Part 39

She looked at him across the little table, through the twilight. A sudden fire leaped up in his eyes, which usually looked coldly at life as if he had resigned himself to let its best things pass him by.

"Peter! You don't mean--you can't mean----"

"Do you want me to mean it?--Do you want me----"

"Want you? I've wanted nothing else since before you were out of short frocks, but----"

"Then why didn't you tell me so before I put them on? I was--oh, Jim, I was _dying_ to hear it. I was afraid you didn't care in that way, that you thought me a silly child always. That's why I went back to stay in the convent, to try and find peace, and forget. But when I heard about Mary and her love, I couldn't bear it there any longer. I hoped that perhaps, after all--and when I came to-day and you looked at me, I knew for certain. I felt so brave, and I made up my mind to propose, for I was sure _you_ wouldn't. It's leap year, anyhow."

They were standing now, and Jim had her in his arms.

"I've been miserable without you," he said. "And it's all your fault. You made me sure it was no use. Don't you remember how you said one day that marrying a cousin must be like paying a long dull visit to relatives?--a thing you hated."

"And you took that to yourself?"

"Naturally. I supposed you thought it merciful to choke me off, so I shut up like an oyster. And then there was Dick----"

"He never existed. Oh, Jim, we've both been rather silly, haven't we? But luckily we're both very young."

"I'm not. I'm almost old enough to be your father."

"You're just the right age for a lover. To think that by one speech which I made merely in order to be mildly witty, I came near spoiling the whole show! But you ought to have known better. You're such a distant, uttermost, outlying cousin--a hill brigand of a cousin claiming my relationship or my life."

"I'm going to claim more than either now."

"My gracious! I do hope so, or I shall have come to visit you in vain."

* * * * * * *

Nobody thought of the unfortunate cabman, but he was not neglectful of his own interests; and having covered his horses and refreshed himself with secret stores of wine and bread, he was asleep under an immense umbrella when, after dark, his existence was remembered. By this time, it was too late in Jim's opinion for Peter to go and call at Princess Della Robbia's. Mary would have begun to dress for dinner, if she were at home; and, besides, a place for Peter to spend the night must be found without delay. She could visit Mary in the morning.

Jim tabooed the idea of a hotel, but thought of Mrs. Winter, as most of her acquaintances did think of her when they wanted practical advice or help. Peter's luggage was transferred from the cab to Jim's automobile, the sleepy _cocher_ was paid above his demands, and the happiest man on the Riviera spun off alone with the happiest girl, in a closed motor car, to Monte Carlo. The chauffeur was told not to drive fast.

Providentially, "St. George's" dreaded aunt had gone, having been told by a doctor that the climate was too exciting for her state of health.

The Winters' spare room was free, and the chaplain and his wife were delighted. News of Mary there was none except that, three or four nights ago, she had called while George and Rose were at Nice and had taken her jewel-case, leaving no message but "her love." Rose supposed that Mary must have wanted some of her pretty things for an entertainment at the Villa Mirasole. Prince Vanno had been away in Rome, but must be due, if he had not already returned. Probably if Miss Maxwell went over to Cap Martin in the morning she would see not only Mary but the Prince, who, said Rose, "looked like a knight-errant or a reformer of the Middle Ages, but, oh, so handsome and so young!"

"I thought when I first saw them together, the very evening of their engagement," she added, "that there was something _fatal_ about them, as if they were not born for ordinary, happy lives, like the rest of us. But thank goodness, I seem to be mistaken. The course of their true love runs so smoothly it almost ceases to be interesting."

XXXVIII

Jim Schuyler did not leave Stellamare next day. His butler-valet had the pleasure of unpacking again. The motor was at Peter's service in the morning, and soon after eleven she was driving through the beautiful gateway of the Villa Mirasole.

Americo answered her ring, bowing politely, but one who knew the ruddy brown face would have seen that he was not himself. In some stress of emotion the man in him had got the better of the servant. His eyes were round as an owl's as he informed the stranger that Miss Grant was no longer at the villa. He even forgot to speak English, a sign with him of deep mental disturbance.

"Where has Miss Grant gone?" Peter inquired, thinking the fellow an idiot.

"I do not know, Mademoiselle."

"Then go and inquire, please."

"I regret, it is useless. No one in this house can tell where Mees Grant is."

"You must be mistaken. I'll send my name to the Princess and ask her to see a friend of Miss Grant's."

Americo's face quivered, and his eyes bulged. "Mademoiselle," he said, "I do not think her Highness can see any one this morning. There is--family trouble."

Peter still hesitated, determined somehow to get news of Mary. Could it be that the engagement had been broken off? she asked herself. As she stood wondering what to do, a tall young man flashed from an inner room into the vestibule, seized a hat from a table, and without appearing to see the butler, pushed past the distressed Americo. He would have passed Peter also like a whirlwind, unconscious of her existence, had she not called out sharply, "Is it Prince Giovanni Della Robbia?"

He wheeled abruptly as a soldier on drill, and stared sombrely from under frowning brows. His pallor and stifled fury of impatience made him formidable, almost startling. Peter thought of a wounded stag at bay.

"I beg your pardon," she stammered, losing the gay self-confidence of the spoilt and pretty American girl. "I'm a great friend of Mary Grant's. I must know where she is."

The man's faced changed instantly. Fierce impatience became fiery eagerness. For a second or two he looked at Peter without speaking, his interest too intense to find expression in words. Then, as she also was silent, he said:

"There is no one I would rather see than a friend of Mary's, except Mary herself. Tell me where you knew her."

"At the convent in Scotland," Peter answered promptly. "I suppose she's told you about it. Did she mention her friend Molly Maxwell?"

"She said she had two friends named Mary. We had little time to talk together--not many days in all. When did you see her last?"

"In November, just before she left the convent. She went and stayed with an aunt a few weeks in London, and then came here. She wrote me about you, and I recognized you from her description. That's why I----"

"Forgive me. I believe you can be of the greatest service to Mary, and to me." He glanced at Americo, who held the door open. "Let us walk in the woods, if you aren't afraid of damp. I've something important to say."

They went down the steps and out of the gate together, like old acquaintances. Peter had no longer any doubt that the "family trouble" concerned Mary; but it was easy to see that whatever it might be, Prince Vanno was on her side. Peter admired him, and burned to serve her friend.

"There has been an abominable lie told," Vanno began, as soon as they were outside his brother's gate. "I must explain to you quickly what's happened, if you're to understand. I went to Rome to tell my father of our engagement. I left Mary with my brother and sister-in-law. I had two happy letters from her. This morning I arrived here in the Rome express. I came straight to Cap Martin, expecting to find Mary. Instead I found my brother and his wife alone. My sister-in-law, I must say in justice, seemed terribly grieved at what had happened. She could or would tell me nothing. But Angelo--my brother--began some rigmarole about Mary having run away from her convent-school years ago with a man, and--but I won't repeat the story. I refused to listen. I can never forgive my brother."

"Good for you!" exclaimed the American girl. "But I see the whole thing, and you needn't even try to repeat the story. I know it without your telling. It happened to another girl with a name almost exactly like Mary's. That's how the mistake must have come about. The girl who ran away disappeared about four years ago. _My_ Mary was at the convent till last fall. I can prove everything I say."

"Will you see my brother and his wife now, and tell them what you know?"

"With the greatest pleasure."

"Thank God you came! In another minute I should have been gone. And I don't know where to look for Mary."

"You don't know? Didn't she write? Or did she expect you to believe things against her?"

"I could hardly have blamed her if she had expected it, for--I failed her once. But that was before I knew her. Nothing could make me doubt her now. She did write to me. I found a letter waiting at the villa this morning--a letter postmarked Monte Carlo, to say I mustn't look for her--that all is over for ever and ever."

"But you're going to look for her all the same?"

"And to find her. I won't rest till I've got her back."

"You're the right sort of man, though you aren't an American."

"My mother was one."

"So much the better. Let's go into the house, and I'll soon make your people swallow any words they've said against Mary."

Americo was still at the door, or had returned there. "Highness," he said, "the Princess wishes me to make you come in. She has to talk. She send me in woods, but I not go, because of young lady with you. I wait here. Princess in yellow saloon, by her lone."

"Come," Vanno said to Peter. "We'll speak to her, and find out what she wants. Then my brother shall come and hear your story."

"Go first and explain me, please," Peter said.

Vanno would have obeyed, but Princess Della Robbia gave him no time. She was wandering restlessly about the room, too impatient to sit down. When she saw Vanno at the door, she went to him swiftly. "I'm so glad Americo found you," she cried. "I need to have a word with you alone. Angelo is so hard! He wouldn't let me see Mary before she went, or even write her a line of love and sympathy. I've hardly eaten or slept since that awful afternoon. If you could know how ill I am, you wouldn't blame me so much! I love Mary. My heart's breaking for her trouble. But I can do nothing, except send a letter for you to give, in case you find her. Please take it--I've written it already, in case--and don't tell Angelo."

"I've brought a friend of Mary's who can prove to you both that she isn't the heroine of that story you and my brother were so quick to believe," Vanno broke in, lacking patience to hear her through.

With a faint "Oh!" Marie shrank back, looking suddenly smaller and older. The pretty hand which had pressed Vanno's sleeve dropped heavily as if its many rings weighed the fingers down. Sickly pale, she fixed her eyes upon him, unable to speak, though her lips fell apart, seeming to form the word "Who?"

Vanno waited for no further explaining, but called Peter, who hovered outside the open door. "Miss Maxwell, will you come?"

Peter appeared instantly, but seeing the Princess, stopped on the threshold, with the face of one who meets a ghost. "Marie Grant!" she exclaimed, the two short words explosive as revolver shots.

The figure in white collapsed like a tossed bundle, into a chair. It seemed that the woman ceased to breathe. In a second the peculiar freshness of her beauty had shrivelled as if scorched by a rushing flame. Only her eyes were alive. They moved wistfully from Peter to Vanno, and from Vanno to the half-open door, as if seeking mercy or escape. She looked agonized, broken, like a fawn caught in a trap.

Peter turned to Vanno. "This is the girl who ran away from our convent with a man," she said crudely. "As she's here in the house, how did Mary come to be suspected?"

"That is my sister-in-law, Princess Della Robbia," Vanno answered. As he spoke his forehead flamed, and his eyes grew keen as swords. His look stripped Marie's soul bare of lies.

She held out her hands, but there was no mercy for her then in either heart. In a moment the two had judged her, with the unhesitating cruelty of youth. Peter's eyes narrowed in disgust, as if the white thing cowering in the chair were a noxious animal, a creature to be exterminated.

"I understand too, very well," she said slowly. "Horrible, wicked woman! You put the blame of your own sins on my Mary, to save yourself, and like the saint she is, she let you do it. But I won't. God sent me here, I see now. You've got to confess, and right my girl."

Tears fell from Marie's eyes. Her face quivered, then crinkled up piteously as a child's face crinkles in a storm of weeping. "Shut the door," she stammered between sobs. "For God's sake, shut the door! If Angelo should come!"

Neither Vanno nor Peter moved. They wished Angelo to come. Seeing them stand there, rigid, relentless, Marie realized as she had not fully realized before that they were her enemies, that no softness or prettiness, no agony of tears could turn their hearts. She sprang up with a choking cry, and stumbled toward the door. Vanno, thinking she meant to run away, took two long steps and placed himself before her.

"Angel with the flaming sword!" were the words that spoke themselves in Peter's mind. But she had no pity yet for Marie.

"I--I only want to shut the door--that's all--because you wouldn't," the Princess faltered. "Just for a few minutes. It's all I ask. Give me a little time."

Vanno closed the door without noise, and stood in front of it like a sentinel. "You may have a few minutes," he said. "Then I shall call Angelo to hear the truth from you or from me. It's for you to choose which."

"Haven't you any mercy in your heart?" she wailed. "I'm only a woman. I'm your brother's wife. He loves me."

"I love Mary," Vanno said.

"It was Mary who spared me. She saw it was worse for me than for her, because I'm married to Angelo. My whole life's at stake. That's why she sacrificed herself. I----"

"The more you say, the worse you make us hate you," Peter cut her short. "You were always selfish. Even when I liked you, I used to think you just like a white Persian cat. When you were petted, you purred. When things went wrong, you scratched. You don't deserve the name of woman. What you've done is as bad as murder."

"I did it for Angelo," Marie pleaded. "I love him so! I couldn't lose his love."

"So you flung Mary to the wolves!" Vanno said. He had not believed that he could see a woman cry without pitying and wishing to help her. But his heart felt hard as stone as he watched Marie's streaming tears. All the brutality of his fierce ancestors had rushed to arms in his nature. The fancy came to his mind that he would still be hard and cold if he had to see her flogged. Then at the suggested picture, something in him writhed and revolted. He was not so hard as he had thought. He had to steel himself against her by thinking of what she had done to Mary.

"You deserve to die!" said Peter.

"I want to die," Marie answered pitifully. She stood supporting herself with an arm that clung to the high straight back of a Florentine chair. "If you will only not tell Angelo till I am dead, that's all I'll ask. Please wait--a little while. I couldn't live and look him in the face if he knew, so I would have to kill myself before you told. I'm too unhappy to be afraid of dying--for my own sake. I've suffered such agonies of fear, nothing could be worse. But there's a reason why it would be wicked to die just now--of my own accord. There's a child coming--in a few months. Afterward, I'll swear to you to kill myself, and then you can tell Angelo everything. Won't you wait till then--only till the end of the summer? Mary would say yes, if she were here."

The one weapon by which she could defend herself against their justice, she had drawn, and stood weakly on guard, her strength spent.

Vanno and Peter looked at one another in silence, in the eyes of each the same question. "Is this the truth?"

Marie read their faces. "Angelo knows that there will be a baby," she whispered. "Indeed it's true. As soon as my child is born, I'm ready to die."

"No one wants you to die!" Peter said sharply.

"Except myself. I must die if you're going to tell. If you won't wait, it will have to be now, at any cost."

"You know that you force us to wait," Vanno answered. "Trust weak woman to conquer! We cannot wish for your death. But I'll find Mary and marry her, in spite of herself. As for my brother, never will I forgive him. And I hope that I may never see you or Angelo again. Let your own soul punish you, while you live."

"Are we to go?" asked Peter.

"Yes," Vanno said.

They went out together, and left Marie staring after them.

For a little while she was safe.

XXXIX

All this time Jim Schuyler's motor had been waiting. It was strange to go out into the sunshine and see the smart chauffeur in his place, placidly reading a newspaper.

"Won't you come with me to Monte Carlo?" Peter asked. "We may find Mary at a hotel."

"I will come," Vanno said. "Her letter was posted there, yet I feel she has gone. She used to talk about Italy, but I don't think she would go to the house Hannaford left her. She couldn't bear the idea of living in his place."

"Let's go straight to Mrs. Winter's and ask her advice," Peter suggested. "She told me all about the Château Lontana last night."

They sat silent as the motor carried them swiftly along the white road. Peter longed to talk, but all the things she most wished to say were impossible to put into words. How Marie had checkmated them! It was like her, Peter thought; but she did not doubt the truth of that thing the Princess had said. There are some looks, some tones, which cannot lie.

Peter did not see what other course they could have taken, instead of that which they had chosen quickly, without discussion, accepting the inevitable. She believed, and she thought Vanno believed, that Marie would have kept her word and killed herself if they had persisted in telling Angelo what she was and had done. She had begged them to "wait a little while," but it was not only a question of waiting. Marie, as usual, had done well for herself. Vanno could not in cold blood, after months had passed and Marie was the mother of his brother's child, tell Angelo the story. At least, Peter was sure he would not bring himself to do that. Even she, who detested Marie now with an almost tigerish hatred, could not imagine herself pouring out such a tale when the first fire of rage had died--no, not even in defence of Mary; for Mary would be the one of all others to say, "Do not speak." Yet it filled Peter with fury to think that now no one could fight for Mary--sweet Mary, who was not by nature one to fight for herself. The great wrong had been done. Vanno could not forgive his brother's injustice. The two would be separated in heart and life while Marie lived. All this through Marie's sin and cowardice in covering it. Yet even those she had injured could not urge her on to death.

Suddenly, just as the motor slowed down near the Monaco frontier, Peter cried out, "There's Mrs. Winter, walking!"

She touched an electric bell, and the chauffeur stopped his car.

Rose was taking her morning exercise. She looked up, smiling at sight of Peter and Vanno getting out of the automobile to meet her.

"Where's Mary?" she asked, then checked herself quickly. She saw by the two faces that something was wrong. "Mary's not ill, I hope?" she amended her question.

Peter left the explanation to Vanno. It concerned his family, and how much he might choose to tell she did not know.

"There's been a misunderstanding," he said. "I came back this morning to find Mary gone. I'm afraid my brother and sister-in-law were not kind to her, and nothing can ever be the same between us again because of that. But the one important thing is to find Mary. She has--thrown me over, in a letter, and it does not tell me where she is. Do you think she can be in Monte Carlo?"

"No, I don't," Rose replied with her usual promptness. "What a shame I was out when she called the other night. Perhaps she would have confided in me. Now I see why she took her jewellery. Maybe she needed money. If we'd been at home, we'd have made her stay with us. Do you know, I shouldn't wonder if she'd gone to the Château Lontana?"

"I thought of that," Vanno said, "but she didn't want to live in Hannaford's house."

"With you! But now she's alone and sad, poor child. If we could only be sure, you could telegraph, not to waste time. I'll tell you what! If she went there, she probably drove instead of taking a train. Wait a minute, while I ask the hunchbacked beggar if he saw her. They were great chums; and it was talking to him I came across her first."

Rose began running to the bridge, where the dwarf, in his shady hat and comfortable cloak, was engaged in eating his luncheon on a newspaper, kept down on the parapet with stones. Vanno and Peter followed quickly, but before they arrived Rose had extracted the desired information. "He did see Mary three nights ago, in a carriage, driving in the direction of Italy," she announced in triumph. "He was just starting for home. What a good thing he hadn't gone!"

"There was another lady in the carriage with my Mademoiselle," added the beggar in bad French, his mouth full of bread and cheese.

"Another lady!" Rose echoed. "Who could it have been?"