XXXIII
WHEN Ida reached her room she put her ear to the closed door leading into Ora’s, and heard the scratch of the hotel pen.
“May I come in?” she asked softly.
There was a rattle of paper, the snap of a trunk lid, and then Ora said in tones as dulcet, “Come in, dear.”
Ida entered and found Ora extended on the sofa.
“What did you run off like that for?” she asked, as she selected the least uncomfortable of the chairs in the fresh and artistic but hardly luxurious room. “The poor man was as glum as a funeral until he’d had two cups of coffee and several cigarettes.”
“I was tired. And I really think he has followed you.”
“You don’t think anything of the sort. His heart was in his patent leathers when he met us, and I just tided him over. He gave me a message for you. Shall I deliver it?”
“Why not?” asked Ora languidly.
“He wants me to impress you with the fact that he’s not come here to make love to you, just to enjoy your exhilarating society——”
“Is he over it?” Ora’s eyes flashed upward.
“Not exactly, but he has no intention of making any more breaks, and being cut off from the solace of your company now and then—principally now, I guess. He’s got to see you or go off to India and shoot tigers. But he’s really much nicer than I had any idea of, and is anxious to give us a good time. Life is a desert, kid, with all the men we know in the next town. Men were invented to amuse us, so do continue to thaw. You did bravely when you got started, and no harm will be done. If you can’t fall in love with him you can’t, and he’s preparedto take his medicine. He’s a good sport. A man like that can behave himself when he sets his mind to it.”
“Is he indulging in the hope that I can be made to care for him?”
“Men are so conceited that they always hope for the best. But he’ll not worry you, that’s the point. It will be fine to have him pilot us about; perhaps he’ll get us inside of one of those old palaces in the Via Garibaldi. And he’ll take us to Monte Carlo. How do you feel about it?”
“I don’t care whether he goes or stays, but on the whole I am rather glad he is here. He has brains and I like to talk to clever men that have seen the world.”
“And don’t keep me hitched to your elbow all the time, for mercy’s sake. I hope he’ll dig up some friend of his here who will beau me. Give him a chance and remember he is a gentleman and has passed his word.”
“Is this a plot?” Ora laughed. “Don’t worry. I won’t bore you any more than I can help. I fancy I am quite safe, for he never really can see me alone, as we have no salon here. Besides, in long days of sight-seeing he’ll no doubt recover, and we shall become merely the best of friends.”
“That’s what I’m figuring on. Now, cut out those love letters and come down to earth.”
Ora sat up in her indignation. “Love letters? I’ve not written a line of love.”
“What in the name of goodness do you write about then to this lover in the air?”
“Oh, I just—talk—about everything that interests me—the things one says to a familiar spirit—that is if there were such a thing—but otherwise has to keep to oneself always.”
“And you don’t call them love letters, because you leave out the ‘darlings’ and ‘dears’? Good thing the man will never see them. Good thing for more reasons than one. Men hate long letters. If I’d disobeyed orders and inflicted Greg, I never would have got that house and the extra ten thousand.”
“And yet he was in love with you once?”
“Thought he was. Just had the usual attack of brain fever men always get when they can’t have the girl they want without marrying her. Lasted about a month. Gregcares too much for other things for any woman to last more than a few minutes in his life, anyway. Just the husband for me.”
Ora was swinging one foot and looking at the point of her slipper.
“I shan’t destroy those letters,” she said finally, “because they have meant something to me that nothing in this life ever will again. But I’ll write no more.”
They remained in Genoa for ten days longer. Valdobia, who had taken rooms at the Miramare, gave them a dinner and they met several of his Genoese friends, but none of the men was blest with Ida’s critical approval. Her demand for the admiration of men was merely a part of her insolent pride in her beauty and magnetism and her love of power; she had little natural coquetry, and wasted no time on a man who bored her or was not “worth while.” She particularly hated soft dark eyes, and the two unfortunate young scions of the aristocracy of Genoa invited by Valdobia, had peculiarly lovely orbs that they rolled exceedingly. But it was a merry party, for no people can be gayer than the Genoese, and they played baccarat until two in the morning; a new experience for the Americans. During the hours devoted to the game Ida had the satisfaction of observing that two pairs of flaming dark eyes had apparently forgotten the existence of woman. Even Valdobia, who held the bank twice and lost a good deal of money, became very keen on the table, although he kept Ora beside him and taught her all that one can learn of a game of chance. The stakes ran very high toward the end, Valdobia lost several thousand francs, and Ora five hundred. She would have lost more, no doubt, for she found it an interesting and exciting experience, but Valdobia dictated her stakes, and she meekly obeyed. Ida, who had been wary, came out even.
“You don’t catch me dropping good money when I don’t get something good enough in return,” she announced as they entered her room at the hotel. “It’s fun all right, but like most things that are off on a side-track from your main purpose in life, just to be nibbled at. I prefer bridge anyhow.”
“Do you? I think I like the game of chance. I don’t mind losing——”
“Well, I do. It made me sick to see you lose five hundred francs, and if it hadn’t been for Valdobia you’d have lost as much more. I couldn’t sleep a wink if I’d lost a hundred plunks.”
Ora laughed. “It would be great fun to see you really excited and carried away about something. I hope you will have visions of sudden wealth at Monte Carlo and forget the world.”
“Not much!” said Ida contemptuously. “I’ll be rich, all right, but it’ll be because I take no chances. I knew whom I was marrying, and he’ll make the millions. You’ll never see me spend a cent unless it brings in good interest, like clothes, and tips, and entertaining. And the only thing that could excite me would be if Amalgamated got the hill, and Greg had to go to work to make his fortune as a mining engineer. But I’m not the kind to get wrinkles worrying. Lord! Don’t the people in this town ever go to sleep?”
Their windows were close to the Via Venti Settembre, although on a short side street. It is possible that the afternoon throngs are replaced by a different set in the evening, and these again by lovers of the night; but certain it is that the more inviting of the streets are rarely deserted until dawn, and the later the revellers the more noisy they are; following a universal law of nature. When the light-hearted Genoese has sung all his songs to the stars and chattered at the top of his voice for several hours, he stands still and screams. The girls put their heads out of the window, wondering if anyone were being murdered below. A group of young men were standing in a circle and outscreaming one another.
Ida slammed the long windows together, fastened the catch and covered them with the heavy shutters. “Me for beauty sleep,” she said; “I like air all right, but I like quiet better. Good night.”
Ora left her window open and lay thinking for a long time. She liked the new excitement of gambling, and she was divided between regret and gratitude that for the last five days she had enjoyed thoroughly the society of the man who would have been the chief exponent of the type she admired had he possessed more primitive strength of personality; had he been obliged to develop his native forces in a fierce battle with life instead of having beenfrom, birth one of her favourites. But he was a man, brave, unsoftened by luxury, quick, keen, resourceful, modern to his finger-tips, an almost perfect companion. What more could any woman ask? Ora wondered just what it was she did ask. She felt very grateful to him, however. Her regret was that her unreal life seemed to be over, or slept profoundly when she perversely and tentatively summoned it. That life had been terrible in its intensity, only retreating now and again when real events crowded, or she deliberately tried to interest herself in a new and charming personality. But all men sooner or later faded to the transparency of wraiths beside the vital figure that dominated her imaginative life. Would Valdobia accomplish the miracle? At least he gave her peace for the moment. She fell asleep smiling and deliberately thinking of him.