"Oh, I must go," she sighed; "Imustget there before them, to see to things."
They stood together in the hall—the hall that he knew would look so pathetically blank to him this afternoon.
"We haven't had long, have we?" he said. "How I'm going to hate everybody in this hydro when you've gone!—the people that mention you, and the people that don't mention you; every single one of them; because I shall be missing you in every second and they'll all be chattering and scandalmongering just the same. When shall I hear from you? You'll tell them as soon as you see them—you won't put it off, even for an hour? Oh, my darling, don't think I'm not alive to all that's beautiful in you, but"—he tried to smile—"youarea little bit of a coward where they're concerned, aren't you? Keep remembering you're free to do as you like. If they aren't pleased, they can be displeased. You haven't got to ask their permission. It's a perfectly simple statement-you're' going to marry me.' They haven't a shadow of right to complain. If you'll remind yourself of that, it'll make it smoother for you.... I wish we could have had a day together first—away from all this crew, I mean. Couldn't you make it to-morrow instead? We'd have a car and go somewhere. Couldn't you, Belle?"
"I can't," she said wistfully. "It'd be heavenly. But I can't. I ought to go upstairs and pack now."
"All right, little woman," said he; "I don't want to make it worse for you. Go along, then. I may see you off, mayn't I? And I'll 'phone at once about your passage on the boat. And I'll come to Beckenhampton the instant you send for me. And we're to be married by special licence next week. Oh, isn't it great! And then your new life begins—the laughter life, the girl life. I'm going to wipe out that troubled look they've put in your eyes—I'm going to make you self-willed, make you tyrannise over me."
"Tyrannise over the Judge! Wouldn't it be a shame?" she laughed. "What a reward for you!"
"I don't know," he said; "I believe I'd like it—it's time you did a little tyrannising. I can't kiss you, darling, because somebody's coming down the stairs, but look at me and let's pretend!"
Downcast as she felt, as the train bore her from him, she felt firm. She could not view the ordeal before her as lightly as he—he did not understand, she told herself; it was natural that he shouldn't—but she was resolved to meet it without delay, and to be bold in the face of the consternation she foresaw. How easy it would have been but for the insincerities she had been guilty of, the craven insincerities! It was her own horrible hypocrisy, not her stepdaughters' disapproval, chat made the task so difficult. As she dwelt upon the difficulties, as she realised the almost incredible shock she was about to deal, the fortitude within her faded, and during the latter half of the journey it was with thankfulness she reflected that she would not have to confront the situation that day.
It should be directly they arrived, though! She vowed it.
She had watched tremulously till nearly three o'clock, when a cab rumbled to the house at last; and her heart turned sicker still as she saw that her stepdaughters were accompanied by their aunt.
"We persuaded her to come."
"I'm afraid I shall be a sad visitor for you, my dear."
"They were quite right. The change will do you good."
They explained that they had lunched early, and they sat awhile in the drawing-room, with their hats and coats on—her sister-in-law oppressive with much crape; the young women also wearing black dresses, very badly made.
"A glass of wine, Harriet? You must be tired after the journey." She rang the bell.
Sipping the port, and alternately nibbling a biscuit, and flicking crumbs from her lap, Aunt Harriet was taciturn and tearful. And she had little to say between tea and dinner, excepting when she spoke huskily of her son's last hours. But in the evening her thoughts reverted to the "happy days she had spent in the house when her dear brother was alive," and she discoursed on them, remarking how "sadly different it seemed now."
"It was a terrible loss for you, Belle," she moaned. "But the parting is only for this life. That's all, my dear, only for this life. You'll meet again where there are no partings. You must keep thinking of that. It's only faith that helps us all to bear up."
And the hypocrite, loathing her hypocrisy, heard herself answer, "Oh, I know! Oh yes!"
At Harrogate the orchestra would be playing now, and he was wondering if she had told them yet! She gazed before her helplessly. She would have to put it off till to-morrow.
Said Mildred, "I daresay Aunt would like to go to bed early."
"If you'll all excuse me, dear, I think I should."
"I think we're all of us ready, aren't we?" murmured Mrs. Findon.
And as they got up and filed from the room, Amy said in sacerdotal tones, "There's one thing we want to do, isn't there, before we go upstairs to-night?" And, like one who performs a rite, she opened the study door; and on the threshold they drooped devoutly.
"O God, forgive me, and help me to be truthful!" prayed the hypocrite when she was alone.
The morrow was Sunday, and in the morning they went to church; and after service they walked dismally to the cemetery. At dinner she could scarcely swallow. She felt faint, and her hands trembled when the return to the drawing-room was made. It had to be now! Her sister-in-law was settling herself for a nap. Amy turned listlessly the pages of a book. Mildred, her shallow eyes upturned, and her head slightly sideways, wore an air of pious resignation to some unexpressed calamity. Turning from the window, with a gulp, the coward stammered:
"Oh ... after you had gone from Harrogate, Mr. Murray asked me to marry him."
The silence seemed to her to last for minutes.
"To dowhat?" gasped Amy.
"Well!" exclaimed Mildred. "It didn't take long to puthimin his place, I hope. What impudence!"
"He had an impudent look," said Amy.
"Some man who was staying at the hydro where you were?" inquired Aunt Harriet. "Fancy! That's the worst of those large places. But I shouldn't let it worry you, my dear. It isn't worth worrying about. Very likely he didn't mean any harm by it. He didn't understand, that's all—didn't know your heart was buried with him who's gone."
"Disgusting,Icall it," said Mildred. "But Aunt's quite right—we needn't talk about it.... I thought this morning—I don't know if you noticed it—that the saxifrage on the grave had gone rather thin; there was a gap here and there. I think we'd better see the superintendent. It isn't what it ought to be, by any means."
She stood struggling to say the rest—she struggled with all the puny will that was within her. And so unfit was she to struggle, that on surrendering, her paramount emotion was relief. She said, "Yes, we'll see him about it, and have some more."
She had intended to write to Murray in time for the evening collection. But she could not write that she had kept her word, and she shrank from writing that she had paltered with it. She lay sleepless, crying with mortification. Once a desperate impulse to be done with her compliance then and there, pulled her up, and she thrust on her dressing-gown; but her mind quailed even as she reached the door, and she sank on to the edge of the bed, procrastinating—and then crept back between the sheets.
She could not write that she had kept her word on the next day either, nor during the two days that followed. The just thing to them both would have been to write him exactly what had happened, but as she was a woman, the thing natural to her when she was to blame was to behave worse still by not writing at all. A feeble attempt she made, but ... what was there to say, excepting that she had failed? In every moment she was conscious of his waiting; she realised the glances that he cast at that letter-rack over the console table, and saw his mouth tighten at every disappointment that it dealt. And she was fond of him. Yet it was beyond her to sustain the effort to confess herself demeaned.
He telegraphed: "Coming to you by the seven o'clock train to-morrow Friday morning."
From her bedroom window, before breakfast, she saw the boy crossing the road with the message, and she darted downstairs and took it from him before the double knock could crash. No one was aware, when the family group made their matins to the study, that in her pocket she had a telegram from a lover. No one surmised, when she served the eggs and bacon, that she was questioning, terrified, how to keep his coming secret. If any of them were in, when the maid said that he was asking for her? She would be tongue-tied. And they—how insulting they'd be to him! It would be awful ... awful, unless she were to prepare them, unless she were to say now that she had heard from him and that they must receive him properly. She knew she wasn't going to say it, but she imagined the sensation if she said it: "Mr. Murray's calling this morning. You've made a mistake—I accepted him." She shivered at the mere notion, at fancying how horror would distort their faces. Just after she had been shamming in that room!... She would make an excuse to go out—she'd meet him at the station.
It was going to be very painful—she wished he weren't coming. In love with him though she was, she knew that she wished he weren't coming. And in that moment it was borne upon her that her expectation of marrying him had died days ago. She could never go through with it! She would have to tell him so—and he wouldn't understand, wouldn't make allowances for her. He had not understood at Harrogate. He'd reproach her, tell her she had treated him badly. And she'd have to sit there, in the waiting-room, trying not to cry, with people looking on....
If she could have been picked up in his arms and carried off this morning, without coming back to the house at all! That would be nice. The girls and Harriet might say what they chose, if she hadn't got to listen to it. But he wouldn't ask her to go like that; she would have to propose it herself. How could she? Besides, when she went out to meet him she couldn't even take a suit-case.... Oh, what good would it do to meet him? Pain for nothing. He thought he would be able to argue her into it, make her promise over again. Wretched. And very likely shewouldpromise—and then what was she going to do? She would feel worse then than she felt now. It would have been far better for them not to see each other. If she told the servant——She couldn't say "Not at home," that would sound dreadful.
He might be here soon, she supposed, unless he had to wait long for the change of trains. If she did mean to go to the station, she ought to go directly she had given orders to the cook. Walking into misery with her eyes open! And walking back with her heart in her shoes. It wouldn't be any easier to say it to them later than it was at this minute—and she would know it even while he was wringing the promise from her. Oh, what was he coming for, to make things worse still? He might have known by her not having written to him——She pushed back her chair with vexation.
After breakfast, when the beds were being made, Mrs. Findon said:
"Doreen, if anybody calls this morning—a gentleman—say we're away from home for a few days. You understand? For a few days—all of us. Oh, and, Doreen, if he asks where we are, you don't know."
More than six years have gone by since Mrs. Findon peeped, breathless, as Mr. Murray got into a cab again and was driven out of her life. And now when she reads in her newspaper, every day, on one page or another, how sublimely mankind has progressed by relapsing into barbarism, and that the new human nature is purged of frailties that were inherent in men and women until the 4th August 1914, she vaguely wonders how it is that her household, and her social circle, and Beckenhampton at large, and she herself have not had their characters regenerated, like the rest of the world. For each morning she goes with the Misses Findon to gaze upon the study, and each Sunday she goes with them to gaze upon the grave; and on their return, while the Misses Findon sit by the fireplace, speaking at long intervals, in subdued tones, their stepmother stares from the window, knowing that her pretence of mourning a husband she did not love will continue as long as she lives. And when she looks back on her romance, she marvels—not at the recreancy of her submission, but that once she briefly dared to dream she would rebel.
At this time of day I do not mind publishing the facts. It happened a few weeks after those pillars of the State—Thibaudin and Hazard—disappeared from Paris with a couple of million francs. They were leading the police a pretty dance, and people said, "Ah, they are probably at the world's end by this time!" I used to think to myself how securely a man who had a mind to do so might lie hidden within an hour's journey of the Grand Boulevard. It was really the disappearance of Thibaudin and Hazard that originated my Idea.
I was manager at that period of the Théâtre Suprême, where we were very soon to produce Beauregard's play,Omphale. I descried a way to attract additional attention to our project. I went to see Beauregard one October morning, and gave him a shock. He was breakfasting in bed.
"Bonjour, maître," I said. "Are you too much occupied to talk business?"
"Panage," exclaimed the dramatist, "if you have come to demand any more mutilations of the manuscript, I tell you without parleying that no consideration on earth will induce me to yield. There is a limit; mon Dieu, there is a limit! Rather than cut another line, or substitute another syllable I will put the contract in the fire."
"Dear friend, you have evidently slept ill and are testy this morning," I said. "Compose yourself. I come to exhilarate you with a great scheme."
He still eyed me apprehensively, and to pacify him I made haste to explain, "It has nothing to do with any alterations in the play."
"Ah!" He breathed relief, and dipped his croissant in his cup.
"It is a scheme for booming it."
My host was forthwith genial. A smile suffused his munching face, and he offered me a cigarette.
"I ask your pardon if I was abrupt," he said. "As you surmise, I passed a bad night. A boom? Well, you know my views on the subject of booming. The ordinary puff preliminary is played out. One needs something novel, Panage, something scholarly. 'Scholarly' is the word. ForOmphale,a play of pre-Hellenic times, one needs the boom scholarly, classical, and grandiose."
"You voice my own sentiments," said I. "One needs nothing less than a production of 'unrivalled accuracy'—costumes 'copied from designs discovered in Crete and dating back to the dim days of the Minotaur.' That would look tasteful in print, would it not? Alors, what do you say to our going to Crete and discovering them?"
"Crete?" stammered Beauregard. Have I mentioned that he was fat and indolent and had never travelled further than Trouville?
"What think you of exploring the Minotaur's lair?" I questioned. "Of penetrating to the apartments of Phædra? Of examining with your own eyes the labyrinth of Ariadne?"
"I?" he ejaculated.
"You and I together, my old one! Our adventures would make pretty reading, hein? Would not all Paris be chattering about yourOmphale?What a fever of impatience for the first night! Think of the effect such paragraphs would have on the advance booking."
The corpulent Beauregard lay back on the pillows, pale and mute. I had spoken too earnestly for him to suspect that I was pulling his leg, and I could see that he was very seriously perturbed. His mind was torn in halves between his longing for the advertisement and his horror of the exertion and expense. After a moment he sat up, perspiring, and wrung my hand.
"Panage," he cried, "you are a man of genius! Your idea is most brilliant; I have never heard its equal. With all my heart I congratulate you. I, alas! cannot accompany you on account of my wife's ill-health, butyouare free. Go, mon ami! Your inspiration will crowd your theatre."
His wife's health was offensively robust. I shook with laughter so unrestrained that the cigarette fell out of my mouth.
"Let me be a trifle more explicit," I said. "It is not essential to my scheme that either you or I should actually go to Crete. It is only essential that we should be reported to have gone there. I propose that we should blazon our departure in all the journals—we might give them interviews in the midst of our packing—and that we should then retire for two or three months to some secluded spot near at hand where there will be nobody to recognise us. I shall confide only in Verdeille, my secretary; I can rely on him, and he will keep the Press well supplied with anecdotes of our vicissitudes during our absence. Mon Dieu! We will make Paris bubble and boil with anticipation."
He was admiring, but timid. "Don't you think it would be very risky?" he demurred. "If our imposture were found out? It would be ruin. For example, what spot?"
"Well, I am not prepared with spots at the instant; I came to you on the effervescence of the notion. But somewhere off the beaten track. One can hide very effectually without going far—I would not mind wagering that Thibaudin and Hazard are lying low in some hamlet. While the police are watching Marseilles and Havre, or picturing them already in South America, they are probably concealed within an easy run of the gare St. Lazare, waiting till the search is relaxed. What about one of the little seaside places in Normandy—have you ever stumbled on one of them a day after the season finished? There is nobody left but the garde-champêtre."
He shivered. "Three months of it?" he queried piteously.
"Our investigations, which we undertake 'to complete the previous labours of the archæologists,' ought to be thorough," I pointed out.
"Is it not worth our while to suffer a little tedium for such an end? Lift your gaze to the cash that will accrue, Beauregard. Dwell upon the box-office besieged. Positively we shall double the value of your play. Also you can take plenty of exercise and improve your figure."
"I abhor exercise," he murmured.
"And you could keep early hours and prolong your life."
"My life is a series of vexations—to prolong it would be fatuous."
"Further, everybody will say what a conscientious artist you are; I don't mind asserting that your passion for accuracy is sweeping me to the Minotaur's lair against my will."
"Well, I will think about it," he said heavily.
He promised to write to me on the morrow.
There was no difficulty about finding a summer resort forsaken enough in October—the difficulty was to find one sufficiently animated to boast an hotel that remained open; and at last I authorised Verdeille to provide us with a furnished chalet. Of these he had reported an unlimited choice everywhere. The resort finally approved for our purpose contained thirty furnished chalets, and they were all to be let with alacrity until the following July. We took ours until February. I had extracted Beauregard's consent, and a fortnight later I hustled him into a cab. He looked as if he were being removed for a kill-or-cure operation, and I am sure he had half a mind to break his word even when we were in the train. On the journey I perused with pleasureLe Matin, and the current issue ofL'Illustration, in which the programme of our imaginary trip was set forth with a wealth of invention that did me credit. The deception, in fact, had been engineered so eloquently that at moments I had almost begun to fancy we were really bound for Crete.
We travelled to Dieppe, and then a cab crawled into a void with us—the motor service, we learnt, was discontinued for the next nine months. The chalet was a high, gaunt house called "Les Myosotis." A peasant, who represented the agence de location, stood at her door to wonder at our arrival. A primitive bonne, whom Verdeille had engaged to attend upon us, appeared to entertain doubts of our sanity. We entered the scene as messieurs "Poupard," and "Bachelet." It wasmyprecaution to choose names beginning with a P and a B; I thought of the initials on our luggage, and our washing—the dramatist had overlooked that point.
Well, I shall not pretend that I was in for a rollicking time. I have a high esteem for Beauregard in the theatre, but Beauregard in a village was unspeakable. His lamentations linger with me yet. We had nothing to do, except to walk in the mud and regard the shutters of the twenty-nine other chalets. At seven o'clock in the evening, the distant lighthouse, and the lamp in our own salon afforded the only lights discoverable for miles round. That fat Parisian's melancholy, his reproaches, his attitudes of despair, defy description. Even when the weather improved, he would perceive no virtue in it. I exclaimed once, "What a beautiful sky to-night!" He replied, "Itwouldbe beautiful from the Place de la Concorde!" He had brought a cartload of novels—and before we had been in the place a week he was complaining that he had nothing to read.
"I shall die if I remain any longer," he declared. "I shall be buried here, I foresee it. The climate doesn't agree with me. Honestly, I feel very unwell. I ought to return to Paris, it is my duty—I have my wife to consider."
"You were never so well in your life," I remonstrated sharply. "Rubbish! there's no escape now, you've got to see it through. Foretaste the triumph ofOmphaleand be blithe."
"How much will a triumph be worth to me if I am dead?" he wailed. "Mon Dieu! what an existence, what demoniac desolation! I shudder when I wake in the morning; the thought of the terrible day before me weighs me down. I have scarcely the energy to put on my socks. To wash my neck exhausts me. Is there nothing, nothing to be done for an hour's respite—is there no entertainment within reasonable distance?"
"My beloved 'Bachelet,'" I said, "you forget; at a place of entertainment we might be recognised. Besides, there isn't any."
He threw up his arms. "It is like being in gaol, word of honour! Who directed you to this fatal hole, where a postman collects letters only when he pleases—this desert, where Monday'sMatindrifts by Tuesday night? By what perverse ingenuity did you contrive to find it? How long have we endured it now?"
"Ten days," I told him cheerfully. "Why, we have only got about eighty more!"
He groaned. "It seems like centuries. My misgiving, of course, is that it will drive me to intemperance: such ordeals as this develop the vice. The natives themselves are staggered by our presence; they whisper about me as I pass. Children follow me up the roads, marvelling; if the population sufficed, I should be followed by crowds. I tell you, we are objects of suspicion; we are a local mystery; they conclude we must have 'done something.' Also the laundress here is a violent savage—she is not a laundress at all. I had six new collars when we came, six collars absolutely new from the box—and this devil has frayed them already. I would never have believed it could be accomplished in the time, but she has managed it. Six collars absolutely new from the box!"
Don't imagine that he had finished! don't suppose that it was merely a bad mood. It was the kind of thing I had to bear from him daily, hourly—from the early coffee to the latest cigarette.
One afternoon, when I had gone for a stroll without him, a contretemps occurred. I had entered the outfitter's, and stationer's, and tobacconist's and provision merchant's—the miniature shop was the only one in the place that had not closed until the following summer—to obtain a pair of shoelaces. That the clod-hoppers cackled about our sojourn was a small matter to me, and I paid no more heed to the woman's curious stare to-day than usual. But I was to meet another stare!
As I waited for my change, a shabby young man came in to ask for a copy ofLe Petit Journal, and a toy for five sous.Le Petit Journal, which I had just read, contained the latest details of my explorations in Crete, and instinctively I looked round. His eyes widened. I did not know him from Adam; but it was evident thatheknewme, at least by sight! I turned hot and cold with confusion.
Grabbing at my coppers, I hurried out, wondering what I had better do if he addressed me. Before I had time to solve the question I heard him striding at my heels. With a deprecating bow that told me he had favours to solicit, he exclaimed, "Monsieur Panage!"
"You are mistaken," I said promptly.
"Oh, monsieur, I beg you to hear me," he cried, "I entreat you! In the theatre you are for ever inaccessible—will you not spare an instant to me here?"
He was so sure of my identity that I realised it would be indiscreet of me to deny it any longer. Since I could not deceive, my only course was to ingratiate him.
"What do you want?" I asked, fuming.
"Monsieur," he broke out, "I am an actor. I have been acting in the provinces since I was a boy. I have played every kind of part from farce to tragedy. I have talent, but I have no influence, and the stage doors of Paris are shut and barred against me! No manager will listen to me, because I am too obscure to obtain an introduction to him; no one will believe that I have ability, because I cannot get a chance to prove it. Oh, I know very well what a liberty I have taken in speaking to you, but I want to get on, I want to get on—I implore you to give me a trial!"
He had me in a nice fix. Apparently he was unaware that I was believed to be in Crete, but he would soon learn it by the newspaper in his pocket, and if I snubbed him he would certainly give me away. He could hold me up to ridicule—I should be the laughing-stock of Paris. It was a fine situation for me. I, the director of the Théâtre Suprême, was compelled to temporise with this provincial mummer!
I scrutinised him in encouraging silence, as if mentally casting him for a part. I saw hope bounding in him.
"Ah!" I said thoughtfully. "Y-e-s.... What is your favourite line?"
"Character, monsieur," he panted. "And, of course, I would accept a very small salary, a very small salary indeed."
I did not doubt it. I could picture him strutting and ranting on the boards of a booth for a louis a week, and holding himself lucky when he earned that.
"Walk on a little way with me," I said graciously; "we can talk as we go along. I should have to see you do something before I could consider you, you know; I must be sure that you are capable. Even the gentleman who plays the servant at the Suprême and hasn't a single word to utter is an experienced comedian. You are not playing any-where in the neighbourhood? you are not in a travelling theatre about here?"
"No, monsieur," he sighed, "I am out of an engagement; I am here because this is where I live."
"Rather remote from the dramatic world?" I suggested, smiling; "something of a drawback, is it not?" His simplicity in crediting me with the notion of recruiting the Suprême from a travelling theatre tickled me nearly to death.
"A grave drawback, monsieur," he agreed. "But I am not alone—I have a child, and she is too delicate to thrive in a city."
"A good many delicate children have thriven in Paris," I remarked.
"In thriving households, monsieur—in healthy quarters. Paris is dear, and I am poor—mychild would be condemned to a slum. I should see her lade away. Better to be a barnstormer all my life than lose my child. She is all I have left to love."
"There is your art," I said, humbugging him.
"My art?" He gave an hysterical laugh. A nervous, jumpy fellow, without a particle of repose. "Listen, monsieur, listen. I am an actor, and if I could demolish the barrier that keeps me out, I might be a great one; but I confess to you that I would abandon art and cast figures on an office stool, or break flints on a road, and thank God for the exchange, if it would buy my child a home! I want money. I want to give my child the comforts that other children have. That'smyambition. I have no loftier pose than fatherhood. My prayer is, not applause, and compliments, and notoriety, not the petty pleasure of hearing I have equalled one favourite or eclipsed another; my prayer is—to give things to my child! I want to buy her nourishing food, and a physician's advice, and the education of a gentlewoman. I want the money to send her to the South when it snows, and to the mountains when it's hot. I want to see her laughing in a garden, like the rich men's children in Paris that you spoke of. I stand and watch them sometimes—when I go there to beg at stage doors till an understrapper kicks me out."
"Well, well, the sort of things you desire are not so expensive," I said suavely. "Some day your salary may provide them all."
"You think it possible, monsieur? Really?" His haggard eyes devoured me.
"You have only to make one success. After that, you will be grossly overpaid, like every other star."
"If I could but do it!" he gasped. "If I could only convince a Paris manager that I have it in me! Year after year I've hoped, and tried, and failed to get a hearing. You may judge my desperation by my audacity in stopping you in the streets. What course is open to me—what steps can I take? Even now, when I am pouring out my heart to monsieur Panage himself, how much does it advance me?"
He was not so simple as I had thought.
"Enfin—by the way, what is your name?"
"My name is Paul Manesse, monsieur."
"Well, monsieur, you must surely understand that until I have seen you act I cannot be of any service to you?"
"I could rehearse on approval," he pleaded.
"Moreover," I added hastily, "all my arrangements are made for some time to come. Later on, when an opportunity arises, we shall see what we shall see." I halted. "Write to me during the run ofOmphale. I shall not forget our little chat. A propos, I am starting to-morrow for Crete; I see the papers are reporting that I am already there, so you need not mention that you have met me—it is never policy to contradict the Press. Yes, I shall bear your name in mind, I assure you."
He did not look assured, however; he stood silent, and his lips were trembling. Heaven knows what solid help my amiability had led him to expect, but it was plain that honeyed phrases were a meagre substitute.
"You have been most courteous to me," he stammered, "you have done me a great honour—as long as I live I shall remember that I have talked with monsieur Panage; but you are leaving what you found, monsieur—a desperate man!"
"Bah! who knows when an opening may occur?" I said, a shade embarrassed. "I may see a chance for you sooner than you think. When I want you I shall send for you."
I little dreamt in what strange circumstances I was to send for him.
Beauregard was snoring on the sofa when I burst into the room.
"Well, you can bestir yourself and pack!" I volleyed. "The place is too hot to hold us; we have to get out!"
"Hein?"
"There is a pro here who knows me, confound him! I had to tell him we were leaving for Crete in the morning—he mustn't see me here again."
The playwright shifted his slippered feet to the floor and sat up. "We go back to Paris?" he inquired, beaming.
"How can that be? Of course not! We must discover another retreat."
"Fugitives!" moaned Beauregard. "Nomads! Do you not think, Panage, thatImight go back to Paris—I could remain cautiously in the house? The truth is, my wife is of a very high-minded character, and it distresses her to have to address tender letters to a monsieur 'Bachelet': she feels that it is not correct."
I was in no mood to be tolerant of his subterfuges. He wept.
I determined to effect our departure the same evening while he was still intimidated—and if only I had been able to accelerate his movements, my change of intentions would have spared us much. His dilatoriness exposed us to a thunderbolt. We had pealed the bell in his bedroom for the lamp, and when the door was opened at last, I turned to utter a sharp complaint of the delay. To my surprise, I saw that a stranger was walking in. There was a fraction of a second in which I stared indignantly, waiting for an apology for his blunder. Then it was as if my heart slipped slowly to my stomach, and I felt catastrophe in the air, even before I heard his rustic, official tones. He arrested us as Thibaudin and Hazard!
Behind me I heard Beauregard's dressing-case drop with a thud.
Our eyes met, and we stood petrified, realising the impossibility of concealing our names. In my terror of the public scandal that was imminent, my clothes stuck to my skin. Curs, as well as criminals, we looked. I rather fancied that our provincial captor was relieved to see what knock-kneed miscreants he had to deal with.
"You bungling idiot!" I gasped. "I am monsieur Panage, of the Théâtre Suprême; this gentleman is monsieur Beauregard, of the Académie Francaise. You shall suffer for this outrage!"
He shifted his feet slightly. It was the least bit in the world, but that motiveless movement betrayed misgiving; I deduced from it that, in his eagerness to distinguish himself, he had taken more responsibility upon his bucolic shoulders than sat quite comfortably on them. I flung my card to him. "Look!"
"What of it?" he said surlily. "What evidence is this? I see you were preparing for flight. No violence!"—Beauregard had impotently wrung his hands—"I have men in the passage. You will offer your explanations in the proper quarter. Come!" He advanced upon me.
"Now, listen to me," I cried, backing in a panic. "Put so much as a finger on us and you are ruined. Not only will I have you discharged from the Force, I will have you hounded out of any employment that you find to the end of your days. It is I who say it! You have no excuse: we bear no resemblance whatever to Thibaudin and Hazard. If you were of Paris you would know as much!"
Again he faltered. Again he saw distinction within his grasp. The workings of a dull intelligence, a fool's passion for promotion, supplied a fascinating study, even in my fear. "Hollow cheeks, small grey moustache, slight stoop?" he recited, eyeing me. His sheep's gaze travelled to Beauregard. "Age forty, bald at crown. Fat."
"Is he the only fat man in France, fool? We can call all Paris to prove who we are!"
"Monsieur will have his opportunity to prove it elsewhere," he returned stubbornly. But the "monsieur" hinted that I was impressing him against his will.
Beauregard began to collect his wits. "If we are compelled to prove it elsewhere, it will be the end ofyou!" he raged. "Better be convinced in time, I warn you. Hazardisfat, yes;Iam, perhaps, a little plump."
"What do you show me?" mumbled the fellow. "I see the card of monsieur Panage. That does not demonstrate that monsieur Panage is present." Complacence was in his gesture, he seemed vain of the brilliance of his reasoning. "All is said. I have no time for discussions."
"Stop!" I cried, inspired. "What if we produce a resident of this very village, to say who I am?"
"Mon Dieu! the man you met," roared Beauregard. "Saved!"
"There is no such person—we have made our inquiries."
"There is a gentleman well known, who has lived here with his daughter since—I don't know how long!"
"Give me his name."
"His name?" I said. "His name is——" I could not recall the name!—it had had no interest for me. I could remember saying, hypocritically, "I shall bear your name in mind "; but what it was I had no idea. I stood dazed. "His name——It escapes me for the moment."
"Enough. The pretence is idle."
"Morbleu!" thundered Beauregard. "Think, Panage, think!"
"I am trying; but I paid no heed to it."
Heavens! what a revenge for the mummer—the name that had fallen on careless ears was now my only chance of rescue. I thrashed my brains for it, sweating with funk.
"The name——It evades me because I have met him only once in my life."
"Or not so often! I am not to be duped."
"Let me think; don't speak for a minute."
"Farceur!"
"His name——I—I nearly had it. Wait."
"I have waited too long. Come! the pair of you."
"His name—his name——" I sought it frantically. "His name is—Paul Manesse!"
I mopped my neck. Our persecutor made a note.
"Where is he to be found?"
"How should I know that? It is not difficult for you to ascertain; doubtless any villager could direct you to him. Now, mark you, I have supplied the name of a resident in a position to correct your monstrous blunder! I advise you to bring him to identify me before the matter becomes more serious for you still. If you put us to public ignominy, apologies will not satisfy me when you discover your mistake. Here is your last chance to extricate yourself."
He ruminated. "Enfin, I will send one of my men to inquire for him," he said grudgingly. "If it turns out that this 'monsieur Manesse' is unknown, I warn you that you will suffer for your game."
The room was about forty feet from the ground—I saw him attentively considering whether, in his absence, we were likely to walk out of the window. He marched into the corridor and gave a whistle. I heard two voices before he came in again.
Uninvited, he sat, clasping his knees. None of us spoke any more. The lamp having still made no appearance, I lit the candles. I do not forget that long half-hour in Les Myosotis. The yokel himself grew restless at last—he rose and went into the corridor again.
"Hark," exclaimed Beauregard suddenly, "the man has come back. Can you hear Manesse? Listen."
"I cannot distinguish," I murmured, straining my ears to the door.
Some minutes passed. To our dismay, our oppressor re-entered alone. Perplexity darkened his brow. He hesitated before he broke the suspensive hush.
"Monsieur Manesse agrees that this afternoon he met monsieur Panage," he announced. "But"—he raised a forensic forefinger—"that does not establish that either ofyouis monsieur Panage. Monsieur Manesse is occupied in telling a fairy tale to his little daughter and cannot spare the time to come here to identify you. Enfin, you will accompany me to the commissaire de police, and you will obtain the evidence in due course."
"Sacré tonnerre!" I screamed. It was the last straw. That strolling player declined to "spare the time," that mountebank neglected Me!
I saw crimson. I paced the room, raving. "What did he say?" I spluttered. "What were the ruffian's words?"
"My man reports that the gentleman replied, 'Monsieur Panage must have had immense difficulty in recollecting my name. He would not stir an inch to save my life—why shouldItake a walk forhim?'"
I sat down. I felt dizzy. I feared I was going to be extremely ill. The man himself seemed moved by my collapse—or increasingly uncertain of his position. He said, "Perhaps a note might be effectual? Alors, if monsieur wishes to write, I will wait."
"Give me your fountain-pen, Beauregard."
"But"—again the forefinger was uplifted—"there must be no secret instructions. I must be satisfied there is no private meaning in the note."
"Good heavens! What am I permitted to say?"
He pondered. "'To monsieur Paul Manesse: Monsieur——' Has monsieur written 'Monsieur'?"
"Yes, yes; go on!"
"'I am now convinced that you can act. I hereby engage you, at the trifling salary of two hundred and fifty francs a week, for prominent parts in my next three productions at the Théâtre Suprême.'"
The silence was sensational.
"Who the devil are you?" I stuttered, when I found my voice.
"Paul Manesse, monsieur," he told me—"your new comedian, if you sign."
I signed. You have heard how we boomedOmphaleand I found a star! That jolly little Manesse girl has a rich papa to-day.
In one of the dullest towns of France, I sat with a Parisian at a variety show.
A Frenchman, with a very grubby shirt-front, presented to the audience "Señorita Pilar Naranjo, the famous dancer of Madrid." My companion started dramatically, and whispered, "I pray you to pardon me—I shall adjourn to the bar till she has done."
Of course, I followed him. "What's the matter?"
"Do not ask me to watch her!"
"Why?"
"I could not support it."
"She is so bad as all that?"
"Bad? She is entrancing."
"Oh! Did you see her when you were in Spain?"
"In Paris, when I had come back. Have you read mySobs After Midnight?"
"No."
"Buy it. It contains perhaps the most poignant poems that I have written—they are moans in metres for my loss of Pilar Naranjo."
"You don't say so?"
"She was the passion of my life." He struck an attitude. "Return to your seat alone, mon ami. For company I shall have my bitter thoughts."
Civility forbade me to let him do all the acting, himself, and I said in solemn tones, "I shall remain by your side."
He brooded heavily, with one eye on the past, and the other on the effect he was making. "In my nature," he informed me, "there is, mysteriously, some Castilian quality—no sooner had I arrived in Spain than I bore myself like a Spaniard. I spent fascinating months there, and when I came home, Paris appeared to me a foreign city. Absently I replied to people in Spanish; my fondest possession was a guitar that I had brought back. Though I could not play it, I derived exquisite pleasure from slinging it over my shoulder when I promenaded in the Garden of the Luxembourg. It may be that instinct warned my compatriots that now they were alien to me, for they seemed to avoid me, and I was alone."
"I can understand it," I said.
"One melancholy evening, as I wandered through the barren streets, pining for the magic of Granada, I noticed the name of 'Pilar Naranjo' on the bills of a minor musique 'all. Though it was a name unknown to me, its nationality was an appeal. I entered the musique 'all. I paid for a fauteuil, and received a pink ticket. What a crisis! Even to-day I cannot behold pink tickets without a shudder."
To the strains of an exiguous orchestra, the provocation of the lady's castanets reached our ears gaily. Her victim writhed.
"Very soon I gathered that she was popular there; but on the stage, to be a foreigner is to be a favourite, and I prepared myself to be disappointed when she appeared. Sapristi! I was spellbound. She danced, that night, thehabenerathat she is dancing now. Ah, those cajoling arms, so irresistible! How imperial was her form, how Southern were her feet! And her face! the bewildering beauty of her face that haunts me still."
I got up.
"Sit down—I could not endure your looking at her without me!" he gasped. "When her turn finished, I had no thought but her; I was scarcely conscious of the monkeys that came next. In some fifteen minutes a girl had danced herself into my destiny—and I was swept to the stage door, like a leaf, on the gale of my emotions.
"I could see nobody inside, to take a message. Ten minutes—a quarter of an hour passed. I waited in the gloomy little cul-de-sac, dreading, in every second, to hear the approaching footstep of a rival with an appointment. So tremendous was my agitation that Spanish tenses with which I was normally familiar evaded me, and my brain buzzed with the effort to compose a preliminary phrase.
"The door opened. Before her features were visible in the darkness, the majesty of her deportment proclaimed that it was she. I advanced. I bowed, with all my grace.
"'Señorita,' I said, 'I am a poet, and I adore you. Will you honour me by supping with me?'
"It was not the overwhelming eloquence that I should have had in French, but I felt that the fervour of my voice should make amends; and I prayed that she would not be flippant in return. My sentiment demanded sweet, grave, contralto tones; a giggle would have been torture to me. Once more, a crisis—a spiritual crisis, in which my heart ceased to beat. Would she respond gravely, or would she giggle?
"She did neither one nor the other. As if I had not spoken, she went by.
"Comment done? I had referred clearly to supper; I was well-dressed, young, handsome—and a dancer at a fifth-rate musique 'all, which was not precisely a college for decorum, refused to dispense with the ceremony of an introduction!
"It was prodigious. And by degrees my anger at the affront subsided. So far from dismissing her from my mind, I paid homage to her virtue. Yes, my bosom was thrilled by deep esteem. On that sad walk home, the romantic passion for a danseuse was transmuted into a devout reverence for a noble woman. I condemned myself for approaching her so informally. There is, in my complex nature, a vein of humility, extremely winning. I resolved to write to her, confessing my fault, before I slept.
"It was a long job, because I had to look up so many words in a dictionary, but I foresaw that she would be touched by the letter. In conclusion I said, 'The impulse that you scorned was born, not of disrespect, but of an admiration, that brooked no curb. If your vestal pride is not adamant to my remorse, grant me, I supplicate, an opportunity to express my penitence at the stage door to-morrow (Wednesday).'
"Wednesday's sunshine already tinged the street when I dropped the missive in the boite-aux-lettres, but I was not conscious of fatigue. On the contrary, I regretted that I must kill eighteen hours in sleep, or some other banality, before the paradise of her presence was attained. How much had happened in a night! All that was frivolous in my disposition had passed away, and I realised that this girl had inspired in me a devotion profound, epoch-making, and supreme."
He paused. From the footlights, the Frenchman of the dirty shirt-front was to be heard in the capacity of interpreter: "Ladies and gentlemen, Señorita Pilar Naranjo desires me to translate to you her heartfelt gratitude for the enthusiasm of your applause. If you will graciously allow her a few moments for a change of costume, Señorita Naranjo will have the honour of presenting to you her sensational Toreador Dance."
The poet groaned. "When I woke I hoped to find that I had slept well into the afternoon. With impatience I saw that it was only mid-day. However, in dressing, I recognised that I might profitably employ some of the time with the dictionary, and I prepared a score of burning declarations for the interview.
"The remaining hours were intolerable. No sooner had the musique 'all opened than I took my seat, but the exasperating entertainment appeared to me to endure for æons before her turn. The torments, inflicted on my suspense by a pair of cross-talk comedians, cannot be surpassed in hell.
"At last I trembled in the cul-de-sac again. At last she came!
"With an obeisance that consigned my career to her feet, I murmured, 'I am here to learn whether I am pardoned.'
"Not a syllable! As before, she passed me by.
"Ah, mon Dieu! I cannot tell you how I reached my couch.
"But my zeal survived even this. I was stricken, but indomitable. I said, 'Behold a saint worth winning!' I said 'Brace up, and demonstrate that you are worthy of her!'
"My friend, every day for a month I thumbed that exhausting dictionary, and a Spanish Grammar, that I might send to her a sonnet every night. For thirty days on end I wrestled with synonyms and inversions in a foreign tongue, to create for her a nightly proof of my genius and my love.
"And I waited for an answer vainly.
"Long after despair had mastered me, I was with a good-for-nothing painter of my acquaintance. He said, 'I have a new flame—delicious. Have you heard of the Spanish dancer up at the Little Casino?'
"By a superhuman effort I controlled myself. 'Your suit prospers?'
"'It is going strong. And only a week since I first dropped in there and saw her!'
"'You are a man of action! But since when have you talked Spanish?'
"'Oh, that isn't necessary,' he laughed; 'she is Spanish only on the stage. Between ourselves, her name is really Marie Durand—she has never been out of France in her life.'
"She had not understood a single word that I had said, or written—and by the time I discovered it, she was another's! He holds her still—you hear him now."
The "interpreter" was speaking again: "Señorita Naranjo desires me to translate——"
At the Opéra Ball, a boy had danced half the night with a partner whose youthful tones were so delicious, whose tenderness was so attractive, that he implored her a hundred times to unmask. "If I do, you'll get up and go away," she gasped at last, fondling his hand. He vowed that it was her temperament that fascinated him, and she took the mask off—and he saw the sunken face of an old, old woman.
Horrified, he left her.
In the same season, another man supplicated to a girl for her love—a girl with a face so beautiful that it made him forget the strangeness of her voice, which was flat and feeble. And the girl, who looked no more than nineteen, replied with exhaustion: "I outlived such emotions long ago. To tell you the truth, the subject sounds to me ridiculous. All I want to-day is peace and quiet."
Wearily she left him.
These two incidents, peculiar as they are, were the outcome of an occurrence queerer still—an occurrence at the tragic epoch of a woman's life when her glass says: "Stop fooling yourself. You've crumpled tothat!"
Madame de Val Fleury had begun to combat the advance of age the day after she detected the first shadowy threat of crowsfeet, as she turned her perfect neck before the mirror. Her triumph was a fleeting one, and the later conquests were briefer yet. Scarcely had the enemy been driven from the glorious eyes when it crept about the chiselled nose and mouth; no sooner was its attack upon her face withheld than it showed greyly in her hair. But she never abandoned the contest, she fought with Time continuously. And although there were moods of depression, as measures more and more drastic were required, custom and vanity enabled her, year by year, decade by decade, to view her reflection with complacence. She beheld it through a haze of illusion, in applying the colour to her shrivelled cheeks. She did not note that the chestnut transformation that had looked so natural on a counter looked spurious on her head; did not see how piteously the perfect neck had sagged.
But one May morning the mirror said: "Stop tooling yourself. You've crumpled tothat!"and madame de Val Fleury sat and saw her face withered as it was—and madame de Val Fleury wailed for her lost loveliness as she had never wailed for her dead husband and son.
A dress that she was to wear for the first time, and that had cost five thousand francs, lay on the bed. She did not glance towards it. She leant her elbows on the toilet table and stared at the brutal glass. And beyond the glass she viewed the ghost of her empire, scenes where famous beauties had turned involuntarily at her entrance. It was the women's homage, the reluctant admiration of her own sex that she mourned for, as she brooded there. In her backward gaze she saw why, as the years sped, she had squandered more and more on her modistes—saw bitterly that she had struggled to prolong, by her clothes, the fast-waning jealousy of her face.
And at Longchamp that day she knew herself to be only an old, unattractive woman, magnificently attired.
Not more than a month after this, madame de Val Fleury had the annoyance to lose a pendant sapphire that she was wearing. A reward, not illiberal, was offered, and when she woke from her nap one afternoon she was relieved to learn that the stone had been picked up by a poor girl, who was waiting in the hall to see her.
"If she is clean, I will see her here," said madame de Val Fleury.
The young girl who entered, in a threadbare frock, had been dowered with beauty so extraordinary that all the lady's pleasure at recovering her jewel was swamped in envy. The eyes, the complexion, the exquisite modelling of the features held her mute for an instant.
Subduing a sigh, she said: "I hear you have found my sapphire?"
"Yes, madame."
"Let me look. Where did you find it?
"It was in the road, madame, just against the kerb, in the rue de Berri."
"Ah, yes. I am glad you saw it. It was a piece of luck for you, too, hein?" She rose and opened her desk.
"Yes, indeed, madame," said the girl, clasping her hands.
"What are you—I mean, what do you do for a living?"
"I work at madame Wilhelmine's, madame."
"The milliner's? Why don't you go as mannequin somewhere?—you are—er—pretty."
"They tell me my figure is not good enough, madame."
"That's true. Your figure is bad," said the lady, more amiably. "Well, you could sit to artists for the face. You could earn more money that way than Wilhelmine pays you, I should think."
"I know only one honest way to make as much money as I want, madame," said the girl, in a low voice. "I want a good deal."
"Tiens! The State lotteries, of course."
"No, madame; a likelier way than that."
"Oh! And what do you call a good deal?"
"Madame understands that I am very poor. A trifle to madame would be a good deal tome.Say, a hundred thousand francs."
"A hundred thousand francs! Such a sum is not a trifle to anybody. You know a way to make it?"
"Thanks to this reward, I have a chance to make it," assented the girl, folding the bank notes that had been given to her.
"Andnotthe lotteries?"
"No, madame; a journey for which I lacked the fare. But I bore madame?"
"No, no; go on."
"Eh bien, I am sick of poverty; I would far rather part with my face and gain wealth than remain beautiful and a beggar."
"You would far rather——What do you say?"
"I am going to the Face Exchange, madame," said the girl resolutely.
The old woman looked at her stupefied. "The what?" she asked in a whisper.
"Madame has not heard of it? It is held once a year. Of course one may fail; one may not be able to strike a bargain—and even if one does, the miracle may not occur. But something tells me I shall be fortunate."
Madame de Val Fleury shrank back on the couch, frightened—she could not doubt that the girl was insane. After a moment, nerving herself to approach the bell, she stammered, "Yes, yes, I remember now. I daresay it is the best thing you can do. Good afternoon to you. I wish you every success." And as she sniffed at the smelling salts brought by her maid, she murmured, trembling, "Mad. How terrible! Quite, quite mad."
The incident did not fade from her mind. She thought of it in the night, and on the morrow, and when she took the sapphire and the snapped chain to her jeweller's. If the nonsense the poor creature talked had only been true! What ecstasy! And her tone had been perfectly sane. ... Oh, of course she was demented. Still—still, miracles did happen. Look at Lourdes! Every day madame de Val Fleury recalled the matter with a curiosity more intense, and regretted the alarm that had prevented her obtaining details.
Before a week had gone by, the curiosity drove her to make a purchase at the milliner's the girl had mentioned.
"You have a young person employed here who found a jewel that I lost," she remarked. "I don't see her in the shop."
"Yes, madame. No, madame—she is in the workroom. How fortunate that madame's sapphire was restored to her!"
"Ah, the workroom. Have you had her long? Is she satisfactory?"
"Ah yes, madame. About two years. I have no fault to find with her."
"I fancied she was a little odd in her manner. You have not noticed anything of the kind?"
"Mais non, madame. No doubt she was shy in madame's presence. No, she is quick to take a hint, that girl; she has all her wits about her."
"You might tell her I should like to have a word with her," faltered madame de Val Fleury. And when the girl appeared, still more beautiful without a hat, she said, "Come to my flat again this evening about nine o'clock if you can. I will make it worth your while. I want to talk to you."
As she passed out she felt breathless and dizzy.
"Then, if she is not mad—" panted madame de Val Fleury, "then, if she is not mad——My God, can there be something in it?"
She had been going to a neighbour's for a game of écarté after dinner, and écarté was a passion with her, but she knew no regrets in cancelling the engagement. A book by her favourite novelist, just published, lay to hand, and reading was another of her pet pleasures, but she did not open it, as she sat waiting for the hour to strike. Punctually at nine o'clock the bell rang. The girl was shown in.
"Good evening," said madame de Val Fleury. "Sit down. No, no, not so far off. Come closer. Tell me. I have been wondering.... What you were speaking about the other afternoon. Is it really a fact?"
"Madame means my intention?"
"I mean the place itself. It actually exists?"
"Ah, certainly it exists, madame!"
"Where is it?"
"In Brittany, madame. Near Pont Chouay."
"But—it sounds incredible! I am sure you are sincere, but—how long have you known of it?"
"I have known of it ever since the first miracle that happened there, madame, four years ago. I lived in the village then. The face of a little girl, the miller's child, was burnt—ah, it was frightful to see!—and her mother knelt and prayed, the whole night through, that she herself might bear the scars instead. And at dawn itwasso, and the child's face was as fair as ever."
"It takes one's breath away! What is the village called?"
"St. Pierre des Champs, madame. If madame goes there and inquires, everyone will confirm what I tell her."
"And such miracles have happened again?"
"At dawn on each seventh of September, madame. I assure madame I speak the truth."
"Listen," said madame de Val Fleury. "I shall go and hear what they say. If I am satisfied, are you willing to—to exchange your face for mine? I will not haggle with you, I will pay what you want. It is a large amount, but you shall have it—a hundred thousand francs."
"One would have to think over the price, madame," said the girl hesitatingly.
"What? It is the figure you named."
"Yes—for an exchange. But it is possible I might change with someone of my own years. Naturally I should prefer that."
"You do not suppose a young girl would pay a hundred thousand francs?" cried madame de Val Fleury, wincing. "If she has youth already, what for?"
"For beauty. There are many young girls who would be content to do so."
"There will not be many living in a little village."
"Ah, madame, people who know arrive from all parts. Besides, it might be better for me to take even fifty thousand francs with a young face than a hundred thousand with—with one more mature. Madame understands that I am human—I am not indifferent to the other sex. If I sacrifice all my prospects of admiration, sweethearts, husband, it is worth a great sum."
"I shall go and hear what they say," repeated madame de Val Fleury, deeply mortified. "What is your name?"
"Berthe Cheron, madame."
"Put it down for me, and your private address. If what I hear convinces me perhaps we may come to terms."
All night the old woman dreamt she was again of surpassing loveliness, the envy of all the women of her world.
She went to Brittany the same week, and returned palpitating with the tales that had been told her. She agreed with mademoiselle Cheron to pay 120,000 francs if the metamorphosis occurred, and it was arranged that, when the time came, they should travel to St. Pierre des Champs together.
In the meanwhile her rapturous reflections were not free from anxiety. If the dawning of the longed-for date should indeed yield her Berthe Cheron's face, she would be no longer recognised as madame de Val Fleury. Her social circle would not know her; monsieur Septfous, her banker—she banked at a private bank, and monsieur Septfous was practically her man of business—would not know her; her servants themselves would not know her when she came back to Paris. To explain would be to meet with perpetual embarrassments. On the whole, the best plan would be to change her name as well. It would mean relinquishing a few friendships that she valued, but——Again, she foresaw herself dazzlingly fair, and caught her breath. Her loveliness would compensate a million-fold.
Her income was derived chiefly from Municipal Bonds and Métro shares. At the bank she had also a substantial sum on deposit. She told monsieur Septfous that she had decided to spend the rest of her life in the country, and she took a draft, payable to bearer, for the full amount of cash, and removed her box of securities.
She determined to call herself madame de Beaulieu.
Late on the evening of the 6th of September the old woman and the girl arrived at St. Pierre des Champs.
They had expected to arrive earlier, but the train crept into Pont Chouay at 7.30 instead of 5.15, and thence they were dependent on the local fiacres, which were hard to find and slow to move. Madame de Val Fleury reached the village, impatient and fatigued.
In the little moonlit market-place, with its vacant stalls, when they entered it at last, many figures circulated, scrutinising one another's features eagerly. Most of the men and women bore lanterns, and one of the stalls had evidently been sub-let for the evening; under the sign "Christophe: Cheese, Eggs, and Butter," a humpback had electric torches for sale. As the pair made their way, across the cobbles, to the shrine that had been erected beside the water-mill, no face of much beauty met their view. The sellers appeared to be chiefly buxom peasant girls, wholesome looking, but no more. Those who had come to buy were of types more various. Here, an old roue, fraudulently dyed and painted, peered avidly at the features of a youth, who raised his lantern and rebuffed him with a jeer. There, an individual with crafty lips and predatory eyes, obviously a sharper, was to be seen bargaining for the physiognomy of a simpleton. A man with a round humorous face darted each moment from one melancholy countenance to another, and a passer-by said, loud enough to be overheard: "Look at Jibily, the low comedian—he is crazy to play tragic parts!" Irritating and incessant was the shrill outcry of a female broker, hobbling with a file of maids-of-all-work at her heels. "Fine faces cheap!" clamoured the crone. "Fine faces cheap!"
It became very cold beside the water-mill. As the laggard night wore by, madame de Val Fleury shivered distressfully. Alternately she prayed and despaired. More than once she glanced, tense with hope, at her companion, striving to detect some promise of the sought-for change, but the girl's face remained unaltered. In the serene radiance of the moon its fairness was exquisite beyond words, and the woman wrung her hands with the intensity of her desire.
Slowly, slowly the moonlight faded. The pallor of dawn streaked the sky; and a hundred faces were upturned beseechingly, a hundred suppliants trembled. Wan and white grew the scene. A tremor and a rustling stirred the huddled figures. Suddenly, somewhere a woman wailed, "No use!" and burst into sobs. Berthe Cheron, fearful now the moment had come, of beholding herself gaunt-cheeked and wrinkled, bowed her head, shuddering, in her hands. Madame de Val Fleury, half dazed with exhaustion and suspense, bent to the shining surface of the pool. The pool receded. It became suddenly unreal. Next, her pounding heart was squeezed with terror—she didn't know if the reflection she beheld was her own, or Berthe Cheron's, from behind her. She nodded wildly at her reflection; she grimaced and gesticulated at it, like a madwoman.... It had happened! She thought she gave an ear-piercing shriek of joy, but she fainted, without a sound.
After the money was paid she neither saw nor heard anything of Berthe Cheron. Aided by a lady whose birth gave her the passport to society, and whose income made her amenable to a financial offer, madame de Val Fleury, or, as she now called herself, Victorine de Beaulieu, was the sensation of Paris that autumn. The consummate toilettes permitted by her wealth lent to her face a beauty even more transcendent than Berthe Cheron's had been. When she drove, people pressed forward on the sidewalks to regard her. When she entered her box at the Opéra, everybody in the house to whom the box was visible looked at her as much as at the stage. In salons, faces the most admired before her advent paled in her presence, like candle flames in sunshine. She was paramount and she revelled in the knowledge. Yet the transformation had its lack. She missed her game of écarté with her erstwhile neighbour. She missed the garrulity of familiar friends whom she no longer met. There were hours when, despite the transports afforded by the mirror now, she found time hang heavy on her hands. And the hands, of course, had not recovered girlishness and beauty. Nor her body, nor her mind.
That was the drawback. Only her face was young. Physically and mentally she was old. Her corsetiere could not provide her with a figure to match the face. Her physician could not give back to her the energies that had gone. Her mirror itself was impotent to revive the enthusiasm and illusions of her youth.
Men made love to the bewildering "young widow." After the first thrill of amazed exultance she was bored. Their fervour kindled no responsive spark. Her aged heart beat no faster. The sentiment, the rhapsodies poured into her ear seemed drearily stupid to the old woman, as she posed on balconies, wishing she were in her bedroom with a cup of tisane and her slippers. During the third passionate proposal addressed to her, it was with extreme difficulty that she restrained her jaws from yawning.
"Why are you so cold—why won't you hear me?" men cried to her. And she answered dully: "I am not impressionable. It doesn't interest me to be made love to. I am tired of all that."
And she was spoken of in Paris as the "girl who was tired of love."
Many evenings during the winter there were when the knowledge that she would be wearied by some man's appeal, if she went out, determined her to remain at home. The opportunity to out-shine other women failed to lure her from the fireside, and she sat in her dressing-gown, playing écarté with her new maid. "It is marvellous what a head for the game madame has, seeing she is so young!" exclaimed the maid, awestruck. "I cannot say as much foryou," snapped her mistress, mourning that quondam neighbour.
When the summer came and she went to the coast, with a score of wonderful dresses, she sighed for companionship more drearily yet. Hitherto, at such places, she had sat among her compeers, amiably chatting. Now she appeared too young to be congruous to the circle of the old—was too old to participate in the pastimes of the young. Scant of breath and stiff in the joints, she viewed morosely the laughing women trooping to the tennis courts. Shrunken beneath her youthful frocks, she dared not don a bathing costume and reveal her wasted form among the sirens lolling by the tents. Queer as the fact seemed, her years irked her more this summer than they had done while she looked her age.