Part 17

“You'll remember this one!” he said.

It was a ridiculous remark. How could one ever forget if this incomparable creature were robbed and perhaps murdered. But were there not some extenuating circumstances in my favor. I presented them as we advanced; my sister and I lived in a rather protected atmosphere apart from all criminal activities, we could not foresee such a result. I had no knowledge of criminal methods.

“I can well believe it,” was the only reply Marquis returned to me.

In addition to my extreme anxiety about Madame Barras I began now to realize a profound sense of responsibility; every one, it seemed, saw what I ought to have done, except myself. How had I managed to overlook it? It was clear to other men. Major Carrington had pointed it out to me as I was turning away; and now here Sir Henry Marquis was expressing in no uncertain words how negligent a creature he considered me--to permit my guest, a woman, to go alone, at night, with this large sum of money.

It was not a pleasant retrospect. Other men--the world--would scarcely hold me to a lesser negligence than Sir Henry Marquis!

I could not forbear, even in our haste, to seek some consolation.

“Do you think Madame Barras has been hurt?”

“Hurt!” he repeated. “How should Madame Barras be hurt?”

“In the robbery,” I said.

“Robbery!” and he repeated that word. “There has been no robbery!”

I replied in some astonishment.

“Really, Sir Henry! You but now assured me that I would remember this night's robbery.”

The drawl got back into his voice.

“Ah, yes,” he said, “quite so. You will remember it.”

The man was clearly, it seemed to me, so engrossed with the mystery that it was idle to interrogate him. And he was walking with a devil's stride.

Still the pointed query of the affair pressed me, and I made another effort.

“Why did these assailants take Madame Barras on with them?”

Marquis regarded me, I thought, with wonder.

“The devil, man!” he said. “They couldn't leave her behind.”

“The danger would be too great to them?”

“No,” he said, “the danger would be too great to her.”

At this moment an object before us in the road diverted our attention. It was the cut-under and the horse. They were standing by the roadside where it makes a great turn to enter the village from the south. There is a wide border to the road at this point, clear of underbrush, where the forest edges it, and there are here, at the whim of some one, or by chance, two great flat stones, one lying upon the other, but not fitting by a hand's thickness by reason of the uneven surfaces.

What had now happened was evident. The assailants of the cut-under had abandoned it here before entering the village. They could not, of course, go on with this incriminating vehicle.

The sight of the cut-under here had on Marquis the usual effect of any important evidential sign. He at once ceased to hurry. He pulled up; looked over the cut-under and the horse, and began to saunter about.

This careless manner was difficult for me at such a time. But for his assurance that Madame Barras, was uninjured it would have been impossible. I had a blind confidence in the man although his expressions were so absurdly in conflict.

I started to go on toward the village, but as he did not follow I turned back. Marquis was sitting on the flat stones with a cigarette in his fingers:

“Good heavens, man,” I cried, “you're not stopping to smoke a cigarette?”

“Not this cigarette, at any rate,” he replied. “Madame Barras has already smoked it.... I can, perhaps, find you the burnt match.”