“Let him drive to the devil,” snarled Zouroff, in his most vicious tone. He was really trying to mask his alarm under an assumption of indifference. “What harm can the idiot do? He cannot hear, he can only make guttural, and unintelligible sounds when he attempts to speak.”
“He can write, your Excellency. Do not forget that. Say that at the moment he has gone crazy. That carriage will halt somewhere in St. Petersburg, or the environs, the police will be on the spot, inquiries will be made. If he cannot speak, they will make him write.”
But Zouroff by now had recovered his incurable optimism. “He will recover his senses shortly and drive back to the Palace for instructions. We will wait up for him.”
The two men were not quite so convinced, although they did not dare openly to dispute their employer’s opinion. They were not quite sure of Stepan’s sudden attack of insanity. There was more in this than met the eye.
Corsini, intensely agitated by the novelty of the unexpected situation, drove recklessly for the first few moments, anxious to put as much space as possible between Zouroff and himself, striving to collect his thoughts.
As he had sat silent by the side of the Prince on their progress from the villa to the Palace, he had thought well over the only plan of campaign that seemed open to him. At the first stopping-place on that long journey to the gloomy Castle of Tchernoff, he would alight, go to the nearest police station and divulge the facts of the Princess’s abduction.
Well, fate had ruled it otherwise. The unconscious girl and her maid were still in St. Petersburg and under his charge. Whither should he convey them? But he must be quick. Zouroff was a man of resource. He might have hired a passing conveyance and, accompanied by his two burly satellites, be rapidly on his track.
And then the thought came swiftly to him. He would turn the carriage round and drive by devious ways to the house of Golitzine. Once in the Count’s care, his precious charge would be safe. And, if he took that devious route, there would be no chance of encountering the formidable Zouroff on the way.
He halted at the door of the Count’s house; but here an unexpected difficulty awaited him. He dare not leave his horses, high-mettled and but slightly blown by their short gallop. Ah, there was a convenient lamp-post, a couple of feet in front of him. He would dismount and tie his reins round it while he knocked at the door.
While he was engaged in this task, a carriage drove up out of the dark, as it were, and halted beside the other one. A cold sweat broke out over the young man as he observed its arrival. This devil of a Zouroff had been too quick for him.