Chapter XIII

The Publisher's Parcel

Though conjectures as to the manner in which poor Agatha Somers had become possessed of the necklace disturbed Ermengarde's sleep, and the glow of the sapphires coloured all her thoughts of her, she was obliged to take the creature to her heart; there was in her something so lovable and so pathetic, especially that appeal in her eyes--so she confided to Mr. Welbourne, who smiled and seemed gratified by this view of their mutual friend, though he said little.

She seems fond of me, Ermengarde reflected; I wonder why? How great, she mused, is the attraction that virtue has for the depraved and rectitude for the outcast! Who could tell what redeeming influence a good woman's kindness might exercise upon this erring young soul? She would certainly befriend the wanderer in every possible way, except that of helping her to dispose of ill-gotten jewellery. Perhaps there might be some grain of truth, some small foundation in fact, for the circumstantial family history this ingenious young person had related to her by the wood fire that evening. She was undoubtedly well-bred, possibly well-born; it was highly probable that she had been nurtured in comfort, if not luxury--still, how did she come by that necklace? It was a small fortune in itself. Nobody reduced to bread-labour would keep so much money locked up. Again, what possible work of a secretarial character could she be doing in this land of lotus-eating? Or how could a penniless young woman afford such an expensive holiday as this? Was she, could she be, a female detective?

In that case, who could she be shadowing, up here in the mountains, among this little company of highly respectable, not to say frumpish, folk? Surely not the thin man--yet human character abounds in the unexpected and even the incredible--had Mr. Welbourne, after all, a wife desirous of shunting him? Was he a wolf in sheep's clothing, a hypocrite steeped in iniquity? Lame and deformed people often have a twist in their character--not that poor Mr. Welbourne was deformed--indeed, had his fleshly covering been a little more abundant, he would have been rather good-looking, his features well-cut, his eyes bright and animated. There was nobody else to shadow at Les Oliviers--no English body else, that is--the visitors mostly consisted of family parties.

No; she must be some kind of spy or conspirator, in league as she was with the Anarchist. Yet Ivor Paul was hardly a spy or a conspirator; both the thin man and the fair Dorris agreed in placing him as the scion of a family of rank; they knew that he was only five lives off a peerage, but those lives were young and vigorous. Lady Seaton, who knew the ins and outs and most intricate ramifications of every family of consequence, and never forgot who married who, and how they were connected with everybody else, a widow old enough to mention her age without prevarication, and herself allied in some distant and complicated manner to every coronet-bearing English name, had known his father in his youth; she remembered that his mother had married a second time; she had forgotten the man's name; it would come back to her presently. Sir George, her late husband, had been in public life; the present baronet represented a North-country constituency, and had been a Minister. So far, the truth of Agatha's story was confirmed; though what the woman of mystery's relations with this young man might be, it was wiser not to dwell upon. And if she improvised ailing aunts at need, so did Miss Boundrish, about whom, with all her delightful deviations from the normal English girl, there was no manner of mystery, her father giving himself out for what he undoubtedly was--a plain, substantial British merchant.

"Our young friend," Mr. Welbourne observed one day after some act of kindness on the part of Agatha to Ermengarde, whose weakness had not yet entirely left her, "appears to be much attached to you, Mrs. Allonby."

"But I can't think why," she replied; "though I can't help liking the girl myself."

"Why should you help it? A kindly nature," he added, with a sigh so deep and so despairing that she was sorry for him. Had the thin man met with so few kindly natures on his earthly pilgrimage; or was it, could it, at his age be, hopeless passion?

Lady Seaton had but recently come up to the peace of the house on the ridge from one of the great hotels below, where there was too much crowding and racket for her. She was fairly well read and interested in many things, and had shown much friendliness, mixed with something that was almost deference, to Ermengarde. In the course of half an hour's desultory chat in the garden she had become acquainted with all the leading facts in Mrs. Allonby's life; Charlie's name, age, school, disposition, and beauty; the busy journalist husband; the attack of influenza; the subsequent depression, and present holiday trip; while Ermengarde had had a vague notion that they had been discussing the climate and topography of the Riviera, and Lady Seaton's own health, all the time.

"You must be very proud of your husband, Mrs. Allonby," she said, when they were parting on that occasion, and Ermengarde made some vague and wondering assent to the assumption.

A husband is a not unusual piece of personal property; why on earth be proud of it? Still, she was not going to let people think she was ashamed of poor old Arthur, who, with all his faults, was probably no worse than other men--besides, even if he were ever so bad, he was _her_ man, and she must stand up for him. "A poor thing, sirs, but mine own."

Since Lady Seaton's arrival Ermengarde had been dimly conscious of a difference in people's manner to her, as if that of the kind-hearted old lady had been infectious, or her avowed interest had conferred some distinction upon her.

Once, when she had tucked herself up cosily in a nook behind a rose-trellis and fallen asleep in the sunshine, she had been waked by a murmur of voices from people on the other side of her trellis, and heard in the adored treble shout of the Boundrish, "Well! I simply call it scandalous. I wonder the Bontemps put up with it. Such goings on are a reflection upon us all."

"You need have no fear, Miss Boundrish," replied Lady Seaton's low, distinct voice, in which Ermengarde detected a subtle hint of sarcasm, "you are quite beyond any such reflection."

"Well, I don't know about that," she replied with complacent gurgles. "One doesn't care to associate with people who get themselves talked about. An inherited instinct, I suppose," with more gurgles. "Besides, how do you know who she is, or whether she has a husband at all? Grass-widows who run about the Continent alone, and play at Monty to that extent that they have to pop their jewels----"

Ermengarde smiled at this. "After all, I'm not the only one who pops jewels here," she thought; "but who on earth can the Boundrish be going for now?"

"--Why, I saw her go in myself, and she thought I didn't know her under her black gossamer, and I saw the things in the window afterwards----"

"You were there, too?" the thin man interjected, with a greenish glitter in his eye.

"Oh yes; nothing escapes _me_----"

"So it appears, and nobody," he murmured to himself.

"--A grass-widow who does that kind of thing needn't go about with her nose in the air, snubbing people she couldn't possibly get in with at home, not to speak of the disgraceful way in which she persecutes that poor silly young Isidore, who will probably get the sack owing to her, besides losing his fiancée----"

Ermengarde smiled to herself. Was the poor boy engaged, then? and how could his engagement affect the only grass-widow besides herself in the house? It certainly was well known that the latter gave the young man a good deal of unnecessary trouble, but what had that to do with this supposed engagement of his?

"Though it's true," the artless girl continued, "that she has given up wearing his flowers at dinner, just to put people off the scent, and persuades herself that nobody notices all the little walks and talks on the quiet--

Ermengarde, who had listened guilelessly, supposing these remarks to be addressed to the general public, suddenly changed colour, while another voice, that of Agatha, as suddenly struck in, "Miss Boundrish, you are positively slanderous. Such things ought not to be said, even if true, which they are not."

"Say, Miss Somers, don't you get mad," the American lady began. "I judge this young Isidore can look after himself some, whoever makes eyes at him, Miss Boundrish. There are folks must flirt, if it's only with a broomstick; they just can't help making eyes when there's any men around. I guess they don't know they're doing it all the time."

"When people are attractive," came in Lady Seaton's exact intonation, "they are often accused of trying to attract."

"Oh, attract," gurgled Miss Boundrish. "How anyone can be attracted by a nose like that--why, you might hang your hat upon it. And as for her waist----"

"Want of style," her mother suggested, "while her dress----"

"Oh, she don't calculate to dress any. She just slumps along anyhow up in these mountains, I judge. I never was much on the apple-cheeked, yalla-haired sort--British gells are too beefy for my taste--else she's pretty enough, and, my! don't her eyes snap; nights, when she kind of fancies herself!"

"And thinks she can play bridge, and tries to strum on the piano," added Dorris viciously.

"Were our fair friend the subject of masculine comment," observed Mr. Welbourne impressively, "the verdict would, I venture to predict, be one of whole-hearted admiration on every count."

"Thank you," sighed Ermengarde in her corner, whence she dared not try to escape.

"Oh, a man's woman is pretty much the same as a lady's man," Dorris gurgled, "so they say."

"You may stake your pile on that, Miss Boundrish," the American corroborated.

"And you don't suppose that hair of hers is all grown on the premises," continued Dorris acidly.

"Whatever you suppose, I've seen it brushed out," Agatha retorted--"lovely hair, like floss-silk."

"At any rate, no hair could be that colour naturally, and it gets brighter every day--thanks to the climate, I suppose. The Monte Carlo yellows are famous, you know----"

"Cat!" murmured Ermengarde. "How I should enjoy the twisting of yours!"

"But what I simply can't _stand_," pursued the injured maiden plaintively, "is her making herself out to be somebody--pretending to be that man's wife----"

"Ah, well! this can't be me. _I_ don't pretend to be anybody's wife," thought Ermengarde.

"She _is_ his wife," Agatha said.

"Or one of his wives. He may have dozens for all we know----"

"Dorris, my _dear_," faltered her poor mother, blushing wildly.

"Well, mater, so he may; that kind of man often does. And, as I said before, nobody knows anything about her, or whether she has any husband at all--she may have five--or six----"

"Seven is considered a round, complete, and therefore sacred, number, though the wife of Bath only had five," observed Mr. Welbourne thoughtfully.

"Bath! What Bath? D'you mean Lord Bath's wife?" Dorris asked. "And did he get her divorced?"

"For the Land's sake, Miss Boundrish," shouted Mrs. Dinwiddie, the American lady, "if you don't just tickle me to death! Lord Bath----" while the thin man chuckled grimly to himself.

"I never _can_ remember about titled people," Dorris complained bitterly, as if this defect of memory was owing to the malice of present company. "And I should have thought that Americans never knew anything to forget," she added vindictively.

"That is so--'cept when we marry dukes. But don't you fret, Miss Boundrish, there's a sight of things better worth knowing than that, you put your bottom dollar on it."

Agatha and Lady Seaton had in the meantime drawn Mrs. Boundrish into other talk, and the thin man had reminded them of an early promise to come to a private view of his sketches, in which project Miss Boundrish, who was within earshot, promptly included herself.

The American went off in another direction, and Ermengarde, unable to stir an inch without attracting attention, kept her eyes fiercely shut, so as to look asleep, till the footsteps died away. Then she rose and went round to the front of the terrace, where Agatha still sat among the flowers, with a fountain pen and a paper partially covered with cipher in her hand, but looking over the sunny amplitude of space to the sea.

She started at seeing Ermengarde, and seemed relieved when the latter told her she had been dozing behind the trellis, and had waked to hear the conversation. "For your part of which, thank you," she said, smiling. "No doubt I ought to have got away, but I hadn't wit or pluck enough," she added, sitting by Agatha, and laying her hand caressingly on her arm. "What that horrid cat said about popping jewellery was partly true. I sold the chain I got at the Carnival, and--a ring--and--h'm--I redeemed the ring only yesterday--there it is--and I hope nobody else will ever know what a fool I've been. The solid truth is, I should have had to go home to England at once if I hadn't got back those few louis I lost that afternoon--and I badly wanted to stay on."

"Did Mr. Mosson give you a wrinkle, or was it pure luck?" Agatha asked, warmed to the heart by this unwonted cordiality.

"Oh, pure luck."

"It's so beguiling--that first luck," Agatha sighed. "And then, when the luck goes, there's the necessity and hope of getting the losses back. The demon of chance sits there, I suppose, like a great spider, weaving, weaving his poison-webs, till the poor fly, caught and tangled hopelessly all round, can struggle no more. And people live on this--on these blighted lives, broken homes, shattered hearts, and widespread misery and despair! Have you seen the cathedral, Mrs. Allonby--that snow-white, brand-new, dazzling immensity of marble at Monaco, flaunting among the palms and pines and flowers, all built out of these cruel gains, these despairs and miseries and degradations? And that palace? Nearly all the palace is new, built out of Casino winnings, as you remember."

"Perhaps that's why it's so vulgar. You want to wipe it out of the picture--cathedral and palace, too, built of money."

"Not of money," she said, her eyes shining with a hard brilliance. "No, built of broken hearts--women's hearts, mothers' hearts, wives' hearts. Oh, to see the whole accursed monstrosity levelled to the ground! I cannot speak of it."

What did this sudden passion mean, Ermengarde wondered; then she remembered the "connexion by marriage," and was sorry for her.

"According to Mr. Welbourne, it is not the gamblers who make the income," she said. "It is the people who stop a few days at Monte Carlo, and throw away a couple of louis at the tables to pass the time. After all, most amusements have to be paid for, and what enjoyment is not liable to abuse?"

"Enjoyment," cried Agatha, "enjoyment!"

"The gambling instinct, the delight in the excitement of chance, seems pretty deeply rooted in human nature."

"What vile passion is not deeply rooted in human nature? Mrs. Allonby, I could tell you tragedies. But no----"

Could anything be more moral, correct, and praise-worthy than this impetuous outburst?

And yet, on the very next day, who should Ermengarde meet in the Casino, coming out of the _Salle de Jeu_, but the woman of mystery herself? Not alone, certainly, but in earnest conversation with the ubiquitous and elusive Anarchist, whom she began to suspect of being no creature of flesh and blood, but some sinister spirit haunting her path with evil intent. So absorbed in their talk were those two that they passed her without recognition, as she turned aside to go into the concert-hall with the American lady and the thin man, who chanced to be with her that day.

A Thursday Classic Concert was being given by the world-famous orchestra; the hall was crowded. Ermengarde thought she recognized everybody she knew on the Riviera in different parts of the house. An aunt, a genuine relative of her own, from Cap Martin, nodded across the fauteuils to her, and missed her in coming out, not wholly to Mrs. Allonby's regret. Elderly relatives are for the fireside, with purring cats, singing tea-kettles and buttered muffins, but they scarcely seem in keeping with places of public amusement. Family matters should never be discussed at full-dress functions.

It was very pleasant outside in the sunlit Gardens by the café, where chairs in a commanding position had been easily found. Fine orchestral music agreeably excites the imagination while it soothes the nerves. Never had the Pathetic Symphony of Tchaikowsky been more beautifully played; it lingered and echoed with harmonious heart-break in the imagination, heightening the beauty of the scenery, making the fresh air fresher and the tea even more enjoyable.

Lady Seaton came up, bringing a nephew, and was easily induced to join the tea-party. The nephew turned out well. Ermengarde observed that his nose was in the Greek style, and his eyes twinkled like the little star of infantile verse. She was in the happy and peaceful mood induced by the subconsciousness of absolutely becoming and perfectly fitting costume. A glance snatched at a little mirror in her bag had assured her that not a hair was out of place, and neither flush nor pallor marred a complexion unsullied by powder or paint. In short, they were all in a mood of great content and enjoyment, when a sudden, a too familiar, sound struck upon Ermengarde's ear, and drew cold chills down her back. It was the voice of Miss Boundrish.

Vainly did the whole party, struck with sudden silence, try to look the other way, and avoid meeting the fair girl's speedwell blue eye, which beamed with friendly recognition and good fellowship. Making her way steadily through the crowd, with the captive Teuton in her wake, she bore resolutely down upon them, her coral lips wreathed in smiles, and graciously announced her intention to join their party.

The captive, innocent of offence, obediently placed chairs in their circle, and gloomily discoursed upon the performance of the orchestra and the shots at the _Tir aux Pigeons_ in correct English and an accent of resigned despair, Dorris, whenever the conversation threatened to become at all interesting, breaking in upon it with some trivial personality.

Mrs. Dinwiddie, fortified by three cups of scented China tea, and refreshed by several deep plunges into a box of superfine bonbons handed her by the thin man, had been drawn from raptures over the kettle-drums into some enlightening hints at the mysteries of American political machinery in different States, of which she had experimental knowledge.

Everybody, especially the Prussian officer, was listening with interest; no one spoke, except to draw out further information; even Ermengarde's familiar demon, the Anarchist, who, to her disgust, was sitting at a table near, drinking something through a long straw, was hanging upon Mrs. Dinwiddie's words, when Dorris, after several baffled attempts by various irrelevant remarks and inept questions, promptly snubbed by the genial Yankee, to plunge headlong into the talk, suddenly shouted, "Mrs. Allonby, I do want to know something very badly," with such energy and emphasis that it was impossible not to give some faint response.

"Yes?" said Ermengarde, politely patient, though she had not forgotten the fair girl's depreciation of her nose, which certainly had a tiny tilt at the tip.

"I want badly to know," Dorris called across Mrs. Dinwiddie, "whether you really are the wife of _the_ Allonby?"

"That is so," echoed the American, her interest suddenly diverted. "Do tell, Mrs. Allonby, are you?"

"How can I tell?" she objected. "I know very well which is my Allonby, but how do I know which is yours?"

"Land's sake!" cried Mrs. Dinwiddie, "Why, the famous Allonby, to be sure--the author of 'Storm and Stress.' Are you a relative of that prominent writer?"

What was the woman driving at? 'Storm and Stress'? Was it--could it be the title of Arthur's latest effusion?

"Well," she replied slowly and thoughtfully, "I never like to be too certain about anything--it is not good manners, so I was brought up to think--but I--ah--I think--yes, I rather fancy that I am--connected with him--the writing-man you are speaking of. As far as I _know_, he is some sort of a connexion of mine--by marriage--only a connexion by marriage."

A curious snorting sound drew momentary and disgusted attention to the Anarchist, who appeared to be choking badly through the long straws--foreigners are so hopelessly ignorant of the niceties of table manners. Mrs. Dinwiddie looked disappointed, even defrauded, until she caught Ermengarde's eye, when her high-featured visage expanded into a genial smile. But Dorris was all gurgles, triumphant, exasperating. "I knew it all the time," she exclaimed scornfully. "I was sure you were not his wife, but Lady Seaton and Mr. Welbourne would have it you were."

"Mr. Allonby's is a very remarkable work," Lady Seaton said. "I don't know when I have been so thoroughly roused and invigorated by any book. All thinking people must be grateful to the author of 'Storm and Stress.'"

"All thinking people are," the nephew added; with firm conviction.

"Very kind of you to say so," Ermengarde faintly murmured.

"They're just mad about it on our side," Mrs. Dinwiddie told her. "We judge that Arthur Allonby has arrived with 'Storm and Stress' on our side."

"A not unusual way of crossing the Atlantic," Ermengarde hazarded, at her wits' end, and imagining some wild mistake or confusion of names, though not without some vague memory of the title mentioned, in connexion with a postal packet from Arthur's publishers, the contents of which she was always going, from a sense of duty, to investigate, and always from innumerable causes omitting to. It would not run away; it could be opened and read at any time, which is no time.

"Well, I reckon it didn't make him sick anyhow," Mrs. Dinwiddie replied, with a grim smile, and Dorris stridently supposed that successful writers usually went to America to read their works in public, and always found that American cookery upset their internal economy more seriously than crossing the Atlantic, an observation that appeared to afford joy to everybody but the captive, whom it plunged into reverie of a melancholy nature.

_The_ Allonby! Not her own native charm, then, but the prestige of that tiresome old Arthur's name was the cause of this new deference that had come to Ermengarde of late. And he had never told her--a lump rose in her throat--had left her to hear his good fortune casually from strangers. To be sure, he could hardly have been expected to write to her: "I have just become a celebrity," "My new novel is a marvel of genius," "I am one of the most remarkable men of this age." Still, she was injured. A wife should not be the last person to hear of a husband's promotion.

Going home in the train that afternoon, she found her neighbour absorbed in a Tauchnitz volume, and sudden curiosity overpowering good manners, she made out "Storm and Stress" on the top of the page. Dining with friends in one of the big barrack hotels that evening, she saw the book lying on little tables in the lounge, in the drawing-room, in her host's sitting-room; and, her glance being detected upon it, heard that it was being read all over Mentone, the Riviera, at Rome, at Florence, in the Engadine, in Paris, wherever wandering Britons congregated; that it was being discussed at suburban dinners and teas, and was found in the reading-rooms of West End clubs; that it had been consigned to the fire by Bishops, and preached about by Archdeacons; that it was talked of by people of culture, and had even penetrated to our most ancient Universities, where undergraduates, face downwards on the turf of sunny college gardens, had been known to pass shining hours in its perusal. And he had never said a word, and had grudged her five hats.

"How proud and happy you must be, dear Mrs. Allonby," said her hostess. "And how does he take it? Is he surprised, or does he take it all for granted? He must at least have known that he was going to make a hit."

"Do you know the sex of the sphinx?" she returned faintly, some hot inexplicable tears misting her eyes. "I have always been sure the sphinx must have been a man. Men are so subtle--especially mine."

"Somebody was saying that the Allonbys don't quite hit it off," her friend told her husband afterwards. "And it's my opinion that she doesn't know where he is. I wonder if _he_ knows where _she_ is?"

When the wife of _the_ Allonby reached her shelter on the ridge that night, she avoided meeting anybody, especially Agatha, who was equally anxious to avoid meeting her, and for the same reason--that she had been having a good cry. But Agatha knew perfectly well why she had had recourse to those waters of comfort, while Ermengarde had not the remotest idea.

Having felt the usual relief from the world-old remedy, brushed out her hair, wrapped herself in a dressing-gown, and smelt M. Isidore's latest floral offering, Mrs. Allonby lighted a tall candle and set to work to master the contents of the publisher's parcel.

So that, when an orange and crimson sunrise came up gloriously out of a peacock green sea, it showed a woman asleep in an easy-chair by a guttering candle, her head on one arm on a table, and half-hidden in a cloud of fair hair, with a volume labelled "Storm and Stress" on the floor at her side.