The Tiger Lily Part 33

"Stop!" said Cornel firmly; and she closed the door behind. "I wish to speak to you both."

"Cornel!" cried Armstrong, in a low and excited voice, "this is madness.

For Heaven's sake, go. Have you no delicacy--no shame?"

"You ask me that!" she cried scornfully; and he shrank from her indignant eyes. "Man, where is your own delicacy?--woman, where is your shame? I claim the right--in the name of truth and honour--to come and upbraid you both."

Valentina made a gesture with her hands, and turned to Armstrong to say in French--

"What does the strange lady mean?"

Cornel took a step forward, with her eyes flas.h.i.+ng.

"Mean, Lady Dellatoria!" she cried loudly; and her rival started and drew herself up.

"Cornel! Silence, for Heaven's sake."

"You invoke Heaven?" she cried; and she turned from him with a look of disgust and scorn. "It means," she cried, "that this is no scene in amateur theatricals played by your set, but real life. You are face to face with me--the woman whose love you have outraged, whose life you have wrecked as well as his. And for what? Your pastime for a few weeks."

"No!" said Valentina, throwing back her head and seizing Armstrong's hand, to hold it tightly between her own. "He is mine--my love for ever. I told you, when you came and defied me, that I could laugh at your girlish efforts to separate us--for it was fate. There, you have tracked me down and seen; now go."

"Yes, I have tracked you down and seen, and you throw off your contemptible disguise--this paltry cloaking and veiling. Armstrong, is this the type of the boasted British woman--an example to the world?"

"Cornel, silence! Pray go!"

"Not yet. I have a right here in the home of my affianced husband. I find him being dragged to ruin and despair by a heartless creature, devoid of love as she is of shame."

"You lie!" cried Valentina fiercely, as she made a quick movement toward Cornel, but Armstrong held her back. "Yes," she said, calming as quickly as she had flashed into rage; "poor child, she is half mad with misery and disappointment. I will not speak--but pity."

Cornel held out her hands to Armstrong as Lady Dellatoria half turned away and linked her fingers upon his arm.

"Before it is too late, Armstrong," said Cornel softly. "No word of reproach shall ever come from those who love you."

He shook his head.

"Listen, dear," she whispered, but her voice thrilled both. "I come to you a weak woman, but strong in my armour of love and truth. They tell me it is lowering, weak, and contemptible--that I am utterly lost to a woman's sense of dignity and shame. But they do not know my love for you--yes, my love for you, I say it even before this creature, who cannot know the depth and truth of a true woman's love--I come, I say, once again to plead, to beg of you to come. Let her go back to her own people; come you to yours, before it is too late."

"It is too late, girl," said Valentina gently. "I forgive you all you have said in ignorance that my love is stronger, more womanly, than yours. In Heaven's sight this is my husband now. We sorrow for you, and can pity. But go now, and leave us in peace. I tell you again--it is too late."

"Yes," said Cornel, with a piteous sigh. "G.o.d forgive you, Armstrong!

I am beaten." Then, as if inspired, her eyes flashed, and the colour left her cheeks, and she cried wildly, "Yes, it is too late." There were voices on the stairs coming plainly to them, for Cornel had in ignorance left the door unlatched, so that the sounds were uninterrupted.

"He's got a lady with him."

"I know, girl. Stand aside. Do you know who I am?"

"Yes, sir; Count Delly-tory, sir."

"Yes!" cried Cornel, with a wail of horror; "her husband. Then it is indeed too late."

"No!" cried Valentina fiercely; "your opportunity for revenge."

She drew back, and stood there erect and proud, with defiance flas.h.i.+ng through her thick veil as the Conte entered, quickly followed by Lady Grayson. A heavy, gold-topped, ebony stick was in his hand, his lips were compressed, and it was plain to see in his pallid face and dilated nostrils that he was struggling with suppressed pa.s.sion.

He was making straight for Armstrong when his eyes fell upon Cornel, who stood now white and calm, as if ready to interpose. Then he looked sharply at the cloaked and veiled figure just on the artist's right.

He stopped in astonishment, confused, and as if the supply of vital force which had urged him on had suddenly been checked.

It was Armstrong's opportunity. A few carelessly spoken, contemptuous utterances as to the meaning of this intrusion and the like would have sufficed to send the Conte back, mortified, and in utter ignorance, to vent his rage upon Lady Grayson, who, in her malignant desire to cast down her dearest confidante and friend from her throne, had brought him on there to be a witness of one of his wife's secret meetings with her lover, such as she had vowed to him were taking place. But Armstrong, in utter scorn of all subterfuge, stood there manly and ready to meet the man in full defiance, come what might.

A terrible silence followed, of moments that felt to all like hours, while each waited for others to speak.

It was Cornel's opportunity too, to bring her rival to her knees and sweep her for ever from her path, and Valentina felt it as she stood there with her teeth clenched and face convulsed behind the thick veil.

For, after all, in spite of her bravery and readiness to defy the man whose name she bore, she was a woman still, and instinctively shrank from the denouement, knowing as she did that a terrible scene must follow; and another later, in spite of English laws, for it was an Italian pitted against a man who would dare all.

But Cornel remained silent, and Lady Grayson scanned all in turn, ending by fixing her eyes upon the great canvas whose back was toward them where they stood.

"I--I beg pardon--some mistake," stammered the Conte. "I did not know that--Curse you," he whispered to Lady Grayson, and relapsing in his excitement into broken English, "You make me with you silly c.o.c.k-bull tale a fool."

Armstrong still made no movement, said no word, but Lady Grayson read him as if he were an open page laid before her, and her eyes twinkled and flashed.

The keen-witted American girl saw it too, and with all her gentleness and love, she possessed the quick perception and readiness of a people born in a clearer air and warmer clime. In those moments, with all her hatred and scorn for the woman who was the blight upon her life, she shrank in all the tenderness of her nature from seeing her humbled to the very dust. More; she grasped the horror of the situation; how that, beneath the weak flippancy of the man of fas.h.i.+on, there smouldered the hot pa.s.sions of his countrymen--pa.s.sions which, once roused, are as hot and destructive as the lava of their great volcano. She saw in imagination, blows, and Armstrong injuring or injured, either being too horrible to be borne. Lastly, she grasped Lady Grayson's plan.

"It is for his sake," she said to herself, "not for hers;" and as, apparently prompted by a whisper from Lady Grayson, the blood flushed into the Conte's face again and he fixed his eyes on his wife, Cornel stepped forward and held out her hand.

"Good-bye, Mr. Dale," she said gently; "you have business with this lady and gentleman; we shall see you another time. Come, signora."

She turned and held out her hand to Valentina, proving herself a better actress, for there was a smile upon her lip, and she bent forward as if whispering something through the veil, the only utterances being the words--

"Don't hesitate. Quick!"

Valentina stared at her--half stunned. Then, as if moved by a stronger will than her own, she laid one white hand on Cornel's arm, and, just bending her head to Armstrong, they moved slowly toward the door.

It was the left hand, and ungloved.

Cornel saw it, and could not restrain a start.

The hand was ungloved, and upon it sparkled several rings--for there had been no need of late to keep up the disguise so closely--and one of those rings was of plain gold.

They were nearly at the door, the Conte drawing back on one side to let them pa.s.s, Lady Grayson on the other, Armstrong still motionless, and feeling as if a hand were compressing his throat, while Cornel, as she went on with the set smile upon her lip, felt that the hand upon her arm trembled, and fancied she heard a sob.

"It is for his sake," she said to herself, "for his sake;" and the next minute they would have been outside the door, when, with one quick movement, Lady Grayson reached out her hand, and s.n.a.t.c.hed the veil from Valentina's face.

The Conte uttered a cry of rage, and made a dash at her, but she avoided him, and sprang toward Armstrong, who caught her to his breast, but so as to have his right hand at liberty.

But it was not free in time, for the Conte, with a cry of rage, swung round, and brought down the heavy ebony stick with a sickening crash upon the artist's head, then caught Valentina from him as he fell inert and senseless upon the floor.

"Well, am I such a simple idiot and fool?" said Lady Grayson in a quick whisper.

"Yes; to talk now," was the fierce reply. "Help me; get her away, or I shall kill him."