T
Twenty minutes’ walking brought me to the wood which lay between the road and the convent. I pressed on; soon the wood ceased and I found myself on the outskirts of a paddock of rough grass, where a couple of cows and half a dozen goats were pasturing; a row of stunted apple trees ran along one side of the paddock, and opposite me rose the white walls of the convent; while on my left was the burying-ground with its arched gateway, inscribed “Mors janua vitæ.” I crossed the grass and rang a bell, that clanged again and again in echo. Nobody came. I pulled a second time and more violently. After some further delay the door was cautiously opened a little way, and a young woman looked out. She was a round-faced, red-cheeked, fresh creature, arrayed in a large close-fitting white cap, a big white collar over her shoulders, and a black gown. When she saw me, she uttered an exclamation of alarm, and pushed the door to again. Just in time I inserted my foot between door and doorpost.
“I beg your pardon,” said I politely, “but you evidently misunderstand me. I wish to enter.”
She peered at me through the two-inch gap my timely foot had preserved.
“But it is impossible,” she objected. “Our rules do not allow it. Indeed, I may not talk to you. I beg of you to move your foot.”
“But then you would shut the door.”
She could not deny it.
“I mean no harm,” I protested.
“‘The guile of the wicked is infinite,’” remarked the little nun.
“I want to see the Mother Superior,” said I. “Will you take my name to her?”
I heard another step in the passage. The door was flung wide open, and a stout and stately old lady faced me, a frown on her brow.
“Madame,” said I, “until you hear my errand you will think me an ill-mannered fellow.”
“What is your business, sir?”
“It is for your ear alone, madame.”
“You can’t come in here,” said she decisively.
For a moment I was at a loss. Then the simplest solution in the world occurred to me.
“But you can come out, madame,” I suggested.
She looked at me doubtfully for a minute. Then she stepped out, shutting the door carefully behind her. I caught a glimpse of the little nun’s face, and thought there was a look of disappointment on it. The old lady and I began to walk along the path that led to the burying-ground.
“I do not know,” said I, “whether you have heard of me. My name is Aycon.”
“I thought so. Mr. Aycon, I must tell you that you are very much to blame. You have led this innocent, though thoughtless, child into most deplorable conduct.”
(“Well done, little duchess!” said I to myself; but of course I was not going to betray her.)
“I deeply regret my thoughtlessness,” said I earnestly. “I would, however, observe that the present position of the duchess is not due to my—shall we say misconduct?—but to that of her husband. I did not invite—”
“Don’t mention her name!” interrupted the Mother Superior in horror.
We had reached the arched gateway; and there appeared standing within it a figure most charmingly inappropriate to a graveyard—the duchess herself, looking as fresh as a daisy, and as happy as a child with a new toy. She ran to me, holding out both hands and crying:
“Ah, my dear, dear Mr. Aycon, you are the most delightful man alive! You come at the very moment I want you.”
“Be sober, my child, be sober!” murmured the old lady.
“But I want to hear,” expostulated the duchess. “Do you know anything, Mr. Aycon? What has been happening up at the house? What has the duke done?”
As the duchess poured out her questions, we passed through the gate; the ladies sat down on a stone bench just inside, and I, standing, told my story. The duchess was amused to hear of old Jean’s chase of her; but she showed no astonishment till I told her that Marie Delhasse was at the hotel in Avranches, and had declined to go further on her journey to-day.
“At the hotel? Then you’ve seen her?” she burst out. “What is she like?”
“She is most extremely handsome,” said I. “Moreover, I am inclined to like her.”
The Mother Superior opened her lips—to reprove me, no doubt; but the duchess was too quick.
“Oh, you like her? Perhaps you’re going to desert me and go over to her?” she cried in indignation, that was, I think, for the most part feigned. Certainly the duchess did not look very alarmed. But in regard to what she said, the old lady was bound to have a word.
“What is Mr. Aycon to you, my child?” said she solemnly. “He is nothing—nothing at all to you, my child.”
“Well, I want him to be less than nothing to Mlle. Delhasse,” said the duchess, with a pout for her protector and a glance for me.
“Mlle. Delhasse is very angry with me just now,” said I.
“Oh, why?” asked the duchess eagerly.
“Because she gathered that I thought she ought to wait for an invitation from you, before she went to your house.”
“She should wait till the Day of Judgment!” cried the duchess.
“That would not matter,” observed the Mother Superior dryly.
Suddenly, without pretext or excuse, the duchess turned and walked very quickly—nay, she almost ran—away along the path that encircled the group of graves. Her eye had bidden me, and I followed no less briskly. I heard a despairing sigh from the poor old lady, but she had no chance of overtaking us. The audacious movement was successful.
“Now we can talk,” said the duchess.
And talk she did, for she threw at me the startling assertion:
“I believe you’re falling in love with Mlle. Delhasse. If you do, I’ll never speak to you again!”
“If I do,” said I, “I shall probably accept that among the other disadvantages of the entanglement.”
“That’s very rude,” observed the duchess.
“Nothing with an ‘if’ in it is rude,” said I speciously.
“Men must be always in love with somebody,” said she resentfully.
“It certainly approaches a necessity,” I assented.
The duchess glanced at me. Perhaps I had glanced at her; I hope not.
“Oh, well,” said she, “hadn’t we better talk business?”
“Infinitely better,” said I; and I meant it.
“What am I to do?” she asked, with a return to her more friendly manner.
“Nothing,” said I.
It is generally the safest advice—to women at all events.
“You are content with the position? You like being at the hotel perhaps?”
“Should I not be hard to please, if I didn’t?”
“I know you are trying to annoy me, but you shan’t. Mr. Aycon, suppose my husband comes over to Avranches, and sees you?”
“I have thought of that.”
“Well, what have you decided?”
“Not to think about it till it happens. But won’t he be thinking more about you than me?”
“He won’t do anything about me,” she said. “In the first place, he will want no scandal. In the second, he does not want me. But he will come over to see her.”
“Her” was, of course, Marie Delhasse. The duchess assigned to her the sinister distinction of the simple pronoun.
“Surely he will take means to get you to go back?” I exclaimed.
“If he could have caught me before I got here, he would have been glad. Now he will wait; for if he came here and claimed me, what he proposed to do would become known.”
There seemed reason in this; the duchess calculated shrewdly.
“In fact,” said I, “I had better go back to the hotel.”
“That does not seem to vex you much.”
“Well, I can’t stay here, can I?” said I, looking round at the nunnery. “It would be irregular, you know.”
“You might go to another hotel,” suggested she.
“It is most important that I should watch what is going on at my present hotel,” said I gravely; for I did not wish to move.
“You are the most—” began the duchess.
But this bit of character-reading was lost. Slow but sure, the Mother Superior was at our elbows.
“Adieu, Mr. Aycon,” said she.
I felt sure that she must manage the nuns admirably.
“Adieu!” said I, as though there was nothing else to be said.
“Adieu!” said the duchess, as though she would have liked to say something else.
And all in a moment I was through the gateway and crossing the paddock. But the duchess ran to the gate, crying:
“Mind you come again to-morrow!”
My expedition consumed nearly two hours; and one o’clock struck from the tower of the church as I slowly climbed the hill, feeling (I must admit it) that the rest of the day would probably be rather dull. Just as I reached the top, however, I came plump on Mlle. Delhasse, who appeared to be taking a walk. She bowed to me slightly and coldly. Glad that she was so distant (for I did not like her looks), I returned her salute, and pursued my way to the hotel. In the porch of it stood the waiter—my friend who had taken such an obliging view of my movements the night before. Directly he saw me, he came out into the road to meet me.
“Are you acquainted with the ladies who have rooms on the first floor?” he asked with an air of mystery.
“I met them here for the first time,” said I.
I believe he doubted me; perhaps waiters are bred to suspicion by the things they see.
“Ah!” said he, “then it does not interest you to know that a gentleman has been to see the young lady?”
I took out ten francs.
“Yes, it does,” said I, handing him the money. “Who was it?”
“The Duke of Saint-Maclou,” he whispered mysteriously.
“Is he gone?” I asked in some alarm. I had no wish to encounter him.
“This half-hour, sir.”
“Did he see both the ladies?”
“No; only the young lady. Madame went out immediately on his arrival, and is not yet returned.”
“And mademoiselle?”
“She is in her room.”
Thinking I had not got much, save good will, for my ten francs—for he told me nothing but what I had expected to hear—I was about to pass on, when he added, in a tone which seemed more significant than the question demanded:
“Are you going up to your room, sir?”
“I am,” said I.
“Permit me to show you the way,” he said—though his escort seemed to me very unnecessary.
He mounted before me. We reached the first floor. Opposite to us, not three yards away, was the door of the sitting-room which I knew to be occupied by the Delhasses.
“Go on,” said I.
“In a moment, sir,” he said.
Then he held up his hand in the attitude of a man who listens.
“One should not listen,” he whispered, apologetically; “but it is so strange. I thought that if you knew the lady—Hark!”
I knew that we ought not to listen. But the mystery of the fellow’s manner and the concern of his air constrained me, and I too paused, listening.
From behind the door there came to our strained attentive ears the sound of a woman sobbing. I sought the waiter’s eyes; they were already bent on me. Again the sad sounds came—low, swift, and convulsive. It went to my heart to hear them. I did not know what to do. To go on upstairs to my own room and mind my own business seemed the simple thing—simple, easy, and proper. But my feet were glued to the boards. I could not go, with that sound beating on my ears: I should hear it all the day. I glanced again at the waiter. He was a kind-looking fellow, and I saw the tears standing in his eyes.
“And mademoiselle is so beautiful!” he whispered.
“What the devil business is it of yours?” said I, in a low but fierce tone.
“None,” said he. “I am content to leave it to you, sir;” and without more he turned and went downstairs.
It was all very well to leave it to me; but what—failing that simple, easy, proper, and impossible course of action which I have indicated—was I to do?
Well, what I did was this: I went to the door of the room and knocked softly. There was no answer. The sobs continued. I had been a brute to this girl in the morning; I thought of that as I stood outside.
“My God! what’s the matter with her?” I whispered.
And then I opened the door softly.
Marie Delhasse sat in a chair, her head resting in her hands and her hands on the table; and her body was shaken with her weeping.
And on the table, hard by her bowed golden head, there lay a square leathern box. I stood on the threshold and looked at her.
The rest of the day did not now seem likely to be dull; but it might prove to have in store for me more difficult tasks than the enduring of a little dullness.
Return to Table of Contents
F
For a moment I stood stock still, wishing to Heaven that I had not opened the door; for I could find now no excuse for my intrusion, and no reason why I should not have minded my own business. The impulse that had made the thing done was exhausted in the doing of it. Retreat became my sole object; and, drawing back, I pulled the door after me. But I had given Fortune a handle—very literally; for the handle of the door grated loud as I turned it. Despairing of escape, I stood still. Marie Delhasse looked up with a start.
“Who’s there?” she cried in frightened tones, hastily pressing her handkerchief to her eyes.
There was no help for it. I stepped inside, saying:
“I’m ashamed to say that I am.”
I deserved and expected an outburst of indignation. My surprise was great when she sank against the back of the chair with a sigh of relief. I lingered awkwardly just inside the threshold.
“What do you want? Why did you come in?” she asked, but rather in bewilderment than anger.
“I was passing on my way upstairs, and—and you seemed to be in distress.”
“Did I make such a noise as that?” said she. “I’m as bad as a child; but children cry because they mustn’t do things, and I because I must.”
We appeared to be going to talk. I shut the door.
“My intrusion is most impertinent,” said I. “You have every right to resent it.”
“Oh, have I the right to resent anything? Did you think so this morning?” she asked impetuously.
“The morning,” I observed, “is a terribly righteous time with me. I must beg your pardon for what I said.”
“You think the same still?” she retorted quickly.
“That is no excuse for having said it,” I returned. “It was not my affair.”
“It is nobody’s affair, I suppose, but mine.”
“Unless you allow it to be,” said I. I could not endure the desolation her words and tone implied.
She looked at me curiously.
“I don’t understand,” she said in a fretfully weary tone, “how you come to be mixed up in it at all.”
“It’s a long story.” Then I went on abruptly: “You thought it was someone else that had entered.”
“Well, if I did?”
“Someone returning,” said I stepping up to the table opposite her.
“What then?” she asked, but wearily and not in the defiant manner of the morning.
“Mme. Delhasse perhaps, or perhaps the Duke of Saint-Maclou?”
Marie Delhasse made no answer. She sat with her elbows on the table, and her chin resting on the support of her clenched hands; her lids drooped over her eyes; and I could not see the expression of her glance, which was, nevertheless, upon me.
“Well, well,” I continued, “we needn’t talk about him. Have you been doing some shopping?” And I pointed to the red leathern box.
For full half a minute she sat, without speech or movement. Then she said in answer to my question, which she could not take as an idle one:
“Yes, I have been doing some bargaining.”
“Is that the result?”
Again she paused long before she answered.
“That,” said she, “is a trifle—thrown in.”
“To bind the bargain?” I suggested.
“Yes, Mr. Aycon—to bind the bargain.”
“Is it allowed to look?”
“I think everything must be allowed to you. You would be so surprised if it were not.”
I understood that she was aiming a satirical remark at me: I did not mind that; she had better flay me alive than sit and cry.
“Then I may open the box?”
“The key is in it.”
I drew the box across, and I took a chair that stood by. I turned the key of the box. A glance showed me Marie’s drooped lids half raised and her eyes fixed on my face.
I opened the box: there lay in it, in sparkling coil on the blue velvet, a magnificent diamond necklace; one great stone formed a pendent, and it was on this stone that I fixed my regard. I took it up and looked at it closely; then I examined the necklace itself. Marie’s eyes followed my every motion.
“You like these trinkets?” I asked.
“Yes,” said she, in that tone in which “yes” is stronger than a thousand words of rapture; and the depths of her eyes caught fire from the stones, and gleamed.
“But you know nothing about them,” I pursued composedly.
“I suppose they are valuable,” said she, making an effort afternonchalance.
“They have some value,” I conceded, smiling. “But I mean about their history.”
“They are bought, I suppose—bought and sold.”
“I happen to know just a little about such things. In fact, I have a book at home in which there is a picture of this necklace. It is known as the Cardinal’s Necklace. The stones were collected by Cardinal Armand de Saint-Maclou, Archbishop of Caen, some thirty years ago. They were set by Lebeau of Paris, on the order of the cardinal, and were left by him to his nephew, our friend the duke. Since his marriage, the duchess has of course worn them.”
All this I said in a most matter-of-fact tone.
“Do you mean that they belong to her?” asked Marie, with a sudden lift of her eyes.
“I don’t know. Strictly, I should think not,” said I impassively.
Marie Delhasse stretched out her hand and began to finger the stones.
“She wore them, did she?”
“Certainly.”
“Ah! I supposed they had just been bought.” And she took her fingers off them.
“It would take a large sum to do that—to buy themen bloc,” I observed.
“How much?”
“Oh, I don’t know! The market varies so much: perhaps a million francs, perhaps more. You can’t tell how much people will give for such things.”
“No, it is difficult,” she assented, again fingering the necklace, “to say what people will give for them.”
I leaned back in my chair. There was a pause. Then her eyes suddenly met mine again, and she exclaimed defiantly:
“Oh, you know very well what it means! What’s the good of fencing about it?”
“Yes, I know what it means,” said I. “When have you promised to go?”
“To-morrow,” she answered.
“Because of this thing?” and I pointed to the necklace.
“Because of—How dare you ask me such questions!”
I rose from my seat and bowed.
“You are going?” she asked, her fingers on the necklace, and her eyes avoiding mine.
“I have the honor,” said I, “to enjoy the friendship of the Duchess of Saint-Maclou.”
“And that forbids you to enjoy mine?”
I bowed assent to her inference. She sat still at the table, her chin on her hands. I was about to leave her, when it struck me all in a moment that leaving her was not exactly the best thing to do, although it might be much the easiest. I arrested my steps.
“Well,” she asked, “is not our acquaintance ended?”
And she suddenly opened her hands and hid her face in them. It was a strange conclusion to a speech so coldly and distantly begun.
“For God’s sake, don’t go!” said I, bending a little across the table toward her.
“What’s it to you? What’s it to anybody?” came from between her fingers.
“Your mother—” I began.
She dropped her hands from her face, and laughed. It was a laugh the like of which I hope not to hear again. Then she broke out:
“Why wouldn’t she have me in the house? Why did she run away? Am I unfit to touch her?”
“If she were wrong, you’re doing your best to make her right.”
“If everybody thinks one wicked, one may as well be wicked, and—and live in peace.”
“And get diamonds?” I added, “Weren’t you wicked?”
“No,” she said, looking me straight in the face. “But what difference did that make?”
“None at all, in one point of view,” said I. But to myself I was swearing that she should not go.
Then she said in a very low tone:
“He never leaves me. Ah! he makes everyone think—”
“Let ‘em think,” said I.
“If everyone thinks it—”
“Oh, come, nonsense!” said I.
“You know what you thought. What honest woman would have anything to do with me—or what honest man either?”
I had nothing to say about that; so I said again.
“Well, don’t go, anyhow.”
She spoke in lower tones, as she answered this appeal of mine:
“I daren’t refuse. He’ll be here again; and my mother—”
“Put it off a day or two,” said I. “And don’t take that thing.”
She looked at me, it seemed to me, in astonishment.
“Do you really care?” she asked, speaking very low.
I nodded. I did care, somehow.
“Enough to stand by me, if I don’t go?”
I nodded again.
“I daren’t refuse right out. My mother and he—”
She broke off.
“Have something the matter with you: flutters or something,” I suggested.
The ghost of a smile appeared on her face.
“You’ll stay?” she asked.
I had to stay, anyhow. Perhaps I ought to have said so, and not stolen credit; but all I did was to nod again.
“And, if I ask you, you’ll—you’ll stand between me and him?”
I hoped that my meeting with the duke would not be in a strong light; but I only said:
“Rather! I’ll do anything I can, of course.”
She did not thank me; she looked at me again. Then she observed.
“My mother will be back soon.”
“And I had better not be here?”
“No.”
I advanced to the table again, and laid my hand on the box containing the Cardinal’s necklace.
“And this?” I asked in a careless tone.
“Ought I to send them back?”
“You don’t want to?”
“What’s the use of saying I do? I love them. Besides, he’ll see through it. He’ll know that I mean I won’t come. I daren’t—I daren’t show him that!”
Then I made a little venture; for, fingering the box idly, I said:
“It would be uncommonly handsome of you to give ‘em to the duchess.”
“To the duchess?” she gasped in wondering tones.
“You see,” I remarked, “either they are the duchess’, in which case she ought to have them; or, if they were the duke’s, they’re yours now; and you can do what you like with them.”
“He gave them me on—on a condition.”
“A condition,” said I, “no gentleman could mention, and no law enforce.”
She blushed scarlet, but sat silent.
“Revenge is sweet,” said I. “She ran away rather than meet you. You send her her diamonds!”
A sudden gleam shot into Marie Delhasse’s eyes.
“Yes,” she said, “yes.” And stopped, thinking, with her hands clasped.
“You send them by me,” I pursued, delighted with the impression which my suggestion had made upon her.
“By you? You see her, then?” she asked quickly.
“Occasionally,” I answered. The duchess’ secret was not mine, and I did not say where I saw her.
“I’ll give them to you,” said Marie—“to you, not to the duchess.”
“I won’t have ‘em at any price,” said I. “Come, your mother will be back soon. I believe you want to keep ‘em.” And I assumed a disgusted air.
“I don’t!” she flashed out passionately. “I don’t want to touch them! I wouldn’t keep them for the world!”
I looked at my watch. With a swift motion, Marie Delhasse leaped from her chair, dashed down the lid of the box, hiding the glitter of the stones, seized the box in her two hands and with eyes averted held it out to me.
“For the duchess?” I asked.
“Yes, for the duchess,” said Marie, with, averted eyes.
I took the box, and stowed it in the capacious pocket of the shooting-jacket which I was wearing.
“Go!” said Marie, pointing to the door.
I held out my hand. She caught it in hers. Upon my word, I thought she was going to kiss it. So strongly did I think it that, hating fuss of that sort, I made a half-motion to pull it away. However, I was wrong. She merely pressed it and let it drop.
“Cheer up! cheer up! I’ll turn up again soon,” said I, and I left the room.
And left in the nick of time; for at the very moment when I, hugging the lump in my coat which marked the position of the Cardinal’s Necklace, reached the foot of the stairs Mme. Delhasse appeared on her way up.
“Oh, you old viper!” I murmured thoughtlessly, in English.
“Pardon, monsieur?” said Mme. Delhasse.
“Forgive me: I spoke to myself—a foolish habit,” I rejoined, with a low bow and, I’m afraid, a rather malicious smile. The old lady glared at me, bobbed her head the slightest bit in the world, and passed me by.
I went out into the sunshine, whistling merrily. My good friend the waiter stood by the door. His eyes asked me a question.
“She is much better,” I said reassuringly. And I walked out, still whistling merrily.
In truth I was very pleased with myself. Every man likes to think that he understands women. I was under the impression that I had proved myself to possess a thorough and complete acquaintance with that intricate subject. I was soon to find that my knowledge had its limitations. In fact, I have been told more than once since that my plan was a most outrageous one. Perhaps it was; but it had the effect of wresting those dangerous stones from poor Marie’s regretful hands. A man need not mind having made a fool of himself once or twice on his way through the world, so he has done some good by the process. At the moment, however, I felt no need for any such apology.
Return to Table of Contents
I
Iwas thoughtful as I walked across theplacein front of the church in the full glare of the afternoon sun. It was past four o’clock; the town was more lively, as folk, their day’s work finished, came out to take their ease and filled the streets and thecafés. I felt that I also had done something like a day’s work; but my task was not complete till I had lodged my precious trust safely in the keeping of the duchess.
There was, however, still time to spare, and I sat down at acaféand ordered some coffee. While it was being brought my thoughts played round Marie Delhasse. I doubted whether I disliked her for being tempted, or liked her for resisting at the last; at any rate, I was glad to have helped her a little. If I could now persuade her to leave Avranches, I should have done all that could reasonably be expected of me; if the duke pursued, she must fight the battle for herself. So I mused, sipping my coffee; and then I fell to wondering what the duchess would say on seeing me again so soon. Would she see me? She must, whether she liked it or not; I could not keep the diamonds all night. Perhaps she would like.
“There you are again!” I said to myself sharply, and I roused myself from my meditations.
As I looked up, I saw the man Lafleur opposite to me. He had his back toward me, but I knew him, and he was just walking into a shop that faced thecaféand displayed in its windows an assortment of offensive weapons—guns, pistols, and various sorts of knives. Lafleur went in. I sat sipping my coffee. He was there nearly twenty minutes; then he came out and walked leisurely away. I paid my score and strolled over to the shop. I wondered what he had been buying. Dueling pistols for the duke, perhaps! I entered and asked to be shown some penknives. The shopman served me with alacrity. I chose a cheap knife, and then I permitted my gaze to rest on a neat little pistol that lay on the counter. My simplerusewas most effective. In a moment I was being acquainted with all the merits of the instrument, and the eulogy was backed by the information that a gentleman had bought two pistols of the same make not ten minutes before I entered the shop.
“Really!” said I. “What for?”
“Oh, I don’t know, sir. It is a wise thing often to carry one of these little fellows. One never knows.”
“In case of a quarrel with another gentleman?”
“Oh, they are hardly such as we sell for dueling, sir.”
“Aren’t they?”
“They are rather pocket pistols—to carry if you are out at night; and we sell many to gentlemen who have occasion in the way of their business to carry large sums of money or valuables about with them. They give a sense of security, sir, even if no occasion arises for their use.”
“And this gentleman bought two? Who was he?”
“I don’t know, sir. He gave me no name.”
“And you didn’t know him by sight?”
“No, sir; perhaps he is a stranger. But indeed I’m almost that myself: I have but just set up business here.”
“Is it brisk?” I asked, examining the pistol.
“It is not a brisk place, sir,” the man answered regretfully. “Let me sell you one, sir!”
It happened to be, for the moment, in the way of my business to carry valuables, but I hoped it would not be for long, so that I did not buy a pistol; but I allowed myself to wonder what my friend Lafleur wanted with two—and they were not dueling pistols! If I had been going to keep the diamonds—but then I was not. And, reminded by this reflection, I set out at once for the convent.
Now the manner in which the Duchess of Saint-Maclou saw fit to treat me—who was desirous only of serving her—on this occasion went far to make me disgusted with the whole affair into which I had been drawn. It might have been supposed that she would show gratitude; I think that even a little admiration and a little appreciation of my tact would not have been, under the circumstances, out of place. It is not every day that a lady has such a thing as the Cardinal’s Necklace rescued from great peril and freely restored, with no claim (beyond that for ordinary civility) on the part of the rescuer.
And the cause did not lie in her happening to be out of temper, for she greeted me at first with much graciousness, and sitting down on the corn bin (she was permitted on this occasion to meet me in the stable), she began to tell me that she had received a most polite—and indeed almost affectionate—letter from the duke, in which he expressed deep regret for her absence, but besought her to stay where she was as long as the health of her soul demanded. He would do himself the honor of waiting on her and escorting her home, when she made up her mind to return to him.
“Which means,” observed the duchess, as she replaced the letter in her pocket, “that the Delhasses are going, and that if I go (without notice anyhow) I shall find them there.”
“I read it in the same way; but I’m not so sure that the Delhasses are going.”
“You are so charitable,” said she, still quite sweetly. “You can’t bring yourself to think evil of anybody.”
The duchess chanced to look so remarkably calm and composed as she sat on the corn bin that I could not deny myself the pleasure of surprising her with the sudden apparition of the Cardinal’s Necklace. Without a word, I took the case out of my pocket, opened it, and held it out toward her. For once the duchess sat stock-still, her eyes round and large.
“Have you been robbing and murdering my husband?” she gasped.
With a very complacent smile I began my story. Who does not know what it is to begin a story with a triumphant confidence in its favorable reception? Who does not know that first terrible glimmer of doubt when the story seems not to be making the expected impression? Who has not endured the dull dogged despair in which the story, damned by the stony faces of the auditors, has yet to drag on a hated weary life to a dishonored grave?
These stages came and passed as I related to Mme. de Saint-Maclou how I came to be in a position to hand back to her the Cardinal’s Necklace. Still, silent, pale, with her lips curled in a scornful smile, she sat and listened. My tone lost its triumphant ring, and I finished in cold, distant, embarrassed accents.
“I have only,” said I, “to execute my commission and hand the box and its contents over to you.”
And, thus speaking, I laid the necklace in its case on the corn bin beside the duchess.
The duchess said nothing at all. She looked at me once—just once; and I wished then and there that I had listened to Gustave de Berensac’s second thoughts and left with him at ten o’clock in the morning. Then having delivered this barbed shaft of the eyes, the duchess sat looking straight in front of her, bereft of her quick-changing glances, robbed of her supple grace—like frozen quicksilver. And the necklace glittered away indifferently between us.
At last the duchess, her eyes still fixed on the whitewashed wall opposite, said in a slow emphatic tone:
“I wouldn’t touch it, if it were the crown of France!”
I plucked up my courage to answer her. For Marie Delhasse’s sake I felt a sudden anger.
“You are pharisaical,” said I. “The poor girl has acted honorably. Her touch has not defiled your necklace.”
“Yes, you must defend what you persuaded,” flashed out the duchess. “It’s the greatest insult I was ever subjected to in my life!”
Here was the second lady I had insulted on that summer day!
“I did but suggest it—it was her own wish.”
“Your suggestion is her wish! How charming!” said the duchess.
“You are unjust to her!” I said, a little warmly.
The duchess rose from the corn bin, made the very most of her sixty-three inches, and remarked:
“It’s a new insult to mention her to me.”
I passed that by; it was too absurd to answer.
“You must take it now I’ve brought it,” I urged in angry puzzle.
The duchess put out her hand, grasped the case delicately, shut it—and flung it to the other side of the stable, hard by where an old ass was placidly eating a bundle of hay.
“That’s the last time I shall touch it!” said she, turning and looking me in the face.
“But what am I to do with it?” I cried.
“Whatever you please,” returned Mme. de Saint-Maclou; and without another word, without another glance, either at me or at the necklace, she walked out of the stable, and left me alone with the necklace and the ass.
The ass had given one start as the necklace fell with a thud on the floor; but he was old and wise, and soon fell again to his meal. I sat drumming my heels against the corn bin. Evening was falling fast, and everything was very still. No man ever had a more favorable hour for reflection and introspection. I employed it to the full. Then I rose, and crossing the stable, pulled the long ears of my friend who was eating the hay.
“I suppose you also were a young ass once,” said I with a rueful smile.
Well, I couldn’t leave the Cardinal’s Necklace in the corner of the convent stable. I picked up the box. Neddy thrust out his nose at it. I opened it and let him see the contents. He snuffed scornfully and turned back to the hay.
“He won’t take it either,” said I to myself, and with a muttered curse I dropped the wretched thing back in the pocket of my coat, wishing much evil to everyone who had any hand in bringing me into connection with it, from his Eminence the Cardinal Armand de Saint-Maclou down to the waiter at the hotel.
Slowly and in great gloom of mind I climbed the hill again. I supposed that I must take the troublesome ornament back to Marie Delhasse, confessing that my fine idea had ended in nothing save a direct and stinging insult for her and a scathing snub for me. My pride made this necessity hard to swallow, but I believe there was also a more worthy feeling that caused me to shrink from it. I feared that her good resolutions would not survive such treatment, and that the rebuff would drive her headlong into the ruin from which I had trusted that she would be saved. Yet there was nothing else for it. Back the necklace must go. I could but pray—and earnestly I did pray—that my fears might not be realized.
I found myself opposite the gun-maker’s shop; and it struck me that I might probably fail to see Marie alone that evening. I had no means of defense—I had never thought any necessary. But now a sudden nervousness got hold of me: it seemed to me as if my manner must betray to everyone that I carried the necklace—as if the lump in my coat stood out conspicuous as Mont St. Michel itself. Feeling that I was doing a half-absurd thing, still I stepped into the shop and announced that, on further reflection, I would buy the little pistol. The good man was delighted to sell it to me.
“If you carry valuables, sir,” he said, repeating his stock recommendation, “it will give you a feeling of perfect safety.”
“I don’t carry valuables,” said I abruptly, almost rudely, and with most unnecessary emphasis.
“I did but suggest, sir,” he apologized. “And at least, it may be that you will require to do so some day.”
“That,” I was forced to admit, “is of course not impossible.” And I slid the pistol and a supply of cartridges into the other pocket of my coat.
“Distribute the load, sir,” advised the smiling nuisance. “One side of your coat will be weighed down. Ah, pardon! I perceive that there is already something in the other pocket.”
“A sandwich-case,” said I; and he bowed with exactly the smile the waiter had worn when I said that I came from Mont St. Michel.
Return to Table of Contents