“Oh! I was proceeding in order. I could go back further, and tell you of the mysterious strange death of Madame Ferranti, a charitable lady of Trieste, who had taken you, almost dead with hunger, from the streets into her service. You were sixteen years of age. Your benefactresses had a son. On the day his mother died—she was said to have been poisoned, though there was no definite proof of this—young Ferranti left home with you, carrying off all the ready money, negotiable deeds, and jewels of his dead mother. Was it you or he who gave Madame Ferranti the cup of tea she drank before she fell asleep never to wake again?” “Indeed it was neither he nor I. It was an old servant, who had been twenty years in their service. Besides, she confessed it, and as there was no proof against her, nor against any one else, she was released.” “Whilst you set out for Venice, and had a pleasant time with your companion. Ah! He had a fine way of mourning for his mother, the young Ferranti! It was at the Café Florian, on the Place Saint-Marc, that, one evening when he was drunk, the young ninny picked a quarrel with an Austrian major, who, the following morning, on the Lido, ran six inches of steel into his body, killing him on the spot.” “Quite true! Poor Ferranti! He was a handsome fellow, who waltzed divinely, but was too fond of absinthe. It _was_ that which killed him, or rather the stoccata of Major Bruzelow—a fine man, whose moustaches went almost round his head, but as stupid as his sabre, and as dangerous. It was he who forced me to leave Venice, where I was enjoying myself so well! I could not even speak to a man without the Major challenging him. He would have called out the whole town; I was obliged to go.” “The Austrian police had something to do with it, had they not?” “I have always hated the Tedeschi, and they have always paid me back in the same coin!” “So that you cannot return to Austria, even now?” “No, all by reason of that fool of a Grodsko.” “And what has become of this excellent Grodsko, who broke his mother’s heart all for your sake?” “The excellent Grodsko spends the summer in Vienna, and the winter at Monte Carlo. Both winter and summer he gambles to pass the time, and when he has lost he drowns his disappointment in drink.” “Does he always lose?” “Yes, so he is always drinking.” “Here are a few corpses already, if I know how to count, to your credit, without mentioning the grief, despair, and shame of others. You have lived a very exciting life, though you have scarcely yet reached the age of thirty.” “I was twenty-eight last week,” rectified the Baroness, coldly. “You have trampled on humanity as on a carpet to gain your objects: luxury, pleasure, domination. And here you are to-day more brilliant, better loved, and more powerful than ever, with a strength of will which shrinks before nothing, and a conscience ready for anything. Am I right?”