Roma's eyes were red with anger and terror, but she tried to laugh over
her fear.
"How simple you are, after all!" she said. "It was Roma Roselli who knew
David Leone, wasn't it? Well, Roma Roselli is dead and buried. Oh, I
know all the story. You did that yourself, and now it cuts the ground
from under you."
"My dear Roma," said the Baron, with a hard and angry face, "if I did
anything in that matter, it was done for your welfare, but whatever it
was, it need not disturb me now. Roma Roselli is not dead, and it
would be easy to bring people from England to say so."
"You daren't! You know you daren't! It would expose them to persecution
for perpetrating a crime."
"In England, not in Italy."
Roma's red eyes fell, and the Baron began to speak in a caressing voice:
"My child, don't fence with me. It is so painful to silence you.... It
is perhaps natural that you should sympathise with the weaker side. That
is the sweet and tender if illogical way of all women. But you must not
imagine that when David Rossi has been arrested he will be walked off to
his death. As a matter of fact, he must go through a new trial, he must
be defended, his sentence would in any case be reduced to imprisonment,
and it may even be wiped out altogether. That's all."
"All? And you ask me to help you to do that?"
"Certainly."
"I won't!"
"Then you could if you would?"
"I can't!"
"Your first word was the better one, my child."
"Very well, I won't! I won't! Aren't you ashamed to ask me to do such a
thing? According to your own story, David Leone was my father's friend,
yet you wish me to give him up to the law that he may be imprisoned,
perhaps for life, and at least turned out of Parliament. Do you suppose
I am capable of treachery like that? Do you judge of everybody by
yourself?... Ah, I know that story too! For shame! For shame!"
The Baron was silent for a moment, and then said in an impassive voice:
"I will not discuss that subject with you now, my child--you are
excited, and don't quite know what you are saying. I will only point out
to you that even if David Leone was your father's friend, David Rossi
was your own enemy."