ich Lady Glyde is about to sign
may be," he continued, "I neither know nor desire to know. I only say
this, circumstances may happen in the future which may oblige Percival,
or his representatives, to appeal to the two witnesses, in which case
it is certainly desirable that those witnesses should represent two
opinions which are perfectly independent the one of the other. This
cannot be if my wife signs as well as myself, because we have but one
opinion between us, and that opinion is mine. I will not have it cast
in my teeth, at some future day, that Madame Fosco acted under my
coercion, and was, in plain fact, no witness at all. I speak in
Percival's interest, when I propose that my name shall appear (as the
nearest friend of the husband), and your name, Miss Halcombe (as the
nearest friend of the wife). I am a Jesuit, if you please to think
so--a splitter of straws--a man of trifles and crochets and
scruples--but you will humour me, I hope, in merciful consideration for
my suspicious Italian character, and my uneasy Italian conscience." He
bowed again, stepped back a few paces, and withdrew his conscience from
our society as politely as he had introduced it.

The Count's scruples might have been honourable and reasonable enough,
but there was something in his manner of expressing them which
increased my unwillingness to be concerned in the business of the
signature. No consideration of less importance than my consideration
for Laura would have induced me to consent to be a witness at all. One
look, however, at her anxious face decided me to risk anything rather
than desert her.

"I will readily remain in the room," I said. "And if I find no reason
for starting any small scruples on my side, you may rely on me as a
witness."

Sir Percival looked at me sharply, as if he was about to say something.
But at the same moment, Madame Fosco attracted his attention by rising
from her chair. She had caught her husband's eye, and had evidently
received her orders to leave the room.

"You needn't go," said Sir Percival.

Madame Fosco looked for her orders again, got them again, said she
would prefer leaving us to our business, and resolutely walked out.
The Count lit a cigarette, went back to the flowers in the window, and
puffed little jets of smoke at the leaves, in a state of the deepest
anxiety about killing the insects.

Meanwhile Sir Percival unlocked a cupboard beneath one of the
book-cases, and produced f