With a violent gesture she pulled aside the hangings, and swept into the library like a foaming tide, her eyes defying Robledo as she advanced.
“What is this you sent Federico to tell me?” she demanded harshly. “Is it true that you want to take him away with you and force him to leave me here, to face our enemies?”
Torre Bianca, who was following her, once more subdued to her spell, began to protest, in order to soothe her.
“I shall never abandon you, Elena, that is what I told Manuel!”
But Elena was intent upon Robledo, and continued advancing toward him.
“And I thought you were a friend! How despicable of you, trying to rob a wife of her husband’s support, trying to make him abandon her!”
As she spoke, she looked fixedly into Robledo’s eyes as though she were trying to see her own reflection in them. But what she found there was something that made her suddenly soften her voice, and finally adopt a childish air of disgust. Even, she raised a finger to scold him. The American, however, remained unmoved before these manœuvres, and Elena had to continue with what dignity she could:—
“Come, please explain all this to me! What is this plan of yours to take my husband away from me, and carry him off to your distant estate where you live like a feudal lord?”
Unmoved either by her voice or her eyes, Robledo replied coldly as though explaining a matter of business.
He and Federico had just been discussing the best means of getting the Marquis out of Paris. It was his intention to have an automobile ready for his friend the following morning, quite as though it had suddenly struck his fancy to take a trip to Spain. Obviously certain precautions were necessary. Torre Bianca was free to go and come as he liked but it was quite possible that, while the judge was making up his mind as to how to carry on the case, the Marquis was being watched by the police. Although the Spanish frontier was several hundred miles away, they could reach it before any order was given for Torre’s arrest. Besides Robledo had some friends near there, who could, in case of danger, help them to get through to Barcelona, and once in that port, it would be easy to take passage for South America.