Stolen Souls. Le Queux William
head, fanning herself slowly, and chatting with that light coquetry that had so charmed me.
A little clock chiming on its silver bells caused me to spring to my feet.
“Nine o’clock!” I exclaimed. “You must excuse me, otherwise I really shall not catch my train.”
“Must you go?” asked Doroteita, in a tone of regret, closing her fan with a snap and rising also.
“Yes,” I said. “This is my last train. I must wish you au revoir, in the hope that we may meet again at a date not far distant.”
“Aren’t you going to exchange tokens of friendship?” Luis suggested, laughing in his careless, good-humoured way. “Give my future brother-in-law your flower, Doroteita.”
She laughed and blushed, then taking the crimson blossom from her hair, handed it to me. I was about to inhale its fragrance when the strange, fixed look in her eyes fascinated me, and as I placed it in the lapel of my coat with a murmured word of thanks, I confess I was startled by the sudden transformation of her countenance.
“Good-bye,” I said, taking her hand.
It was cold, limp, and trembling.
“Adieu,” she answered huskily.
I turned to shake hands with her brother, but before I could do so, he had pounced upon me from behind, holding my arms powerless, crying —
“No, no, my friend, you will not escape so easily!”
“What – what do you mean?” I gasped in abject amazement.
“I mean that you do not leave this place alive,” he hissed in my ear. Though I could not see him, I could feel his hot breath upon my cheek, and struggled violently to free myself, but in his iron grip I seemed powerless as a child.
“Now, quick, Doroteita!” he commanded. “Remember, we have no time to lose. Don’t stand staring there!”
“Do you mean to kill me?” I cried, clenching my teeth and struggling with all my might to free my arms.
“Curse you, woman! Don’t you hear me?” he yelled at Doroteita, who stood transfixed, with face ashen pale and hands clenched in desperation. “Remember what we have at stake! You have trapped him – finish your work, or – or I’ll kill you!”
In a second she sprang forward, and, snatching from my buttonhole the flower she had given me, held her handkerchief over my mouth with one hand, while with the other she pressed the flower against my nostrils. It seemed damp with some evil-smelling fluid, and though I struggled, she held my face with such determined force, that the leaves of the blossom were forced into my nose, and I was compelled to inhale the disagreeable perfume they emitted.
The odour was strange, and in a few seconds produced a curious giddiness such as I had never before experienced. My brain became paralysed and my limbs assumed an unaccountable rigidness. I tried to speak, but was unable. My jaws seemed to have become suddenly fixed, as if attacked by tetanus. A thrill of horror ran through me, for I could not breathe, and the pang of pain that shot through my eyes was excruciating.
Feeling myself utterly helpless in the hands of those who had so cunningly plotted my murder, I wondered in that brief instant whether Luis was Doroteita’s lover, and whether on discovering our friendship, he had planned this terrible and merciless revenge. My enchantress’s handsome face, now hideously distorted by mingled fear and passion, was close to me, her eyes riveted to mine, and as she pressed the strange flower against my face, her white lips moved as if speaking to me. But I was deaf. My senses had been destroyed.
Next second, though I fought against the sudden faintness that crept over me, my head swam, and my surroundings grew indistinct. I felt myself falling. Then, by a sudden darkness that fell upon me, the present became blotted out.
On opening my aching eyes, they became dazzled by a bar of golden sunlight that strayed in between the closed curtains.
Amazed, I gazed around from where I lay stretched upon the floor. Then, in a few moments, the recollection of the strange events of the previous night returned to me in all their grim reality. The woman I had adored had, from some motive utterly incomprehensible, enticed me there to murder me! Feeling terribly weak and ill, I managed to struggle to my feet. I looked for the fatal flower, but could not find it. Then my eyes fell upon the clock, and I was amazed to discover it was past three in the afternoon.
I had remained unconscious nearly eighteen hours!
Half fearful lest another attempt should be made upon me, I searched the rooms on the ground floor and shouted. No one stirred. The house was tenantless!
Walking with difficulty down the hill towards the Ezcurra, I suddenly remembered my dispatch, and placing my hand in the inner pocket of my coat, I found it gone! It had evidently been stolen; but for what object was an enigma.
As I passed onward under the trees of the Calle del Pozzo, boys were crying La Voz, and from their strident shouts, and the eagerness of purchasers, I knew that the new Ministry had been officially announced. My intellect seemed too disordered to think, so I merely returned to the hotel, and, casting myself on the bed, slept till next morning.
I refrained from lodging a complaint with the police, believing that my extraordinary story would be discredited; nevertheless, I remained three days longer, endeavouring to discover some facts regarding the Countess d’Avendaño and her daughter. All I could glean was, that, a month before, they had taken the Villa Guipuzcoa for the season, and that a number of tradespeople, including two jewellers, were now exceedingly anxious to ascertain their whereabouts. Therefore, after much futile effort to ascertain the truth about Doroteita, I at length returned to London, being compelled to invent an absurdly lame excuse for not telegraphing the information of the new Cabinet.
Last July I again found myself in Spain. Another serious crisis had occurred. The Carlists were known to be carrying on an active propaganda, and I had been despatched to Madrid, so as to be on the spot if serious trouble arose. Only one London newspaper keeps a resident correspondent in the Spanish capital, the remainder of the news from that city being supplied through a well-known agency. A few days after my arrival at the Hôtel de Rome, in the Caballero de Gracia, I called upon Señor Navarro Reverter, Minister of Finance, and was granted an interview. I desired to ascertain his views on the situation, and as he had been very communicative during those stormy times at San Sebastian a year before, I had no doubt that he would give me a few opinions worth telegraphing.
As I entered his cosy private room in the Calle de Alcala, and he rose to greet me, my gaze became fixed upon the mantelshelf behind him, for upon it stood two cabinet photographs of a man and a woman.
The one was a counterfeit presentment of Luis d’Avendaño; the other a portrait of Doroteita!
When I had formally “interviewed” him upon the financial reforms and other matters regarding which I desired his opinion, I asked to be allowed to see the photographs, and he handed them to me with a smile.
“Doroteita d’Avendaño!” I ejaculated. The features were unmistakable, though the dress was different.
“Are they – er – friends of yours?” the Minister asked, regarding me keenly from beneath his shaggy brows.
“They were – once,” I answered. “Ever since we were at San Sebastian last year I have been endeavouring to trace them.”
“What? Did she add you to her list of victims?” he asked, laughing.
“Well, the plot was scarcely successful, otherwise I should not be here now,” I replied. Then I told him briefly how, after luring me to their villa, the interesting pair had attempted to murder me.
“Extraordinary!” he ejaculated, when I had finished. “Curiously enough, however, your story supplies just the link in the chain of evidence that was missing at their trial.”
“Their trial?” I exclaimed. “Tell me about them.”
“Well, in the first place, the enchantress you knew as Doroteita d’Avendaño was none other than the notorious Liseta Gonzalez, known to the police