Macbean sat back watching the smoke curl slowly up, plunged in deep reflection. That man of all others was to marry Mary Morini! What a cruel vagary of Fate! Did she really love the fellow? he wondered. Had his elegant airs and graces, his stiff poses, and French effeminacy really attracted her? To him it seemed impossible. She was too sweet and womanly, too modest and full of the higher ideals of life, to allow that veneer of polish to deceive her. It might be, of course, that the marriage was to be one of convenience—that the Minister wished his daughter to become a French countess with an ancient title like that of Dubard—yet he could not conceive that she would of her own free will marry such a man.
Evidently His Excellency Camillo Morini was in blind ignorance of the character of his guest, or he would never for a moment entertain him in the bosom of his family.
If they were really engaged, then her future was at stake. He alone knew the truth—that ghastly, amazing truth—and it was therefore his bounden duty to go to her and frankly tell her all that he knew—or better, to seek an interview with the Minister and place the facts before him.
When he had bidden his uncle good-night and mounted to the small old-fashioned bedroom, he blew out the candle and sat at the open window gazing out upon the wide stretch of pasture land white in the moonbeams, reviewing the whole situation and endeavouring to decide upon the best course of action.
Mary Morini had charmed him with her sweet face and piquante cosmopolitan manner, yet at that same moment he had made a discovery that held him dumb in amazement. He recognised that she was in deadly peril—how deadly she little dreamed, and that to save her—to save the honour of her family—he must tell the truth.
He saw before him the tragedy of silence, and yet, alas! his lips were sealed.
To utter one single word of what he knew would be to bring upon himself opprobrium, disgrace, ruin!