I not your daughter—the descendant of men who never feared?"
Violante looked sublime while she spoke; and as she ended she led her father gently on towards the door, which his wife had now gained.
"Jemima—wife mine!—pardon, pardon," cried the Italian, whose heart had been yearning to repay such tenderness and devotion, "come back to my breast—it has been long closed—it shall be open to you now and for ever."
In another moment, the wife was in her right place—on her husband's bosom; and Violante, beautiful peacemaker, stood smiling, awhile at both, and then lifted her eyes gratefully to heaven, and stole away.
CHAPTER XIII.
On Randal's return to town, he heard mixed and contradictory rumors in the streets, and at the clubs, of the probable downfall of the Government at the approaching session of Parliament. These rumors had sprung up suddenly, as if in an hour. True that, for some time, the sagacious had shaken their heads and said, "Ministers could not last." True that certain changes in policy, a year or two before, had divided the party on which the Government depended, and strengthened that which opposed it. But still its tenure in office had been so long, and there seemed so little power in the Opposition to form a cabinet of names familiar to official ears, that the general public had anticipated, at most, a few partial changes. Rumor now went far beyond this. Randal, whose whole prospects at present were but reflections from the greatness of his patron, was alarmed. He sought Egerton, but the minister was impenetrable, and seemed calm, confident and imperturbed. Somewhat relieved, Randal then set himself to work to find a safe home for Riccabocca; for the greater need to succeed in obtaining fortune there, if he failed in getting it through Egerton. He found a quiet house, detached and secluded, in the neighborhood of Norwood. No vicinity more secure from espionage and remark. He wrote to Riccabocca, and communicated the address, adding fresh assurances of his own power to be of use. The next morning he was seated in his office, thinking very little of the details, that he mastered, however, with mechanical precision, when the minister who presided over that department of the public service sent for him into his private room, and begged him to take a letter to Egerton, with whom he wished to consult relative to a very important point to be decided in the cabinet that day. "I want you to take it," said the minister, smiling (the minister was a frank, homely man), "because you are in Mr. Egerton's confidence, and he may give you some verbal message besides a written reply. Egerton is often over cautious and brief in the litera scripta."