"However did you get here?" asked Lydia in surprise.
"I went into Nice," said the girl carelessly. "The detectives were going there and I gave them a lift."
"I see," said Jack, "so you came into Turbie by the back road? I wondered why I hadn't seen your car."
"You expected me, did you?" she smiled, as she sat down at the table and selected a peach from its cotton-wool bed. "I only arrived a second ago, in fact I was opening the door when you almost knocked my head off. What a violent man you are, Jack! I shall have to put you into my story."
Glover had recovered his self-possession by now.
"So you are adding to your other crimes by turning novelist, are you?" he said good-humouredly. "What is the book, Miss Briggerland?"
"It is going to be called 'Suspected,'" she said coolly. "And it will be the Story of a Hurt Soul."
"Oh, I see, a humorous story," said Jack, wilfully dense. "I didn't know you were going to write a biography."
"But do tell me about this, it is very thrilling, Jean," said Lydia, "and it is the first I've heard of it."
Jean was skinning the peach and was smiling as at an amusing thought.
"I've been two years making up my mind to write it," she said, "and I'm going to dedicate it to Jack. I started work on it three or four days ago. Look at my wrist!" She held out her beautiful hand for the girl's inspection.
"It is a very pretty wrist," laughed Lydia, "but why did you want me to see it?"
"If you had a professional eye," said the girl, resuming her occupation, "you would have noticed the swelling, the result of writers' cramp."
"The yarn about your elderly admirer ought to provide a good chapter," said Jack, "and isn't there a phrase 'A Chapter of Accidents'—thatought to go in?"
She did not raise her eyes.
"Don't discourage me," she said a little sadly. "I have to make money somehow."
How much had she heard? Jack was wondering all the time, and he groaned inwardly when he saw how little effect his warning had upon the girl he was striving toprotect. Women are natural actresses, but Lydia was not acting now. She was genuinely fond of Jean and he could see that she had accepted his warnings as the ravings of a diseased imagination. He confirmed this view when after a morning of sight-seeing and the exploration of the spot where, two thousand years before, the Emperor Augustine had erected his lofty "trophy," they returned to the villa. There are some omissions which are marked, and when Lydia allowed him to depart without pressing him to stay to dinner he realised that he had lost the trick.
"When are you going back to London?" she asked.
"To-morrow morning," said Jack. "I don't think I shall come here again before I go."
She did not reply immediately. She was a little penitent at her lack of hospitality, but Jack had annoyed her and the more convincing he had become, the greater had been the irritation he had caused. One question he had to ask but he hesitated.
"About that will——" he began, but her look of weariness stopped him.
It was a very annoyed young man that drove back to the Hôtel de Paris. He had hardly gone before Lydia regretted her brusqueness. She liked Jack Glover more than she was prepared to admit, and though he had onlybeen in Cap Martin for two days she felt a little sense of desolation at his going. Very resolutely she refused even to consider his extraordinary views about Jean. And yet——
Jean left her alone and watched her strolling aimlessly about the garden, guessing the little storm which had developed in her breast. Lydia went to bed early that night, another significant sign Jean noted, and was not sorry, because she wanted to have her father to herself.
Mr. Briggerland listened moodily whilst Jean related all that she had learnt, for she had been in thesalonat the National for a good quarter of an hour before Jack had discovered her.
"I thought he would want her to make a will," she said, "and, of course, although she has rejected the idea now, it will grow on her. I think we have the best part of a week."
"I suppose you have everything cut and dried as usual," growled Mr. Briggerland. "What is your plan?"
"I have three," said Jean thoughtfully, "and two are particularly appealing to me because they do not involve the employment of any third person."
"Had you one which brought in somebody else?" asked Briggerland in surprise. "I thought a clever girl like you——"
"Don't waste your sarcasm on me," saidJean quietly. "The third person whom I considered was Marcus Stepney," and she told him the gist of her conversation with the gambler. Mr. Briggerland was not impressed.
"A thief like Marcus will get out of paying," he said, "and if he can stall you long enough to get the money you may whistle for your share. Besides, a fellow like that isn't really afraid of a charge of bigamy."
Jean, curled up in a big arm-chair, looked up under her eyelashes at her father and laughed.
"I had no intention of letting Marcus marry Lydia," she said coolly, "but I had to dangle something in front of his eyes, because he may serve me in quite another way."
"How did he get those two slashes on his hand?" asked Mr. Briggerland suddenly.
"Ask him," she said. "Marcus is getting a little troublesome. I thought he had learnt his lesson and had realised that I am not built for matrimony, especially for a hectic attachment to a man who gains his livelihood by cheating at cards."
"Now, now, my dear," said her father.
"Please don't be shocked," she mocked him. "You know as well as I do how Marcus lives."
"The boy is very fond of you."
"The boy is between thirty and thirty-six," she said tersely. "And he's not the kind ofboy that I am particularly fond of. He is useful and may be more useful yet."
She rose, stretched her arms and yawned.
"I'm going up to my room to work on my story. You are watching for Mr. Jaggs?"
"Work on what?" he said.
"The story I am writing and which I think will create a sensation," she said calmly.
"What's this?" asked Briggerland suspiciously. "A story? I didn't know you were writing that kind of Stuff."
"There are lots of important things that you know nothing about, parent," she said and left him a little dazed.
For once Jean was not deceiving him. A writing table had been put in her room and a thick pad of paper awaited her attention. She got into her kimono and with a little sigh sat down at the table and began to write. It was half-past two when she gathered up the sheets and read them over with a smile which was half contempt. She was on the point of getting into bed when she remembered that her father was keeping watch below. She put on her slippers and went downstairs and tapped gently at the door of the darkened dining-room.
Almost immediately it was opened.
"What did you want to tap for?" he grumbled. "You gave me a start."
"I preferred tapping to being shot," she answered. "Have you heard anything or seen anybody?"
The French windows of the dining-room were open, her father was wearing his coat and on his arm she saw by the reflected starlight from outside he carried a shot-gun.
"Nothing," he said. "The old man hasn't come to-night."
She nodded.
"Somehow I didn't think he would," she said.
"I don't see how I can shoot him without making a fuss."
"Don't be silly," said Jean lightly. "Aren't the police well aware that an elderly gentleman has threatened my life, and would it be remarkable if seeing an ancient man prowl about this house you shot him on sight?"
She bit her lips thoughtfully.
"Yes, I think you can go to bed," she said. "He will not be here to-night. To-morrow night, yes."
She went up to her room, said her prayers and went to bed and was asleep immediately.
Lydia had forgotten about Jean's story until she saw her writing industriously at a small table which had been placed on the lawn. It was February, but the wind and the sun were warm and Lydia thought she had never seen a more beautiful picture than the girl presentedsitting there in a garden spangled with gay flowers, heavy with the scent of February roses, a dainty figure of a girl, almost ethereal in her loveliness.
"Am I interrupting you?"
"Not a bit," said Jean, putting down her pen and rubbing her wrist. "Isn't it annoying. I've got to quite an exciting part, and my wrist is giving me hell."
She used the word so naturally that Lydia forgot to be shocked.
"Can I do anything for you?"
Jean shook her head.
"I don't exactly see what you can do," she said, "unless you could—but, no, I would not ask you to do that!"
"What is it?" asked Lydia.
Jean puckered her brows in thought.
"I suppose you could do it," she said, "but I'd hate to ask you. You see, dear, I've got a chapter to finish and it really ought to go off to London to-day. I am very keen on getting an opinion from a literary friend of mine—but, no, I won't ask you."
"What is it?" smiled Lydia. "I'm sure you're not going to ask the impossible."
"The thought occurred to me that perhaps you might write as I dictated. It would only be two or three pages," said the girl apologetically. "I'm so full of the story at this moment that it would be a shame if I allowed the divinefire of inspiration—that's the term, isn't it—to go out."
"Of course I'll do it," said Lydia. "I can't write shorthand, but that doesn't matter, does it?"
"No, longhand will be quick enough for me. My thoughts aren't so fast," said the girl.
"What is it all about?"
"It is about a girl," said Jean, "who has stolen a lot of money——"
"How thrilling!" smiled Lydia.
"And she's got away to America. She is living a very full and joyous life, but the thought of her sin is haunting her and she decides to disappear and let people think she has drowned herself. She is really going into a convent. I've got to the point where she is saying farewell to her friend. Do you feel capable of being harrowed?"
"I never felt fitter for the job in my life," said Lydia, and sitting down in the chair the girl had vacated, she took up the pencil which the other had left.
Jean strolled up and down the lawn in an agony of mental composition and presently she came back and began slowly to dictate.
Word by word Lydia wrote down the thrilling story of the girl's remorse, and presently came to the moment when the heroine was inditing a letter to her friend.
"Take a fresh page," said Jean, as Lydiapaused half-way down one sheet. "I shall want to write something in there myself when my hand gets better. Now begin:
"My dear Friend."
Lydia wrote down the words and slowly the girl dictated.
"I do not know how I can write you this letter. I intended to tell you when I saw you the other day how miserable I was. Your suspicion hurt me less than your ignorance of the one vital event in my life which has now made living a burden. My money has brought no joy to me. I have met a man I love, but with whom I know a union is impossible. We are determined to die together—farewell—"
"I do not know how I can write you this letter. I intended to tell you when I saw you the other day how miserable I was. Your suspicion hurt me less than your ignorance of the one vital event in my life which has now made living a burden. My money has brought no joy to me. I have met a man I love, but with whom I know a union is impossible. We are determined to die together—farewell—"
"You said she was going away," interrupted Lydia.
"I know," Jean nodded. "Only she wants to give the impression——"
"I see, I see," said Lydia. "Go on."
"Forgive me for the act I am committing, which you may think is the act of a coward, and try to think as well of me as you possibly can. Your friend——"
"Forgive me for the act I am committing, which you may think is the act of a coward, and try to think as well of me as you possibly can. Your friend——"
"I don't know whether to make her sign her name or put her initials," said Jean, pursing her lips.
"What is her name?"
"Laura Martin. Just put the initials L.M."
"They're mine also," smiled Lydia. "What else?"
"I don't think I'll do any more," said Jean. "I'm not a good dictator, am I? Though you're a wonderful amanuensis."
She collected the papers tidily, put them in a little portfolio and tucked them under her arm.
"Let us gamble the afternoon away," said Jean. "I want distraction."
"But your story? Haven't you to send it off?"
"I'm going to wrestle with it in secret, even if it breaks my wrist," said Jean brightly.
She took the portfolio up to her room, locked the door and sorted over the pages. The page which held the farewell letter she put carefully aside. The remainder, including all that part of the story she had written on the previous night, she made into a bundle, and when Lydia had gone off with Marcus Stepney to swim, she carried the paper to a remote corner of the grounds and burnt it sheet by sheet. Again she examined the "letter," folded it and locked it in a drawer.
Lydia, returning from her swim, was met by Jean half-way up the hill.
"By the way, my dear, I wish you would give me Jack Glover's London address," she said as they went into the house. "Write ithere. Here is a pencil." She pulled out an envelope from a stationery rack and Lydia, in all innocence, wrote as she requested.
The envelope Jean carried upstairs, put into it the letter signed "L. M.," and sealed it down. Lydia Meredith was nearer to death at that moment than she had been on the afternoon when Mordon the chauffeur brought his big Fiat on to the pavement of Berkeley Street.
It was in the evening of the next day that Lydia received a wire from Jack Glover. It was addressed from London and announced his arrival.
"Doesn't it make you feel nice, Lydia," said Jean, when she saw the telegram, "to have a man in London looking after your interests—a sort of guardian angel—and another guardian angel prowling round your demesne at Cap Martin?"
"You mean Jaggs? Have you seen him?"
"No, I have not seen him," said the girl softly. "I should rather like to see him. Do you know where he is staying at Monte Carlo?"
Lydia shook her head.
"I hope I shall see him before I go," said Jean. "He must be a very interesting old gentleman."
It was Mr. Briggerland who first caught a glimpse of Lydia's watchman. Mr. Briggerland had spent the greater part of the day sleeping. He was unusually wakeful at one o'clock in the morning, and sat on the veranda in a fur-lined overcoat, his gun lay across hisknees. He had seen many mysterious shapes flitting across the lawn, only to discover on investigation that they were no more than the shadows which the moving tree-tops cast.
At two o'clock he saw a shape emerge from the tree belt and move stealthily in the shadow of the bushes toward the house. He did not fire because there was a chance that it might have been one of the detectives who had promised to keep an eye upon the Villa Casa in view of the murderous threats which Jean had received.
Noiselessly he rose and stepped in his rubber shoes to the darker end of the stoep. It was old Jaggs. There was no mistaking him. A bent man who limped cautiously across the lawn and was making for the back of the house. Mr. Briggerland cocked his gun and took aim....
Both girls heard the shot, and Lydia, springing out of bed, ran on to the balcony.
"It's all right, Mrs. Meredith," said Briggerland's voice. "It was a burglar, I think."
"You haven't hurt him?" she cried, remembering old Jaggs's nocturnal habits.
"If I have, he's got away," said Briggerland. "He must have seen me and dropped."
Jean flew downstairs in her dressing-gown and joined her father on the lawn.
"Did you get him?" she asked in a low voice.
"I could have sworn I shot him," said her father in the same tone, "but the old devil must have dropped."
He heard the quick catch of her breath and turned apprehensively.
"Now, don't make a fuss about it, Jean, I couldn't help it."
"You couldn't help it!" she almost snarled. "You had him under your gun and you let him go. Do you think he'll ever come again, you fool?"
"Now look here, I'm not going to——" began Mr. Briggerland, but she snatched the gun from his hand, looked swiftly at the lock and ran across the lawn toward the trees.
Somebody was hiding. She sensed that and all her nerves were alert. Presently she saw a crouching figure and lifted the gun, but before she could fire it was wrested from her hand.
She opened her lips to cry out for help, but a hand closed over her mouth, and swung her round so that her back was toward her assailant, and then in a flash his arm came round her neck, the flex of the elbow against her throat.
"Say one of them prayers of yours," said a voice in her ear, and the arm tightened.
She struggled furiously, but the man held her as though she were a child.
"You're going to die," whispered the voice. "How do you like the sensation?"
The arm tightened on her neck. She wassuffocating, dying she thought, and her heart was filled with a wild, mad longing for life and a terror undreamt of. She could faintly hear her father's voice calling her and then consciousness departed.
When Jean came to herself she was in Lydia Meredith's arms. She opened her eyes and saw the pathetic face of her father looming from the background. Her hand went up to her throat.
"Hallo, people—how did I get here?" she asked as she struggled into a sitting position.
"I came in search of you and found you lying on the ground," quavered Mr. Briggerland.
"Did you see the man?" she asked.
"No. What happened to you, darling?"
"Nothing," she said with that composure which she could command. "I must have fainted. It was rather ridiculous of me, wasn't it?" she smiled.
She got unsteadily to her feet and again she felt her throat. Lydia noticed the action.
"Did he hurt you?" she asked anxiously. "It couldn't have been Jaggs."
"Oh no," smiled Jean, "it couldn't have been Jaggs. I think I'll go to bed."
She did not expect to sleep. For the first time in her extraordinary life fear had come to her, and she had shivered on the very edge of the abyss. She felt the shudder she could notrepress and shook herself impatiently. Then she extinguished the light and went to the window and looked out. Somewhere there in the darkness she knew her enemy was hidden, and again that sense of apprehension swept over her.
"I'm losing my nerve," she murmured.
It was extraordinary to Lydia Meredith that the girl showed no sign of her night's adventure when she came in to breakfast on the following morning. She looked bright. Her eyes were clear and her delicate irony as pointed as though she had slept the clock round.
Lydia did not swim that day, and Mr. Stepney had his journey out to Cap Martin in vain. Nor was she inclined to go back with him to Monte Carlo to the Casino in the afternoon, and Mr. Stepney began to realise that he was wasting valuable time.
Jean found her scribbling in the garden and Lydia made no secret of the task she was undertaking.
"Making your will? What a grisly idea?" she said as she put down the cup of tea she had carried out to the girl.
"Isn't it," said Lydia with a grimace. "It is the most worrying business, too, Jean. There is nobody I want to leave money to except you and Mr. Glover."
"For heaven's sake don't leave me any or Jack will think I am conspiring to bring aboutyour untimely end," said Jean. "Why make a will at all?"
There was no need for her to ask that, but she was curious to discover what reply the girl would make, and to her surprise Lydia fenced with the question.
"It is done in all the best circles," she said good-humouredly. "And, Jean, I'm not interested in a single public institution! I don't know by title the name of any home for dogs, and I shouldn't be at all anxious to leave my money to one even if I did."
"Then you'd better leave it to Jack Glover," said the girl, "or to the Lifeboat Institution."
Lydia threw down her pencil in disgust.
"Fancy making one's will on a beautiful day like this, and giving instructions as to where one should be buried. Brrr! Jean," she asked suddenly, "was it Mr. Jaggs you saw in the wood?"
Jean shook her head.
"I saw nobody," she said. "I went in to look for the burglar; the excitement must have been too much for me, and I fainted."
But Lydia was not satisfied.
"I can't understand Mr. Jaggs myself," she said, but Jean interrupted her with a cry.
Lydia looked up and saw her eyes shining and her lips parting in a smile.
"Of course," she said softly. "He used to sleep at your flat, didn't he?"
"Yes, why?" asked the girl in surprise.
"What a fool I am, what a perfect fool!" said Jean, startled out of her accustomed self-possession.
"I don't quite know where your folly comes in, but perhaps you will tell me," but Jean was laughing softly.
"Go on and make your will," she said mockingly. "And when you've finished we'll go into the rooms and chase the lucky numbers. Poor dear Mrs. Cole-Mortimer is feeling a little neglected, too, we ought to do something for her."
The day and night passed without any untoward event. In the evening Jean had an interview with her French chauffeur, and afterwards disappeared into her room. Lydia tapping at her door to bid her good night received no answer.
Day was breaking when old Jaggs came out from the trees in his furtive way and glancing up and down the road made his halting way toward Monte Carlo. The only objects in sight was a donkey laden with market produce led by a bare-legged boy who was going in the same direction as he.
A little more than a mile along the road he turned sharply to the right and began climbing a steep and narrow bridle path which joined the mountain road, half-way up to La Turbie. The boy with the donkey turned off to the mainroad and continued the steep climb toward the Grande Corniche. There were many houses built on the edge of the road and practically on the edge of precipices, for the windows facing the sea often looked sheer down for two hundred feet. At first these dwellings appeared in clusters, then as the road climbed higher, they occurred at rare intervals.
The boy leading the donkey kept his eye upon the valley below, and from time to time caught a glimpse of the old man who had now left the bridle path, and was picking his way up the rough hill-side. He was making for a dilapidated house which stood at one of the hairpin bends of the road, and the donkey-boy, shading his eyes from the glare of the rising sun, saw him disappear into what must have been the cellar of the house, since the door through which he went was a good twenty feet beneath the level of the road. The donkey-boy continued his climb, tugging at his burdened beast, and presently he came up to the house. Smoke was rising from one of the chimneys, and he halted at the door, tied the rope he held to a rickety gate post, and knocked gently.
A bright-faced peasant woman came to the open door and shook her head at the sight of the wares with which the donkey was laden.
"We want none of your truck, my boy," she said. "I have my own garden. You are not a Monogasque."
"No, signora," replied the boy, flashing his teeth with a smile. "I am from San Remo, but I have come to live in Monte Carlo to sell vegetables for my uncle, and he told me I should find a lodging here."
She looked at him dubiously.
"I have one room which you could have, boy," she said, "though I do not like Italians. You must pay me a franc a night, and your donkey can go into the shed of my brother-in-law up the hill."
She led the way down a flight of ancient stairs and showed him a tiny room overlooking the valley.
"I have one other man who lives here," she said. "An old one, who sleeps all day and goes out all night. But he is a very respectable man," she added in defence of her client.
"Where does he sleep?" asked the boy.
"There!" The woman pointed to a room on the opposite side of the narrow landing. "He has just come in, I can hear him." She listened.
"Will madame get me change for this?" The boy produced a fifty-franc note, and the woman's eyebrows rose.
"Such wealth!" she said good-naturedly. "I did not think that a little boy like you could have such money."
She bustled upstairs to her own room, leavingthe boy alone. He waited until her heavy footsteps sounded overhead, and then gently he tried the door of the other lodger. Mr. Jaggs had not yet bolted the door, and the spy pushed it open and looked. What he saw satisfied him, for he pulled the door tight again, and as the footfall of old Jaggs came nearer the door, the donkey-boy flew upstairs with extraordinary rapidity.
"I will come later, madame," he said, when he had received the change. "I must take my donkey into Monte Carlo."
She watched the boy and his beast go down the road, and went back to the task of preparing her lodger's breakfast.
To Monte Carlo the cabbage seller did not go. Instead, he turned back the way he had come, and a hundred yards from the gate of Villa Casa, Mordon, the chauffeur, appeared, and took the rope from his hand.
"Did you find what you wanted, mademoiselle?" he asked.
Jean nodded. She got into the house through the servants' entrance and up to her room without observation. She pulled off the black wig and applied herself to removing the stains from her face. It had been a good morning's work.
"You must keep Mrs. Meredith fully occupied to-day." She waylaid her father on the stairs to give him these instructions.
For her it was a busy morning. First she went to the Hôtel de Paris, and on the pretext of writing a letter in the lounge, secured two or three sheets of the hotel paper and an envelope. Next she hired a typewriter and carried it with her back to the house. She was working for an hour before she had the letter finished. The signature took her some time. She had to ransack Lydia's writing case before she found a letter from Jack Glover—Lydia's signature was easy in comparison.
This, and a cheque drawn from the back of Lydia Meredith's cheque-book, completed her equipment.
That afternoon Mordon, the chauffeur, motored into Nice, and by nine o'clock that night an aeroplane deposited him in Paris. He was in London the following morning, a bearer of an urgent letter to Mr. Rennett, the lawyer, which, however, he did not present in person.
Mordon knew a French girl in London, and she it was who carried the letter to Charles Rennett—a letter that made him scratch his head many times before he took a sheet of paper, and addressing the manager of Lydia's bank, wrote:
"This cheque is in order. Please honour."
"Desperate diseases," said Jean Briggerland, "call for desperate remedies."
Mr. Briggerland looked up from his book.
"What was that tale you were telling Lydia this morning," he asked, "about Glover's gambling? He was only here a day, wasn't he?"
"He was here long enough to lose a lot of money," said Jean. "Of course he didn't gamble, so he did not lose. It was just a little seed-sowing on my part—one never knows how useful the right word may be in the right season."
"Did you tell Lydia that he was losing heavily?" he asked quickly.
"Am I a fool? Of course not! I merely said that youth would be served, and if you have the gambling instinct in you, why, it didn't matter what position you held in society or what your responsibilities were, you must indulge your passion."
Mr. Briggerland stroked his chin. There were times when Jean's schemes got very far beyond him, and he hated the mentalexercise of catching up. The only thing he knew was that every post from London bore urgent demands for money, and that the future held possibilities which he did not care to contemplate. He was in the unfortunate position of having numerous pensioners to support, men and women who had served him in various ways and whose approval, but what was more important, whose loyalty, depended largely upon the regularity of their payments.
"I shall gamble or do something desperate," he said with a frown. "Unless you can bring off a coup that will produce twenty thousand pounds of ready money we are going to get into all kinds of trouble, Jean."
"Do you think I don't know that?" she asked contemptuously. "It is because of this urgent need of money that I have taken a step which I hate."
He listened in amazement whilst she told him what she had done to relieve her pressing needs.
"We are getting deeper and deeper into Mordon's hands," he said, shaking his head. "That is what scares me at times."
"You needn't worry about Mordon," she smiled. Her smile was a little hard. "Mordon and I are going to be married."
She was examining the toe of her shoe attentively as she spoke, and Mr. Briggerland leapt to his feet.
"What!" he squeaked. "Marry a chauffeur? A fellow I picked out of the gutter? You're mad! The fellow is a rascal who has earned the guillotine time and time again."
"Who hasn't?" she asked, looking up.
"It is incredible! It's madness!" he said. "I had no idea——" he stopped for want of breath.
Mordon was becoming troublesome. She had known that better than her father.
"It was after the 'accident' that didn't happen that he began to get a little tiresome," she said. "You say we are getting deeper and deeper into his hands? Well, he hinted as much, and I did not like it. When he began to get a little loving I accepted that way out as an easy alternative to a very unpleasant exposure. Whether he would have betrayed us I don't know; probably he would."
Mr. Briggerland's face was dark.
"When is this interesting event to take place?"
"My marriage? In two months, I think. When is Easter? That class of person always wants to be married at Easter. I asked him to keep our secret and not to mention it to you, and I should not have spoken now if you had not referred to the obligation we were under."
"In two months?" Mr. Briggerland nodded. "Let me know when you want this to end, Jean," he said.
"It will end almost immediately. Please do not trouble," said Jean, "and there is one other thing, father. If you see Mr. Jaggs in the garden to-night, I beg of you do not attempt to shoot him. He is a very useful man."
Her father sank back in his chair.
"You're beyond me," he said, helplessly.
Mordon occupied two rooms above the garage, which was conveniently situated for Jean's purpose. He arrived late the next night, and a light in his window, which was visible from the girl's room, told her all she wanted to know.
Mr. Mordon was a good-looking man by certain standards. His hair was dark and glossily brushed. His normal pallor of countenance gave him the interesting appearance which men of his kind did not greatly dislike, and he had a figure which was admired in a dozen servants' halls, and a manner which passed amongst housemaids for "gentlemanly," and amongst gentlemen as "superior." He heard the foot of the girl on the stairs, and opened the door.
"You have brought it?" she said, without a preliminary word.
She had thrown a dark cloak over her evening dress, and the man's eyes feasted on her.
"Yes, I have brought it—Jean," he said.
She put her finger to her lips.
"Be careful, François," she cautioned in a low voice.
Although the man spoke English as well as he spoke French, it was in the latter language that the conversation was carried on. He went to a grip which lay on the bed, opened it and took out five thick packages of thousand-franc notes.
"There are a thousand in each, mademoiselle. Five million francs. I changed part of the money in Paris, and part in London."
"The woman—there is no danger from her?"
"Oh no, mademoiselle," he smiled complacently. "She is not likely to betray me, and she does not know my name or where I am living. She is a girl I met at a dance at the Swiss Waiters' Club," he explained. "She is not a good character. I think the French police wish to find her, but she is very clever."
"What did you tell her?" asked Jean.
"That I was working a coup with Vaud and Montheron. These are two notorious men in Paris whom she knew. I gave her five thousand francs for her work."
"There was no trouble?"
"None whatever, mademoiselle. I watched her, and saw she carried the letter to the bank. As soon as the money was changed I left Croydon by air for Paris, and came on from Paris to Marseilles by aeroplane."
"You did well, François," she said, and patted his hand.
He would have seized hers, but she drew back.
"You have promised, François," she said with dignity, "and a French gentleman keeps his word."
François bowed.
He was not a French gentleman, but he was anxious that this girl should think he was, and to that end had told her stories of his birth which had apparently impressed her.
"Now will you do something more for me?"
"I will do anything in the world, Jean," he cried passionately, and again a restraining hand fell on his shoulder.
"Then sit down and write; your French is so much better than mine."
"What shall I write?" he asked. She had never called upon him for proof of his scholarship, and he was childishly eager to reveal to the woman he loved attainments of which he had no knowledge.
"Write, 'Dear Mademoiselle'." He obeyed.
"'have returned from London, and have confessed to Madame Meredith that I have forged her name and have drawn £100,000 from her bank——'"
"'have returned from London, and have confessed to Madame Meredith that I have forged her name and have drawn £100,000 from her bank——'"
"Why do I write this, Jean?" he asked in surprise.
"I will tell you one day—go on. François," she continued her dictation.
"'And now I have learnt that Madame Meredith loves me. There is only one end to this—that which you see——'"
"'And now I have learnt that Madame Meredith loves me. There is only one end to this—that which you see——'"
"Do you intend passing suspicion to somebody else?" he asked, evidently fogged, "but why should I say——?"
She stopped his mouth with her hand.
"How wonderful you are, Jean," he said, admiringly, as he blotted the paper and handed it to her. "So that if this matter is traced to you——" She looked into his eyes and smiled.
"There will be trouble for somebody," she said, softly, as she put the paper in her pocket.
Suddenly, before she could realise what was happening he had her in his arms, his lips pressed against hers.
"Jean, Jean!" he muttered. "You adorable woman!"
Gently she pressed him back and she was still smiling, though her eyes were like granite.
"Gently, François," she said, "you must have patience!"
She slipped through the door and closed it behind her, and even in her then state of mind she did not slam it, nor did she hurry down the stairs, but went out, taking her time, and was back in the house without her absence having been noticed. Her face, reflected in her long mirror, was serene in its repose, but within her a devil was alive, hungry for destruction. Noman had roused the love of Jean Briggerland, but at least one had succeeded in bringing to life a consuming hate which, for the time being, absorbed her.
From the moment she drew her wet handkerchief across her red lips and flung the dainty thing as though it were contaminated through the open window, François Mordon was a dead man.
A letter from Jack Glover arrived the next morning. He had had an easy journey, was glad to have had the opportunity of seeing Lydia, and hoped she would think over the will. Lydia was not thinking of wills, but of an excuse to get back to London. Of a sudden the loveliness of Monte Carlo had palled upon her, and she had almost forgotten the circumstances which had made the change of scene and climate so welcome.
"Go back to London, my dear?" said Mrs. Cole-Mortimer, shocked. "What a—a rash notion! Why it isfreezingin town and foggy and ... and I really can't let you go back!"
Mrs. Cole-Mortimer was agitated at the very thought. Her own good time on the Riviera depended upon Lydia staying. Jean had made that point very clear. She, herself, she explained to her discomforted hostess, was ready to go back at once, and the prolongation of Mrs. Cole-Mortimer's stay depended upon Lydia's plans. A startling switch of cause and effect, for Mrs. Cole-Mortimer had understood that Jean's will controlled the plans of the party.
Lydia might have insisted, had she really known the reason for her sudden longing for the grimy metropolis. But she could not even convince herself that the charms of Monte Carlo were contingent upon the presence there of a man who had aroused her furious indignation and with whom she had spent most of the time quarrelling. She mentioned her unrest to Jean, and Jean as usual seemed to understand.
"The Riviera is rather like Turkish Delight—very sweet, but unsatisfying," she said. "Stay another week and then if you feel that way we'll all go home together."
"This means breaking up your holiday," said Lydia in self-reproach.
"Not a bit," denied the girl, "perhaps I shall feel as you do in a week's time."
A week! Jean thought that much might happen in a week. In truth events began to move quickly from that night, but in a way she had not anticipated.
Mr. Briggerland, who had been reading the newspaper through the conversation, looked up.
"They are making a great fuss of this Moor in Nice," he said, "but if I remember rightly, Nice invariably has some weird lion to adore."
"Muley Hafiz," said Lydia. "Yes, I saw him the day I went to lunch with Mr. Stepney, a fine-looking man."
"I'm not greatly interested in natives," said Jean carelessly. "What is he, a negro?"
"Oh, no, he's fairer than—" Lydia was about to say "your father," but thought it discreet to find another comparison. "He's fairer than most of the people in the south of France," she said, "but then all very highly-bred Moors are, aren't they?"
Jean shook her head.
"Ethnology means nothing to me," she said humorously. "I've got my idea of Moors from Shakespeare, and I thought they were mostly black. What is he then? I haven't read the papers."
"He is the Pretender to the Moorish throne," said Lydia, "and there has been a lot of trouble in the French Senate about him. France supports his claims, and the Spaniards have offered a reward for his body, dead or alive, and that has brought about a strained relationship between Spain and France."
Jean regarded her with an amused smile.
"Fancy taking an interest in international politics. I suppose that is due to your working on a newspaper, Lydia."
Jean discovered that she was to take a greater interest in Muley Hafiz than she could have thought was possible. She had to go into Monte Carlo to do some shopping. Mentone was nearer, but she preferred the drive into the principality.
The Rooms had no great call for her, and whilst Mordon went to a garage to have afaulty cylinder examined, she strolled on to the terrace of the Casino, down the broad steps towards the sea. The bathing huts were closed at this season, but the little road down to the beach is secluded and had been a favourite walk of hers in earlier visits.
Near the huts she passed a group of dark-looking men in long white jellabs, and wondered which of these was the famous Muley. One she noticed with a particularly negro type of face, wore on his flowing robe the scarlet ribbon of the Legion of Honour. Somehow or other he did not seem interesting enough to be Muley, she thought as she went on to a strip of beach.
A man was standing on the sea shore, a tall, commanding man, gazing out it seemed across the sunlit ocean as though he were in search of something. He could not have heard her footfall because she was walking on the sand, and yet he must have realised her presence, for he turned, and she almost stopped at the sight of his face. He might have been a European; his complexion was fair, though his eyebrows and eyes were jet black, as also was the tiny beard and moustache he wore. Beneath the conventional jellab he wore a dark green jacket, and she had a glimpse of glittering decorations before he pulled over his cloak so that they were hidden. But it was his eyes which held her. They were large and as blackas night, and they were set in a face of such strength and dignity that Jean knew instinctively that she was looking upon the Moorish Pretender.
They stood for a second staring at one another, and then the Moor stepped aside.
"Pardon," he said in French, "I am afraid I startled you."
Jean was breathing a little quicker. She could not remember in her life any man who had created so immediate and favourable an impression. She forgot her contempt for native people, forgot his race, his religion (and religion was a big thing to Jean), forgot everything except that behind those eyes she recognised something which was kin to her.
"You are English, of course," he said in that language.
"Scottish," smiled Jean.
"It is almost the same, isn't it?" He spoke without any trace of an accent, without an error of grammar, and his voice was the voice of a college man.
He had left the way open for her to pass on, but she lingered.
"You are Muley Hafiz, aren't you?" she asked, and he turned his head. "I've read a great deal about you," she added, though in truth she had read nothing.
He laughed, showing two rows of perfect white teeth. It was only by contrast with theirwhiteness that she noticed the golden brown of his complexion.
"I am of international interest," he said lightly and glanced round toward his attendants.
She thought he was going and would have moved on, but he stopped her.
"You are the first English speaking person I have talked to since I've been in France," he said, "except the American Ambassador." He smiled as at a pleasant recollection.
"You talk almost like an Englishman yourself."
"I was at Oxford," he said. "My brother was at Harvard. My father, the brother of the late Sultan, was a very progressive man and believed in the Western education for his children. Won't you sit down?" he asked, pointing to the sand.
She hesitated a second, and then sank to the ground, and crossing his legs he sat by her side.
"I was in France for four years," he carried on, evidently anxious to hold her in conversation, "so I speak both languages fairly well. Do you speak Arabic?" He asked the question solemnly, but his eyes were bright with laughter.
"Not very well," she answered gravely. "Are you staying very long?" It was a conventional question and she was unprepared for the reply.
"I leave to-night," he said, "though veryfew people know it. You have surprised a State secret," he smiled again.
And then he began to talk of Morocco and its history, and with extraordinary ease he traced the story of the families which had ruled that troubled State.
He touched lightly on his own share in the rebellion which had almost brought about a European war.
"My uncle seized the throne, you know," he said, taking up a handful of sand and tossing it up in the air. "He defeated my father and killed him, and then we caught his two sons."
"What happened to them?" asked Jean curiously.
"Oh, we killed them," he said carelessly. "I had them hanged in front of my tent. You're shocked?"
She shook her head.
"Do you believe in killing your enemies?"
She nodded.
"Why not? It is the only logical thing to do."
"My brother joined forces with the present Sultan, and if I ever catch him I shall hang him too," he smiled.
"And if he catches you?" she asked.
"Why, he'll hang me," he laughed. "That is the rule of the game."
"How strange!" she said, half to herself.
"Do you think so? I suppose from the European standpoint——"
"No, no," she stopped him. "I wasn't thinking of that. You are logical and you do the logical thing. That is how I would treat my enemies."
"If you had any," he suggested.
She nodded.
"If I had any," she repeated with a hard little smile. "Will you tell me this—do I call you Mr. Muley or Lord Muley?"
"You may call me Wazeer, if you're so hard up for a title," he said, and the little idiom sounded queer from him.
"Well, Wazeer, will you tell me: Suppose somebody who had something that you wanted very badly and they wouldn't give it to you, and you had the power to destroy them, what would you do?"
"I should certainly destroy them," said Muley Hafiz. "It is unnecessary to ask. 'The common rule, the simple plan'" he quoted.
Her eyes were fixed on his face, and she was frowning, though this she did not know.
"I am glad I met you this afternoon," she said. "It must be wonderful living in that atmosphere, the atmosphere of might and power, where men and women aren't governed by the finicking rules which vitiate the Western world."
He laughed.
"Then you are tired of your Western civilisation," he said as he rose and helped her to her feet (his hands were long and delicate, and she grew breathless at the touch of them). "You must come along to my little city in the hills where the law is the sword of Muley Hafiz."
She looked at him for a moment.
"I almost wish I could," she said and held out her hand.
He took it in the European fashion and bowed over it. She seemed so tiny a thing by the side of him, her head did not reach his shoulder.
"Good-bye," she said hurriedly and turning, walked back the way she had come, and he stood watching her until she was out of sight.
"Jean!"
She looked round to meet the scowling gaze of Marcus Stepney.
"I must say you're the limit," he said violently. "There are lots of things I imagine you'd do, but to stand there in broad daylight talking to a nigger——"
"If I stand in broad daylight and talk to a card-sharper, Marcus, I think I'm just low enough to do almost anything."
"A damned Moorish nigger," he spluttered, and her eyes narrowed.
"Walk up the road with me, and if you possibly can, keep your voice down to the level which gentlemen usually employ when talking to women," she said.
She was in better condition than he, and he was a little out of breath by the time they reached the Café de Paris, which was crowded at that hour with the afternoon tea people.
He found a quiet corner, and by this time his anger, and a little of his courage, had evaporated.
"I've only your interest at heart, Jean," he said almost pleadingly, "but you don'twant people in our set to know you've been hobnobbing with this infernal Moor."
"When you say 'our set,' to which set are you referring?" she asked unpleasantly. "Because if it is the set I believe you mean, they can't think too badly of me for my liking. It would be a degradation to me to be admired by your set, Marcus."
"Oh, come now," he began feebly.
"I thought I had made it clear to you and I hoped you would carry the marks to your dying day"—there was malice in her voice, and he winced—"that I do not allow you to dominate my life or to censor my actions. The 'nigger' you referred to was more of a gentleman than you can ever be, Marcus, because he has breed, which the Lord didn't give to you."
The waiter brought the tea at that moment, and the conversation passed to unimportant topics till he had gone.
"I'm rather rattled," he apologised. "I lost six thousand louis last night."
"Then you have six thousand reasons why you should keep on good terms with me," said Jean smiling cheerfully.
"That cave man stuff?" he asked, and shook his head. "She'd raise Cain."
Jean was laughing inside herself, but she did not show her merriment.
"You can but try," she said. "I've already told you how it can be done."
"I'll try to-morrow," he said after a thought. "By heavens, I'll try to-morrow!"
It was on the tip of her tongue to say "Not to-morrow," but she checked herself.
Mordon came round with the car to pick her up soon after. Mordon! Her little chin jerked up with a gesture of annoyance, which she seldom permitted herself. And yet she felt unusually cheered. Her meeting with the Moor was a milestone in her life from which memory she could draw both encouragement and comfort.
"You met Muley?" said Lydia. "How thrilling! What is he like, Jean? Was he a blackamoor?"
"No, he wasn't a blackamoor," said the girl quietly. "He was an unusually intelligent man."
"H'm," grunted her father. "How did you come to meet him, my dear?"
"I picked him up on the beach," said Jean coolly, "as any flapper would pick up any nut."
Mr. Briggerland choked.
"I hate to hear you talking like that, Jean. Who introduced him?"
"I told you," she said complacently. "I introduced myself. I talked to him on the beach and he talked to me, and we sat down and played with the sand and discussed one another's lives."
"But how enterprising of you, Jean," said the admiring Lydia.
Mr. Briggerland was going to say something, but thought better of it.
There was a concert at the theatre that night and the whole party went. They had a box, and the interval had come before Lydia saw somebody ushered into a box on the other side of the house with such evidence of deference that she would have known who he was even if she had not seen the scarlet fez and the white robe.
"It is your Muley," she whispered.
Jean looked round.
Muley Hafiz was looking across at her; his eyes immediately sought the girl's, and he bowed slightly.
"What the devil is he bowing at?" grumbled Mr. Briggerland. "You didn't take any notice of him, did you, Jean?"
"I bowed to him," said his daughter, not troubling to look round. "Don't be silly, father; anyway, if he weren't nice, it would be quite the right thing to do. I'm the most distinguished woman in the house because I know Muley Hafiz, and he has bowed to me! Don't you realise the social value of a lion's recognition?"
Lydia could not see him distinctly. She had an impression of a white face, two large black spaces where his eyes were and a blackbeard. He sat all the time in the shadow of a curtain.
Jean looked round to see if Marcus Stepney was present, hoping that he had witnessed the exchange of courtesies, but Marcus at that moment was watching little bundles of twelve thousand franc notes raked across to the croupier's end of the table—which is the business end of Monte Carlo.
Jean was the last to leave the car when it set them down at the Villa Casa. Mordon called her respectfully.
"Excuse me, mademoiselle," he said, "I wish you would come to the garage and see the new tyres that have arrived. I don't like them."
It was a code which she had agreed he should use when he wanted her.
"Very good, Mordon, I will come to the garage later," she said carelessly.
"What does Mordon want you for?" asked her father, with a frown.
"You heard him. He doesn't approve of some new tyres that have been bought for the car," she said coolly. "And don't ask me questions. I've got a headache and I'm dying for a cup of chocolate."
"If that fellow gives you any trouble he'll be sorry," said Briggerland. "And let me tell you this, Jean, that marriage idea of yours——"
She only looked at him, but he knew the look and wilted.
"I don't want to interfere with your private affairs," he mumbled, "but the very thought of it gets me crazy."
The garage was a brick building erected by the side of the carriage drive, built much nearer the house than is usually the case.
Jean waited a reasonable time before she slipped away. Mordon was waiting for her before the open doors of the garage. The place was in darkness; she did not see him standing in the entrance until she was within a few paces of the man.
"Come up to my room," he said briskly.
"What do you want?" she asked.
"I want to speak to you and this is not the place."
"This is the only place where I am prepared to speak to you at the moment, François," she said reproachfully. "Don't you realise that my father is within hearing, and at any moment Madame Meredith may come out? How would I explain my presence in your room?"
He did not answer for the moment, then:
"Jean, I am worried," he said, in a troubled voice. "I cannot understand your plans—they are too clever for me, and I have known men and women of great attainment. The great Bersac——"
"The great Bersac is dead," she said coldly. "He was a man of such great attainmentsthat he came to the knife. Besides, it is not necessary that you should understand my plans, François."
She knew quite well what was troubling him, but she waited.
"I cannot understand the letter which I wrote for you," said Mordon. "The letter in which I say Madame Meredith loved me. I have thought this matter out, Jean, and it seems to me that I am compromised."
She laughed softly.
"Poor François," she said mockingly. "With whom could you be compromised but with your future wife? If I desire you to write that letter, what else matters?"
Again he was silent.
"I cannot speak here," he said almost roughly. "You must come to my room."
She hesitated. There was something in his voice she did not like.
"Very well," she said, and followed him up the steep stairs.