The Game Played in the Dark | Page 4

turned to his attendant.
"I shall be in the study, Parkinson. Show her there in three minutes.
You stay and have another cigarette, Greatorex. By that time she will
either have gone or have interested me."
In three minutes' time Parkinson threw open the study door.
"The lady, sir," he announced.
Could he have seen, Carrados would have received the impression of a
plainly, almost dowdily, dressed young woman of buxom figure. She
wore a light veil, but it was ineffective in concealing the unattraction of
the face beneath. The features were swart and the upper lip darkened
with the more than incipient moustache of the southern brunette. Worse
remained, for a disfiguring rash had assailed patches of her skin. As she
entered she swept the room and its occupant with a quiet but
comprehensive survey.
"Please take a chair, Madame. You wished to see me?"
The ghost of a demure smile flickered about her mouth as she complied,
and in that moment her face seemed less uncomely. Her eye lingered
for a moment on a cabinet above the desk, and one might have noticed
that her eye was very bright. Then she replied.
"You are Signor Carrados, in--in the person?"

Carrados made his smiling admission and changed his position a
fraction--possibly to catch her curiously pitched voice the better.
"The great collector of the antiquities?"
"I do collect a little," he admitted guardedly.
"You will forgive me, Signor, if my language is not altogether good.
When I live at Naples with my mother we let boardings, chiefly to
Inglish and Amerigans. I pick up the words, but since I marry and go to
live in Calabria my Inglish has gone all red--no, no, you say, rusty. Yes,
that is it; quite rusty."
"It is excellent," said Carrados. "I am sure that we shall understand one
another perfectly."
The lady shot a penetrating glance but the blind man's expression was
merely suave and courteous. Then she continued:
"My husband is of name Ferraja--Michele Ferraja. We have a vineyard
and a little property near Forenzana." She paused to examine the tips of
her gloves for quite an appreciable moment. "Signor," she burst out,
with some vehemence, "the laws of my country are not good at all."
"From what I hear on all sides," said Carrados, "I am afraid that your
country is not alone."
"There is at Forenzana a poor labourer, Gian Verde of name,"
continued the visitor, dashing volubly into her narrative. "He is one day
digging in the vineyard, the vineyard of my husband, when his spade
strikes itself upon an obstruction. 'Aha,' says Gian, 'what have we here?'
and he goes down upon his knees to see. It is an oil jar of red earth,
Signor, such as was anciently used, and in it is filled with silver money.
"Gian is poor but he is wise. Does he call upon the authorities? No, no;
he understands that they are all corrupt. He carries what he has found to
my husband for he knows him to be a man of great honour.

"My husband also is of brief decision. His mind is made up. 'Gian,' he
says, 'keep your mouth shut. This will be to your ultimate profit.' Gian
understands, for he can trust my husband. He makes a sign of mutual
implication. Then he goes back to the spade digging.
"My husband understands a little of these things but not enough. We go
to the collections of Messina and Naples and even Rome and there we
see other pieces of silver money, similar, and learn that they are of
great value. They are of different sizes but most would cover a lira and
of the thickness of two. On the one side imagine the great head of a
pagan deity; on the other--oh, so many things I cannot remember
what." A gesture of circumferential despair indicated the hopeless
variety of design.
"A biga or quadriga of mules?" suggested Carrados. "An eagle carrying
off a hare, a figure flying with a wreath, a trophy of arms? Some of
those perhaps?"
"Si, si bene," cried Madame Ferraja. "You understand, I perceive,
Signor. We are very cautious, for on every side is extortion and an
unjust law. See, it is even forbidden to take these things out of the
country, yet if we try to dispose of them at home they will be seized
and we punished, for they are tesoro trovato, what you call treasure
troven and belonging to the State--these coins which the industry of
Gian discovered and which had lain for so long in the ground of my
husband's vineyard."
"So you brought them to England?"
"Si, Signor. It is spoken of as a land of justice and rich nobility who
buy these things at the highest prices. Also my