Castle Craneycrow | Page 5

me. Of course he denies
it, but you know what he said when I first asked him if we had met. He
was the tenor in Pagani's opera company, and he sang in several of the
big South American cities. They were in Rio Janeiro for weeks, and we
lived in the same hotel. There's no mistake about it, old man. This
howling swell of to-day was Pagani's tenor, and he was a good one, too.
Gad, what a Romeo he was! Imagine him in the part, Bob. Lord, how
the women raved about him!"
"I say, Phil, don't be ass enough to tell anybody else about this, even if
you're cocksure he's the man. He was doubtless driven to the stage for
financial reasons, you know, and it wouldn't be quite right to bring it up
now if he has a desire to suppress the truth. Since he has come into the
title and estates it might be deuced awkward to have that sort of a past
raked up."
"I should say it would be awkward if that part of his past were raked up.
He wasn't a Puritan, Bob."
"They are a bit scarce at best."
"He was known in those days as Giovanni Pavesi, and he wasn't in such
dire financial straits, either. It was his money that backed the enterprise,
and it was common property, undenied by him or anyone else, that the
chief object in the speculation was the love of the prima donna,
Carmenita Malban. And, Bob, she was the most beautiful woman I ever
saw. The story was that she was a countess or something of the sort.
Poverty forced her to make use of a glorious voice, and the devil sent
Pagani to young Pavesi, who was then a student with some ripping big
master, in the hope that he would interest the young man in a scheme to

tour South America. It seems that Signorita Malban's beauty set his
heart on fire, and he promptly produced the coin to back the enterprise,
the only condition being that he was to sing the tenor roles. All this
came out in the trial, you know." "The trial! What trial?"
"Giovanni's. Let me think a minute. She was killed on the 29th of
March, and he was not arrested until they had virtually convicted one of
the chorus men of the murder. Pagani and Pavesi quarrelled, and the
former openly accused his 'angel' of the crime. This led to an arrest just
as the tenor was getting away on a ship bound for Spain."
"Arrested him for the murder of the woman? On my life, Quentin, you
make a serious blunder unless you can prove all this. When did it all
happen?"
"Two years ago. Oh, I'm not mistaken about it; it is as clear as sunlight
to me now. They took him back and tried him. Members of the troupe
swore he had threatened on numerous occasions to kill her if she
continued to repulse him. On the night of the murder--it was after the
opera--he was heard to threaten her. She defied him, and one of the
women in the company testified that he sought to intimidate Malban by
placing the point of his stiletto against her white neck. But, in spite of
all this, he was acquitted. I was in New York when the trial ended, but I
read of the verdict in the press dispatches. Some one killed her, that is
certain, and the nasty job was done in her room at the hotel. I heard
some of the evidence, and I'll say that I believed he was the guilty man,
but I considered him insane when he committed the crime. He loved
her to the point of madness, and she would not yield to his passion. It
was shown that she loved the chorus singer who was first charged with
her murder."
"Ravorelli doesn't look like a murderer," said Lord Bob, stoutly.
"But he remembers seeing me in that courtroom, Bob."

IV

AND THE GIRL, TOO

"Now tell me all about our Italian friend," said Quentin next morning to
Lady Frances, who had not lost her frank Americanism when she
married Lord Bob, The handsome face of the young prince had been in
his thoughts the night before until sleep came, and then there were
dreams in which the same face appeared vaguely sinister and
foreboding. He had acted on the advice of Lord Bob and had said
nothing of the Brazilian experiences.
"Prince Ugo? I supposed that every newspaper in New York had been
devoting columns to him. He is to marry an American heiress, and
some of the London journals say she is so rich that everybody else
looks poor beside her."
"Lucky dog, eh? Everybody admires