Aslong as I live I shall never forget that Sunday morning of my second arrival at New Orleans. A saffron heat-haze hung over the river and the city, robbed alike from the yellow waters of the one and the pestilent moisture of the other. It would have been strange indeed if this capital of Louisiana, brought hither to a swamp from the sands of Biloxi many years ago by the energetic Bienville, were not visited from time to time by the scourge!
Again I saw the green villas on the outskirts, the verdure-dotted expanse of roofs of the city behind the levee bank, the line of Kentucky boats, keel boats and barges which brought our own resistless commerce hither in the teeth of royal mandates. Farther out, and tugging fretfully in the yellow current, were the aliens of the blue seas, high-hulled, their tracery of masts and spars shimmering in the heat: a full-rigged ocean packet from Spain, a barque and brigantine from the West Indies, a rakish slaver from Africa with her water-line dry, discharged but yesterday of a teeming horror of freight. I looked again upon the familiar rows of trees which shaded the gravelled promenades where Nick had first seen Antoinette. Then we were under it, for the river was low, and the dingy-uniformed officer was bowing over our passports beneath the awning. We walked ashore, Monsieur Vigo and I, and we joined a staring group of keel boatmen and river-men under the willows.
Below us, the white shell walks of the Place d'Armes were thronged with gayly dressed people. Over their heads rose the fine new Cathedral, built by the munificence of Don Andreas Almonaster, and beside that themany-windowed, heavy-arched Cabildo, nearly finished, which will stand for all time a monument to Spanish builders.
“It is Corpus Christi day,” said Monsieur Vigo; “let us go and see the procession.”
Here once more were the bright-turbaned negresses, the gay Creole gowns and scarfs, the linen-jacketed, broad-hatted merchants, with those of soberer and more conventional dress, laughing and chatting, the children playing despite the heat. Many of these people greeted Monsieur Vigo. There were the saturnine, long-cloaked Spaniards, too, and a greater number than I had believed of my own keen-faced countrymen lounging about, mildly amused by the scene. We crossed the square, and with the courtesy of their race the people made way for us in the press; and we were no sooner placed ere the procession came out of the church. Flaming soldiers of the Governor's guard, two by two; sober, sandalled friars in brown, priests in their robes,—another batch of color; crosses shimmering, tapers emerging from the cool darkness within to pale by the light of day. Then down on their knees to Him who sits high above the yellow haze fell the thousands in the Place d'Armes. For here was the Host itself, flower-decked in white and crimson, its gold-tasselled canopy upheld by four tonsured priests, a sheen of purple under it,—the Bishop of Louisiana in his robes.
“The Governor!” whispered Monsieur Vigo, and the word was passed from mouth to mouth as the people rose from their knees. François Louis Hector, Baron de Carondelet, resplendent in his uniform of colonel in the royal army of Spain, his orders glittering on his breast,—pillar of royalty and enemy to the Rights of Man! His eye was stern, his carriage erect, but I seemed to read in his careworn face the trials of three years in this moist capital. After the Governor, one by one, the waiting Associations fell in line, each with its own distinguishing sash. So the procession moved off into the narrow streets of the city, the people in the Place dispersed to new vantage points, and Monsieur Vigo signed me to follow him.
“I have a frien',la veuveGravois, who lives ver' quiet. She have one room, and I ask her tek you in, Davy.” He led the way through the empty Rue Chartres, turned to the right at the Rue Bienville, and stopped before an unpretentious house some three doors from the corner. Madame Gravois, elderly, wizened, primp in a starched cotton gown, opened the door herself, fell upon Monsieur Vigo in the Creole fashion; and within a quarter of an hour I was installed in her best room, which gave out on a little court behind. Monsieur Vigo promised to send his servant with my baggage, told me his address, bade me call on him for what I wanted, and took his leave.
First, there was Madame Gravois' story to listen to as she bustled about giving orders to a kinky-haired negro girl concerning my dinner. Then came the dinner, excellent—if I could have eaten it. The virtues of the former Monsieur Gravois were legion. He had come to Louisiana from Toulon, planted indigo, fought a duel, and Madame was a widow. So I condense two hours into two lines. Happily, Madame was not proof against the habits of the climate, and she retired for her siesta. I sought my room, almost suffocated by a heat which defies my pen to describe, a heat reeking with moisture sucked from the foul kennels of the city. I had felt nothing like it in my former visit to New Orleans. It seemed to bear down upon my brain, to clog the power of thought, to make me vacillating. Hitherto my reasoning had led me to seek Monsieur de St. Gré, to count upon that gentleman's common sense and his former friendship. But now that the time had come for it, I shrank from such a meeting. I remembered his passionate affection for Antoinette, I imagined that he would not listen calmly to one who was in some sort connected with her unhappiness. So a kind of cowardice drove me first to Mrs. Temple. She might know much that would save me useless trouble and blundering.
The shadows of tree-top, thatch, and wall were lengthening as I walked along the Rue Bourbon. Heedless of what the morrow might bring forth, the street was givenover to festivity. Merry groups were gathered on the corners, songs and laughter mingled in the court-yards, billiard balls clicked in thecabarets. A fat, jolly little Frenchman, surrounded by tripping children, sat in his doorway on the edge of thebanquette, fiddling with all his might, pausing only to wipe the beads of perspiration from his face.
“Madame Clive,mais oui, Monsieur, l' petite maison en face.” Smiling benignly at the children, he began to fiddle once more.
The little house opposite! Mrs. Temple, mistress of Temple Bow, had come to this! It was a strange little home indeed, Spanish, one-story, its dormers hidden by a honeycombed screen of terra-cotta tiles. This screen was set on the extreme edge of the roof which overhung thebanquetteand shaded the yellow adobe wall of the house. Low, unpretentious, the latticed shutters of its two windows giving it but a scant air of privacy,—indeed, they were scarred by the raps of careless passers-by on the sidewalk. The two little battened doors, one step up, were closed. I rapped, waited, and rapped again. The musician across the street stopped his fiddling, glanced at me, smiled knowingly at the children; and they paused in their dance to stare. Then one of the doors was pushed open a scant four inches, a scarlet madras handkerchief appeared in the crack above a yellow face. There was a long moment of silence, during which I felt the scrutiny of a pair of sharp, black eyes.
“What yo' want, Marse?”
The woman's voice astonished me, for she spoke the dialect of the American tide-water.
“I should like to see Mrs. Clive,” I answered.
The door closed a shade.
“Mistis sick, she ain't see nobody,” said the woman. She closed the door a little more, and I felt tempted to put my foot in the crack.
“Tell her that Mr. David Ritchie is here,” I said.
There was an instant's silence, then an exclamation.
“Lan' sakes, is you Marse Dave?” She opened thedoor—furtively, I thought—just wide enough for me to pass through. I found myself in a low-ceiled, darkened room, opposite a trim negress who stood with her arms akimbo and stared at me.
“Marse Dave, you doan rec'lect me. I'se Lindy, I'se Breed's daughter. I rec'lect you when you was at Temple Bow. Marse Dave, how you'se done growed! Yassir, when I heerd from Miss Sally I done comed here to tek cyar ob her.”
“How is your mistress?” I asked.
“She po'ly, Marse Dave,” said Lindy, and paused for adequate words. I took note of this darky who, faithful to a family, had come hither to share her mistress's exile and obscurity. Lindy was spare, energetic, forceful—and, I imagined, a discreet guardian indeed for the unfortunate. “She po'ly, Marse Dave, an' she ain' nebber leabe dis year house. Marse Dave,” said Lindy earnestly, lowering her voice and taking a step closer to me, “I done reckon de Mistis gwine ter die ob lonesomeness. She des sit dar an' brood, an' brood—an' she use' ter de bes' company, to de quality. No, sirree, Marse Dave, she ain' nebber sesso, but she tink 'bout de young Marsa night an' day. Marse Dave?”
“Yes?” I said.
“Marse Dave, she have a lil pink frock dat Marsa Nick had when he was a bebby. I done cotch Mistis lookin' at it, an' she hid it when she see me an' blush like 'twas a sin. Marse Dave?”
“Yes?” I said again.
“Where am de young Marsa?”
“I don't know, Lindy,” I answered.
Lindy sighed.
“She done talk 'bout you, Marse Dave, an' how good you is—”
“And Mrs. Temple sees no one,” I asked.
“Dar's one lady come hyar ebery week, er French lady, but she speak English jes' like the Mistis. Dat's my fault,” said Lindy, showing a line of white teeth.
“Your fault,” I exclaimed.
“Yassir. When I comed here from Caroliny de Mistis done tole me not ter let er soul in hyah. One day erbout three mont's ergo, dis yer lady come en she des wheedled me ter let her in. She was de quality, Marse Dave, and I was des' afeard not ter. I declar' I hatter. Hush,” said Lindy, putting her fingers to her lips, “dar's de Mistis!”
The door into the back room opened, and Mrs. Temple stood on the threshold, staring with uncertain eyes into the semi-darkness.
“Lindy,” she said, “what have you done?”
“Miss Sally—” Lindy began, and looked at me. But I could not speak for looking at the lady in the doorway.
“Who is it?” she said again, and her hand sought the door-post tremblingly. “Who is it?”
Then I went to her. At my first step she gave a little cry and swayed, and had I not taken her in my arms I believe she would have fallen.
“David!” she said, “David, is it you? I—I cannot see very well. Why did you not speak?” She looked at Lindy and smiled. “It is because I am an old woman, Lindy,” and she lifted her hand to her forehead. “See, my hair is white—I shock you, David.”
Leaning on my shoulder, she led me through a little bedroom in the rear into a tiny garden court beyond, a court teeming with lavish colors and redolent with the scent of flowers. A white shell walk divided the garden and ended at the door of a low outbuilding, from the chimney of which blue smoke curled upward in the evening air. Mrs. Temple drew me almost fiercely towards a bench against the adobe wall.
“Where is he?” she said. “Where is he, David?”
The suddenness of the question staggered me; I hesitated.
“I do not know,” I answered.
I could not look into her face and say it. The years of torment and suffering were written there in characters not to be mistaken. Sarah Temple, the beauty, was dead indeed. The hope which threatened to light again the dead fires in the woman's eyes frightened me.
“Ah,” she said sharply, “you are deceiving me. It is not like you, David. You are deceiving me. Tell me, tell me, for the love of God, who has brought me to bear chastisement.” And she gripped my arm with a strength I had not thought in her.
“Listen,” I said, trying to calm myself as well as her. “Listen, Mrs. Temple.” I could not bring myself to call her otherwise.
“You are keeping him away from me,” she cried. “Why are you keeping him away? Have I not suffered enough? David, I cannot live long. I do not dare to die—until he has forgiven me.”
I forced her, gently as I might, to sit on the bench, and I seated myself beside her.
“Listen,” I said, with a sternness that hid my feelings, and perforce her expression changed again to a sad yearning, “you must hear me. And you must trust me, for I have never pretended. You shall see him if it is in my power.”
She looked at me so piteously that I was near to being unmanned.
“I will trust you,” she whispered.
“I have seen him,” I said. She started violently, but I laid my hand on hers, and by some self-mastery that was still in her she was silent. “I saw him in Louisville a month ago, when I returned from a year's visit to Philadelphia.” I could not equivocate with this woman, I could no more lie to her sorrow than to the Judgment. Why had I not foreseen her question?
“And he hates me?” She spoke with a calmness now that frightened me more than her agitation had done.
“I do not know,” I answered; “when I would have spoken to him he was gone.”
“He was drunk,” she said. I stared at her in frightened wonderment. “He was drunk—it is better than if he had cursed me. He did not mention me? Or any one?”
“He did not,” I answered.
She turned her face away.
“Go on, I will listen to you,” she said, and satimmovable through the whole of my story, though her hand trembled in mine. And while I live I hope never to have such a thing to go through with again. Truth held me to the full, ludicrous tragedy of the tale, to the cheap character of my old Colonel's undertaking, to the incident of the drum, to the conversation in my room. Likewise, truth forbade me to rekindle her hope. I did not tell her that Nick had come with St. Gré to New Orleans, for of this my own knowledge was as yet not positive. For a long time after I had finished she was silent.
“And you think the expedition will not get here?” she asked finally, in a dead voice.
“I am positive of it,” I answered, “and for the sake of those who are engaged in it, it is mercifully best that it should not. The day may come,” I added, for the sake of leading her away, “when Kentucky will be strong enough to overrun Louisiana. But not now.”
She turned to me with a trace of her former fierceness.
“Why are you in New Orleans?” she demanded.
A sudden resolution came to me then.
“To bring you back with me to Kentucky,” I answered. She shook her head sadly, but I continued: “I have more to say. I am convinced that neither Nick nor you will be happy until you are mother and son again. You have both been wanderers long enough.”
Once more she turned away and fell into a revery. Over the housetop, from across the street, came the gay music of the fiddler. Mrs. Temple laid her hand gently on my shoulder.
“My dear,” she said, smiling, “I could not live for the journey.”
“You must live for it,” I answered. “You have the will. You must live for it, for his sake.”
She shook her head, and smiled at me with a courage which was the crown of her sufferings.
“You are talking nonsense, David,” she said; “it is not like you. Come,” she said, rising with something of her old manner, “I must show you what I have been doing all these years. You must admire my garden.”
I followed her, marvelling, along the shell path, and there came unbidden to my mind the garden at Temple Bow, where she had once been wont to sit, tormenting Mr. Mason or bending to the tale of Harry Riddle's love. Little she cared for flowers in those days, and now they had become her life. With such thoughts in my mind, I listened unheeding to her talk. The place was formerly occupied by a shiftless fellow, a tailor; and the court, now a paradise, had been a rubbish heap. That orange tree which shaded the uneven doorway of the kitchen she had found here. Figs, pomegranates, magnolias; the camellias dazzling in their purity; the blood-red oleanders; the pink roses that hid the crumbling adobe and climbed even to the sloping tiles,—all these had been set out and cared for with her own hands. Ay, and the fragrant bed of yellow jasmine over which she lingered,—Antoinette's favorite flower.
Antoinette's flowers that she wore in her hair! In her letters Mrs. Temple had never mentioned Antoinette, and now she read the question (perchance purposely put there) in my eyes. Her voice faltered sadly. Scarce a week had she been in the house before Antoinette had found her.
“I—I sent the girl away, David. She came without Monsieur de St. Gré's knowledge, without his consent. It is natural that he thinks me—I will not say what. I sent Antoinette away. She clung to me, she would not go, and I had to be—cruel. It is one of the things which make the nights long—so long. My sins have made her life unhappy.”
“And you hear of her? She is not married?” I asked.
“No, she is not married,” said Mrs. Temple, stooping over the jasmines. Then she straightened and faced me, her voice shaken with earnestness. “David, do you think that Nick still loves her?”
Alas, I could not answer that. She bent over the jasmines again.
“There were five years that I knew nothing,” she continued. “I did not dare ask Mr. Clark, who comes to meon business, as you know. It was Mr. Clark who brought back Lindy on one of his trips to Charleston. And then, one day in March of this year, Madame de Montméry came.”
“Madame de Montméry?” I repeated.
“It is a strange story,” said Mrs. Temple. “Lindy had never admitted any one, save Mr. Clark. One day early in the spring, when I was trimming my roses by the wall there, the girl ran to me and said that a lady wished to see me. Why had she let her in? Lindy did not know, she could not refuse her. Had the lady demanded admittance? Lindy thought that I would like to see her. David, it was a providential weakness, or curiosity, that prompted me to go into the front room, and then I saw why Lindy had opened the door to her. Who she is or what she is I do not know to this day. Who am I now that I should inquire? I know that she is a lady, that she has exquisite manners, that I feel now that I cannot live without her. She comes every week, sometimes twice, she brings me little delicacies, new seeds for my garden. But, best of all, she brings me herself, and I am always counting the days until she comes again. Yes, and I always fear that she, too, will be taken away from me.”
I had not heard the sound of voices, but Mrs. Temple turned, startled, and looked towards the house. I followed her glance, and suddenly I knew that my heart was beating.
Hesitatingon the step, a lady stood in the vine-covered doorway, a study in black and white in a frame of pink roses. The sash at her waist, the lace mantilla that clung about her throat, the deftly coiled hair with its sheen of the night waters—these in black. The simple gown—a tribute to the art of her countrywomen—in white.
Mrs. Temple had gone forward to meet her, but I stood staring, marvelling, forgetful, in the path. They were talking, they were coming towards me, and I heard Mrs. Temple pronounce my name and hers—Madame de Montméry. I bowed, she courtesied. There was a baffling light in the lady's brown eyes when I dared to glance at them, and a smile playing around her mouth. Was there no word in the two languages to find its way to my lips? Mrs. Temple laid her hand on my arm.
“David is not what one might call a ladies' man, Madame,” she said.
The lady laughed.
“Isn't he?” she said.
“I am sure you will frighten him with your wit,” answered Mrs. Temple, smiling. “He is worth sparing.”
“He is worth frightening, then,” said the lady, in exquisite English, and she looked at me again.
“You and David should like each other,” said Mrs. Temple; “you are both capable persons, friends of the friendless and towers of strength to the weak.”
The lady's face became serious, but still there was the expression I could not make out. In an instant she seemed to have scrutinized me with a precision from which there could be no appeal.
“I seem to know Mr. Ritchie,” she said, and added quickly: “Mrs. Clive has talked a great deal about you. She has made you out a very wonderful person.”
“My dear,” said Mrs. Temple, “the wonderful people of this world are those who find time to comfort and help the unfortunate. That is why you and David are wonderful. No one knows better than I how easy it is to be selfish.”
“I have brought you an English novel,” said Madame de Montoméry, turning abruptly to Mrs. Temple. “But you must not read it at night. Lindy is not to let you have it until to-morrow.”
“There,” said Mrs. Temple, gayly, to me, “Madame is not happy unless she is controlling some one, and I am a rebellious subject.”
“You have not been taking care of yourself,” said Madame. She glanced at me, and bit her lips, as though guessing the emotion which my visit had caused. “Listen,” she said, “the vesper bells! You must go into the house, and Mr. Ritchie and I must leave you.”
She took Mrs. Temple by the arm and led her, unresisting, along the path. I followed, a thousand thoughts and conjectures spinning in my brain. They reached the bench under the little tree beside the door, and stood talking for a moment of the routine of Mrs. Temple's life. Madame, it seemed, had prescribed a regimen, and meant to have it followed. Suddenly I saw Mrs. Temple take the lady's arm, and sink down upon the bench. Then we were both beside her, bending over her, she sitting upright and smiling at us.
“It is nothing,” she said; “I am so easily tired.”
Her lips were ashen, and her breath came quickly. Madame acted with that instant promptness which I expected of her.
“You must carry her in, Mr. Ritchie,” she said quietly.
“No, it is only momentary, David,” said Mrs. Temple. I remember how pitifully frail and light she was as I picked her up and followed Madame through the doorway into the little bedroom. I laid Mrs. Temple on the bed.
“Send Lindy here,” said Madame.
Lindy was in the front room with the negress whom Madame had brought with her. They were not talking. I supposed then this was because Lindy did not speak French. I did not know that Madame de Montméry's maid was a mute. Both of them went into the bedroom, and I was left alone. The door and windows were closed, and a green myrtle-berry candle was burning on the table. I looked about me with astonishment. But for the low ceiling and the wide cypress puncheons of the floor the room might have been a budoir in a manor-house. On the slender-legged, polished mahogany table lay books in tasteful bindings; a diamond-paned bookcase stood in the corner; afauteuiland various other chairs which might have come from the hands of an Adam were ranged about. Tall silver candlesticks graced each end of the little mantel-shelf, and between them were two Lowestoft vases having the Temple coat of arms.
It might have been half an hour that I waited, now pacing the floor, now throwing myself into the arm-chair by the fireplace. Anxiety for Mrs. Temple, problems that lost themselves in a dozen conjectures, all idle—these agitated me almost beyond my power of self-control. Once I felt for the miniature, took it out, and put it back without looking at it. At last I was startled to my feet by the opening of the door, and Madame de Montméry came in. She closed the door softly behind her, with the deft quickness and decision of movement which a sixth sense had told me she possessed, crossed the room swiftly, and stood confronting me.
“She is easy again, now,” she said simply. “It is one of her attacks. I wish you might have seen me before you told her what you had to say to her.”
“I wish indeed that I had known you were here.”
She ignored this, whether intentionally, I know not.
“It is her heart, poor lady! I am afraid she cannot live long.” She seated herself in one of the straight chairs. “Sit down, Mr. Ritchie,” she said; “I am glad you waited. I wanted to talk with you.”
“I thought that you might, Madame la Vicomtesse,” I answered.
She made no gesture, either of surprise or displeasure.
“So you knew,” she said quietly.
“I knew you the moment you appeared in the doorway,” I replied. It was not just what I meant to say.
There flashed over her face that expression of the miniature, the mouth repressing the laughter in the brown eyes.
“Montméry is one of my husband's places,” she said. “When Antoinette asked me to come here and watch over Mrs. Temple, I chose the name.”
“And Mrs. Temple has never suspected you?”
“I think not. She thinks I came at Mr. Clark's request. And being a lady, she does not ask questions. She accepts me for what I appear to be.”
It seemed so strange to me to be talking here in New Orleans, in this little Spanish house, with a French vicomtesse brought up near the court of the unfortunate Marie Antoinette; nay, with Hélène de St. Gré, whose portrait had twice come into my life by a kind of strange fatality (and was at that moment in my pocket), that I could scarce maintain my self-possession in her presence. I had given the portrait, too, attributes and a character, and I found myself watching the lady with a breathless interest lest she should fail in any of these. In the intimacy of the little room I felt as if I had known her always, and again, that she was as distant from me and my life as the court from which she had come. I found myself glancing continually at her face, on which the candle-light shone. The Vicomtesse might have been four and twenty. Save for the soberer gown she wore, she seemed scarce older than the young girl in the miniature who had the presence of a woman of the world. Suddenly I discovered with a flush that she was looking at me intently, without embarrassment, but with an expression that seemed to hint of humor in the situation. To my astonishment, she laughed a little.
“You are a very odd person, Mr. Ritchie,” she said.“I have heard so much of you from Mrs. Temple, from Antoinette, that I know something of your strange life. After all,” she added with a trace of sadness, “it has been no stranger than my own. First I will answer your questions, and then I shall ask some.”
“But I have asked no questions, Madame la Vicomtesse,” I said.
“And you are a very simple person, Mr. Ritchie,” continued Madame la Vicomtesse, smiling; “it is what I had been led to suppose. A serious person. As the friend of Mr. Nicholas Temple, as the relation and (may I say?) benefactor of this poor lady here, it is fitting that you should know certain things. I will not weary you with the reasons and events which led to my coming from Europe to New Orleans, except to say that I, like all of my class who have escaped the horrors of the Revolution, am a wanderer, and grateful to Monsieur de St. Gré for the shelter he gives me. His letter reached me in England, and I arrived three months ago.”
She hesitated—nay, I should rather say paused, for there was little hesitation in what she did. She paused, as though weighing what she was to say next.
“When I came to Les Îles I saw that there was a sorrow weighing upon the family; and it took no great astuteness on my part, Mr. Ritchie, to discover that Antoinette was the cause of it. One has only to see Antoinette to love her. I wondered why she had not married. And yet I saw that there had been an affair. It seemed very strange to me, Mr. Ritchie, for with us, you understand, marriages are arranged. Antoinette really has beauty, she is the daughter of a man of importance in the colony, her strength of character saves her from being listless. I found a girl with originality of expression, with a sense of the fitness of things, devoted to charitable works, who had not taken the veil. That was on her father's account. As you know, they are inseparable. Monsieur Philippe de St. Gré is a remarkable man, with certain vigorous ideas not in accordance with the customs of his neighbors. It was he who first confided in me that he would not force Antoinetteto marry; it was she, at length, who told me the story of Nicholas Temple and his mother.” She paused again, and, reading between the lines, I perceived that Madame la Vicomtesse had become essential to the household at Les Îles. Philippe de St. Gré was not a man to misplace a confidence.
“It was then that I first heard of you, Mr. Ritchie, and of the part which you played in that affair. It was then I had my first real insight into Antoinette's character. Her affection for Mrs. Temple astonished me, bewildered me. The woman had deceived her and her family, and yet Antoinette gave up her lover because he would not take his mother back. Had Mrs. Temple been willing to return to Les Îles after you had providentially taken her away, they would have received her. Philippe de St. Gré is not a man to listen to criticism. As it was, Antoinette did not rest until she found where Mrs. Temple had hidden herself, and then she came here to her. It is not for us to judge any of them. In sending Antoinette away the poor lady denied herself the only consolation that was left to her. Antoinette understood. Every week she has had news of Mrs. Temple from Mr. Clark. And when I came and learned her trouble, Antoinette begged me to come here and be Mrs. Temple's friend. Mr. Ritchie, she is a very ill woman and a very sad woman,—the saddest woman I have ever known, and I have seen many.”
“And Mademoiselle de St. Gré?” I asked.
“Tell me about this man for whom Antoinette has ruined her life,” said Madame la Vicomtesse, brusquely. “Is he worth it? No, no man is worth what she has suffered. What has become of him? Where is he? Did you not tell her that you would bring him back?”
“I said that I would bring him back if I could,” I answered, “and I meant it, Madame.”
Madame la Vicomtesse bit her lip. Had she known me better, she might have smiled. As for me, I was wholly puzzled to account for these fleeting changes in her humor.
“You have taken a great deal upon your shoulders, Mr. Ritchie,” she said. “They are from all accounts broadones. There, I was wrong to be indignant in your presence,—you who seem to have spent your life in trying to get others out of difficulties. Mercy,” she said, with a quick gesture at my protest, “there are few men with whom one might talk thus in so short an acquaintance. I love the girl, and I cannot help being angry with Mr. Temple. I suppose there is something to be said on his side. Let us hear it—I dare say he could not have a better advocate,” she finished, with an indefinable smile.
I began at the wrong end of my narrative, and it was some time before I had my facts arranged in proper sequence. I could not forget that Madame la Vicomtesse was looking at me fixedly. I reviewed Nick's neglected childhood; painted as well as I might his temperament and character—his generosity and fearlessness, his recklessness and improvidence. His loyalty to those he loved, his detestation of those he hated. I told how, under these conditions, the sins and vagaries of his parents had gone far to wreck his life at the beginning of it. I told how I had found him again with Sevier, how he had come to New Orleans with me the first time, how he had loved Antoinette, and how he had disappeared after the dreadful scene in the garden at Les Îles, how I had not seen him again for five years. Here I hesitated, little knowing how to tell the Vicomtesse of that affair in Louisville. Though I had a sense that I could not keep the truth from so discerning a person, I was startled to find this to be so.
“Yes, yes, I understand,” she said quickly. “And in the morning he had flown with that most worthy of my relatives, Auguste de St. Gré.”
I looked at her, finding no words to express my astonishment at this perspicacity.
“And now what do you intend to do?” she asked. “Find him in New Orleans, if you can, of course. But how?” She rose quickly, went to the fireplace, and stood for a moment with her back to me. Suddenly she turned. “It ought not to be difficult, after all. Auguste de St. Gré is a fool, and he confirms what you say of the expedition. He is, indeed, a pretty person to choose for anintrigue of this kind. And your cousin,—what shall we call him?”
“To say the least, secrecy is not Nick's forte,” I answered, catching her mood.
She was silent awhile.
“It would be a blessing if Monsieur le Baron could hang Auguste privately. As for your cousin, he may be worth saving, after all. I know Monsieur de Carondelet, and he has no patience with conspirators of this sort. I think he would not hesitate to make examples of them. However, we will try to save them.”
“We!” I repeated unwittingly.
Madame la Vicomtesse looked at me and laughed outright.
“Yes,” she said, “you will do some things, I others. There are the gaming clubs with their ridiculous names,L'Amour, La Mignonne, La Désirée” (she counted them reflectively on her fingers). “Both of our gentlemen might be tempted into one of these. You will drop into them, Mr. Ritchie. Then there is Madame Bouvet's.”
“Auguste would scarcely go there,” I objected.
“Ah,” said Madame la Vicomtesse, “but Madame Bouvet will know the names of some of Auguste's intimates. This Bouvet is evidently a good person, perhaps she will do more for you. I understand that she has a weak spot in her heart for Auguste.”
Madame la Vicomtesse turned her back again. Had she heard how Madame Bouvet had begged me to buy the miniature?
“Have you any other suggestions to make?” she said, putting a foot on the fender.
“They have all been yours, so far,” I answered.
“And yet you are a man of action, of expedients,” she murmured, without turning. “Where are your wits, Mr. Ritchie? Have you any plan?”
“I have been so used to rely on myself, Madame,” I replied.
“That you do not like to have your affairs meddled with by a woman,” she said, into the fireplace.
“I give you the credit to believe that you are too clever to misunderstand me, Madame,” I said. “You must know that your help is most welcome.”
At that she swung around and regarded me strangely, mirth lurking in her eyes. She seemed about to retort, and then to conquer the impulse. The effect of this was to make me anything but self-complacent. She sat down in the chair and for a little while she was silent.
“Suppose we do find them,” she said suddenly. “What shall we do with them?” She looked up at me questioningly, seriously. “Is it likely that your Mr. Temple will be reconciled with his mother? Is it likely that he is still in love with Antoinette?”
“I think it is likely that he is still in love with Mademoiselle de St. Gré,” I answered, “though I have no reason for saying so.”
“You are very honest, Mr. Ritchie. We must look at this problem from all sides. If he is not reconciled with his mother, Antoinette will not receive him. And if he is, we have the question to consider whether he is still worthy of her. The agents of Providence must not be heedless,” she added with a smile.
“I am sure that Nick would alter his life if it became worth living,” I said. “I will answer for that much.”
“Then he must be reconciled with his mother,” she replied with decision. “Mrs. Temple has suffered enough. And he must be found before he gets sufficiently into the bad graces of the Baron de Carondelet,—these two things are clear.” She rose. “Come here to-morrow evening at the same time.”
She started quickly for the bedroom door, but something troubled me still.
“Madame—” I said.
“Yes,” she answered, turning quickly.
I did not know how to begin. There were many things I wished to say, to know, but she was a woman whose mind seemed to leap the chasms, whose words touched only upon those points which might not be understood. She regarded me with seeming patience.
“I should think that Mrs. Temple might have recognized you,” I said, for want of a better opening.
“From the miniature?” she said.
I flushed furiously, and it seemed to burn me through the lining of my pocket.
“That was my salvation,” she said. “Mrs. Temple has never seen the miniature. I have heard how you rescued it, Mr. Ritchie,” she added, with a curious smile. “Monsieur Philippe de St. Gré told me.”
“Then he knew?” I stammered.
She laughed.
“I have told you that you are a very simple person,” she said. “Even you are not given to intrigues. I thank you for rescuing me.”
I flushed more hotly than before.
“I never expected to see you,” I said.
“It must have been a shock,” she said.
I was dumb. I had my hand in my coat; I fully intended to give her the miniature. It was my plain duty. And suddenly, overwhelmed, I remembered that it was wrapped in Polly Ann's silk handkerchief.
Madame la Vicomtesse remained for a moment where she was.
“Do not do anything until the morning,” she said. “You must go back to your lodgings at once.”
“That would be to lose time,” I answered.
“You must think of yourself a little,” she said. “Do as I say. I have heard that two cases of the yellow fever have broken out this afternoon. And you, who are not used to the climate, must not be out after dark.”
“And you?” I said.
“I am used to it,” she replied; “I have been here three months. Lest anything should happen, it might be well for you to give me your address.”
“I am with Madame Gravois, in the Rue Bienville.”
“Madame Gravois, in the Rue Bienville,” she repeated. “I shall remember.À demain, Monsieur.” She courtesied and went swiftly into Mrs. Temple's room. Seizing my hat, I opened the door and found myself in the dark street.