The Argosy, Vol. XXV, No. 1 — page 118: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

118 BY RIGHT OF SWORD. Another long pause followed. Then she laid her hand in mine and looked straight at me. ‘‘ Are you really a brave man ?’’ she asked. I seemed to take fire under her touch and look. “That is not a question a man can answer for himself. ‘Test me.” ‘If your sister were insulted, would you fight for her?’’ She little knew the cord she had touched, or guessed how the reference cooled me. ‘“T have already done so,’’ I returned. ‘‘ In days of old men fought for any woman who was wronged. Would you ?’”’ ‘‘ I have done it before now,’’ I answered, still thinking of Olga, and my thoughts for some reason slipped back to the first meeting on the Moscow platform. | | She paused and looked away from me for a moment as if hesitating ; and then leaning close to me that I could feel her warm breath on my cheek as she spoke, while her grasp tightened on my arm, she said ina tone of deep feeling : ‘I have been wronged. You see me here as Iam and what I am, but save for the happiness you have made me feel in being with you, I am the most wretched woman in all Russia. Will you help me? Dare you?’’ And she seemed to hang on my words as she waited for my reply, her eyes search- ing mine as if to read my answer there. I was about to reply with a pledge inspired by the enthusiasm with which she had fired: me, when my instinctive caution restrained me. She was quick to see my moment’s hesitation, and not willing to risk a refusal, she added hastily : ‘‘ We cannot talk of this here. I ought not to have spoken of it now ; but you seem to have drawn my very soul from me. Come to me tomorrow to my house. I will be alone at three. You will come—mny friend?’’ And indescribable solicitude spoke through her last two words, all suggestive of infinite trust in me. ‘“Certainly,’”’ Icried. ‘‘ And certainly your friend, if I dare.”’ She answered with a glance; and then seemed to cast aside her excite- ment. Rising she let me lead her back to the ballroom. When I left her there were others round us, but as she bowed I caught a glance and the whispered words : ‘€T trust you.’’ I turned away half bewildered, and went home at once, pondering what was to be the upshot of this new development. CHAPTER XVIII.—THE REASON OF THE INTRIGUE. WHEN I was alone, and the strange charm of the Princess Weletsky’s presence had given way to calm reflection, my doubts began to grow. I was naturally a cautious man under ordinary circumstances: and now my sus- picions were the keener because my caution had been momentarily lulled to sleep. (S@) Eomichbook