Chapter 20

THE MAN IN THE SHADOWS

Late one day, a fortnight after her visit to Blake's office, Vittoria returned from a call upon Myra Nell Warren, to find Oliveta in a high state of apprehension. The girl, who had evidently kept watch for her, met her at the door, and inquired, nervously:

"What news? What have you heard?"

"Nothing further, sorella mia."

"Impossible! God in Heaven! I am dying! This suspense--I cannot endure it longer."

Vittoria laid a comforting hand upon her.

"Courage!" she said. "We can only wait. I too am torn by a thousand demons. Caesar has gone, but no one knows where."

Oliveta shuddered. "We are ruined. He suspects."

"So you have said before, but how could he suspect?"

"I don't know, yet judge for yourself. I worm his secrets from him at the cost of kisses and endearments; I hold him in my arms and with smiles and caresses I lead him to betray himself. Then, suddenly, without warning or farewell, he vanishes. I tell you he knows. He has the cunning of the fiend, and your friend Signore Blake has blundered." Oliveta's face blanched with terror. She clung to her companion weakly, repeating over and over: "He will return. God help us, he will return."

"Even though he knows the truth, which is far from likely, he would scarcely dare to come here," Vittoria said, striving with a show of confidence which she did not feel to calm her foster sister.

"You do not know him as I do. You do not know the furies which goad him in his anger."

In spite of herself Vittoria felt choked again by those fears which during the days since Maruffi's disappearance she had with difficulty controlled. She knew that the net had been spread for him in all caution, yet he had slipped through it. Whether he had been warned or whether mere chance had taken him from the city at the last moment, neither she, nor Blake, nor the Chief of Police had been able to learn. All had been done with such secrecy that, except a bare half-dozen trusted officers, no one knew him to be even suspected of a part in the Mafia's affairs. Norvin had been quick to sense the possible danger to the two women, and had urged them to accept his protection; but they had convinced him that such a course had its own dangers, for in case the Mafioso was really unsuspicious the slightest indiscretion on their part might frighten him. Therefore they had insisted upon living as usual until something more definite was known.

This afternoon Vittoria had received a message from Myra Nell, requesting, or rather demanding, her immediate attendance. She had gone gladly, hoping to divert her mind from its present anxieties; but the girl had talked of little except Norvin Blake and the effect had not been calming.

Oliveta soon discovered that her