“Evil!” I exclaimed, gazing in wonderment at her beauty. “What evil can you possibly bring upon me?”
“You will, perhaps, discover some day,” she answered, with a hollow, artificial laugh. “But I’m so very late. Good night, and thank you again so much.”
Then turning quickly, with a graceful bow she entered the gate leading to the house, and rang the bell.
I saw her admitted by a smart maid, and having lit a fresh cigarette settled myself in a corner, and told the cabman to drive back to Charing Cross Mansions.
The man opened the trap-door in the roof of the conveyance, and began to chat, as night-cabmen will do to while away the time, yet the outlook was very dismal—that broad, long, never-ending road glistening with wet, and lit by two straight rows of street-lamps as far as the eye could reach right down to Oxford Street.
I was thinking regretfully of Aline; of her grace, her beauty, and of the strange circumstances in which we had become acquainted. Her curious declaration that she might cause me some mysterious evil sorely puzzled me, and I felt impelled to seek some further explanation.
I entered my chambers with my latch-key, and the ever-watchful Simes came forward, took my hat and coat, drew forward my particular armchair, and placed the whiskey and syphon at my elbow.
I had mixed a final drink, and was raising my glass, when suddenly my eyes fell upon the little triangular side-table where the curios were displayed.
What I saw caused me to start and open my eyes in amazement. Then I walked across to inspect it more closely.
The ivory crucifix, the most treasured in my collection, had been entirely consumed by fire. Nothing remained of it but its ashes, a small white heap, the silver effigy fused to a mass.