Best Short Stories Omnibus - Volume 2

I

I“Must I sign this?” asked the poor wretch, as Count Blöwitz pointed to pen, ink, and paper, and bade him sit down, and write.

“It is absolutely imperative that you should,” replied the banker. “Do you suppose,” he added drily, “that I intend to pay you a million francs without any acknowledgment for the money?”

“You have the plans,” retorted the other doggedly.

“Quite so,” said Count Blöwitz sardonically, “but, as I have already explained to you, I do not buy plans of fortifications for my own private use; and, suppose in after years, when I offer them for sale, I should be accused of having stolen them?”

“You would denounce me?” said the traitor, in a trembling voice.

“Not unless I were compelled to do so. After all,” added the banker, after a slight pause, “it is not too late yet. There are your plans, sign nothing, take them back—and go.”

The wretched man hesitated; every conflicting passion was imprinted upon his haggard countenance. With hungering eyes, he watched Count Blöwitz, who, with one hand, was idly toying with a pile of bank notes that lay upon his desk, and with the other held out a bundle of papers—the plans of the fortifications of Odessa, which the traitor had offered him for sale.

“I will sign,” the Russian said at last, and with feverish hands wrote his name, one of the noblest in the empire, at the foot of the receipt that consummated his dishonour.

A contemptuous smile lurked round the corner of Count Blöwitz’ mouth as he proceeded, slowly and deliberately, to count out the money, which he then tossed on the table.

The Russian picked up the notes one by one; his hand was trembling violently but his hesitation had ceased, his lips were tightly set; evidently he was satisfied, and thought the crisp bits of paper sufficient compensation for the infamy.

“One word more before you leave,” said Count Blöwitz, after he had examined the plans and receipt, and locked them up in his bureau; “in the ordinary course of events, I shall probably still meet you in St. Petersburg society. As I have pledged my word to you that no indiscretion on my part shall ever betray you, and it might arouse suspicion that my well-known friendship towards you should so suddenly cease, I am quite willing to shake hands with you when we meet, and even exchange a few words, whenever my abstaining from so doing is likely to create comment. At the same time, I need not remind you that all i*********e with other members of my family must immediately cease; my niece shall herself explain to her friends and acquaintances, that her mind had not been fully made up when she became engaged to you, and that her marriage therefore, has been broken off by mutual consent. You understand?”

The young man who had listened to the early part of the banker’s speech, with head bent, almost annihilated with shame, now looked up, and an absolutely touching glance of appeal, so yearning was it, came into his dark eyes.

“You will not tell her—all?” he said, in tones so pleading, so heart-broken, that the older man stared at him in some astonishment.

“I shall be compelled to tell her all,” he said, “for I am sorry to say she is very much in love with you, and I know that nothing would make her give you up—save knowledge of the truth.”

“It was because I was too poor to marry her that I did—this,” said the young man, in a voice almost broken with despair.

“You did not imagine, I presume,” said Count Blöwitz haughtily, “that, after all that has passed between us, I could ever allow you to approach my niece with a view to marriage?”

“But you—yourself——” gasped the unfortunate young man.

“My dear Constantin, that is altogether a different matter,” rejoined the banker calmly. “To commence with, though my banking house is established in Russia, and I have carried on business at St. Petersburg for thirty years, I am not a Russian. My wife was a Russian, my niece and nephew are Russian, but I am an Austrian, and as such owe no allegiance to this country. I shall offer these plans for sale to the Austrian Government; they will, no doubt, give me a fair price for them. I have your receipt to prove that I was not the thief. A man offers me wares to sell, I buy them from him—at his own figure—with a view to selling them again at a profit; there is no disgrace in that, it is merely a matter of speculation ; and I repeat again, these plans are of Odessa, and I am no Russian.”

“You pushed me to it,” retorted the young man doggedly. “Was it not you who first in my hearing spoke of the large sum that could be obtained for correct traceries of the plans of Odessa? you afterwards who, to goad me to the deed, spoke of Maria’s love of luxury, and probable marriage with a man wealthier than I? you who encouraged me to know her, to love her, acquiesced in our engagement, then threatened to break it off unless my position was very much improved? Then, when my soul was prepared for the poison, was it not you, again, who told me of these speculations your cursed banking-house made in traitors’ deeds?

“Aye, Count Blöwitz, yours was the coward’s part; you wished to run no risk, only reap the reward; you throw me a million, and will probably pocket three times that amount, while with a bland smile you show me the door, call me a vile traitor, unworthy to become a member of your family, and still style yourself the noble and wealthy Count Blöwitz, the head of the great banking-house whom everybody delights to call friend. No! it shall not be! traffic with my honour and your own, if you will, but let there be loyalty among thieves—you shall swear to hold your cursed tongue before Maria, or, by Heaven, I will kill you.”

The banker had at first listened to the young man’s raving speech as he would to the wanderings of a lunatic, but now the Russian’s eyes glared with so fierce, so deadly a hatred, that Count Blöwitz, realising his own probable danger, rose in order to ring for a valet that would rid him of this ranting maniac, who now stood before him with hands tightly clenched and knees bent ready for a spring. There was a moment’s pause and the banker’s hand was already on the bell pull, but whether the fright had been too great, or whether the young Russian’s hands had really grasped his throat, it were impossible to say, for the next instant he staggered back, his hands tried vainly to grasp something for support, he gave one short gasp and fell forward on his face.

The traitor looked round him in bewilderment. What did it mean? What had happened? He knelt down by the side of the banker, whose eyes, still turned upwards, wore that last agonised look of terror, the heart was still, the mouth convulsed, as if in a final fruitless endeavour to shriek for help. Was Count Blöwitz dead? Had fate removed the only witness to the treacherous deed? But then—those plans—that receipt—they were still in that bureau—and the key, there it was, grasped tightly in the dead man’s hand—one effort—it dropped out—no one was coming—the house was still—five minutes more.

An icy perspiration stood on his forehead; his knees were trembling so that he could hardly rise from the position in which he still was. The banker had not stirred; only a more ashen look had spread over his features. The young man closed his eyes; he could not bear to look at them. Then he picked up the key.

“For Heaven’s sake, what is the matter?” said a frightened voice, a girl’s, close at his elbow. The young man shuddered. He did not move; he knew it was too late. The key dropped from his hand on to the floor.

“My uncle!—what has happened? Constantin, why don’t you speak?

“She had fallen on her knees by the side of the dead man, and, taking his head in her arms, turned to the young man.

“Call Antoine at once. He must run for a doctor. But, for Heaven’s sake, tell me what has happened?”

With a superhuman effort, Constantin roused himself, and mechanically began telling her how her uncle had been chatting pleasantly; that suddenly he had got up, not feeling well, and—had fallen forward; Constantin thought he was dead.

Two or three lacqueys had now come in. One of them sent for a doctor, and M. Antoine, the valet, with the help of another, was lifting his master from the floor, to carry him to his room.

Maria Alexandrowna had sunk broken-hearted into a chair, while Constantin still stood there transfixed, his eyes riveted on the floor, where that key—that fatal key—was still lying.

He stooped forward to pick it up, but Maria Alexandrowna saw it, too, for she said: “Give me that key, Constantin; it is that of my dear uncle’s desk. All his private papers are in there, and nobody must touch them till my brother Stefan comes home from Okhotsk. He is my uncle’s nearest male relative, and he will dispose of them as he thinks best.”

Mechanically, and as if in a dream, the young man gave her the key, and she took it from him, little guessing what terrible secrets concerning the man she loved were thus placed in her keeping.

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