Page:Arthur Stringer - The Hand of Peril.djvu/217

 you, and that was why, the next day, you forged the signatures to the Paris Electric certificates which had been stolen a month before. Lambert knew, then, that he had you under his thumb. You had killed a man, and no one must know. It was the secret between you and your father. It was the chain that held you down. And Carlesi dead was worth even more to him than Carlesi alive!"

"Oh, don't—don't!" half sobbed the girl. "Don't go on with this!"

But Morello was not to be stopped.

"You killed Carlesi. You leaned out of the window and saw your father carry the body away. You saw it, with your own eyes. But you did not see everything. You did not see where he was taken. You did not see that he was still alive, and that in three weeks' time he was given four thousand lira on condition that he go to America and never be seen back in Italy!"

"What do you mean by that?" gasped the breathless girl.

"I mean what I have said. You did not kill Carlesi. It was this fine father of yours who lied to you, who made you think you had murdered a man!"

"This can't be true—it can't!"

"I can prove it is true. I can bring this man Carlesi to you, and then you will know. He will point out the bullet-wound, with his own finger. Then you will understand who the liar is!"

The girl's voice was so quiet that the listening Kestner could scarcely catch her next words as she spoke.