Take you this precious paper, and lock
it up again carefully in the drawer of that
desk. Let them see you, do it. So; so.  And
you are a witness to it, remember. You will
know and recollect that that is my will,
which leaves the bulk of my property to my
wife—' to my beloved wife.'  Now go."

The latter command was addressed to
Barletti and Veronica, who, nothing loth
to leave that presence, withdrew. It was
the fifth evening after the day the incidents
of which have been narrated in the
preceding chapter. On returning home from
the ship Sir John had taken to his bed,
and had not since left it. He was in a
strangely excited state, and fuller than
usual of capricious ill humour.

After Sir John had dismissed them from
his bedside, Veronica and Barletti remained
tête-à-tête in the large dimly-lighted saloon.
No one observed them. They were free
to remain together as long as they chose.
Sir John, far from displaying suspicion,
seemed to desire Barletti's presence in the
house. But yet the prince made no
attempt to profit by this opportunity of
making love to the beautiful Veronica. She
sat down silently, and with a disturbed
countenance. He walked to the window
whose shutters were unclosed, and looked
out into the moonlight. The oppression of
Sir John's looks and words weighed upon
them both like a hot, stifling air.

Veronica broke the silence. She spoke
in a subdued voice, although there was, as
she well knew, no human creature within
ear-shot.

"Cesare! Why don't you speak to me?
I feel so horribly unstrung."

"Cara! You have been too much tried.
You must try to be strong and composed.
Coraggio."

"I hate such meaningless talk," she
replied, fretfully. " ' Coraggio!' It is not
courage I want. Courage won't explain
and make clear. Do you think, Cesare,
that he is really—dying?"

"He is undoubtedly very, very ill."

"There again! Meaningless empty
words. I know —we all know—that he is
very, very ill. But I ask if you think the
end is near?"

Cesare really loved her, and he was
patient with her as real love is. He seated
himself near her, and softly placed his hand
upon her head.

"Veronica mia," he said, " I am not
skilled in such signs. But it does seem to
me that there is to-night a warning change
in him."

Veronica shuddered and drew close to
him, pressing her shoulder against his with
the gesture, not of a lover, but of a little
frightened child that seeks the comfort of
human contact in the dark.

"He must feel deeply the wrong he did
you," proceeded Cesare. " It must be
owned that he is doing what he can to save
his soul. The testament he has made is a
generous one."

"Yes—I don't know——"

"You don't know?"

"I—I— feel— I cannot explain it; but I
have a strange feeling as though he were
fooling me to the last."

"Fancies, my child. What puts them
into your head?"

"I cannot explain it, I tell you. He
looks at me sometimes almost fiendishly.
And with a kind of exultation in his eyes
too. Just now I almost believed his mind
was wandering."

"No, no; he was in perfect possession
of his senses," said Barletti, hastily, feeling
that this suggestion was an extremely
imprudent one for Sir John's legatee to make.
"He has done everything with forethought
and deliberation. The marriage on board
ship was his own idea, was it not?"

"Yes."

"And on the first distant hint of his
making a provision for you— which you
uttered in accordance with my suggestion
—he met your wishes by telling you that
he had already made a will with which his
widow would have no reason to be
dissatisfied?"

"Yes."

"The will is clearly expressed and duly
witnessed, is it not?"

"He did not show it to me. He merely
read a few words from it."

"But, he stated what its purport was, in
the presence of Paul, who had witnessed it.
And its terms surpassed your expectations.
Is all that not true?"

"Y—yes, I suppose so. Yes; it is true,"
added Veronica, in a firmer tone. Barletti's
recapitulation of the facts was reassuring
her. She had, in truth, spoken at first
with an indistinct hope of eliciting some
such reassuring statement of the case.

"But," she added, after a pause, during
which her memory had vividly recalled
certain of Sir John's looks and words:
"although all that is true, quite true, I
cannot help being made uneasy by his
manner. Why should he do this for me if
he hates me, as I most thoroughly believe
he does?"