In Direst Peril | Page 6

any of his inventions, or to show the least
shame when he was discovered in a lie. I am told that people who
suffer from kleptomania cannot be taught to be ashamed of stealing,
though even a dog has grace enough to be abashed if you catch him in
an act of dishonesty. I have met in my lifetime two or three men like
Brunow, who lie without temptation, and who do not feel disgraced
when detected.

For once I could not help believing him, and his story stuck in my mind
in a very disagreeable way, for Miss Rossano fairly haunted me, and
anything which was associated with her had an importance in my eyes.
It was a hard thing to think that such a living tragedy should be so close
to a creature so young and bright and happy. I praised Brunow in my
own mind for his sensible resolution to keep the secret of her father's
existence from her, but I was constantly thinking whether there might
not be some possibility of setting the prisoner free. If I had been a rich
man I could see quite enough chance of adventure to tempt me to the
enterprise. I hated the Austrian rule with all my heart and soul, as at
that time the Austrian rule deserved that every freeborn Englishman
should hate it. The thought of Italian independence set my blood on fire,
and I would as soon have fought for that cause as for any in the world.
I don't care to talk much about my own character, but I have often
laughed to hear myself spoken of as a man whose life has been guided
by romantic considerations. If I know anything about myself at all it is
that I am severely practical. I could not even think of so far-away an
enterprise as the attempted rescue of the count, a thing which, at the
time, I was altogether unlikely and unable to attempt, without taking
account of all the pros and cons, so, far as I could see them. In my own
mind I laid special stress on the friendly attendant mentioned in the
count's brief and pathetic letter. I felt sure that if I only had money
enough to make that fellow feel safe about his future, I could have got
the prisoner away. For in my own practical, hard-headed way I had got
at the maps of the country and had studied the roads and had read up
every line I could find.
If I try to explain what kept me a whole four weeks from accepting
Miss Rossano's invitation to call upon her at the house of her aunt,
Lady Rollinson, I am not at all sure that I shall succeed; I can say quite
truly that there was not a waking hour in all that time in which she did
not occupy my mind. Every morning I resolved that I would make the
promised call, and every day dwindled into midnight without my
having done it. I need not say that I was by this time aware of the
condition of my heart. I ridiculed myself without avail, and tried to
despise myself as a feather-headed fellow who had become a woman's

captive at a glance. It was certainly not her wealth and my poverty
which kept me away from her, for I never gave that matter a single
thought--nor should I at any time in my life have regarded money as an
inducement to marriage, or the want of it as a bar. It was no exalted
idea of her birth as compared with mine, for I am one of the Fyffes of
Dumbartonshire, and there is as good blood in my veins as flows from
the heart of any Italian that ever wore a head. The plain fact, so far as I
can make myself plain, is that I had already determined to win Miss
Rossano for myself if I could, and that I felt that she deserved to be
approached with delicacy and reserve. I knew all the while that I might
be wasting chances, and I endured a good deal of trouble on that
account. But four whole weeks went by before I ventured to obey her
invitation to call, and by that time I was sore afraid that she had
forgotten all about me.
It was Lady Rollinson herself who received me; a fat and comfortable
lady of something more than fifty, as I should judge, though it is a
perilous thing for a man to be meddling with guesses at a lady's age.
She looked as if she could enjoy a good dinner, and as if she liked to
have things soft and cosey about her; but in spite of that, she wore a
countenance of