three years passed away quietly in the kentish village, and every day olga's unreasoning terror of niaz grew gradually fainter and fainter. if she had known that niaz had escaped from the mines, after eight months' imprisonment, and made his way by means of his tartar friends across the passes to tibet and calcutta, she would not have allowed the sense of security to grow so strong upon her.
meanwhile frank, often in london, had picked up the acquaintance of a certain m. de vouillemont, a french gentleman much about at the clubs, of whose delightful manners and wide acquaintance with the world and men he was never tired of talking to olga. "a most charming man, indeed, de vouillemont, and very anxious to come down here and see hazelhurst. besides, olga, he has been even in russia, and he knows how to talk admirably about everybody and everything. i've asked him down for friday evening. now, do, like a good girl, break your rule for once, and come and dine with us, although there's to be a stranger. it's only one, you know, and the girls would be so delighted if you'd help entertain him, for he speaks hardly any english, and their french, poor things, is horribly insular and boarding-schooly."
at last, with much reluctance, olga consented, and[pg 185] on the friday she went up to the big house at eight punctually.
mrs. davids and the girls were not yet in the drawing-room when she arrived; but m. de vouillemont had dressed early, and was standing with his back to the room, looking intently at some pictures on the wall, as olga entered.
as she came in, and the servant shut the door behind her, the stranger turned slowly. in a moment she recognized him. his complexion was disguised, so as to make him look darker than before; his black moustache was shaved off; his hair was differently cut and dressed; but still, as he looked her in the face, she knew him at once. it was alexander niaz!
petrified with fear, she could neither fly nor scream. she stood still in the middle of the drawing-room, and stared at him fixedly in an agony of terror.
niaz had evidently tracked her down, and come prepared for his horrid revenge. without a moment's delay, his face underwent a hideous change, and from the cultivated european gentleman in evening clothes that he looked when she entered, he was transformed as if by magic into a grinning, gibbering tartar savage, with his tongue lolling out once more, as of old in siberia, in hateful derision of her speechless terror.
seizing her roughly by the arm, he dragged her after him, not so much unresisting as rigid with horror, to the open fireplace. a marble fender ran around the tiled hearth. laying her down upon the rug as if she were dead, he placed her small right hand with savage glee upon that ready-made block, and then proceeded deliberately to take out a small steel hatchet from inside his evening coat. olga was too terrified even to withdraw her hand. he raised the axe on high—it flashed a second in the air—a smart throb of pain—a dreadful crunching of bone and sinew—and olga's hand fell white and lifeless upon the tiled hearthplace. without stopping to look at[pg 186] her for a second, he took it up brutally in his own, and flung it with a horrible oath into the blazing fire.
at that moment, the door opened, and frank entered.
olga, lying faint and bleeding on the hearth rug, was just able to look up at him imploringly and utter in a sharp cry of alarm the one word "niaz."
frank sprang upon him like an angry lion.
"i told her her hand should pay the penalty," the tartar cried, with a horrible joy bursting wildly from his livid features; "and now it burns in the fire over yonder, as she herself shall burn next minute for ever and ever in fire and brimstone."
as he spoke he drew a pistol from his pocket, and pointed it at her with his finger on the trigger.
next moment, before he could fire, frank had seized his hand, flung the pistol to the farther end of the drawing-room, and forced the tartar down upon the floor in a terrible life-and-death struggle.
niaz's face, already livid, grew purpler and purpler as they wrestled with one another on the carpet in that deadly effort. his wrath and vindictiveness gave a mad energy to his limbs and muscles. should he be baulked of his fair revenge at last? should the woman who had betrayed him escape scot-free with just the loss of a hand, and he himself merely exchange a siberian for an english prison? no, no, never! by st. nicholas, never! ha, madame! i will murder you both! the pistol! the pistol! a thousand devils! let me go! i will kill you yet! i will kill you! i will kill you! then he gasped, and grew blacker and purpler—blacker and purpler—blacker—blacker—blacker—ever blacker. presently he gasped again. frank's hand was now upon his mumbling throat. they rolled over and over in their frantic struggles. then a long, slow inspiration. after that, his muscles relaxed. frank loosed him a little, but knelt upon his breast heavily still, lest he should rise again in[pg 187] another paroxysm. but no: he lay quite motionless—quite motionless, and never stirred a single finger.
frank felt his heart—no movement; his pulse—quite quiet; his lips—not a breath perceptible! then he rose, faint and staggoring, and rang for the servants.
when the doctor came hurriedly from the village to bandage up the russian lady's arm, he immediately pronounced that m. de vouillemont was dead—stone dead—not a doubt about it. probably apoplexy under stress of violent emotion.
the inquest was a good deal hushed up, owing to the exceedingly painful circumstances of the case; and to this day very few people about torquay (where she now lives) know how mrs. frank davids, the quiet lady who dresses herself always in black, and has such a beautiful softened half-frightened expression, came to lose her right hand. but everybody knows that mr. davids is tenderness itself to her, and that she loves him in return with the most absolute and childlike devotion.
it was worth cutting off her right hand, after all, to be rid of that awful spectre of niaz, and to have gained the peaceful love of frank davids.
