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THE MOTOR MAID


    *    *    *    *    *


      BOOKS BY C. N. AND A. M. WILLIAMSON

        LORD LOVELAND DISCOVERS AMERICA
        SET IN SILVER
        THE LIGHTNING CONDUCTOR
        THE PRINCESS PASSES
        MY FRIEND THE CHAUFFEUR
        LADY BETTY ACROSS THE WATER
        ROSEMARY IN SEARCH OF A FATHER
        THE PRINCESS VIRGINIA
        THE CAR OF DESTINY
        THE CHAPERON


    *    *    *    *    *


THE MOTOR MAID

by

C. N. AND A. M. WILLIAMSON

Authors of "Lord Loveland Discovers America,"
"My Friend the Chauffeur," "The Princess Virginia," etc.

With Four Illustrations in Color
by F. M. Du Mond and F. Lowenheim







[Illustration: "We raced along a clear road, the Etang shimmering blue
before us"]



A. L. Burt Company
Publishers                New York
All rights reserved, including that of translation
into foreign languages, including the scandinavian
Copyright, 1910, By Doubleday, Page & Company
Published, August, 1910
The Country Life Press, Garden City, N.Y.





                      To The Three Gertrudes





ILLUSTRATIONS

"We raced along a clear road, the Etang shimmering
  blue before us"                                  _Frontispiece_

                                                     facing page
"While I wrestled ... with a bodice as snug as
  the head of a drum, the lord of all it contained
  appeared in the doorway"                                    48

"It took half an hour to dig the car out, and push
  her up from the hollow where the snow lay thickest"        272

"Jack's hand, inside Mr. Stokes's beautiful, tall
  collar, shook Bertie back and forth till his teeth
  chattered like castanets"                                  328





CHAPTER I


One hears of people whose hair turned white in a single night. Last
night I thought mine was turning. I had a creepy feeling in the roots,
which seemed to crawl all the way down inside each separate hair,
wriggling as it went. I suppose you couldn't have nervous prostration of
the hair? I worried dreadfully, it kept on so long; and my hair is so
fair it would be almost a temptation for it, in an emergency, to take
the one short step from gold to silver. I didn't dare switch on the
light in the _wagon-lit_ and peep at my pocket-book mirror (which
reflects one's features in sections of a square inch, giving the survey
of one's whole face quite a panorama effect) for fear I might wake up
the Bull Dog.

I've spelt him with capitals, after mature deliberation, because it
would be nothing less than _lèse majesté_ to fob him off with little
letters about the size of his two lower eye-tusks, or chin-molars, or
whatever one ought to call them.

He was on the floor, you see, keeping guard over his mistress's shoes;
and he might have been misguided enough to think I had designs on
them--though what I could have used them for, unless I'd been going to
Venice and wanting a private team of gondolas, I can't imagine.

I being in the upper berth, you might (if you hadn't seen him) have
fancied me safe; but already he had once padded half-way up the
step-ladder, and sniffed at me speculatively, as if I were a piece of
meat on the top shelf of a larder; and if half-way up, why not all the
way up? _Il était capable du tout._

I tried to distract my mind and focus it hard on other things, as
Christian Scientists tell you to do when you have a pin sticking into
your body for which _les convenances_ forbid you to make an exhaustive
search.

I lay on my back with my eyes shut, trying not to hear any of the sounds
in the _wagon-lit_ (and they were not confined to the snoring of His
Majesty), thinking desperately. "I will concentrate all my mentality,"
said I to myself, "on thoughts beginning with P, for instance. My Past.
Paris. Pamela."

Just for a few minutes it was comparatively easy. "Dear Past!" I sighed,
with a great sigh which for divers reasons I was sure couldn't be heard
beyond my own berth. (And though I try always even to _think_ in
English, I find sometimes that the words group themselves in my head in
the old patterns--according to French idioms.) "Dear Past, how thou wert
kind and sweet! How it is brutalizing to turn my back upon thee and thy
charms forever!"

"Oh, my goodness, I shall certainly die!" squeaked a voice in the berth
underneath; and then there was a sound of wallowing.

She (my stable-companion, shall I call her?) had been giving vent to all
sorts of strange noises at intervals, for a long time, so that it would
have been hopeless to try and drown my sorrows in sleep.

Away went the Gentle Past with a bump, as if it had knocked against a
snag in the current of my thoughts.

Paris or Pamela instead, then! or both together, since they seem
inseparable, even when Pamela is at her most American, and tells me to
"talk United States."

It was all natural to think of Pamela, because it was she who gave me
the ticket for the _train de luxe_, and my berth in the _wagon-lit_. If
it hadn't been for Pamela I should at this moment have been crawling
slowly, cheaply, down Riviera-ward in a second-class train, sitting bolt
upright in a second-class carriage with smudges on my nose, while
perhaps some second-class child shed jammy crumbs on my frock, and its
second-class baby sister howled.

"Oh, why did I leave my peaceful home?" wailed the lady in the lower
berth.

Heaven alone (unless it were the dog) knew why she had, and knew how
heartily I wished she hadn't. A good thing Cerberus was on guard, or I
might have dropped a pillow accidentally on her head!

Just then I wasn't thanking Pamela for her generosity. The second-class
baby's mamma would have given it a bottle to keep it still; but there
was nothing I could give the fat old lady; and she had already resorted
to the bottle (something in the way of patent medicine) without any good
result. Yet, _was_ there nothing I could give her?

"Oh, I'm dying, I _know_ I'm dying, and nobody cares! I shall choke to
death!" she gurgled.

It was too much. I could stand it and the terrible atmosphere no longer.
I suppose, if I had been an early Christian martyr, waiting for my turn
to be devoured might have so got on my nerves eventually that I would
have thrown myself into the arena out of sheer spite at the lions, and
then tried my best to disagree with them.

Anyway, Bull Dog or no Bull Dog, having made a light, I slid down from
my berth--no thanks to the step-ladder--dangled a few wild seconds in
the air, and then offering--yes, offering my stockinged feet to the
Minotaur, I poked my head into the lower berth.

"What are you going to do?" gasped its occupant, _la grosse femme_ whose
fault it would be if my hair did change from the gold of a louis to the
silver of a mere franc.

"You say you're stifling," I reminded her, politely but firmly, and my
tone was like the lull before a storm.

"Yes, but----" We were staring into each other's eyes, and--could I
believe my sense of touch, or was it mercifully blunted? It seemed that
the monster on the floor was gently licking my toes with a tongue like a
huge slice of pink ham, instead of chewing them to the bone. But there
are creatures which do that to their victims, I've heard, by way of
making it easier to swallow them, later.

"You also said no one cared," I went on, courageously. "_I_ care--for
myself as well as for you. As for what I'm going to do--I'm going to do
several things. First, open the window, and then--_then I'm going to
undress you_."

"You must be mad!" gasped the lady, who was English. Oh, but more
English than any one else I ever saw in my life.

"Not yet," said I, as I darted at the thick blind she had drawn down
over the window, and let it fly up with a snap. I then opened the window
itself, a few inches, and in floated a perfumed breath of the soft April
air for which our bereaved lungs had been longing. The breeze fluttered
round my head like a benediction until I felt that the ebbing tide of
gold had turned, and was flowing into my back hair again.

"No wonder you're dying, madam," I exclaimed, switching the heat-lever
to "Froid." "So was I, but being merely an Upper Berth, with no rights,
I was suffering in silence. I watched you turn the heat full on, and
shut the window tight. I saw you go to bed in _all_ your clothes, which
looked terribly thick, and cover yourself up with both your blankets;
but I said nothing, because you were a Lower Berth, and older than I am.
I thought maybe you _wanted_ a Turkish Bath. But since you don't--I'll
try and save you from apoplexy, if it isn't too late."

I fumbled with brooches and buttons, with hooks and eyes. It was even
worse than I'd supposed. The creature's conception of a travelling
costume _en route_ for the South of France consisted of a heavy tweed
dress, two gray knitted stay-bodices, one pink Jaeger chemise, and a
couple of red flannel petticoats. My investigations went no further;
but, encouraged in my rescue work by spasmodic gestures on the part of
the patient, and forbearance on the part of the dog, I removed several
superfluous layers of wool. One blanket went to the floor, where it was
accepted in the light of a gift by His Majesty, and the other was
returned to its owner.

"Now are you better, madam?" I asked, panting with long and well-earned
breaths. She reposed on an elbow, gazing up at me as at a surgeon who
has performed a painful but successful operation; and she was an object
_pour faire rire_, the poor lady!

She wore an old-fashioned false front of hair, "sunning over with curls"
(brown ones, of a brown never seen on land or sea), and a pair of
spectacles, pushed up in an absent-minded moment, were entangled in its
waves. Her face, which was large, with a knot of tiny features in the
middle, shone red with heat and excitement. She would have had the look
of an elderly child, if it hadn't been for her bright, shrewd little
eyes, which twinkled observantly--and might sparkle with temper. Nobody
who was not rich and important would dare to dress as badly as she did.
Altogether she was a figure of fun. Indeed, I couldn't help feeling what
quaint mantelpiece ornaments she and her dog would make. Yet, for some
reason, I didn't feel inclined to laugh, and I eyed her as solemnly as
she eyed me. As for His Majesty, I began to see that I had misunderstood
him. After all, he had never, from the first, regarded me as an eatable.

"Yes, I _am_ better," replied His Majesty's mistress. "People have
always told me it came on treacherously cold at night in France, so I
prepared accordingly. I suppose I ought to thank you. In fact, I do
thank you."

"I acted for myself as much as for you," I confessed. "It was so hot,
and you were suffering out loud."

"I have never travelled at night before," the lady defended herself.
"Indeed, I've made a point of travelling as little as possible, except
by carriage. I don't consider trains a means of conveyance for
gentlefolk. They seem well enough for cattle who may not mind being
herded together."

"Or for dogs," I suggested.

"Nothing is too good for Beau--my _only_ Beau!" (at this I did not
wonder). "But I wouldn't have moved without him. He's as necessary to me
as my conscience. I was afraid the guard was going to make a fuss about
him, which would have been awkward, as I can't speak a word of French,
or any other silly language into which Latin has degenerated. But
luckily English gold doesn't need to be translated."

"It loses in translation," said I, amused. I sat down on my bag as I
spoke, and timorously invited Beau (never was name less appropriate) to
be patted. He arose from the blanket and accepted my overtures with an
expression which may have been intended for a smile, or a threat of the
most appalling character. I have seen such legs as his on old-fashioned
silver teapots; and the crook in his tail would have made it useful as a
door-knocker.

"I don't think I ever saw him take so to a stranger," exclaimed his
mistress, suddenly beaming.

"I wonder you risked him with me in such close quarters then," said I.
"Wouldn't it have been safer if you'd had your maid in the compartment
with you----"

"My maid? My tyrant!" snorted the old lady. "She's the one creature on
earth I am afraid of, and she knows it. When we got to Dover, and she
saw the Channel wobbling about a little, she said it was a great nasty
wet thing, and she wouldn't go on it. When I insisted, she showed
symptoms of seasickness; and in consequence she is waiting for me in
Dover till I finish the business that's taking me to Italy. I had no
more experience than she, but I had _courage_. It's perhaps a question
of class. Servants consider only themselves. You, too, I see, have
courage. I was inclined to think poorly of you when you first came in,
and to wish I'd been extravagant enough to take the two beds for myself,
because I thought you were afraid of Beau. Yet now you're patting him."

"I _was_ rather afraid at first," I admitted. "I never met an English
bull dog socially before."

"They're more angels than dogs. Their one interest in life is love--for
their friends; and they wouldn't hurt a fly."

"Larger game would be more in their way, I should think," said I. "But
I'm glad he likes me. I like to be liked. It makes me feel more at home
in life."

"H'm! That's a funny idea!" remarked the old lady. "'At home in life!'
You've made yourself pretty well at home in this _wagon-lit_, anyhow,
taking off all your clothes and putting on your nightgown. I should
never have thought of that. It seems hardly decent. Suppose we should be
killed."

"Most people do try to die in their nightgowns, when you come to think
of it," said I.

"Well, you have a quaint way of putting things. There's something very
original about you, my dear young woman. I thought you were mysterious
at first, but I believe it's only the effect of originality."

"I don't know which I'd rather be," I said, "original or mysterious, if
I couldn't afford both. But I'm not a young woman."

"Goodness!" exclaimed the old lady, wrinkling up her eyes to stare at
me. "I may be pretty blind, but it can't be make-up."

I laughed. "I mean _je suis jeune fille_. I'm not a young woman. I'm a
young girl."

"Dear me, is there any difference?"

"There is in France."

"I'm not surprised at queer ideas in France, or any other foreign
country, where I've always understood that _anything_ may happen. Why
can't everybody be English? It would be so much more simple. But you're
not French, are you?"

"Half of me is."

"And what's the other half, if I may ask?"

"American. My father was French, my mother American."

"No wonder you don't always feel at home in life, divided up like that!"
she chuckled. "It must be so upsetting."

"Everything is upsetting with me lately," I said.

"With me too, if it comes to that--or would be, if it weren't for Beau.
What a pity you haven't got a Beau, my dear."

I smiled, because (in the Americanized sense of the word) I had one, and
was running away from him as fast as I could. But the thought of
Monsieur Charretier as a "beau" made me want to giggle hysterically.

"You say 'was,' when you speak of your father and mother," went on the
old lady, with childlike curiosity, which I was encouraging by not
going back to bed. "Does that mean that you've lost them?"

"Yes," I said.

"And lately?"

"My father died when I was sixteen, my mother left me two years ago."

"You don't look more than nineteen now."

"I'm nearly twenty-one."

"Well, I don't mean to catechize you, though one certainly must get
friendly--or the other way--I suppose, penned up in a place like this
all night. And you've really been very kind to me. Although you're a
pretty girl, as you must know, I didn't think at first I was going to
like you so much."

"And I didn't you," I retorted, laughing, because I really did begin to
like the queer old lady now, and was glad I hadn't dropped a pillow on
her head.

"That's right. Be frank. I like frankness. Do you know, I believe you
and I would get on very well together if our acquaintance was going to
be continued? If Beau approves of a person, I let myself go."

"You use him as if he were a barometer."

"There you are again, with your funny ideas! I shall remember that one,
and bring it out as if it were my _own_. I consider myself quite lucky
to have got you for a travelling companion. It's such a comfort to hear
English again, and talk it, after having to converse by gesture--except
with Beau. I hope you're going on to Italy?"

"No. I'm getting off at Cannes."

"I'm sorry. But I suppose you're glad?"

"Not particularly," said I.

"I've always heard that Cannes was gay."

"It won't be for me."

"Your relations there don't go out much?"

"I've no relations in Cannes. Aren't you tired now, and wouldn't you
like me to make you a little more comfortable?"

"Does that mean that _you're_ tired of answering questions? I haven't
meant to be rude."

"You haven't been," I assured her. "You're very kind to take an
interest."

"Well, then, I'm _not_ tired, and I _wouldn't_ like to be made more
comfortable. I'm very well as I am. Do you want to go to sleep?"

"I want to, but I know I can't. I'm getting hungry. Are you?"

"Getting? I've _got_. If Simpkins were here I'd have her make us tea, in
my tea-basket."

"I'll make it if you like," I volunteered.

"A French--a half French--girl make tea?"

"It's the American half that knows how."

"You look too ornamental to be useful. But you can try."

I did try, and succeeded. It was rather fun, and never did tea taste so
delicious. There were biscuits to go with it, which Beau shared; and I
do wish that people (other people) were obliged to make faces when they
eat, such as Beau has to make, because if so, one could add a new
interest to life by inviting even the worst bores to dinner.

I was fascinated with his contortions, and I did not attempt to conceal
my sudden change of opinion concerning Beau as a companion. When I had
humbly invited him to drink out of my saucer, which I held from high
tide to low, I saw that my conquest of his mistress was complete.
Already we had exchanged names, as well as some confidences. I knew that
she was Miss Paget, and she knew that I was Lys d'Angely; but after the
tea-drinking episode she became doubly friendly.

She told me that, owing to an unforeseen circumstance (partly, even
largely, connected with Beau) which had caused a great upheaval in her
life, she had now not a human being belonging to her, except her maid
Simpkins, of whom she would like to get rid if only she knew how.

"Talk of the Old Man of the Sea!" she sighed. "_He_ was an afternoon
caller compared with Simpkins. She's been on my back for twenty years. I
suppose she will be for another twenty, unless I slam the door of the
family vault in her face."

"Couldn't Beau help you?" I asked.

"Even Beau is powerless against her. She has hypnotized him with marrow
bones."

"You've escaped from her for the present," I suggested. "She's on the
other side of the Channel. Now is your time to be bold."

"Ah, but I can't stop out of England for ever, and I tell you she's
waiting for me at Dover. A relative (a very eccentric one, and quite
different from the rest of us, or he wouldn't have made his home abroad)
has left me a house in Italy, some sort of old castle, I believe--so
unsuitable! I'm going over to see about selling it for I've no one to
trust but myself, owing to the circumstances of which I spoke. I want to
get back as soon as possible--I hope in a few weeks, though how I shall
manage without any Italian, heaven may know--I don't! Do you speak it?"

"A little."

"Well, I wish I could have you with me. You'd make a splendid companion
for an old woman like me: young, good to look at, energetic (or you
wouldn't be travelling about alone), brave (conquered your fear of
Beau), accomplished (three languages, and goodness knows what besides!),
presence of mind (the way you whisked my clothes off), handy (I never
tasted better tea)--altogether you sum up ideally. What a pity you're
rich, and out of the market!"

"If I look rich my appearance must be more distinguished than I
supposed--and it's also very deceiving," said I.

"You're rich enough to travel for pleasure in _wagon-lits_, and have
silver-fitted bags."

"I'm not travelling for pleasure. You exaggerate my bags and my
_wagon-lits_, for I've only one of each; and both were given me by a
friend who was at the Convent with me."

"The Convent! Good heavens! are you an escaping nun?"

I laughed. "I went to school at a Convent. That was when I thought I
_was_ going to be rich--at least, rich enough to be like other girls.
And if I _am_ 'escaping' from something, it isn't from the arms of
religion."

"If you're not rich, and aren't going to relatives, why not take an
engagement with me? Come, I'm in earnest. I always make up my mind
suddenly, if it's anything important, and hardly ever regret it. I'm
sure we should suit. You've got no nonsense about you."

"Oh yes I have, lots!" I broke in. "That's all I have left--that, and my
sense of humour. But seriously, you're very kind--to take me on faith
like this--especially when you began by thinking me mysterious. I'd
accept thankfully, only--I'm engaged already."

"To be married, I suppose you mean?"

"Thank heaven, no! To a Princess."

"Dear me, one would think you were a man hater!"

"So I am, a _one_-man hater. What Simpkins is to you, that man is to me.
And that's why I'm on my way to Cannes to be the companion of the
Princess Boriskoff, who's said to be rather deaf and very
quick-tempered, as well as elderly and a great invalid. She sheds her
paid companions as a tree sheds its leaves in winter. I hear that Europe
is strewn with them."

"Nice prospect for you!"

"Isn't it? But beggars mustn't be choosers."

"You don't look much like a beggar."

"Because I can make my own dresses and hats--and nightgowns."

"Well, if your Princess sheds you, let me know, and you may live yet to
deliver me from Simpkins. I feel you'd be equal to it! My address
is--but I'll give you a card." And, burrowing under her pillow, she
unearthed a fat handbag from which, after some fumbling, she presented
me with a visiting-card, enamelled in an old-fashioned way. I read:
"Miss Paget, 34a Eaton Square. Broomlands House, Surrey."

"Now you're not to lose that," she impressed upon me. "Write if you're
scattered over Europe by this Russian (I never did believe much in
Princesses, excepting, of course, our _own_ dear Royalties), or if you
ever come to England. Even if it's years from now, I assure you Beau and
I won't have forgotten you. As for your address--"

"I haven't any," I said. "At present I'm depending on the Princess for
one. She's at the Hotel Majestic Palace, Cannes; but from what my friend
Pam--the Comtesse de Nesle--says, I fancy she doesn't stop long in any
town. It was the Comtesse de Nesle who got me the place. She's the only
one who knows where I'm going, because--after a fashion, I'm running
away to be the Princess's companion."

"Running away from the Man?"

"Yes; also from my relatives who're sure it's my duty to be _his_
companion. So you see I can't give you their address. I've ceased to
have any right to it. And now I really think I _had_ better go back to
bed."




CHAPTER II


At half-past ten this morning we parted, the best of friends, and I
dropped a good-bye kiss into the deep black gorge between the
promontories of Beau's velvet forehead and plush nose.

We'd had breakfast together, Miss Paget and I, to say nothing of the
dog, and I felt rather cheerful. Of course I dreaded the Princess; but I
always did like adventures, and it appeared to me distinctly an
adventure to be a companion, even in misery. Besides, it was nice to
have come away from Monsieur Charretier, and to feel that not only did
he not know where I was, but that he wasn't likely to find out. Poor me!
I little guessed what an adventure on a grand scale I was in for.
Already this morning seems a long time ago; a year at the Convent used
to seem shorter.

I drove up to the hotel in the omnibus which was at the station, and
asked at the office for the Princess Boriskoff. I said that I was
Mademoiselle d'Angely, and would they please send word to the Princess,
because she was expecting me.

It was a young assistant manager who received me, and he gave me a very
queer, startled sort of look when I said this, as if I were a suspicious
person, and he didn't quite know whether it would be better to answer me
or call for help.

"I haven't made a mistake, have I?" I asked, beginning to be anxious.
"This _is_ the hotel where the Princess is staying, isn't it?"

"She was staying here," the youth admitted. "But--"

"Has she _gone_?"

"Not exactly."

"She must be either here or gone."

Again he regarded me with suspicion, as if he did not agree with my
statement.

"Are you a relative of the Princess?" he inquired.

"No, I'm engaged to be her companion."

"Oh! If that is all! But perhaps, in any case, it will be better to wait
for the manager. He will be here presently. I do not like to take the
responsibility."

"The responsibility of what?" I persisted, my heart beginning to feel
like a patter of rain on a tin roof.

"Of telling you what has happened."

"If something has happened, I can't wait to hear it. I must know at
once," I said, with visions of all sorts of horrid things: that the
Princess had decided not to have a companion, and was going to disown
me; that my cousin Madame Milvaine had somehow found out everything;
that Monsieur Charretier had got on my track, and was here in advance
waiting to pounce upon me.

"It is a thing which we do not want to have talked about in the hotel,"
the young man hesitated.

"I assure you I won't talk to any one. I don't know any one to talk to."

"It is very distressing, but the Princess Boriskoff died about four
o'clock this morning, of heart failure."

"Oh!" ... I could not get out another word.

"These things are not liked in hotels, even when not contagious."

The assistant manager looked gloomily at me, as if I might be held
responsible for the inconvenient event; but still I could not speak.

"Especially in the high season. It is being kept secret. That is the
custom. In some days, or less, it will leak out, but not till the
Princess has--been removed. You will kindly not mention it,
mademoiselle. This is very bad for us."

No, I would kindly not mention it, but it was worse for me than for
them. The Hotel Majestic Palace looked rich; very, very rich. It had
heaps of splendid mirrors and curtains, and imitation Louis XVI. sofas,
and everything that a hotel needs to make it happy and successful, while
I had nothing in the world except what I stood up in, one fitted bag,
one small box, and thirty-two francs. I didn't quite see, at first
sight, what I was to do; but neither did the assistant manager see what
that had to do with him.

Once I knew a girl who was an actress, and on tour in the country she
nearly drowned herself one day. When the star heard of it, he said: "How
_should_ we have played to-night if you'd been dead--without an
understudy, too?"

At this moment I knew just how the girl must have felt when the star
said that.

"I--I think I must stay here a day or two, until I can--arrange things,"
I managed to stammer. "Have you a small single room disengaged?"

"We have one or two small north rooms which are usually occupied by
valets and maids," the young man informed me. "They are twelve francs a
day."

"I'll take one," I replied. And then I added anxiously: "Have any
relatives of the Princess come?"

"None have come; and certainly none will come, as it would now be too
late. Her death was very sudden. The Princess's maid knows what to do.
She is an elderly woman, experienced. The suite occupied by Her Highness
will be free to-morrow."

"Oh! And had she no friends here?"

"I do not think the Princess was a lady who made friends. She was very
proud and considered herself above other people. Would you like to see
your room, mademoiselle? I will send some one to take you up to it. It
will be on the top floor."

I was in a mood not to care if it had been on the roof, or in the
cellar. I hardly knew where I was going, as a few minutes later a still
younger youth piloted me across a large square hall toward a lift; but I
was vaguely conscious that a good many smart-looking people were sitting
or standing about, and that they glanced at me as I went by. I hoped
dimly that I didn't appear conspicuously pale and stricken.

Just in front of the lift door a tall woman was talking to a little man.
There was an instant of delay while my guide and I waited for them to
move, and before they realized that we were waiting.

"They say the poor thing is no worse than yesterday, however, my maid
tells me--" The lady had begun in a low, mysterious tone, but broke off
suddenly when it dawned upon her that she was obstructing the way.

I knew instinctively _who_ was the subject of the whispered
conversation, and I couldn't help fixing my eyes almost appealingly on
the tall woman; for though she was middle-aged and not pretty, her voice
was so nice and she looked so kind that I felt a longing to have her for
a friend. She had probably been acquainted with Princess Boriskoff, I
said to myself, or she would not be talking of her now, with bated
breath, as a "poor thing."

Evidently the lady had been waiting for the lift to come down, for when
my guide rang and it descended she took a step forward, giving a
friendly little nod to her companion, and saying, "Well, I must go. I
feel sure it's _true_ about her."

Then, instead of sailing ahead of me into the lift, as she had a perfect
right to do, being much older and far more important than I, and the
first comer as well, she hesitated with a pleasant half smile, as much
as to say, "You're a stranger. I give up my right to you."

"Oh, please!" I said, stepping aside to let her pass, which she did,
making room for me to sit down beside her on the narrow plush-covered
seat. But I didn't care to sit. I was so crushed, it seemed that, if
once I sat down I shouldn't have courage to rise up again and wrestle
with the difficulties of life.

The lady got out on the second floor, throwing back a kindly glance, as
if she took a little interest in me, and wanted me to know it. I suppose
it must have been because I was tired and nervous after a whole night
without sleep that the shock I'd just received was too much for me.
Anyway, that kind glance made a lump rise in my throat, and the lump
forced tears into my eyes. I looked down instantly, so that she
shouldn't see them and think me an idiot, but I was afraid she did.

The young man who was taking me up to the top floor, and treating me
rather nonchalantly because I was a North Roomer and a Twelve Francer,
waved the lift boy aside to open the door himself for the lady; so that
I knew she must be considered a person worth conciliating.

Shut up in my ten-by-six-foot room, I tried to compose myself and make
plans; but to make plans on thirty-two francs, when you've no home, and
would be far from it even if you had one; when you've nobody to help
you, and wouldn't want to ask them if you had--is about as hard as to
play the piano brilliantly without ever having taken a lesson. With
Princess Boriskoff dead, with Pamela de Nesle sailing for New York
to-morrow morning, and no other intimate friends rich enough to do
anything for me, even if they were willing to help me fly in the face of
Providence and Madame Milvaine, it did seem (as Pamela herself would
say) as though I were rather "up against it."

The thought of Miss Paget suddenly jumped into my head, and the wish
that, somehow, I had kept her up my sleeve as a last resort, in case she
really were in earnest about her offer. But she hadn't told me where she
was going in Italy, and it would be of no use writing to one of her
English addresses, as I couldn't stop on where I was, waiting for an
answer.

Altogether things were very bad with me.

After I had sat down and thought for a while, I rang, and asked for the
housekeeper. A hint or two revealed that she was aware of what had
happened, and, explaining that I was to have been Princess Boriskoff's
companion, I said that I must see the Princess's maid. She must come to
my room. I must have a talk with her.

Presently, after an interval which may have been meant to emphasize her
dignity, appeared a pale, small Russian woman whose withered face was as
tragic and remote from the warmth of daily life as that of the eldest
Fate.

She could speak French, and we talked together. Yes, her mistress had
died very suddenly, but she and the doctors had always known that it
might happen so, at any moment. It was hard for me, but--what would you?
Life was hard. It might have been that I would have found life hard with
Her Highness. What was to be, would be. I must write to my friends. It
was not in her power to do anything for me. Her Highness had left no
instructions. These things happened. Well! one made the best of them.
There was nothing more to say.

So we said nothing more, and the woman moved away silently, as if to
funeral music, to prepare for her journey to Russia. I--went down to
luncheon.

One always does go down to luncheon while one is still inclined to keep
up appearances before oneself; but the restaurant was large and terribly
magnificent, with a violent rose-coloured carpet, and curtains which
made me, in my frightened pallor, with my pale yellow hair and my gray
travelling dress, feel like a poor little underground celery-stalk flung
into a sunlit strawberry-bed, amid a great humming of bees.

The vast rosy sea was thickly dotted with many small table-islands that
glittered appetizingly with silver and glass; but I could not have
afforded to acknowledge an appetite even if I'd had one.

My conversation with the Russian woman had made me rather late. Most of
the islands were inhabited, and as I was piloted past them by a haughty
head waiter I heard people talking about golf, tennis, croquet, bridge,
reminding me that I was in a place devoted to the pursuit of pleasure.

The most desirable islands were next the windows, therefore the one at
which I dropped anchor (for I'd changed from a celery-stalk into a
little boat now) was exactly in the middle of the room, with no view
save of faces and backs of heads.

One of the faces was that of the lady who had gone up with me in the
lift; and now and then, from across the distance that separated us, I
saw her glance at me. She sat alone at a table that had beautiful roses
on it, and she read a book as she ate.

One ordered here _à la carte_: there was no _déjeuner à prix fixe_; and
it took courage to tell a waiter who looked like a weary young duke that
I would have _consommé_ and bread, with nothing, no, _nothing_ to
follow.

Oh! the look he gave me, as if I had annexed the table under false
pretences!

Suddenly the chorus of an American song ran with mocking echoes through
my brain. I had heard Pamela sing it at the Convent:

    The waiter roared it through the hall:
    "We don't give bread with _one_ fish-ball!
    We-don't-_give_-bread with one fish-_ba-a-ll_!"

I half expected some such crushing protest, and it was only when the
weary duke had turned his back, presumably to execute my order, that I
sank into my chair with a sigh of relief after strain.

Just at that moment I met the eye of the lady of the lift, and when the
waiter reappeared with a small cup, on a charger large enough to have
upheld the head of John the Baptist, she looked again. In five minutes I
had finished the _consommé_, and it became painful to linger. Rising, I
made for the door, which seemed a mile away, and I did not lift my head
in passing the table where the lady sat behind her roses. I heard a
rustling as I went by, however, a crisp rustling like flower-leaves
whispering in a breeze, or a woman's silk ruffles stroking each other,
which followed me out into the hall.

Then the pleasant voice I had heard near the lift spoke behind me:

"Won't you have your coffee with me in the garden?"

I could hardly believe at first that it was for me the invitation was
intended, but turning with a little start, I saw it repeated in a pair
of gentle gray eyes set rather wide apart in a delicate, colourless
face.

"Oh! thank you!" I hesitated. "I--"

"Do forgive me," went on the lady, "but your face interested me this
morning, and as we're all rather curious about strangers--we idle ones
here--I took the liberty of asking the manager who you were. He told
me--"

"About the Princess?" I asked, when she paused as if slightly
embarrassed.

"He told me that you said you had come to Cannes to be her companion. He
didn't tell me she was dead, poor woman, but--there are some things one
knows by instinct, by intuition, aren't there? And then--I couldn't help
seeing, or perhaps only imagining, that you looked sad and worried. You
are very young, and are here all alone, and so--I thought perhaps you
wouldn't mind my speaking to you?"

"I'm very grateful," I said, "for your interest. And it's so good of you
to ask me to have coffee with you." (I was almost sure, too, that she
had hurried away in the midst of her luncheon to do this deed of
kindness.)

"Perhaps, after all, you'll come with me to my own sitting-room," she
suggested. "We can talk more quietly there; and though the garden's
quite lovely, it's rather too glaring at this time of day."

We went up in the lift together, and the moment she opened the door of
her sitting-room I saw that she had contrived to make it look like
herself. She talked only about her books and photographs and flowers
until the coffee had come, and we seemed better acquainted. Then she
told me that she was Lady Kilmarny--"Irish in every drop in her veins";
and presently set herself to draw me out.

I began by making up my mind not to pour forth all my troubles, lest she
should think that I wanted to take advantage of her kindness and sponge
upon her for help; but she was irresistible, as only a true Irishwoman
can be, and the first thing I knew, I had emptied my heart of its
worries.




CHAPTER III


"You will have to go back to the cousins you've been living with in
Paris," pronounced Lady Kilmarny. "You're much too young and pretty to
be _anywhere_ alone."

"I can't go on living with them unless I promise to marry Monsieur
Charretier," I explained. "I'd rather scrub floors than marry Monsieur
Charretier."

"You'd never finish one floor. The second would finish you. I thought
French girls--well, then, _half_ French girls--usually let their people
arrange their marriages."

"Perhaps I'm not usual. I _hope_ Monsieur Charretier isn't."

"Is he such a monster?"

"He is fat, especially in all the places he oughtn't to be fat. And old.
But worse than his _embonpoint_ and his nose, he made his money in--you
could never guess."

"I see by your face, my poor child: it was Liver Pills."

"Something far more dreadful."

"Are there lower depths?"

"There are--Corn Plasters."

"Oh, my dear, you are _quite_ right! You couldn't marry him."

"Thank you so much! Then, I can't go back to my cousins. They--they
take Monsieur Charretier seriously. I think they even take his
plasters--gratuitously."

"Is he so very rich?"

"But disgustingly rich. He has an awful, bulbous new château in the
country, with dozens of incredibly high-powered motor-cars; and in the
most expensive part of Paris a huge apartment wriggling from floor to
ceiling with _Nouveau Art_. The girl who marries him will have to be
smeared with diamonds, and know the most appalling people. In fact,
she'll have to be a kind of walking, pictorial advertisement for the
success of Charretier's Corn Plasters."

"He must know some nice people, since he knows relations of yours."

"Thank you for the compliment, which I hope you pay me on circumstantial
evidence. But it's deceiving. My mother, I believe, was the only nice
person in her family. These cousins, husband and wife, brought mamma to
Europe to live with them when she was a young girl, quite rich and an
orphan. They were furious when she fell in love with papa, who was only
a lieutenant with nothing but a very old name, the ruins of a castle
that tourists paid francs to see, and a ramshackle house in Paris almost
too dilapidated to let. It was a mere detail to them that he happened to
be one of the best-looking and most agreeable young men in the world.
They did nothing but say, 'I told you so!' for years, whenever anything
disastrous happened--as it constantly did, for poor papa and mamma loved
each other so much, and had so much fun, that they couldn't have time
to be business-like. My cousins thought everything mamma did was a
madness--such as sending me to the most fashionable convent school in
France. As if I hadn't to be educated! And then, when the castle fell so
to bits that tourists wouldn't bother with it any more, and nobody but
rats would live in the Paris house unless it was repaired--and poor papa
was killed in a horrid little Saturday-to-Monday war of no importance
(except to people whose hearts it broke)--oh! I believe the cousins were
glad! They thought it was a judgment. That happened years ago, when I
was only fifteen, and though they've plenty of money (more than most
people in the American colony) they didn't offer to help; and mamma
would have died sooner than ask. I had to be snatched out of school, to
find that all the beautiful dreams of being a happy _débutante_ must go
by contraries. We lived in the tumble-down house ourselves, mamma and I,
and her friends rallied round her--she was so popular and pretty. They
got her chances to give singing lessons, and me to do translating, and
painting _menus_. We were happy again, after a while, in spite of all,
and people were so good to us! Mamma used to hold a kind of _salon_,
with all the brightest and best crowding to it, though they got nothing
but sweet biscuits, _vin ordinaire_, and conversation--and besides, the
house might have taken a fancy to fall down on their heads any minute.
It was sporting of them to come at all!"

"And the cousins. Did they come?"

"Not they! They're of the society of the little Brothers and Sisters of
the Rich. Their set was quite different from ours. But when mamma died
nearly two years ago, and I was alone, they did call, and Cousin Emily
offered me a home. I was to give up all my work, of course, which she
considered degrading, and was simply to make myself useful to her as a
daughter of the house might do. That was what she _said_."

"You accepted?"

"Yes. I didn't know her and her husband as well as I do now; and before
she died mamma begged me to go to them, if they asked me. That was when
Monsieur Charretier came on the scene--at least, he came a few months
later, and I've had no peace since. Lately, things were growing more and
more impossible, when my best friend, Comtesse de Nesle, came to my
rescue and found (or thought she'd found) me this engagement with the
Princess. As I told you, I simply ran away--_sneaked_ away--and came
here without any one but Pamela knowing. And now she--the Comtesse--is
just sailing for New York with her husband."

"The Comtesse de Nesle--that pretty little American! I've met her in
Paris--and at the Dublin Horse Show," exclaimed Lady Kilmarny. "Well, I
wish I could take up the rescue work where she has laid it down. I think
you are a most romantic little figure, and I'd love to engage you as my
companion, only my husband and I are as poor as church mice. Like your
father, we've nothing but our name and a few ruins. When I come South
for my health I can't afford such luxuries as a husband and a maid. I
have to choose between them and a private sitting-room. So you see, I
can't possibly indulge in a companion."

People seemed to be always wanting me as one, and then reluctantly
abandoning me!

"Your kindness and sympathy have helped me a lot," said I.

"They won't pay your way."

"I have no way. So far as I can see, I shall have to stop in Cannes,
anonymously so to speak, for the rest of my life."

"Where would you like to go, if you could choose--since you can't go to
your relations?"

Again my thoughts travelled after Miss Paget, as if she had been a fat,
red will-o'-the-wisp.

"To England, perhaps," I answered. "In a few weeks from now I might be
able to find a position there." And I went on to tell, in as few words
as possible, my adventure in the railway train.

"H'm!" said Lady Kilmarny. "We'll look her up in _Who's Who_, and see if
she exists. If she's anybody, she'll be there. And _Who's Who_ I always
have with me, abroad. One meets so many pretenders, it's quite
dangerous."

"How can you tell I'm not one?" I asked. "Yet you spoke to me."

"Why, you're down in a kind of invisible book, called 'You're You.' It's
sufficient reference for me. Besides, if your two eyes couldn't be
trusted, it would be easy to shed you."

Lady Kilmarny said this smilingly, as she found the red book, and passed
her finger down the columns of P's.

"Yes, here's the name, and the two addresses on the visiting-card. She's
the Honourable Maria Paget, only daughter of the late Baron Northfield.
Yes, an engagement with her would be safe, if not agreeable. But how to
get you to England?"

"Perhaps I could go as somebody's maid," I reflected aloud.

She looked at me sharply. _"Would_ you do that?"

"It would be better than being an advertisement for Corn Plasters," I
smiled.

"Then," said Lady Kilmarny, "perhaps, after all, I can help you. But
no--I should never dare to suggest it! The thought of a girl like
you--it would be too dreadful."




CHAPTER IV


When my father had been extravagant, he used to say gaily in
self-defence that "one owed something to one's ancestors." Certainly, if
it had not been for several of his ancestors, he would not have owed so
much to his contemporaries. But in spite of their agreeable vices, or
because of them, I was brought up in the cult of ancestor worship, as
religiously as if I had been Chinese.

To be a d'Angely was a privilege, in our eyes, which not only supplied
gilding for the gingerbread, but for the most economical substitutes.

   "Ne roi je suis,
    Ne prince aussi,
    Je suis le Sire d'Angely,"

calmly remarked the gentleman of Louis XI.'s time, who became famous for
hanging as many retainers as he liked, and defending his action by
originating the family motto.

Mother also had ancestors who began to take themselves seriously
somewhere about the time of the _Mayflower_, though for all we know they
may have secured their passage in the steerage.

"A Courtenay can do anything," was their rather ambiguous motto, which
suggested that it might have been started in self-defence, if not as a
boast; and it (the name, not the motto) had been thoughtfully
sandwiched in between my Lys and my d'Angely by my sponsors in baptism,
that if necessary I might ever have an excuse at hand for any dark deed
or infra dig-ness.

I used often to murmur the consoling mottoes to myself when pattering
through muddy streets, too poor to take an omnibus, on the way to
sell--or try to sell--my translations or my _menus_. But now, after all
that's happened, if it is to strike conviction to my soul, I shall be
obliged to yell it at the top of my mental lungs.

(That expression may sound ridiculous, but it isn't. We could not talk
to ourselves as we do, in all kinds of voices, high or low, if we hadn't
mental lungs, or at the least, sub-conscious-self lungs.)

_Je suis_ the daughter of the last Sire d'Angely; and a Courtenay can do
anything; so of course it's all right; and it's no good my ancestors
turning in their graves, for they'll only make themselves uncomfortable
without changing my mind.

I, Lys d'Angely, am going to be a lady's-maid; or rather, I am going to
be the maid of an extremely rich person who calls herself a lidy.

It's perfectly awful, or awfully comic, according to the point of view,
and I swing from one to the other, pushed by my fastidiousness to my
sense of humour, and back again, in a way to make me giddy. But it's
settled. I'm going to do it. I had almost to drag the suggestion out of
Lady Kilmarny, who turned red and stammered as if I were the great lady,
she the poor young girl in want of a situation.

There was, said she, a quaint creature in the hotel (one met these
things abroad, and was obliged to be more or less civil to them) who
resembled Monsieur Charretier in that she was disgustingly rich. It was
not Corn Plasters. It was Liver Pills, the very same liver pills which
had dropped into the mind of Lady Kilmarny when I hesitated to put into
words the foundation of my _pretendant's_ future. It was the Liver Pills
which had eventually introduced into her brain the idea she falteringly
embodied for me.

The husband of the quaint creature had invented the pills, even as
Monsieur Charretier had invented his abomination. Because of the pills
he had been made a Knight; at least, Lady Kilmarny didn't know any other
reason. He was Sir Samuel Turnour (evolved from Turner), just married
for the second time to a widow in whose head it was like the continual
frothing of new wine to be "her ladyship."

Lady Turnour had lately quarrelled with a maid and dismissed her, Lady
Kilmarny told me. Now, she was in immediate need of another, French
(because French maids are fashionable) able to speak English, because
the Turnour family had as yet mastered no other language. Lady Kilmarny
believed that this was the honeymoon of the newly married pair, and
that, after having paused on the wing at Cannes, for a little billing
and cooing, they intended to pursue their travels in France for some
weeks, before returning to settle down in England. "Her Ladyship" was
asking everybody with whom she had contrived to scrape acquaintance
(especially if they had titles) to recommend her a maid. Lady Kilmarny,
as a member of the League against Cruelty to Animals, had determined
that nothing would induce her to throw any poor mouse to this cat, even
if she heard of a mouse plying for hire; but here was I in a dreadful
scrape, professing myself ready to snap at anything except Corn
Plasters; and she felt bound to mention that the mousetrap was open, the
cheese waiting to be nibbled.

"Do you think she'd have me?" I asked--"the quaint creature, her
ladyship?"

"Only too likely that she would," said Lady Kilmarny. "But remember, the
worst is, she doesn't _know_ she's a quaint creature. She is quite happy
about herself, offensively happy, and would consider you the 'creature.'
A truly awful person, my dear. A man in this hotel--the little thing you
saw me talking to this morning, knows all about them both. I think they
began in Peckham or somewhere. They _would_, you know, and call it
'S.W.' She was a chemist's daughter, and he was the humble assistant,
long before the Pill materialized, so she refused him, and married a
dashing doctor. But unfortunately he dashed into the bankruptcy court,
and afterward she probably nagged him to death. Anyway he died--but not
till long after Sam Turner had taken pity on some irrelevant widow, as
his early love was denied him. The widow had a boy, to whom the
stepfather was good--(really a very decent person according to his
lights!) and kept on making pills and millions, until last year he lost
his first wife and got a knighthood. The old love was a widow by this
time, taking in lodgers in some neighbourhood where you _do_ take
lodgers, and Sir Samuel found and gathered her like a late rose.
Naturally she puts on all the airs in the world, and diamonds in the
morning. She'll treat you like the dirt under her feet, because that's
her conception of her part--and yours. But I'll introduce you to her if
you like."

After a little reflection, I did like; but as it seemed to me that
there'd better not be two airs in the family, I said that I'd put on
none at all, and make no pretensions.

"She's the kind that doesn't know a lady or gentleman without a label,"
my kind friend warned me. "You must be prepared for that."

"I'll be prepared for anything," I assured her. But when it came to the
test, I wasn't quite.

Lady Kilmarny wrote a line to Lady Turnour, and asked if she might bring
a maid to be interviewed--a young woman whom she could recommend. The
note was sent down to the bride (who of course had the best suite in the
hotel, on the first floor) and presently an answer came--saying that Her
Ladyship would be pleased to receive Lady Kilmarny and the person in
question.

Suddenly I felt that I must go alone. "Please leave me to my fate," I
said. "I should be too self-conscious if you were with me. Probably I
should laugh in her face, or do something dreadful."

"Very well," Lady Kilmarny agreed. "Perhaps you're right. Say that I
sent you, and that, though you've never been with me, friends of mine
know all about you. You might tell her that you were to have travelled
with the Princess Boriskoff. That will impress her. She would kiss the
boot of a Princess. Afterward, come up and tell me how you got on with
'Her Ladyship.'"

I was stupid to be nervous, and told myself so; but as I knocked at the
door of the suite reserved for Millionaires and other Royalties, my
heart was giving little ineffective jumps in my breast, like--as my old
nurse used to say--"a frog with three legs."

"Come in!" called a voice with sharp, jagged edges.

I opened the door. In a private drawing-room as different as the
personality of one woman from another, sat Lady Turnour. She faced me as
I entered, so I had a good look at her, before casting down my eyes and
composing my countenance to the self-abnegating meekness which I
conceived fitting to a _femme de chambre comme il faut_.

She was enthroned on a sofa. One could hardly say less, there was so
much of her, and it was all arranged as perfectly as if she were about
to be photographed. No normal woman, merely sitting down, with no other
object than to be comfortable, would curve the tail of her gown round in
front of her like a sickle; or have just the point of one shoe daintily
poised on a footstool; or the sofa-cushions at exactly the right angle
behind her head to make a background; or the finger with all her best
rings on it, keeping the place in an English illustrated journal.

I dared not believe that she had posed for me. It must have been for
Lady Kilmarny; and that I alone should see the picture was a bad
beginning.

She is of the age when a woman can still tell people that she is forty,
hoping they will exclaim politely, "Impossible!"

It is not enough for her to be a Ladyship and a millionairess. She will
be a beauty as well, or at all costs she will be looked at. To that end
are her eyebrows and lashes black as jet, her undulated hair crimson,
her lips a brighter shade of the same colour, and her skin of magnolia
pallor, like the heroines of the novels which are sure to be her
favourites. Once, she must have been handsome, a hollyhock queen of a
kitchen-garden kingdom; but she would be far more attractive now if only
she had "abdicated," as nice middle-aged women say in France.

Her dress was the very latest dream of a neurotic Parisian modiste, and
would have been seductive on a slender girl. On her--well, at least she
would have her wish in it--she would not pass unnoticed!

She looked surprised at sight of me, and I saw she didn't realize that I
was the expected candidate.

"Lady Kilmarny couldn't come," I began to explain, "and--"

"Oh!" she cut me short. "So you are the young person she is recommending
as a maid."

I corrected Miss Paget when she called me a "young woman," but times
have changed since then, and in future I must humbly consent to be a
young person, or even a creature.

For a minute I forgot, and almost sat down. It would have been the end
of me if I had! Luckily I remembered What I was, and stood before my
mistress, trying to look like Patience on a monument with butter in her
mouth which mustn't be allowed to melt.

"What is your name?" began the catechism (and the word was "nime,"
according to Lady Turnour).

"N or M," nearly slipped out of my mouth, but I put Satan with all his
mischief behind me, and answered that I was Lys d'Angely.

"Oh, the surname doesn't matter. As you're a French girl, I shall call
you by your first name. It's always done."

(The first time in history, I'd swear, that a d'Angely was ever told his
name didn't matter!)

"You seem to speak English very well for a French woman?" (This almost
with suspicion.)

"My mother was American."

"How extraordinary!"

(This was apparently a _tache_. Evidently lady's-maids are expected
_not_ to have American mothers!)

"Let me hear your French accent."

I let her hear it.

"H'm! It seems well enough. Paris?"

"Paris, madame."

"Don't call me 'madame.' Any common person is madame. You should say
'your ladyship'."

I said it.

"And I want you should speak to me in the third person, like the French
servants are supposed to do in good houses."

"If mad--if your ladyship wishes."

(Thank heaven for a sense of humour! My one wild desire was to laugh.
Without that blessing, I should have yearned to slap her.)

"What references have you got from your last situation?"

"I have never been in service before--my lady."

"My word! That's bad. However, you're on the spot, and Lady Kilmarny
recommends you. The poor Princess was going to try you, it seems. I
should think she wouldn't have given much for a maid without any
experience."

"I was to have had two thousand francs a year as the Princess's com--if
the Princess was satisfied."

"Preposterous! I don't believe a word of it. Why, what can you _do_? Can
you dress hair? Can you make a blouse?"

"I did my mother's hair, and sometimes my cousin's."

"_Your_ mother! _Your_ cousin! I'm talking of a lidy."

My sense of humour _did_ almost fail me just then. But I caught hold of
it by the tail just as it was darting out of the window, spitting and
scratching like a cross cat.

It was remembering Monsieur Charretier that brought me to my bearings.
"I think your ladyship would be satisfied," I said. "And I make all my
own dresses."

"That one you've got on?--which is _most_ unsuitable for a maid, I may
tell you, and I should never permit it."

"This one I have on, also."

"I thought maybe it had been a present. Well, it's _something_ that you
speak both English and French passably well. I'll try you on Lady
Kilmarny's recommendation, if you want to come to me for fifty francs a
month. I won't give more to an _amateur_."

I thought hard for a minute. Lady Kilmarny had said it would not be many
weeks before the Turnours went to England. There, if Miss Paget (who
seemed extremely nice by contrast and in retrospect) were still of the
same mind, I might find a good home. If not, she was as kind as she was
queer, and would help me look further. So I replied that I would accept
the fifty francs, and would do my best to please her ladyship.

She did not express herself as gratified. "You can begin work this
evening," she said. "I was obliged to send away my last maid yesterday,
and I'm _lost_ without one." (This was delightful from a "lidy" who had
kept lodgers for years, with the aid perhaps of one smudgy-nosed
"general"!) "But have you no more suitable clothes? I can't let a maid
of mine go flaunting about, like a Mary-Jane-on-Sunday."

I mentioned a couple of plain black dresses in my wardrobe, which might
be made to answer if I were allowed a few hours' time to work upon them,
and didn't add that they remained from my mourning for one dearly loved.

"You can have till six o'clock free," said Lady Turnour. "Then you must
come back to lay out my things for dinner, and dress me. What about your
room? Had the Princess taken something for you in the hotel?"

I evaded a direct answer by saying that I had a room; and was inwardly
thankful that, evidently, the Turnours had not noticed me in the
restaurant at luncheon, otherwise things might have been awkward.

"Very well, you can keep the same one, then," went on her ladyship, "and
let the hotel people know it's Sir Samuel who pays for it. To-morrow
morning we leave, in our sixty-horse-power motor car. We are making a
tour before going back to England. Sir Samuel's stepson joins us in
Paris or perhaps before and travels on with us. He is staying now with
some French people of very high title, who live in a château. You will
sit on the front seat with the chauffeur."

This was a blow! I hadn't thought of the chauffeur. "But," thought I,
"chauffeur or no chauffeur, it's too late now for retreat."

Talk of Prometheus with his vulture, the Spartan boy with his decently
concealed wolf! What of Lys d'Angely with an English chauffeur in her
pocket?




CHAPTER V


When I was dismissed from the Presence, I ran to Lady Kilmarny with my
story, and she agreed with me that the thing to dread most in the whole
situation was the chauffeur.

"Of course he'll naturally consider himself on an equality with you,"
she said, "and you'll have to eat with him at hotels, and all that.
Once, when my husband and I were touring in France, and used to break
down near little inns, we were obliged to have a chauffeur at the same
table with us, because there was only one long one (table, I mean, not
chauffeur) and we couldn't spare time to let him wait till we'd
finished. My dear, it was ghastly! You would never believe if you hadn't
seen it, how the creature swallowed his knife when he ate, and did
conjuring tricks with his fork and spoon. I simply _dared_ not look at
him gnawing his bread, but used to shut my eyes. I hate to distress you,
poor child, but I tell you these things as a warning. _Are_ you able to
bear it?"

I said that I, too, could shut my eyes.

"You can't make a habit of doing so. And he may want to put his arm
round your waist, or chuck you under the chin. I used to have complaints
from my maid, who was comparatively plain, while you--but I don't want
to frighten you. He _may_ be different from our man. Some, they say,
are most respectable. I love common people when they're nice, and give
up quite pleasantly to being common; and of course Irish ones are too
delightful. But you can't hope for an Irish chauffeur. I hear they don't
exist. They're all French or German or English. Let us hope this one may
be the father of a family."

It was well enough to be told to hope; and Lady Kilmarny meant to be
kind, but what she said made me "creep" whenever I thought of the
chauffeur.

She advised me not to take my meals with the maids and valets at the
Majestic Palace, because a change, so sudden and Cinderella-like, after
lunching in the restaurant, would cause disagreeable talk in the hotel.
As my living in future would be at the charge of the Turnours, I might
afford myself a few indulgences to begin with, she argued; and deciding
that she was right, I made up my mind to have my remaining meals served
in my own room.

I hastily stripped a black frock of its trimming, dressed my hair more
simply even than usual, parted down the middle, and altogether strove to
achieve the air of a _femme de chambre_ born, not made. But I'm bound to
chronicle the fact for my own future reference (when some day I shall
laugh at this adventure) that the effect, though restful to the eye,
suggested the stage _femme de chambre_ rather than the sober reality one
sees in every-day life. However, I was conscious of having done my best,
a state of mind which always produces a cool, strawberries-and-cream
feeling in the soul; and thus supported I tripped (yes, I _did_ trip!)
downstairs to adorn Lady Turnour for dinner.

The door was open between her bedroom and the sitting-room. Waiting in
the former I could hear voices in the latter. Lady Turnour and her
husband were talking about the arrival of the stepson whose name, I soon
gleaned from their conversation, is Herbert. Naturally, it _would_ be.
People like that are always named Herbert, and are familiarly known to
those whom they may concern as "Bertie."

Presently, her ladyship came into the bedroom, and said, as a queen
might say to her tirewoman, "Put me into my dressing-gown." If there
were a feminine word for "sirrah," I think she would have liked to call
me it.

My eye, roving distractedly, pounced upon a gold-embroidered, purple
silk kimono, perhaps more appropriate to Pooh-Bah than to a stout
English lady of the lower middle class. I released it from its hook on
the door, and would that her ladyship had been as easy to release from
her bodice!

She had not one hook, but many; and they were all so incredibly tight
that, to put her into the dressing-gown as ordered, I feared it would be
necessary to melt and pour her out of the gown she had on.

While I wrestled, silent and red faced, with a bodice as snug as the
head of a drum, the lord of all it contained appeared in the doorway,
and stopped, looking at me in surprise.

He is common, too, this Sir Samuel, millionaire maker of pills; but he
is common in a good, almost pathetic way, quite different from his
wife's way--or Monsieur Charretier's. He has stick-up gray hair curling
all over his round head, blue eyes, twinkling with a mild, yet shrewd
expression (which might be merry if encouraged by her ladyship), and a
large, slouching body with stooped shoulders.

"What young lady have we here?" he inquired.

"Not a young lady at all," explained his wife sharply. "My new French
maid."

"I beg your pardon, I'm sure," said Sir Samuel, though it wasn't quite
clear whether it was my forgiveness or that of his spouse he craved, for
his mistake in supposing me to be a "young lady."

"What's her name?" he wanted to know, evidently approving of me, if not
as a maid, at least as a human being.

"Something ridiculous in French that sounds like 'Liz,'" sniffed her
ladyship. "But I shall call her Elise. Also I shall expect her to stop
dyeing her hair."

"But, madame, I do not dye it!" I exclaimed.

"Don't tell me. I know dyed hair when I see it."

(She ought to, having experience enough with her own!)

"Nature is the dyer, then," I ventured to persist, piqued to
self-defence by the certainty that her object was to strip me of my
wicked mask before her husband.

"I'm not used to being contradicted by my servants," her ladyship
reminded me.

"My dear, do let the poor girl know whether she dyes her hair or not."
Sir Samuel pleaded for me with more kindness than discretion. "I'm sure
she speaks beautiful English."

[Illustration: "While I wrestled ... with a bodice as snug as the head
of a drum, the lord of all it contained appeared in the doorway"]

"As if that had anything to do with it! She may as well understand, to
begin with, that I won't put up with impudence and answering back.
Hair that colour doesn't go with dark eyes. And eyelashes like that
aren't suitable to lady's-maids."

"If your ladyship pleases, what am I to do with mine?" I asked in the
sweetest little voice; and I would have given anything for someone to
whom I might have telegraphed a laugh.

"Wash the dark stuff off of them and let them be light," were the simple
instructions promptly returned to me.

There was no more to be said, so I cast down the offending features (are
one's lashes one's features?) and swallowed my feelings just as Lady
Turnour will have to swallow my hair and eyelashes if I'm to stop in her
service. If they stick in her throat, I suppose she will discharge me.
For a leopard cannot change his spots, and a girl will not the colour of
her locks and lashes--when she happens to be fairly well satisfied with
Nature's work.




CHAPTER VI


Pamela's mother-in-law, _la Comtesse douairière_, wears a lovely, fluffy
white thing over her own diminishing front hair, which I once heard her
describe, when struggling to speak English, as her "combination." Pam
and I laughed nearly to extinction, but I didn't laugh this morning when
I was obliged to help Lady Turnour put on hers.

They say an emperor is no hero to his valet, and neither can an empress
be a heroine to her maid when she bursts for the first time upon that
humble creature's sight, without her transformation.

It _did_ make an unbelievable difference with her ladyship; and it must
have been a blow to poor Sir Samuel, after all his years of hopeless
love for a fond gazelle, when at last he made that gazelle his own, and
saw it running about its bedroom with all its copper-coloured
"ondulations" naively lying on its dressing-table.

Poor Miss Paget's false front was one of those frank, self-respecting
old things one might have allowed one's grandmother to wear, just as she
would wear a cap; but a transformation--well, one has perhaps believed
in it, if one has not the eye of a lynx, and the disillusion is awful.

Of course, a lady's-maid is not a human being, and what it is thinking
matters no more than what thinks a chair when sat upon; so I don't
suppose "her ladyship" cared ten centimes for the impression I was
receiving and trying to digest in the first ten minutes after my morning
entrance.

As my hair waves naturally, I've scarcely more than a bowing
acquaintance with a curling-iron; but luckily for me I always did Cousin
Catherine's when she wanted to look as beautiful as she felt; and though
my hands trembled with nervousness, I not only "ondulated" Lady
Turnour's transformation without burning it up, but I added it to her
own locks in a manner so deft as to make me want to applaud myself.

Even she could find no fault. The effect was twice as _chic_ and
becoming as that of yesterday. She looked younger, and nearer to being
the _grande dame_ that she burns to be. I saw various emotions working
in her mind, and attributed her silence on the subject of my personal
defects (unchanged despite her orders) to the success I was making with
her toilet. In her eyes, I began to take on lustre as a Treasure not to
be lightly thrown away on the turn of a dye.

When she was dressed and painted to represent a "lady motorist," it was
my business to pack not only for her but for Sir Samuel, who is the sort
of man to be miserable under the domination of a valet. There were a
round dozen of trunks, which had to be sent on by rail, and there was
also luggage for the automobile; such ingenious and pretty luggage (bran
new, like everything of her ladyship's, not excepting her complexion)
that it was really a pleasure to pack it. As for the poor motor maid, it
was broken to her that she must, figuratively speaking, live in a bag
during the tour, and that bag must have a place under her feet as she
sat beside the driver. It might make her as uncomfortable as it liked,
but whatever it did, it must on no account interfere with the chauffeur.

We were supposed to start at ten, but a woman of Lady Turnour's type
doesn't think she's making herself of enough importance unless she keeps
people waiting. She changed her mind three times about her veil, and had
her dressing-bag (a gorgeous affair, beside which mine is a mere
nutshell) reopened at the last minute to get out different hatpins.

It was half-past ten when the luggage for the automobile was ready to be
taken away, and having helped my mistress into her motoring coat, I left
her saying farewell to some hotel acquaintances she had scraped up, and
went out to put her ladyship's rugs into the car.

I had not seen it yet, nor the dreaded chauffeur, my galley-companion;
but as the front door opened, _voilà_ both; the car drawn up at the
hotel entrance, the chauffeur dangling from its roof.

Never did I see anything in the way of an automobile so large, so azure,
so magnificent, so shiny as to varnish, so dazzling as to brass and
crystal.

Perhaps the windows aren't really crystal, but they were all bevelly and
glittering in the sunshine, and seemed to run round the car from back to
front, giving the effect of a Cinderella Coach fitted on to a motor.
Never was paint so blue, never was crest on carriage panel so large and
so like a vague, over-ripe tomato. Never was a chauffeur so long, so
slim, so smart, so leathery.

He was dangling not because he fancied himself as a tassel, but because
he was teaching some last piece of luggage to know its place on the roof
it was shaped to fit.

"Thank goodness, at least he's not fat, and won't take up much room," I
thought, as I stood looking at the back of his black head.

Then he jumped down, and turned round. We gave each other a glance, and
he could not help knowing that I must be her ladyship's maid, by the way
I was loaded with rugs, like a beast of burden. Of my face he could see
little, as I had on a thick motor-veil with a small triangular talc
window, which Lady Kilmarny had given me as a present when I bade her
good-bye. I had the advantage of him, therefore, in the staring contest,
because his goggles were pushed up on the top of his cap with an
elastic, somewhat as Miss Paget's spectacles had been caught in her
false front.

His glance said: "Female thing, I've got to be bothered by having you
squashed into the seat beside me. You'd better not be chatty with the
man at the wheel, for if you are, I shall have to teach you motor
manners."

My glance, I sincerely hoped, said nothing, for I hurriedly shut it off
lest it should say too much, the astonished thought in my mind being:
"Why, Leather Person, you look exactly like a gentleman! You have the
air of being the master, and Sir Samuel your servant."

He really was a surprise, especially after Lady Kilmarny's warning.
Still, I at once began to tell myself that chauffeurs _must_ have
intelligent faces. As for this one's clear features, good gray eyes,
brown skin, and well-made figure, they were nothing miraculous, since it
is admitted that even a lower grade of beings, grooms and footmen, are
generally chosen as ornaments to the establishments they adorn. Why
shouldn't a chauffeur be picked out from among his fellows to do credit
to a fine, sixty-horse-power blue motor-car? Besides, a young man who
can't look rather handsome in a chauffeur's cap and neat leather coat
and leggings might as well go and hang himself.

The Leather Person opened the door of the car for me, that I might put
in the rugs. I murmured "thank you" and he bowed. No sooner had I
arranged my affairs, and slipped the scent-bottle and bottle of salts,
newly filled, into a dainty little case under the window, when Lady
Turnour and Sir Samuel appeared.

I have met few, if any, queens in daily life, but I'm almost sure that
the Queen of England, for instance, wouldn't consider it beneath her
dignity to take some notice of her chauffeur's existence if she were
starting on a motor tour. Lady Turnour was miles above it, however. So
far as she was concerned, one would have thought that the car ran
itself; that at sight of her and Sir Samuel, the arbiters of its
destiny, its heart began to beat, its body to tremble with delight at
the honour in store for it.

"Tell him to shut the windows," said her ladyship, when she was settled
in her place. "Does he think I'm going to travel on a day like this with
all the wind on the Riviera blowing my head off?"

The imperial order was passed on to "him," who was addressed as Bane,
or Dane, or something of that ilk; and I was sorry for poor Sir Samuel,
whose face showed how little he enjoyed the prospect of being cooped up
in a glass box.

"A day like this" meant that there was a wind which no one under fifty
had any business to know came out of the east, for it arrived from a sky
blue as a vast, inverted cup of turquoise. The sea was a cup, too; a cup
of gold glittering where the Esterel mountains rimmed it, and full to
the frothing brim of blue spilt by the sky.

Perhaps there was a hint of keenness in the breeze, and the palms in the
hotel garden were whispering to each other about it, while they rocked
the roses tangled among their fans; yet it seemed to me that the
whispers were not of complaint, but of joy--joy of life, joy of beauty,
and joy of the spring. The air smelled of a thousand flowers, this air
that Lady Turnour shunned as if it were poison, and brought me a sense
of happiness and adventure fresh as the morning. I knew I had no right
to the feeling, because this wasn't my adventure. I was only in it on
sufferance, to oil the wheels of it, so to speak, for my betters; yet
golden joy ran through all my veins as gaily, as generously, as if I
were a princess instead of a lady's-maid.

Why on earth I was happy, I didn't know, for it was perfectly clear that
I was going to have a horrid time; but I pitied everybody who wasn't
young, and starting off on a motor tour, even if on fifty francs a month
"all found."

I pitied Lady Turnour because she was herself; I pitied Sir Samuel
because he was married to her; I pitied the people in the big hotel,
who spent their afternoons and evenings playing bridge with all the
windows hermetically sealed, while there was a world like this out of
doors; and I wasn't sure yet whether I pitied the chauffeur or not.

He didn't look particularly sorry for himself, as he took his seat on my
right. I was well out of his way, and he had the air of having forgotten
all about me, as he steered away from the hotel down the flower-bordered
avenue which led to the street.

"Anyhow," said I to myself, behind my little three-cornered talc window,
"whatever his faults may be, appearances are _very_ deceptive if he ever
tries to chuck me under the chin."

There we sat, side by side, shut away from our pastors and masters by a
barrier of glass, in that state of life and on that seat to which it had
pleased Providence to call us, together.

"We're far enough apart in mind, though," I told myself. Yet I found my
thoughts coming back to the man, every now and then, wondering if his
nice brown profile were a mere lucky accident, or if he were really
intelligent and well educated beyond his station. It was deliciously
restful at first to sit there, seeing beautiful things as we flashed by,
able to enjoy them in peace without having to make conversation, as the
ordinary _jeune fille_ must with the ordinary _jeune monsieur_.

"And is it that you love the automobilism, mademoiselle?"

"But yes, I love the automobilism. And you?"

"I also." (Hang it, what shall I say to her next?)

"And the dust. It does not too much annoy you?"

(Oh, bother, I do wish he'd let me alone!)

"No, monsieur. Because there are compensations. The scenery, is it not?"

"And for me your society." (What a little idiot she is!)

And so on. And so on. Oh yes, there were consolations in being a motor
maid, sitting as far away as possible from a cross-looking if rather
handsome chauffeur, who would want to bite her if she tried to do the
"society act."

But after a while, when we'd spun past the charming villas and
attractive shops of Cannes (which looks so deceitfully sylvan, and is
one of the gayest watering-places in the world) silence began to be a
burden.

It is such a nice motor car, and I did want to ask intelligent questions
about it!

I was almost sure they would be intelligent, because already I know
several things about automobiles. The Milvaines haven't got one, but
most of their friends in Paris have, and though I've never been on a
long tour before, I've done some running about. When one knows things,
especially when one's a girl--a really well-regulated, normal girl--one
does like to let other people know that one knows them. It's all well
enough to cram yourself full to bursting with interesting facts which it
gives you a vast amount of trouble to learn, just out of respect for
your own soul; and there's a great deal in that point of view, in one's
noblest moments; but one's noblest moments are like bubbles, radiant
while they last, then going pop! quite to one's own surprise, leaving
one all flat, and nothing to show for the late bubble except a little
commonplace soap.

Well, I am like that, and when I'm not nobly bubbling I love to say what
I'm thinking to somebody who will understand, instead of feeding on
myself.

It really was a waste of good material to see all that lovely scenery
slipping by like a panorama, and to be having quite heavenly thoughts
about it, which must slip away too, and be lost for ever. I got to the
pass when it would have been a relief to be asked if "this were my first
visit to the Riviera;" because I could hastily have said "Yes," and then
broken out with a volley of impressions.

Seeing beautiful things when you travel by rail consists mostly on
getting half a glimpse, beginning to exclaim, "Oh, look _there_!" then
plunging into the black gulf of a tunnel, and not coming out again until
after the best bit has carefully disappeared behind an uninteresting,
fat-bodied mountain. But travelling by motor-car! Oh, the difference!
One sees, one feels; one is never, never bored, or impatient to arrive
anywhere. One would enjoy being like the famous brook, and "go on
forever."

Other automobiles were ahead of us, other cars were behind us, in the
procession of Nomads leaving the South for the North, but there had been
rain in the night, so that the wind carried little dust. My spirit sang
when we had left the long, cool avenue lined with the great
silver-trunked plane trees (which seemed always, even in sunshine, to be
dappled with moonlight) and dashed toward the barrier of the Esterels
that flung itself across our path. The big blue car bounded up the
steep road, laughing and purring, like some huge creature of the desert
escaped from a cage, regaining its freedom. But every time we neared a
curve it was considerate enough to slow down, just enough to swing round
with measured rhythm, smooth as the rocking of a child's cradle.

Perhaps, thought I, the chauffeur wasn't cross, but only concentrated.
If I had to drive a powerful, untamed car like this, up and down roads
like that, I should certainly get motor-car face, a kind of inscrutable,
frozen mask that not all the cold cream in the world could ever melt.

I wondered if he resorted to cold cream, and before I knew what I was
doing, I found myself staring at the statuesque brown profile through my
talc triangle.

Evidently animal magnetism can leak through talc, for suddenly the
chauffeur glanced sharply round at me, as if I had called him. "Did you
speak?" he asked.

"Dear me, no, I shouldn't have dared," I hurried to assure him. Again he
transferred his attention from the road to me, though only a fraction,
and for only the fraction of a second. I felt that he saw me as an eagle
on the wing might see a fly on a boulder toward which he was steering
between intervening clouds.

"Why shouldn't you dare?" he wanted to know.

"One doesn't usually speak to lion-tamers while they're engaged in
taming," I murmured, quite surprised at my audacity and the sound of my
own voice.

The chauffeur laughed. "Oh!" he said.

"Or to captains of ocean liners on the bridge in thick fogs," I went on
with my illustrations.

"What do you know about lion-tamers and captains on ocean liners?" he
inquired.

"Nothing. But I imagine. I'm always doing a lot of imagining."

"Do you think you will while you're with Lady Turnour?"

"She hasn't engaged my brain, only my hands and feet."

"And your time."

"Oh, thank goodness it doesn't take time to imagine. I can imagine all
the most glorious things in heaven and earth in the time it takes you to
put your car at the next corner."

He looked at me longer, though the corner seemed dangerously near--to an
amateur. "I see you've learned the true secret of living," said he.

"Have I? I didn't know."

"Well, you have. You may take it from me. I'm a good deal older than you
are."

"Oh, of course, all really polite men are older than the women they're
with."

"Even chauffeurs?"

It was my turn to laugh now. "A chauffeur with a lady's-maid."

"You seem an odd sort of lady's-maid."

"I begin to think you're an odd sort of chauffeur."

"Why?"

"Well--" I hesitated, though I knew why, perfectly. "Aren't you rather
abrupt in your questions? Suppose we change the subject. You seem to
have tamed this tiger until it obeys you like a kitten."

"That's what I get my wages for. But why do you think I'm an odd sort
of chauffeur?"

"For that matter, then, why do you think I'm an odd lady's-maid?"

"As to that, probably I'm no judge. I never talked to one except my
mother's, and she--wasn't at all like you."

"Well, that proves my point. The very fact that your mother _had_ a
maid, shows you're an odd sort of chauffeur."

"Oh! You mean because I wasn't always 'what I seem,' and that kind of
_Family Herald_ thing? Do you think it odd that a chauffeur should be by
way of being a gentleman? Why, nowadays the woods and the story-books
are full of us. But things are made pleasanter for us in books than in
real life. Out of books people fight shy of us. A 'shuvvie' with the
disadvantage of having been to a public school, or handicapped by not
dropping his H's, must knock something off his screw."

"Are you really in earnest, or are you joking?" I asked.

"Half and half, perhaps. Anyway, it isn't a particularly agreeable
position--if that's not too big a word for it. I envy you your
imagination, in which you can shut yourself up in a kind of armour
against the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune."

"You wouldn't envy me if you had to do Lady Turnour's hair," I sighed.

The chauffeur laughed out aloud. "Heaven forbid!" he exclaimed.

"I'm sure Sir Samuel would forbid, anyhow," said I.

"Do you know, I don't think this trip's going to be so bad?" said he.

"Neither do I," I murmured in my veil.

We both laughed a good deal then. But luckily the glass was expensively
thick, and the car was singing.

"What are you laughing at?" I asked.

"Something that it takes a little sense of humour to see, when you've
been down on your luck," said he.

"A sense of humour was the only thing my ancestors left me," said I. "I
don't wonder you laugh. It really is quaintly funny."

"Do you think we're laughing at the same thing?"

"I'm almost sure of it."

"Do tell me your part, and let's compare notes."

"Well, it's something that nobody but us in this car--unless it's the
car itself--knows."

"Then it is the same thing. They haven't an idea of it, and wouldn't
believe it if anyone told them. Yes, it is funny."

"About their not being--"

"While you--"

"And you--"

"Thanks. A lady--"

"A gentleman--"

"And the only ones on board--"

"Are the two servants!"

"As long as _they_ don't notice--"

"And we do!"

"Perhaps we may get some fun out of it?"

"Extra--outside our wages. Would it be called a 'perquisite'?"

"If so, I'm sure we deserve it."

I sighed, thinking of her ladyship's transformation, and lacing up her
boots. "Well, there's a lot to make up for."

And he gave me another look--a very nice look, although he could see
nothing of me but eyes and one third of a nose. "If I can ever at all
help to make up, in the smallest way, you must let me try," he said.

I ceased to think that his profile was cross, or even stern.

I was glad that the chauffeur and I were in the same box--I mean, the
same car.




CHAPTER VII


All the same, I wondered a great deal how he came there, and I hoped
that he was wondering the same sort of thing about me. In fact, I laid
myself out to produce such a result. That is to say, I took some pains
to show myself as little like the common or parlour lady's-maid as
possible. I never took so much pains to impress any human being, male or
(far less) female, as I took to impress that mere chauffeur--the very
chauffeur I'd been lying awake at night dreading as the most
objectionable feature in my new life.

All the nice things I'd thought of by the way, before we introduced
ourselves to each other, I trotted out (at least, as many as I had
presence of mind to remember); and though I'm afraid he didn't pay me
the compliment of trying to "brill" in return, I told myself that it was
not because he didn't think me worth brilling for, but because he's
English. It never seems to occur to an Englishman to "show off." I
believe if Sir Samuel Turnour's chauffeur, Mr. What's-his-name, knew
twenty-seven languages, he could be silent in all of them.

He did let me play the car's musical siren, though; a fascinating
bugbear, supposed to warn children, chickens, and other light-minded
animals that something important is coming, and they'd better look
alive. It has two tunes, one grave, one gay. I suppose we would use the
grave one if the creature hadn't looked alive?

Although he didn't say much, the chauffeur (or "shuvvie" as he
scornfully names himself) knew all about Robert Macaire and Gaspard De
Besse--knew more about them than I, also their escapades on this road
over the Esterels, and in the mountain fastnesses, when highwaymen were
as fashionable as motor-cars are now. I'd forgotten that it was this
part of the world where they earned their bread and fame; and was quite
thrilled to hear that the ghost of De Besse is supposed to keep on, as a
permanent residence, his old shelter cave near the summit of strangely
shaped Mont Vinaigre. I'm sure, though, even if we'd passed his pitch at
midnight instead of midday, he wouldn't have dared pop out and cry
"Stand and deliver!" to a sixty-horsepower Aigle.

I almost wished it were night, as we swooped over mountain tops, our
eyes plunging down the deep gorges, and dropping with fearful joy over
precipices, for the effect would have been more solemn, more mysterious.
I could imagine that the fantastically formed rocks which loomed above
us or stood ranged far below would have looked by moonlight like statues
and busts of Titans, carved to show poor little humanity such creatures
as a dead world had known. But it is hard for one's imagination to do
the best of which it feels capable when one is dying for lunch.

Even the old "Murder Inn," which my companion obligingly pointed out,
didn't give me the thrill it ought, because time was getting on when we
flew past it, and I would have been capable of eating vulgar bread and
cheese under its wickedly historic roof if I had been invited.

"Do you suppose they know anything about the road and its history?" I
asked the chauffeur, with a slight gesture of my swathed head toward the
solid wall of glass which was our background.

"They? Certainly not, and don't want to know," he answered with an air
of assurance.

"Why do they go about in motors then," I wondered, "if they don't take
interest in things they pass?"

"You must understand as well as I do why this sort of person goes about
in motors," said he. "They go because other people go--because it's the
thing. The 'other people' whom they slavishly imitate may really like
the exhilaration, the ozone, the sight-seeing, or all three; but to this
type the only part that matters is letting it be seen that they've got a
handsome car, and being able to say 'We've just come from the Riviera in
our sixty-horse-power motor-car.' They'd always mention the power."

"Lady Turnour did, even to me," I remembered. "But is Sir Samuel like
that?"

"No, to do him justice, he isn't, poor man. But his wife is his
Juggernaut. I believe he enjoys lying under her wheels, or thinks he
does--which is the same thing."

"Have you been with them long?" I dared to inquire.

"Only a few days. I brought the car down for them from Paris, though not
this way--a shorter one. We're new brooms, the car and I."

"All their brooms seem to be new," I reflected. "I wonder what the
stepson is like?"

"Luckily it doesn't matter much to me," said the chauffeur
indifferently.

"Nor to me. But his name's Herbert."

"His surname?"

"I don't know. There's a Herbert lurking somewhere. It always suggests
to me oily hair parted in the middle and smeared down on each side of a
low, narrow forehead. Could you know a 'Bertie'?"

"I did once, and never want to again. He was a swine and a snob. Hope
you never came across the combination?"

I forgot to answer, because, having left the mountain world behind, a
formidable line of nobly planned arches began striding along beside us,
through the sun-bright fields, and I was sure it must be the giant Roman
aqueduct of Fréjus.

Instead of discussing such little things as the Turnours and their
Bertie, we began to talk of Phoenicians, Ligurians, and of Romans; of
Pliny, who had a beloved friend at Fréjus; and all the while to breathe
in the perfume of a land over which a vast tidal wave of balsamic pines
had swept.

Fréjus we were not to see now: that was for the dim future, after lunch;
but we turned to the left off the main road, and ran on until we saw,
bathed in pines, deliciously deluged and drowned in pines, the white
glimmer of classic-looking villas. These meant Valescure, said the
chauffeur; and the Grand Hotel--not classic looking, but pretty in its
terraced garden--meant luncheon.

The car drew up before the door, according to order, or rather,
according to hypnotic suggestion; for it seems that it is the chauffeur
who alone knows anything of the way, and who, while appearing to be
non-committal, is virtually planning the tour. "Valescure might be a
good stopping-place for lunch," he had murmured, an eye on the road map
over which his head bent with Sir Samuel's. "Very beautiful--rather
exclusive. You may remember Mr. Chamberlain stopped there."

The exclusiveness and the Chamberlain-ness decided Lady Turnour, behind
Sir Samuel's shoulder (so the chauffeur told me); consequently, here we
were--and not at St. Raphael, which would have seemed the more obvious
place to stop.

I say "we," but Lady Turnour would have been surprised to hear that her
maid dared count herself and a chauffeur in the programme. Creatures
like us must be fed, just as you pour petrol into the tanks of a motor,
or stoke a furnace with coals, because otherwise our mechanism wouldn't
go, and that would be awkward when we were wanted.

The chauffeur opened the door of the car as if he had been born to open
motor-car doors, and Lady Turnour allowed herself to be helped out by
her husband. Her jewel-bag clutched in her hand (she doesn't know me
well enough yet to trust me with it, and hasn't had bagsful of jewels
for long), she passed her two servants without expending a look on them.
Sir Samuel followed, telling his chauffeur to have the automobile ready
at the door again in an hour and a quarter; and we two Worms were left
to our own resources.

"I shan't garage her," said my fellow Worm of the car. "I'll just drive
her out of the way, where I can look over her a bit when I've snatched
something to eat. I'll take the fur rugs inside--you're not to bother,
they're big enough to swamp you entirely. And then you--"

"Yes, then I--" I repeated desolately. "What is to become of me?"

"Why, you're to have your lunch, of course," he replied. "I thought you
said you were hungry."

"So I am, starving. But--"

"Well?"

"Aren't you going to have a proper lunch?"

"A sandwich and a piece of cheese will do for me, because there are one
or two little things to tinker up on the car, and an hour and a quarter
isn't long. I think I shall bring my grub out of doors, and--But is
anything the matter?"

"I can't go in and have lunch alone. I simply can't," I confessed to the
young man whose society I had intended to avoid like a pestilence. "You
see, I--I never--this is the first time."

A look of comprehension flashed over his face.

"Yes, I see," he said. "Of course, the moment I heard your voice I
realized that this wasn't your sort of work, but I didn't know you were
quite so new to it as all that. You've never taken a meal in the
couriers' room of an hotel?"

"No," I confessed. "At the Majestic Palace Lady Kil--that is, I decided
to have everything brought up to my room, there."

"By Jove, we are a strange pair! This is my first job, too, and so far
I've been able to feed where I chose; but that's too good to last on
tour. One must accommodate oneself to circumstances, and a man easily
can. But you--I know how you feel. However, it's the first step that
costs. Do you mind much?"

"It's the stepping in alone that costs the most," I said.

"Well, I'm only too delighted if I can be of the least use. Let the car
rip! I'll see to her afterward. Now I'm going to take care of you. You
need it more than she does."

What would Lady Kilmarny have said if she had heard my deliberate
encouragement of the chauffeur, and his reckless response? What would
she have thought if she could have seen us walking into the couriers'
dining-room, side by side, as if we had been friends for as many years
as we'd really been acquaintances for minutes, leaving the car he was
paid to cherish in his bosom sulking alone!

That sweet lady's face, surprised and reproachful, rose before my eyes,
but I had no regrets. And instead of trembling with apprehension when I
saw that the couriers' room was empty, I rejoiced in the prospect of
lunching alone with the redoubtable chauffeur.

It was too early for the regular feeding hour of the _pensionnaires_,
maids, and valets, and we sat down opposite each other at the end of a
long table. A bored young waiter, with little to hope for in the way of
_pourboires_, ambled off in quest of our food. I began to unfasten my
head covering, and after a search for various fugitive pins I emerged
from obscurity, like the moon from behind a cloud.

With a sigh of relief, I smiled at my companion; and it was only his
expression of surprise which reminded me that he had been seeing me "as
through a glass darkly."

I suppose, unless you are a sort of Sherlock Holmes of physiognomy, you
can't map out a woman's face by a mere glimpse of eyes through a
triangular bit of talc, already somewhat damaged by exposure to sun and
wind.

It mayn't be good manners to look a gift motor-veil in the talc, but I
must admit that, glad as I was of its protection, mine was somewhat the
worse for certain bubbles, cracks, and speckles; so whether or no Mr.
Bane or Dane may combine the science of chauffeuring with that of
physiognomy, it's certain that he had the air of being taken aback.

Of course, I know that I'm not exactly plain, and that the contrast
between my eyes and hair is a little out of the common; so, as soon as I
remembered that he hadn't seen me before, I guessed more or less what
his almost startled look meant. Still, I suppose most girls--anyway,
half-French, half-American girls--would have done exactly what I
proceeded to do.

I looked as innocent as a fluffy chicken when it first sidles out of its
eggshell into the wide, wide world; and said: "Oh, I do hope I haven't a
smudge on the end of my nose?"

"No," replied the chauffeur, instantly becoming expressionless. "Why do
you ask?"

"Only I was afraid, from your face, that there was something wrong."

"So far as I can see, there's nothing wrong," said he, calmly, and
broke a piece of bread. "Very good butter, this, that they give to _nous
autres_," he went on, in the same tone of voice, and my respect for him
increased.

(Men are really rather nice creatures, take them all in all!)

As he had sacrificed his duty to the car for me, I sacrificed my duty to
my digestion for him, and bolted my luncheon. Then, when released from
guard duty, he returned to his true allegiance, and I ventured to walk
on the terrace to admire the view.

Far away it stretched, over garden, and pineland, and flowery
meadow-spaces, to the blue, silver-sewn sea, which to my fancy looked
Homeric. Nothing modern caught the eye to break the romance of the
illusion. All was as it might have been twenty or thirty centuries ago,
when on the Mediterranean sailed "Phoenicians, mariners renowned, greedy
merchantmen with countless gauds in a black ship."

I had just begun to play that I was a young woman of Tyre, taken on an
adventurous excursion by an indulgent father, when presto! Lady
Turnour's voice brought me back to the present with a jump. There's
nothing Homeric about her!

She and Sir Samuel had finished their luncheon, and so had several other
people. There was an exodus of well-dressed, nice-looking women from
dining-room to terrace, and conscious that I ought to have been herding
among their maids, I fled with haste and humility. What right had I, in
this sweet place divinely fit to be a rest-cure for goddesses tired of
the social diversions of Olympus?

I scuttled off to the car, and stood ready to serve my mistress when it
should please her to be tucked under her rugs.

Despite delays, the chauffeur had finished whatever had to be done, and
soon we were spinning away from Valescure, far away, into a world of
flowers.

Black cypresses soared skyward, so clean cut, so definite, that I seemed
to hear them, crystal-shrill, like the sharp notes in music, as they
leaped darkly out from a silver monotone of olives and a delicate ripple
of pearly plum or pear blossom. Mimosas poured floods of gold over the
spring landscape, blazing violently against the cloudless blue. Bloom of
peach and apple tree garlanded our road on either side; the way was
jewelled with roses; and acres of hyacinths stretched into the distance,
their perfume softening the keenness of the breeze.

"Are they going to let you pass Fréjus without pausing for a single
look?" I asked mournfully. But at that instant there came a peal of the
electric bell which is one of the luxurious fittings of the car. It
meant "stop!" and we stopped.

"Aren't there some ruins here--something middle-aged?" asked Sir Samuel,
meaning mediæval.

"Roman ruins, sir," replied his chauffeur, without changing countenance.

"Are they the sort of things you ought to say you've seen?"

"I think most people do stop and see them, sir."

"What is your wish, my dear?" Sir Samuel gallantly deferred to his
bride. "I know you don't like out-of-door sightseeing when it's windy,
and blows your hair about, but--"

"We might try, and if I don't like it, we can go on," replied Lady
Turnour, patronizing the remains of Roman greatness, since it appeared
to be the "thing" for the nobility and gentry to do.

The chauffeur obediently turned the big blue Aigle, and let her sail
into the very centre of the vast arena where Cæsar saw gladiators fight
and die.

It was very noble, very inspiring, and from some shady corner promptly
emerged a quaintly picturesque old guardian, ready to pour forth floods
of historic information. He introduced himself as a soldier who had seen
fighting in Mexico under Maximilian, therefore the better able to
appreciate and fulfil his present task. But her ladyship listened for
awhile with lack-lustre eyes, and finally, when dates were flying about
her ears like hail, calmly interrupted to say that she was "glad she
hadn't lived in the days when you had to go to the theatre out of
doors."

"I can't understand more than one word in twelve that the old thing
says, anyhow," she went on. "Elise must give me French lessons every day
while she does my hair. I hope she has the right accent."

"He's saying that this amphitheatre was once almost as large as the one
at Nîmes, but that it would only hold about ten thousand spectators,"
explained the chauffeur, who was engaged partly for his French and
knowledge of France.

"It's nonsense bothering to know that now, when the place is tumbling to
pieces," sneered her ladyship.

"I beg your pardon, my lady; I only thought that, as a rule, the best
people do feel bound to know these things. But of course--" He paused
deferentially, without a twinkle in his eye, though I was pressing my
lips tightly together, and trying not to shake spasmodically.

"Oh, well, go on. What else does the old boy say, then?" groaned Lady
Turnour, _martyrisée_.

Mr. Bane or Dane didn't dare to glance at me. With perfect gravity he
translated the guide's best bits, enlarging upon them here and there in
a way which showed that he had independent knowledge of his own. And it
was a feather in his cap that his eloquence eventually interested Lady
Turnour. She made him tell her again how Fréjus was Claustra Gallæ to
Cæsar, and how it was the "Caput" for this part of the wonderful Via
Aurelia, which started at Rome, never ending until it came to Arles.

"Why, we've been to Rome, and we're going to Arles," she exclaimed. "We
can tell people we've been over the whole of the Via Aurelia, can't we?
We needn't mention that the automobile didn't arrive till after we got
to Cannes. And anyway, you say there were once theatres there, and at
Antibes, like the one at Fréjus, so we've been making a kind of Roman
pilgrimage all along, if we'd only known it."

"It is considered quite the thing to do, in Roman amphitheatres, to make
a tour of the prisoners' cells and gladiators' dressing-rooms, the guide
says," insinuated the chauffeur. And then, when the bride and
bridegroom, reluctant but conscientious, were swimming round the vast
bowl of masonry, like tea-leaves floating in a great cup, he turned to
me.

"Why don't you thank me?" he inquired. "I was doing it for you. I knew
you hated to miss all this, and I saw she meant to go on, so I
intervened, in the only way I could think of, to touch her."

"If you're always as clever as that, I don't see why this shouldn't be
_our_ trip," I said. "That will be a consolation."

"I'm afraid you'll often need more consolation than that," he answered.
"Lady Turnour is--as the Americans say--a pretty 'stiff proposition.'"

"Still, if you can hypnotize her into going to all the places, and
stopping to look at all the nicest things, this will at least be a cheap
automobile tour for us both."

I laughed, but he didn't; and I was sorry, for I thought I deserved a
smile. And he has a nice one, with even white teeth in it, and a wistful
sort of look in his eyes at the same time: a really interesting smile.

I wondered what he was thinking about that made him look so grave; but I
conceitedly felt that it was something concerning me--or the situation
of us both.




CHAPTER VIII


The tidal wave of pines followed us as, having had one glance at the
Porte Dorée, we left Fréjus, old and new, behind. It followed us out of
gay little St. Raphael, lying in its alluvial plain of flowers, and on
along the coast past which the ships of Augustus Cæsar used to sail.

Not in my most starry dreams could I have fancied a road as beautiful as
that which opened to us soon, winding above the dancing water.

Graceful dryad pines knelt by the wayside, stretching out their arms to
the sea, where charming little bays shone behind enlacing branches, blue
as the eyes of a wood-nymph gleaming shyly through the brown tangle of
her hair. Pine balsam mingled with the bitter-sweet perfume of almond
blossom, and caught a pungent tang of salt from the wind.

What romance--what beauty! It made me in love with life, just to pass
this way, and know that so much hidden loveliness existed. I glanced
furtively over my shoulder at the couple whose honeymoon it is--our
master and mistress. Lady Turnour sat nodding in the conservatory
atmosphere of her glass cage, and Sir Samuel was earnestly choosing a
cigar.

Suddenly it struck me that Providence must have a vast sense of humour,
and that the little inhabitants of this earth, high and low, must
afford It a great deal of benevolent amusement.

All too soon we swept out of the forest, straight into a little town,
St. Maxime, with a picturesque port of its own, where red-sailed fishing
boats lolled as idly as the dark-eyed young men in cafés near the shore.
A few tourists walking out from the hotel on the hill gazed rather
curiously at us in our fine blue car; and we gazed away from them,
across a sapphire gulf, to the distant houses of St. Tropez, banked high
against a promontory of emerald.

I should have liked to run on to St. Tropez, for I knew his pretty
legend; how he was one of the guards of St. Paul in prison, and was
converted by the eloquence of his captive; but the chauffeur said that,
after La Foux (famed home of miniature horses) the coast road would lose
its surface of velvet. It would be laced in and out with crossings of a
local railway line, and there would be so many bumps that Lady Turnour
was certain to wake up very cross.

"For your sake I don't want to make her cross," said he, and turned
inland; but the way was no less beautiful. The pines were tired of
running after us, but great cork trees marched beside the road, like an
army of crusaders in disarray, half in, half out, of armour. Above, rose
the Mountains of the Moors, whose very name seemed to ring with the
distant echo of a Saracen war song; and here and there, on a bare, wild
hillside, towered all that was left of some ancient castle, fallen into
ruin. Cogolin was fine, and Grimaud was even finer.

Up a steep ascent, through shadowy forests we had passed, now and then
coming suddenly upon a little red-roofed village nestling among the
trees as a strawberry among its leaves, when abruptly we flashed out
where spaces of sky and silver sea opened. Between hills that seemed to
sweep a curtsey to us, we flew down an apple-paring road toward Hyères.

The Turnours had lunched, if not wisely, probably too well, at Valescure
about one o'clock, and it wasn't yet four; but the air at the beautiful
Costebelle hotels is said to be perpetually glittering with Royalties
and other bright beings of the great world, so her ladyship wouldn't
have been persuaded to miss the place.

Not that anyone tried to persuade her, for the two powers behind the
throne (and in front of the car) wanted to go--not to see the Royalties,
but the beauties of Costebelle itself.

We slipped gently through the town of Hyères, whose avenues of giant
palms looked like great sea anemones turned into trees, and then spurted
up a hill into a vast and fragrant grove that smelled of a thousand
flowers. In the grove stood three hotels, with wide views over
jade-green lagoons to an indigo sea; and at the most charming of the
trio we stopped.

Nothing was said about tea for the two servants, but while the "quality"
had theirs on an exquisite terrace, the chauffeur brought a steaming cup
to me, as I sat in the car.

"This was given me for my _beaux yeux_," he said, "but I don't want any
tea, so please take it, and don't let it be wasted."

I was convinced that he had paid for that cup of tea with coin harder
if not brighter than the _beaux yeux_ in question; but it would have
hurt his feelings if I had refused, therefore I drank the tea and
thanked the giver.

"You are being very kind to me," I said, "Mr. Bane or Dane; so do you
mind telling me which it is?"

"Dane," he replied shortly. "Not that it matters. A chauffeur by any
other name would smell as much of oil and petrol. It's actually my real
name, too. Are you surprised? I was either too proud or too stubborn to
change it--I'm not sure which--when I took up 'shuvving' for a
livelihood."

"No, I'm not surprised," I said. "You don't look like the sort of man
who would change his name as if it were a coat. I've kept mine, too, to
'maid' with. You 'shuv,' I 'maid.' It sounds like an exercise in a
strange language."

"That's precisely what it is," he answered. "A difficult language to
learn at first, but I'm getting the 'hang' of it. I hope you won't need
to pursue the study very thoroughly."

"And you think you will?"

"I think so," he said, his face hardening a little, and looking dogged.
"I don't see any way out of it for the present."

I was silent for almost a whole minute--which can seem a long time to a
woman--half hoping that he meant to tell me something about himself; how
it was that he'd decided to be a professional chauffeur, and so on. I
was sure there must be a story, an interesting story--perhaps a romantic
one--and if he confided in me, I would in him. Why not, when--on my
part, at least--there's nothing to conceal, and we're bound to be
companions of the Road for weal or woe? But if he felt any temptation to
be expansive he resisted it, like a true Englishman; and to break a
silence which grew almost embarrassing I was driven to ask him, quite
brazenly, if he had no curiosity to know my name.

"Not exactly curiosity," said he, smiling his pleasant smile again. "I'm
never curious about people I--like, or feel that I'm going to like. It
isn't my nature."

"It's just the opposite with me."

"We're of opposite sexes."

"You believe that explains it? I don't know. Man may be a fellow
creature, I suppose--though they didn't teach me that at the Convent.
But tell me this: even if you have no curiosity, because you hope you
can manage to endure me, _do_ you think I look like an 'Elise'?"

"Somehow, you don't. Names have different colours for me. Elise is
bright pink. You ought to be silver, or pale blue."

"Elise is my professional name; Lady Turnour is my sponsor. My real
name's Lys--Lys d'Angely."

"Good! Lys _is_ silver."

"I wish I could coin it. Let me see if I can guess what you ought to be?
You look like--like--well, Jack would suit you. But that's too good to
be true. I shall never meet a 'Jack' except in books and ballads."

"My name is John Claud. But when I was a boy, I always fought any chap
who called me 'Claud,' and tried to give him a black eye or a bloody
nose. You may call me Jack, if you like."

"Certainly not. I shall call you Mr. Dane."

"Shuvvers are never mistered."

"Not even by the females of their kind? I always supposed that manners
were very toploftical in the servants' hall."

"We may both soon know."

"Elise, take that cup at once where you got it from, and come back to
your place. We are ready to start."

This from Lady Turnour. (Really, if she takes to interfering every time
we others have got to the middle of an interesting conversation, I don't
know what I shall do to her! Perhaps I'll put her transformation on
side-wise. Or would that be blackmail?)

Silently the chauffeur took the cup from my frightened fingers, and
marched off with it into the hotel, without a "by your leave" or "with
your leave."

"My word, your chauffeur might have better manners!" grumbled Lady
Turnour to Sir Samuel, as she climbed into the car; but there was no
scolding when the rude young man came briskly back, looking supremely
unconscious of having given offence.

"Now we must make good time to Marseilles, if we're to get there for
dinner," he said, when he had started the car, and taken his place. "We
shall stop there to-night, or rather, just outside the town, in one of
the nicest hotels on earth, as you will see."

"Whose choice?" I asked.

"Mine," he laughed, "but I don't think Sir Samuel knows that!"

Down to Hyères we floated again, on the wings of the Aigle, I looking
longingly across the valley where the old town climbed a citadeled
hill, and lay down at the foot of a sturdy though crumbling castle. If
this were _really_ my own tour, as I am trying to play it is, I would
have commanded a long stop at Costebelle, to make explorations of the
region round about. I can imagine no greater joy than to be able to stay
at beautiful places as long as one wished, and to keep on doing
beautiful things till one tired of doing them.

But life is a good deal like a big busybody of a policeman, continually
telling us to get up and move on!

Our world was a flower world again, ringed in like a secret fairyland,
with distant mountains of extraordinarily graceful shapes--charming
lady-mountains; and as far as we could see the road was cut through a
carpet of pink, white, and golden blossoms destined by and by for the
markets of Paris, London, Berlin, and Vienna.

Before I thought it could be so near, we dashed into Toulon, a very
different Toulon from the Toulon of the railway station, where I
remembered stopping a few mornings (which seemed like a few years) ago.
Now, it looked a noble and impressive place, as well as a tremendously
busy town; but my eye climbed to the towery heights above, wondering on
which one Napoleon--a smart young officer of artillery--placed the
batteries that shelled the British out of the harbour, and gained for
him the first small laurel leaf of his imperial crown.

I thought, too, of all the French novels I'd read, whose sailor heroes
were stationed at Toulon, and there met romantic or sensational
adventures. They were always handsome and dashing, those heroes, and as
we threaded intricate fortifications, I found myself looking out for at
least one or two of them.

Yes, they were there, plenty of heroes, almost all handsome, with
splendid dark eyes that searched flatteringly to penetrate the mystery
of my talc triangle. They didn't know, poor dears, that there was
nothing better than a lady's-maid behind it. What a waste of gorgeous
glances!

I laughed to myself at the fancy, and the chauffeur sitting beside me
wanted to know why; but I wouldn't tell him. One really can't say
everything to a man one has known only for a day. And yet, the curious
part is, I feel as if we had been the best of friends for a long time. I
never felt like that toward any man before, but I suppose it is because
of the queer resemblance in our fates.

Beyond Toulon we had to slow down for a long procession of gypsy
caravans on their way to town; quaint, moving houses, with strings of
huge pearls that were gleaming onions, festooned across their blue or
green doors and windows; and out from those doors and windows wonderful
eyes gazed at us--eyes full of secrets of the East, strange eyes, more
fascinating in their passing glance than those of the gay young heroes
at Toulon.

So we flew on to the village of Ollioules, and into the dim mountain
gorge of the same musical name. The car plunged boldly through the veil
of deep blue shadow which hung, ghostlike, over the serpentine curves of
the white road; and out of its twilight-mystery rose always the faint
singing of a little river that ran beside us, under the steep gray wall
of towering rock.

At the top of the gorge a surprise of beauty waited for us as our way
led along a sinuous road cut into the swelling mountain-side. Far off
lay the sea, with an army of tremendous purple rocks hurling themselves
headlong into the molten gold of the water, like a drove of mammoths.
All the world was gold and royal purple. Hills and mountains stood up,
darkly violet, out of a golden plain, against a sky of gold; and it was
such a picture as only Heaven or Turner could have painted.

Nor was there any break in the varied splendor of the scene and of the
sun's setting until we came to the dull-looking town of Aubagne. After
that, the Southern darkness swooped in haste, and while we wound
tediously through the immense, never-ending traffic of Marseilles, it
"made night." All the length and breadth of the Cannebière burst into
brilliance of electric light, as if in our honor. The great street
looked as gay as a Paris boulevard; and as we turned into it, we turned
into an adventure.

To begin with, nothing seemed less likely than an adventure. We drew up
calmly before the door of a hotel whence a telephonic demand for rooms
must be sent to La Reserve, under the same management. It was the
chauffeur who had to go in and telephone, for the bridegroom is even
more helpless in French than the bride; and before Mr. Dane could stop
the car, Sir Samuel called out: "Keep the motor going, to save time. You
needn't be a minute in there. Her ladyship is hungry, and wants to get
on."

The chauffeur raised his eyebrows, but obeyed in silence, leaving the
motor hard at work, the automobile panting as impatiently to be off as
if "she" suffered with Lady Turnour.

No sooner was the tall, leather-clad figure out of sight than a crowd of
small boys and youths pressed boldly round the handsome car. Her
splendour was her undoing, for a plain, every-day sort of automobile
might have failed to attract.

Laughing, jabbering _patois_, a dozen young imps forced their audacious
attentions on the unprotected azure beauty. What was I, that I could
defend her, left there as helpless as she, while her great heart
throbbed under me?

It was easy to say "_Allez-vous en--va!_" and I said it, not once, but
again and again, each time more emphatically than before. Nobody paid
the slightest attention, however, except, perhaps to find an extra spice
of pleasure in tormenting me. If I had been a yapping miniature lap-dog,
with teeth only _pour faire rire_, I could not have been treated with
greater disdain by the crowd. I glanced hastily round to see if Sir
Samuel had not taken alarm; but, sitting beside his wife in the big
crystal cage, he seemed blissfully unconscious of danger to his splendid
Aigle. Instead, the couple looked rather pleased than otherwise to be a
centre of attraction.

"Perhaps," I thought, "they're right, and these young wretches can work
no real harm to the car. They ought to know better than I--"

But they didn't; for before the thought could spin itself out in my
mind, a gypsy-eyed little fiend of twelve or thirteen made a spring at
the driver's seat. With a yelp of mischievous glee he proved his daring
to his comrades by snatching at the starting-lever. He was quick as a
flash of summer lightning, but if I hadn't been quicker, the big car
might have leaped into life, and run amuck through the most crowded
street in busy Marseilles. I felt myself go cold and hot, horribly
uncertain whether my interference might work harm or good, but before I
quite knew what I did, I had sent the boy flying with a sounding box on
the ear.

He squealed as he sprawled backward, and I stood up, ready for battle,
my fingers tingling, my heart pounding. The imp was up again, in half a
breath, pushed forward by his friends to take revenge, and I could hear
Sir Samuel or her ladyship wrestling vainly with the window behind me.
What would have happened next I can't tell, except that I was in a mood
to fight for our car till the death, even if knives flashed out; and I
think I was gasping "Police! Police!" but at that instant Mr. Jack Dane
hurled himself like a catapult from the hotel. He dashed the weedy
youths out of his way like ninepins, jumped to his seat, and the car and
the car's occupants were safe.

"You are a trump, Miss d'Angely," said he, as we boomed away from the
hotel, scattering the crowd before us as an eddy of wind scatters autumn
leaves. "You did just the right thing at just the right time. It was all
my fault. I oughtn't to have left the motor going."

"It was Sir Samuel's fault," I contradicted him.

"No. Whatever goes wrong with the car is always the chauffeur's fault.
Sir Samuel wanted me to do a foolish thing, and I oughtn't to have done
it. I had your life to think of--"

"And theirs."

"Theirs, of course. But I would have thought of yours first."

It made my heart feel as warm as a bird in a nest to be complimented by
the man at the helm for presence of mind, and then to hear that already
I'd gained a friend to whom my life was of some value. Since my mother
died, there has been no one for whom I've come first.

I wanted badly to do something to show my gratitude, but could think of
nothing except that, by and by, when we knew each other better, I might
offer to sew on his buttons or mend his socks.




CHAPTER IX


"I suppose we'll meet by-and-by at dinner?" I said (I'm afraid rather
wistfully) to the chauffeur as he drove the car up a steep hill to the
door of La Reserve, on The Corniche.

"Well, no," he answered, "because you needn't fear anything disagreeable
here, and I'm going to stop at a less expensive place. You see, I pay my
own way, and as I really have to live on my screw, it doesn't run to
grand hotels. This one _is_ rather grand; but you will be all right,
because, although it's a famous place for food, at this season few
people stop overnight, and I've found out through the telephone that the
Turnours are the only ones who have taken bedrooms. That means you'll
have your dinner and breakfast by yourself."

"Oh, that will be nice!" I said, trying to speak as if I delighted in
the thought of solitude and reflection. "I wish I were paying my own
way, too; but I couldn't do it on fifty francs a month, could I?"

"Fifty francs a month!" he echoed, astonished. "Is that your
compensation for being a slave to such a woman? By Jove, it makes me hot
all over, to think that a girl like you should--"

"Well, this trip is thrown in as additional compensation," I reminded
him. "And thanks to you and your kindness, I believe I'm going to find
my place more than tolerable."

The car stopped, and duty began. I couldn't even turn and say good night
to the chauffeur, as I walked primly into the hotel, laden with my
mistress's things.

She and Sir Samuel had the best rooms in the house, a suite big enough
and grand enough for a king and queen, with a delightful _loggia_
overlooking the high garden and the sea. But of course Lady Turnour
would die rather than seem impressed by anything, and would probably
pick faults if she were invited to sleep at Buckingham Palace or Windsor
Castle--a contingency which I think unlikely. She was snappish with
hunger, and did not trouble to restrain her temper before me. Poor Sir
Samuel! It is he who has snatched her from her lodging-house, to lead
her into luxury, because of his faithful love of many years; and this is
the way she rewards him! If I'd been in his place, and had a javelin
handy, I think I might suddenly have become a widower.

She was better after dinner, however, so I knew she must have been well
fed: and in the morning, after a gorgeous _déjeuner_ on the loggia, she
was in an amiable mood to plan for the day's journey.

At ten o'clock the chauffeur arrived, and was shown up to the Turnours'
vast Louis XVI. salon. He looked as much like an icily regular,
splendidly null, bronze statue as a flesh-and-blood young man could
possibly look, for that, no doubt, is his conception of the part of a
well-trained "shuvver"; and he did not seem aware of my existence as he
stood, cap in hand, ready for orders.

As for me, I flatter myself that I was equally admirable in my own
_métier_. I was assorting a motley collection of guide-books, novels,
maps, smelling-salts, and kodaks when he came in, and was dying to look
up, but I remained as sweetly expressionless as a doll.

The bronze statue respectfully inquired how its master would like to
make a little _détour_, instead of going by way of Aix-en-Provence to
Avignon, as arranged. Within an easy run was a spot loved by artists,
and beginning to be talked about--Martigues on the Etang de Berre, a
salt lake not far from Marseilles--said to be picturesque. The Prince of
Monaco was fond of motoring down that way.

At the sound of a princely name her ladyship's mind made itself up with
a snap. So the change of programme was decided upon, and curious as to
the chauffeur's motive, I questioned him when again we sat shoulder to
shoulder, the salt wind flying past our faces.

"Why the Etang de Berre?" I asked.

"Oh, I rather thought it would interest you. It's a queer spot."

"Thank you. You think I like queer spots--and things?"

"Yes, and people. I'm sure you do. You'll like the Etang and the country
round, but _they_ won't."

"That's a detail," said I, "since this tour runs itself in the interests
of the _femme de chambre_ and the chauffeur."

"We're the only ones who have any interests that matter. It's all the
same to them, really, where they go, if I take the car over good roads
and land them at expensive hotels at night. But I'm not going to do that
always. They've got to see the Gorge of the Tarn. They don't know that
yet, but they have."

"And won't they like seeing it?"

"Lady Turnour will hate it."

"Then we may as well give it up. Her will is mightier than the sword."

"Once she's in, there'll be no turning back. She'll have to push on to
the end."

"She mayn't consent to go in."

"Queen Margherita of Italy is said to have the idea of visiting the Tarn
next summer. Think what it would mean to Lady Turnour to get the start
of a queen!"

"You are Machiavelian! When did you have this inspiration?"

"Well, I got thinking last night that, as they have plenty of
time--almost as much time as money--it seemed a pity that I should whirl
them along the road to Paris at the rate planned originally. You see,
though there are plenty of interesting places on the way mapped
out--you've been to Tours, you say--"

"What of that?"

"Oh, the trip might as well be new for everybody except myself; and as
you like adventures--"

"You think it's the Turnours' duty to have them."

"Just so. If only to punish her ladyship for grinding you down to fifty
francs a month. What a reptile!"

"If she's a reptile, I'm a cat to plot against her."

"Do cats plot? Only against mice, I think. And anyhow, _I'm_ doing all
the plotting. I've felt a different man since yesterday. I've got
something to live for."

"Oh, _what?_" The question asked itself.

"For a comrade in misfortune. And to see her to her journey's end. I
suppose that end will be in Paris?"

"No-o," I said. "I rather think I shall go on all the way to England
with Lady Turnour--if I can stand it. There's a person in England who
will be kind to me."

"Oh!" remarked Mr. Dane, suddenly dry and taciturn again. I didn't know
what had displeased him--unless he was sorry to have my company as far
as England; yet somehow I couldn't quite believe it was that.

All this talk we had while dodging furious trams and enormous waggons
piled with merchandise, in that maelstrom of traffic near the Marseilles
docks, which must be passed before we could escape into the country. At
last, coasting down a dangerously winding hill with a too suggestively
named village at the bottom--L'Assassin--the Aigle turned westward. The
chauffeur let her spread her wings at last, and we raced along a clear
road, the Etang already shimmering blue before us, like an eye that
watched and laughed.

Then we had to swing smoothly round a great circle, to see in all its
length and breadth that strange, hidden, and fishy fairy-land of which
Martigues is the door. Once the Phoenicians found their way here,
looking for salt, which is exploited to this day; Marius camped near
enough to take his morning dip in the Etang, perhaps; and Jeanne, queen
of Naples, held Martigues for herself. But now only fish, and fishermen,
and a few artists occupy themselves in that quaint little world which
one passes all regardlessly in the flying "_Côte d'Azur_."

As we sailed round the road which rings the sleepy-looking salt lake,
Lady Turnour had a window opened on purpose to ask what on earth the
Prince of Monaco found to admire in this flat country, where there were
no fine buildings? And her rebellion made me take alarm for the success
of our future plots. But the chauffeur (anxious for the same reason,
maybe, that she should be content) explained things nicely.

Why, said he, for one thing the best fish eaten at the best restaurants
of Monte Carlo came out of the Etang de Berre. The _bouillabaise_ which
her ladyship had doubtless tasted at La Reserve last night, originally
owed much to the same source; and talking of _bouillabaise_, Martigues
was almost as famous for it as La Reserve itself. One had but to lunch
at the little hotel Paul Chabas to prove that. And then, for less
material reasons, His Serene Highness might be influenced by the fact
that Corot had loved this ring of land which clasped the Etang de
Berre--Ziem, too, and other artists whose opinion could not be despised.

These arguments silenced if they didn't convince Lady Turnour, though
she had probably never heard of Ziem, or even Corot, and we two in front
were able to admire the charming scene in peace. Crossing bridges here
and there we saw, rising above sapphire lake and silver belt of olives
jewelled with rosy almond blossom, more than one miniature Carcassonne,
or ruined castle small as if peeped at through a diminishing glass.
There was Port le Bouc, the Mediterranean harbour of the Etang, or
watergate to fairyland, as Martigues was the door; Istre on its proud
little height; Miramas and Berre, important in their own eyes, and
pretty in all others when reflected in the glassy surface of blue water.
There were dark groups of cypresses, like mourning figures talking
together after a funeral--ancient trees who could almost remember the
Romans; and better than all else, there was Pont Flavian, which these
Romans had built.

Even Lady Turnour condescended to get out of the car to do honour to the
bridge with its two Corinthian arches of perfect grace and beauty; but
she had nothing to say to the poor little, tired-looking lions sitting
on top, which I longed to climb up and pat.

She wanted to push on, and her one thought of Aix-en-Provence was for
lunch. Was Dane sure we should find anything decent to eat there? Very
well, then the sooner we got it the better.

What a good thing there was someone on board the car to appreciate
Provence, someone to keep saying--"We're in Provence--_Provence!_"
repeating the word just for the joy and music of it, and all it means of
romance and history!

If there had not been someone to say and feel that, every turn of the
tyres would have been an insult to Provence, who had put on her
loveliest dress to bid us welcome. Among the olives and almonds, young
trees of vivid yellow spouted pyramids of thin, gold flame against a sky
of violet, and the indefinable fragrance of spring was in the air. We
met handsome, up-standing peasants in red or blue _beréts_, singing
melodiously in _patois_--Provençal, perhaps--as they walked beside their
string of stout cart-horses. And the songs, and the dark eyes of the
singers, and the wonderful horned harness which the noble beasts wore
with dignity, all seemed to answer us: "Yes, you are in Provence."

We talked of old Provence, my Fellow Worm and I, while our master and
mistress wearied for their luncheon; of the men and women who had passed
along this road which we travelled. What would Madame de Sévigné, or
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, or George Sand have said if a blue car like
ours had suddenly flashed into their vision? We agreed that, in any
case, not one of them--or any other person of true imagination--would
call abominable a wonderful piece of mechanism with the power of
flattening mountains into plains, triumphing over space, annihilating
distance; a machine combining fiercest energy with the mildest docility.
No, only old fogies would close their hearts to a machine fit for the
gods, and pride themselves on being motophobes forever. We felt
ourselves, car and all, to be worthy of this magic way, lined with
blossoms that played like rosy children among the strange rocks
characteristic of Provence--rocks which seemed to have boiled up all hot
out of the earth, and then to have vied with each other in hardening
into most fantastic shapes. Even we felt ourselves worthy to meet a few
troubadours, as we drew near to Aix, where once they held their Courts
of Love; and we had talked ourselves into an almost dangerously romantic
mood by the time we arrived at the hotel in the Cours Mirabeau.

There, in the wide central _Place_, sprayed a delicious fountain
splashed with gold by the sunlight that filtered through an arbour of
great trees; and there, too, was a statue of good King René. Perhaps, if
I hadn't known that Aix-en-Provence was the home of the troubadours, and
that its springs had been loved by the Romans before the days of
Christianity, I might not have thought it more charming than many
another ancient sleepy town of France; but it is impossible to
disentangle one's imagination and sentiment from one's eyesight;
therefore, Aix seemed an exquisite place to me.

Now that I knew how knight-errantry in some of its branches was likely
to affect Mr. Dane's pocket, I resolved that nothing should tempt me to
encourage him in the pursuit. No matter how many flirtatious smiles were
shed upon me by enterprising waiters, no matter how many conversations
were begun by couriers who took me for rather a superior sample of
"young person," I would bear all, all, without a complaint which might
seem like a hint for protection.

When Lady Turnour had forgotten me, in the dazzling light that beat
about the thought of luncheon, I almost bustled into the hotel, and
asked for the servants' dining-room. I knew that there was little hope
of eating alone, for several important-looking motor-cars were drawn up
before the hotel; but I was hardly prepared for the gay company I found
assembled.

Three chauffeurs, a valet, and two maids were lunching, and judging from
appearances the meal was far enough advanced to have cemented lifelong
friendships. Wine being as free as the air you breathe, in this country
of the grape, naturally the big glass _caraffes_ behind the plates were
more than half empty, and the elder of the two elderly maids had a
shining pink knob on her nose.

I hadn't yet taken off my diving-bell (as I've named my head covering),
and every eye was upon me during the intricate process of removal.
Conversation, which was in French, slackened in the interests of
curiosity; and when the new face was exposed to public gaze the three
gallant chauffeurs jumped up, as one man, each with the kind intention
of placing me in a chair next himself. "_Voilà une petite tête trop
jolie pour être cachée comme ça!_" exclaimed the best looking and
boldest of the trio.

The ladies of the party sniffed audibly, and raised their somewhat
moth-eaten eyebrows at each other in virtuous disapproval of a young
female who provoked such remarks from strangers. The valet, who had the
air of being engaged to the maid with the nose, confined himself to a
non-committal grin, but the second and third chauffeurs loyally
supported their leader. "_Vous avez raison_," they responded, laughing
and showing quantities of white teeth. Then they followed up their
compliment by begging that mademoiselle would sit down, and allow her
health to be drunk--with that of the other ladies.

"Yes, sit down by me," said Number One, indicating a chair. "This is the
Queen's throne."

"By me," said Number Two. "I'll cut up your meat for you."

"By me," said Number Three. "I'll give you my share of pudding."

By this time I was red to the ears, not knowing whether it were wiser
for a lady's-maid to run away, or to take the rough chaff
good-humouredly, and make the best of it. I fluttered, undecided, never
thinking of the old adage concerning the woman who hesitates.

In an instant, it was forcibly recalled to my mind, for Number One
chauffeur, smelling strongly of the good red wine of Provence, came
forward and offered me his arm.

This was too much.

"Please don't!" I stammered, in my confusion speaking English.

"_Ah, Mademoiselle est Anglaise!_" the two others exclaimed, "_Vive
l'entente cordiale!_ We are Frenchmen. You are Italian. She belongs to
our side."

"Let her choose," said the handsome Italian, pointing his moustache and
doing such execution upon me with his splendid eyes, that if they'd been
Maxim guns I should have fallen riddled with bullets.

"I'll sit by nobody," I managed to answer, this time in French. "Please
take your seats. I will have a chair at the other end of the table."

"You see, mademoiselle is too polite to choose between us. She's afraid
of a duel," laughed good-looking Number One. "I tell you what we must
do. We'll draw lots for her. Three pellets of bread. The biggest wins."

"Beg your pardon, monsieur," remarked Mr. Dane, whom I hadn't seen as he
opened the door, "mademoiselle is of my party. She is waiting for me."

His voice was perfectly calm, even polite, but as I whirled round and
looked at him, fearing a scene, I saw that his eyes were rather
dangerous. He looked like a dog who says, as plainly as a dog can speak,
"I'm a good fellow, and I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt. But put
that bone down, or I bite."

The Italian dropped the bone (I don't mind the simile) not because he
was afraid, I think, but because Mr. John Dane's chin was much squarer
and firmer than his; and because such sense of justice as he had told
him that the newcomer was within his rights.

"And I beg mademoiselle's pardon," he replied with a bow and a flourish.

"I'm so glad you've come--but I oughtn't to be, and I didn't expect
you," I said, when my chauffeur had pulled out a chair for me at the end
of the table farthest from the other maids and chauffeurs.

"Why not?" he wanted to know, sitting down by my side.

"Because I suppose it's the best hotel in town, and--"

"Oh, you're thinking of my pocket! I wish I hadn't said what I did last
night. Looking back, it sounds caddish. But I generally do blurt out
things stupidly. If I didn't, I shouldn't be 'shuvving' now--only that's
another story. To tell the whole truth, it wasn't the state of my
pocketbook alone that influenced me last night. I had two other reasons.
One was a selfish one, and the other, I hope, unselfish."

"I hope the selfish one wasn't fear of being bored?"

"If that's a question, it doesn't deserve an answer. But because you've
asked it, I'll tell you both reasons. I'd stopped at La Reserve before,
in--in rather different circumstances, and I thought--not only might it
make talk about me, but--"

"I understand," I said. "Of course, Lady Turnour isn't as careful a
chaperon as she ought to be."

Then we both laughed, and the danger-signals were turned off in his
eyes. When he isn't smiling, Mr. Dane sometimes looks almost sullen,
quite as if he could be disagreeable if he liked; but that makes the
change more striking when he does smile.

"You needn't worry about that pocket of mine," he went on, as we ate our
luncheon. "It's as cheap here as anywhere; and when I saw all those
motors before the door, I made up my mind that you'd probably need a
brother, so I came as soon as I could leave the car."

"So you are my brother, are you?" I echoed.

"Don't you think you might adopt me, once for all, in that relationship?
Then, you see, the chaperoning won't matter so much. Of course, it's
early days to take me on as a brother, but I think we'd better begin at
once."

"Before I know whether you have any faults?" I asked. And just for the
minute, the French half of me was a little piqued at his offer. That
part of me pouted, and said that it would be much more amusing to travel
in such odd circumstances beside a person one could flirt with, than to
make a pact of "brother and sister." He might have given me the chance
to say first that I'd be a sister to him! But the American half slapped
the French half, and said: "What silly nonsense! Don't be an idiot, if
you can help it. The man's behaving beautifully. And it will just do you
good to have your vanity stepped on, you conceited little minx!"

"Oh, I've plenty of faults, I'll tell you to start with--plenty you may
have noticed already, and plenty more you haven't had time to notice
yet," said my new relative. "I'm a sulky brute, for one thing, and I've
got to be a pessimist lately, for another--a horrid fault, that!--and I
have a vile temper--"

"All those faults might be serviceable in a _brother_," I said. "Though
in any one else--"

"In a friend or a lover, they'd be unbearable, of course; I know that,"
he broke in. "But who'd want me for a friend? And as for a lover, why,
I'm struck off the list of eligibles, forever--if I was ever on it."

After that, we ate our luncheon as fast as we could (a very bad habit,
which I don't mean to keep up for man or brother), and even though the
others had begun long before we did, we finished while they were still
cracking nuts and peeling apples, their spirits somewhat subdued by the
Englishman's presence.

"The great folk won't have got their money's worth for nearly an hour
yet," said Mr. Dane. "Don't you want to go and have a look at the
Cathedral? There are some grand things to see there--the triptych called
'Le Buisson Argent,' and some splendid old tapestry in the choir; a
whole wall and some marble columns from a Roman temple of Apollo--oh,
and you mustn't forget to look for the painting of St. Mitre the Martyr
trotting about with his head in his hands. On the way to the Cathedral
notice the doorways you'll pass. Aix is celebrated for its doorways."

(Evidently my brother passed through Aix, as well as along the Corniche,
under "different circumstances!")

"You mean--I'm to go alone?"

"Yes, I can't leave the car to take you. I'm sorry."

The French half of me was vexed again, but didn't dare let the sensible
American half, which knew he was right, see it, for fear of another
scolding.

I thanked him in a way as businesslike as his own, and said that I would
take his advice; which I did. Although I hate sightseeing by myself, I
wouldn't let him think I meant to be always trespassing on his good
nature; and afterward I was glad I hadn't yielded to my inclination to
be helpless, for the Cathedral and the doorways were all he had
promised, and more. It was a scramble to see anything in the few minutes
I had, though, and awful to feel that Lady Turnour was hanging over my
head like a sword. The thought of how she would look and what she would
say if I kept the car waiting was a string tied to my nerves, pulling
them all at once, like a jumping-jack's arms and legs, so that I
positively ran back to the hotel, more breathless than Cinderella when
the hour of midnight began to strike. But there was the magic glass
coach, not yet become a pumpkin; there was the chauffeur, not turned
into whatever animal a chauffeur does turn into in fairy stories; and
there were not Sir Samuel and her ladyship, nor any sign of them.

"Thank goodness, I'm not late!" I panted. "I was afraid I was. That dear
verger wouldn't realize that there could be anything of more importance
in the world than the statue of Ste. Martha and the Tarasque."

"Nothing is, really," said Mr. Dane, glancing up from some
dentist-looking work he was doing in the Aigle's mouth under her lifted
bonnet. "But you _are_ a little late--"

"Oh!" I gasped, pink with horror. "You don't mean to say the Turnours
have been out, and waiting?"

"I do, but don't be so despairing. I told them I thought I'd better
look the car over, and wasn't quite ready. That's always true, you know.
A motor's like a pretty woman; never objects to being looked at. So they
said 'damn,' and strolled off to buy chocolates."

"It's getting beyond count how many times you've saved me, and this is
only our second day out," I exclaimed. "Here they come now, as they
always do, when we exchange a word."

I trembled guiltily, but there was no more than a vague general
disapproval in Lady Turnour's eyes, the kind of expression which she
thinks useful for keeping servants in their place.

I got into mine, on the front seat; the car's bonnet got into its, the
chauffeur into his, and at just three o'clock we turned our backs upon
good King René.

The morning had drunk up all the sunshine of the day, leaving none for
afternoon, which was troubled with a hint of coming mistral. The
landscape began to look like a hastily sketched water-colour, with its
hills and terraces of vine; and above was a pale sky, blurred like
greasy silver. The wind roamed moaning among the tops of the tall
cypresses, set close together to protect the meadows from one of "the
three plagues of Provence." And even as the mistral tweaked our noses
with a chilly thumb and finger, our eyes caught sight of the second and
more dreaded plague: the deceitfully gentle-seeming Durance, which in
its rage can come tearing down from the Alps with the roar of a famished
lion.

Far above the wide river, the Aigle glided across a high-hung suspension
bridge, the song of the water floating up to our ears mingling with the
purr of the motor--two giant forces, one set loose by nature, the other
by man, duetting harmoniously together, while the wind wailed over our
heads. But for the third and last plague of Provence we would have had
to search in vain, for the land is no longer tormented by Parliament.

Always the road had stretched before us, up hill after hill, as straight
drawn between its scantily grass-covered banks as the parting in an old
man's hair; and always, far ahead, wave following wave of hill and
mountain had seemed to roll toward us like the sea as we advanced to
meet them. After the vineyards had come wild rocks, set with crumbling
forts, and towers, and châteaux; then the mild interest of fruit blossom
spraying pink and white among primly pollarded olives; then grape
country again, with squat, low-growing vines like gnomes kicking up
gnarled legs as they turned somersaults; then a break into wonderful
mountain country, with Orgon's ruins towering skyward, dark as despair,
a wild romance in stone. But before we reached the great suspension
bridge, the Pont de Bonpas, the landscape appeared exhausted after its
sublime efforts, and inclined to quiet down for a rest. It was only near
Avignon that it sprung up refreshed, ready for more strange surprises;
and the grim grandeur of the scenery as we approached the ancient town
seemed to prophesy the mediæval towers and ramparts of the historic
city.

Skirting the huge city wall, the blue car was the one note of modernity;
but hardly had we turned in at a great gate worthy to open in welcome
for Queen Jeanne of Naples, or Bertrand du Guesclin, than we were in the
hum of twentieth-century life. I resented the change, for one expects
nothing, wants nothing, modern in Avignon; but in a moment or two we had
left the bright cafés and shops behind, to plunge back into the middle
ages. Anything, it seemed, might happen in the queer, shadowed streets
of tall old houses with mysterious doorways, through which the Aigle
cautiously threaded, like a glittering crochet needle practicing a new
stitch. Then, in the quiet _place_, asleep and dreaming of stirring
deeds it once had seen, we stopped before a dignified building more like
some old ducal family mansion than a hotel.

But it was a hotel, and we were to stop the night in it, leaving all
sightseeing for the next morning. Lady Turnour was tired. She had done
too much already for one day--with a reproachful glance at the chauffeur
whom she thus made responsible for her prostration. Nothing would induce
her to go out again that evening, and she thought that she would dine in
her own sitting-room. She didn't like old places, or old hotels, but she
supposed she would have to make the best of this one. She was a woman
who _never_ complained, unless it really was her duty, and then she
didn't hesitate.

This was her mood when getting out of the car, but inside the quaint and
charming house a look at the visitors' register changed it in a flash.
There was one prince and one duke; there were several counts; and as to
barons, they were peppered about in rich profusion. Each noble being was
accompanied by his chauffeur, so evidently it was the "thing" to stop in
the Hotel de l'Europe, and the _haut monde_ considered Avignon worth
wasting time upon. Instantly her ladyship resolved to recover
gracefully from her fatigue, and descend to the public dining-room for
dinner.

So fascinated was she by the list of great names, that she lingered over
the reading of them, as one lingers over the last strawberries of the
season; and I had to stand at attention close behind her, with her rugs
over my arm, lest any one should miss seeing that she had a maid.

"Dane says the best thing is to make Avignon a centre, and stop here two
or three nights, 'doing' the country round, before going on to Nîmes or
Arles," she said to Sir Samuel, who was clamouring for the best rooms in
the house. "I didn't feel I should like that plan, but thinking it over,
I'm not sure he isn't right."

I knew very well what her "thinking it over" meant!

They stood discussing the pros and cons, and as I didn't yet know the
numbers of our rooms, I was obliged to wait till I was told. I was not
bored, however, but was looking about with interest, when I heard the
teuf-teuf of a motor-car outside. "There goes Mr. Jack Dane with the
Aigle," I thought; and yet there was a difference in the sound. I'm too
amateurish in such matters to understand the exact reason for such
differences, though chauffeurs say they could tell one make of motor
from another by ear if they were blindfolded. Perhaps it wasn't our car
leaving, but another one coming to the hotel!

I had nothing better to do than to watch for new arrivals. My eyes were
lazily fixed on the door, and presently it opened. A figure, all fur and
a yard wide, came in.

It was the figure of Monsieur Charretier.




CHAPTER X


For a minute everything swam before me, as it used to at the Convent
after some older girl had twisted up the ropes of the big swing, with me
in it, and let me spin round. Also, I felt as if a jugful of hot water
had been dashed over my head. I seemed to feel it trickling through my
hair and into my ears.

If I could have moved, I believe I should have bolted like a frightened
rabbit, perfectly regardless of what Lady Turnour might think, caring
only to dart away without being caught by the man I'd done such wild
deeds to escape. But I was as helpless as a person in a nightmare; and,
indeed, it was as unreal and dreadful to me as a nightmare to see that
fat, fur-coated figure walking toward me, with the bearded face of
Monsieur Charretier showing between turned-up collar and motor-cap
surmounted by lifted goggles.

They say you have time to think of everything while you are drowning. I
believe that, now, because I had time to think of everything while that
furry gentleman took a dozen steps. I thought of all the things he and
my cousins had ever done to disgust me with him during his "courtship."
I asked myself whether his arrival here was a coincidence, or whether
he'd been tracking me all along, step by step, while I'd been chuckling
to myself over my lucky escape. I thought of what he would do when he
recognized me, and what Lady Turnour would say, and Sir Samuel. And
although I couldn't see exactly what good he could do in such a
situation, I wished vaguely that my brother the chauffeur were on the
spot. Then suddenly, with a wild rush of joy, I remembered that I was
facing the danger through my little talc window.

Any properly trained heroine of melodrama would have ejaculated "Saved!"
but I haven't a tragedy nose, and I gave only a stifled squeak, more
like the swan-song of a dying frog than anything more romantic.

Nobody heard it, luckily; and Monsieur Charretier, who had just come
into the twilight of the hall from the brighter light out of doors,
bustled past the retiring figure of the lady's-maid without a glance. I
had even to take a step out of his way, not to be brushed by his fur
shoulder, so wide he was in his expensive motoring coat; and trembling
from the shock, I awkwardly collided with Lady Turnour. She, in her
turn, avoiding my onslaught as if I'd been a beggar in rags, stepped on
Monsieur Charretier's toe.

He exclaimed in French, she apologized in English.

He bowed a great deal, assuring madame that she had not inconvenienced
him. She accused her maid, whose stupidity was in fault; and because
each one looked to the other rich and prosperous they were extremely
polite to one another. Even then, though her ladyship snapped at me,
"What _has_ come over you, Elise? You're as clumsy as a cow!" he had no
notice to waste upon the _femme de chambre_. Yet I dared not so much as
murmur, "Pardon!" lest he should recognize my voice.

Fortunately my mistress and her husband were now ready to go up to
their rooms, and we left Monsieur Charretier engaging quarters for
himself and his chauffeur. Evidently he was going to stop all night; but
from his indifference to me I judged joyfully that he had not come to
the hotel armed with information concerning my movements. He might be
searching for his lost love, but he didn't know that she was at hand.

All my pleasure in the thought of sightseeing at Avignon was gone, like
a broken bubble. I shouldn't dare to see any sights, lest I should be
seen. But stopping indoors wouldn't mean safety. Lady's-maids can't keep
their rooms without questions being asked; and if I pretended to be ill,
very likely Lady Turnour would discharge me on the spot, and leave me
behind as if I were a cast-off glove. Yet if I flitted about the
corridors between my mistress's room and mine, I might run up against
the enemy at any minute.

I tried to mend the ravelled edges of my courage by reminding myself
that Monsieur Charretier couldn't pick me up in his motor-car, and run
off with me against my will; but the argument wasn't much of a
stimulant. To be sure, he couldn't use violence, nor would he try; but
if he found me here he would "have it out" with me, and he would tell
things to Lady Turnour which would induce her to send me about my
business with short shrift.

He could say that I'd run away from my relatives, who were also my
guardians, and altogether he could make out a case against me which
would look a dark brown, if not black. Then, when Lady Turnour and Sir
Samuel had washed their hands of me, and I was left in a strange hotel,
practically without a sou--unless the Turnours chose to be
inconveniently generous, and packed me off with a ticket to Paris--I
should find it very difficult to escape from my Corn Plaster admirer.
This time there would be no kind Lady Kilmarny to whom I could appeal.

Between two evils, one chooses that which makes less fuss. It wasn't as
intricate to risk facing Monsieur Charretier as it was to eat soap and
be seized with convulsions; so I went about my business, waiting upon
her ladyship as if I had not been in the throes of a mental earthquake.
She was not particularly cross, because the gentleman whose acquaintance
I had thrust upon her might turn out to be Somebody, in which case my
clumsiness would be a blessing in disguise; but if she had boxed my ears
I should hardly have felt it.

Bent upon dazzling the eyes of potentates in the dining-room, and
outshining possible princesses, the lady was very particular about her
dress. Although the big luggage had gone on by train to some town of
more importance (in her eyes) than Avignon, she had made me keep out a
couple of gowns rather better suited for a first night of opera in Paris
than for dinner at the best of provincial hotels. She chose the smarter
of these toilettes, a black _chiffon_ velvet embroidered with golden
tiger-lilies, and filled in with black net from shoulder to throat. Then
the blue jewel-bag was opened, and a nodding diamond tiger-lily to match
the golden ones was carefully selected from a blinding array of
brilliants, to glitter in her masses of copper hair. Round her neck went
a rope of pearls that fell to the waist whose slenderness I had just,
with a mighty muscular effort, secured; but not until she had dotted a
few butterflies, bats, beetles and other scintillating insects about her
person was she satisfied with the effect. At least, she was certain to
create a sensation, as Sir Samuel proudly remarked when he walked in to
get his necktie tied by me--a habit he has adopted.

"I wonder if I ought to trust Elise with my bag?" Lady Turnour asked
him, anxiously, at last. "So far, since we've been on tour, I've carried
it over my arm everywhere, but it doesn't go very well with a costume
like this. What do you think?"

"Why, I think that Elise is a very good girl, and that your jewels will
be perfectly safe with her if you tell her to take care of the bag, and
not let it out of her sight," replied Sir Samuel, evidently embarrassed
by such a question within earshot of the said Elise.

"Perhaps I'd better have dinner in my own room, so as to guard it more
carefully?" I suggested, brightening with the inspiration.

"That's not necessary," answered her ladyship. "You can perfectly well
eat downstairs, with the bag over your arm, as I have done for the last
two days. I don't intend to pay extra for you to have your meals served
in your room on any excuse whatever."

I couldn't very well offer to pay for myself. That would have raised the
suspicion that I had hidden reasons of my own for dining in private, and
I regretted that I hadn't held my tongue. Lady Turnour ostentatiously
locked the receptacle of her jewels with its little gilded key, which
she placed in a gold chain-bag studded with rubies as large as currants;
and then, reminding me that I was responsible for valuables worth she
didn't know how many thousands, she swept away, leaving a trail of white
heliotrope behind.

In any case I would wait, I thought, until I could be tolerably certain
that all the guests of the hotel had gone down to dinner. If I knew
Monsieur Charretier, he would be among the first to feed, but I couldn't
afford to run needless risks. I lingered over the task of putting my
mistress's belongings in order, almost with pleasure, and then, once in
my own room, I took as long as I could with my own toilet. I was ready
at last, and could think of no further excuse for pottering, when
suddenly it occurred to me that I might do my hair in a demurer, less
becoming way, so that, if I should have the ill luck to encounter a
sortie of the enemy, I might still contrive to pass without being
recognized.

I pinned a clean towel round my neck, barber fashion, and pulling the
pins out of my hair, shook it down over my shoulders. But before I could
twist it up again, there came a light tap, tap, at the door.

"There!" I thought. "Some one has been sent to tell me the servants'
dinner will be over if I don't hurry. Perhaps it's too late already, and
I'm _so_ hungry!"

I bounced to the door, and threw it wide open, to find Mr. John Dane
standing in the passage, holding a small tray crowded with dishes.

"Here you are," he said, in the most matter-of-fact way, as if bringing
meals to my door had been a fixed habit with him, man and boy, for
years. "Hope I haven't spilt anything! There's such a crush in our
feeding place that I thought you'd be safer up here. So I made friends
with a dear old waiter chap, and said I wanted something nice for my
sister."

"You didn't!" I exclaimed.

"I did. Do you mind much? I understood it was agreed that was our
relationship."

"No, I don't mind much," I returned. "Thank you for everything." I shook
back a cloud of hair, and glanced up at the chauffeur. Our eyes met, and
as I took the tray my fingers touched his. His dark face grew faintly
red, and then a slight frown drew his eyebrows together.

"Why do you suddenly look like that?" I asked. "Have I done anything to
make you cross?"

"Only with myself," he said.

"But why? Are you sorry you've been kind to me? Oh, if you only knew, I
need it to-night. Go on being kind."

"You're not the sort of girl a man can be kind to," he said, almost
gruffly, it seemed to me.

"Am I ungrateful, then?"

"I don't know what you are," he answered. "I only know that if I looked
at you long as you are now I should make an ass of myself--and make you
detest or despise me. So good night--and good appetite."

He turned to go, but I called him back. "Please!" I begged. "I'll only
keep you one minute. I'm sure you're joking, big brother, about being an
ass, or poking fun at me. But I don't care. I need some advice so badly!
I've no one but you to give it to me. I know you won't desert me,
because if you were like that you wouldn't have come to stop at this
hotel to watch over your new sister--which I'm sure you did, though
that may sound ever so conceited."

"Of course I won't desert you," he said. "I couldn't--now, even if I
would. But I'll go away till you've had your dinner, and--and made
yourself look less like a siren and more like an ordinary human
being--if possible. Then I'll run up and knock, and you can come out in
the passage to be advised."

"A siren--with a towel round her neck!" I laughed. "If I should sing to
you, perhaps you might say--"

"Don't, for heaven's sake, or there would be an end of--your brother,"
he broke in, laughing a little. "It wouldn't need much more." And with
that he was off.

He is very abrupt in his manner at times, certainly, this strange
chauffeur, and yet one's feelings aren't exactly hurt. And one feels,
somehow, as I think the motor seems to feel, as if one could trust to
his guidance in the most dangerous places. I'm sure he would give his
life to save the car, and I believe he would take a good deal of trouble
to save me; indeed, he has already taken a good deal of trouble, in
several ways.

When he had gone I set down the tray, shut the door, and went to see how
I really did look with my hair hanging round my shoulders. My ideas on
the subject of sirenhood are vague; but I must confess, if the creatures
are like me with my hair down, they must be quite nice, harmless little
persons. I admire my hair, there's so much of it; and at the ends, a
good long way below my waist, there's such a thoroughly agreeable curl,
like a yellow sea-wave just about to break. Of course, that sounds very
vain; but why shouldn't one admire one's own things, if one has things
worth admiring? It seems rather ungrateful to Providence to cry them
down; and ingratitude was never a favourite vice with me.

One would have said that the chauffeur knew by instinct what I liked
best to eat, and he must have had a very persuasive way with the waiter.
There was crême d'orge, in a big cup; there were sweetbreads, and there
was lemon meringue. Nothing ever tasted better since my "birthday
feasts" as a child, when I was allowed to order my own dinner.

My room being on the first floor, though separated by a labyrinth of
quaint passages from Lady Turnour's, there was danger in a corridor
conversation with Mr. Dane at an hour when people might be coming
upstairs after dinner; but he was in such a hurry to escape from me that
I had no time to explain; and I really had not the heart to make myself
hideous, by way of disguise, as I'd planned before his knock at the
door. As an alternative I put on a hat, pinning quite a thick veil over
my face, and when the expected tap came again, I was prepared for it.

"Are you going out?" my brother asked, looking surprised, when I flitted
into the dim corridor, with Lady Turnour's blue bag dutifully slipped on
my arm.

"No," I answered. "I'm _hiding_. I know that sounds mysterious, or
melodramatic, or something silly, but it's only disagreeable. And it's
what I want to ask your advice about." Then, shamefacedly when it came
to the point, I unfolded the tale of Monsieur Charretier.

"By Jove, and he's in this house!" exclaimed the chauffeur, genuinely
interested, and not a bit sulky. "You haven't an idea whether he's been
actually tracking you?"

"If he has, he must have employed detectives, and clever ones, too," I
said, defending my own strategy.

"Is he the sort of man who would do such a thing--put detectives on a
girl who's run away from home to get rid of his attentions?"

"I don't know. I only know he has no idea of being a gentleman. What can
you expect of Corn Plasters?"

"Don't throw his corn plasters in his face. He might be a good fellow in
spite of them."

"Well, he isn't--or with them, either. He may be acting with my cousin's
husband, who values him immensely, and wants him in the family."

"Is he very rich?"

"Disgustingly," said I, as I had said to Lady Kilmarny.

"Yet you bolted from a good home, where you had every comfort, rather
than be pestered to marry him?"

"Oh, what do you call a 'good home,' and 'every comfort'? I had enough
to eat and drink, a sunny room, decent clothes, and wasn't allowed to
work except for Cousin Catherine. But that isn't my idea of goodness and
comfort."

"Nor mine either."

"Yet you seem surprised at me."

"I was thinking that, little and fragile as you look--like a delicate
piece of Dresden china--you're a brave girl."

"Oh, thank you!" I cried. "I do love to be called 'brave' better than
anything, because I'm really such a coward. You don't think I've done
wrong?"

"No-o. So far as you've told me."

"What, don't you believe I've told you the truth?" I flashed out.

"Of course. But do women ever tell the whole truth to men--even to their
brothers? What about that kind friend of yours in England?"

"What kind friend?" I asked, confused for an instant. Then I remembered,
and--almost--chuckled. The conversation I had had with him came back to
me, and I recalled a queer look on his face which had puzzled me till I
forgot it. Now I was on the point of blurting out: "Oh, the kind friend
is a Miss Paget, who said she'd like to help me if I needed help," when
a spirit of mischief seized me. I determined to keep up the little
mystery I'd inadvertently made. "I know," I said gravely. "_Quite_ a
different kind of friend."

"Some one you like better than Monsieur Charretier?"

"_Much_ better."

"Rich, too?"

"Very rich, I believe, and of a noble family."

"Indeed! No doubt, then, you are wise, even from a worldly point of
view, in refusing the man your people want you to marry, and
taking--such extreme measures not to let yourself be over persuaded,"
said Mr. Dane, stiffly, in a changed tone, not at all friendly or nice,
as before. "I meant to advise you not to go on to England with Lady
Turnour, as the whole situation is so unsuitable; but now, of course, I
shall say no more."

"It was about something else I wanted advice," I reminded him. "But I
suppose I must have bored you. You suddenly seem so cross."

"I am not in the least cross," he returned, ferociously. "Why should I
be?--even if I had a right, which I haven't."

"Not the right of a brother?"

"Hang the rights of a brother!" exclaimed Mr. Dane.

"Then don't you want to be my brother any more?"

He walked away from me a few steps, down the corridor, then turned
abruptly and came back. "It isn't a question of what I want," said he,
"but of what I can have. Sometimes I think that after all you're nothing
but an outrageous little flirt."

"Sometimes? Why, you've only known me two days. As if you could judge!"

"Far be it from me to judge. But it seems as though the two days were
two years."

"Thank you. Well, I may be a flirt--the French side of me, when the
other side isn't looking. But I'm not flirting with _you_."

"Why should you waste your time flirting with a wretched chauffeur?"

"Yes, why? Especially as I've other things to think of. But I don't
_want_ your advice about those things now. I wouldn't have it even if
you begged me to. You've been too unkind."

"I beg your pardon, with all my heart," he said, his voice like itself
again. "I'm a brute, I know! It's that beastly temper of mine, that is
always getting me into trouble--with myself and others. Do forgive me,
and let me help you. I want to very much."

"I just said I wouldn't if you begged."

"I don't beg. I insist. I'll inflict my advice on you, whether you like
it or not. It's this: get the man out of Avignon the first thing
to-morrow morning."

"That's easy to say!"

"And easy to do--I hope. What would be his first act, do you think, if
he got a wire from you, dated Genoa, and worded something like this:
'Hear you are following me. I send this to Avignon on chance, to tell
you persecution must cease or I will find means to protect myself. Lys
d'Angely.'"

"I think he'd hurry off to Genoa as fast as he could go--by train,
leaving his car, or sending it on by rail. But how could I date a
telegram from Genoa?"

"I know a man there who--"

"Elise, I'm astonished at you!" exclaimed the shocked voice of Lady
Turnour. "Talking in corridors with strange young men! and you've been
out, too, without my permission, and _with_ my jewel-bag! How dare you?"

"I haven't been out," I ventured to contradict.

"Then you were going out--"

"And I had no intention of going out--"

"Don't answer me back like that! I won't stand it. What are you doing in
your hat, done up in a thick veil, too, at this time of night, as if you
were afraid of being recognized?"

I had to admit to myself that appearances were dreadfully against me. I
didn't see how I could give any satisfactory explanation, and while I
was fishing wildly in my brain without any bait, hoping to catch an
inspiration, the chauffeur spoke for me.

"If your ladyship will permit me to explain," he began, more
respectfully than I'd heard him speak to anyone yet, "it is my fault
ma'mselle is dressed as she is."

"What on earth is he going to say?" I wondered wildly, as he paused an
instant for Lady Turnour's consent, which perhaps an amazed silence
gave. I believed that he didn't know himself what to say.

"I wanted your ladyship's maid, when she had nothing else to do, to put
on her out-of-door things and let me make a sketch of her for an
illustrated newspaper I sometimes draw for. Naturally she didn't care
for her face to go into the paper, so she insisted upon a veil. My
sketch is to be called, 'The Motor Maid,' and I shall get half a guinea
for it, I hope, of which it's my intention to hand ma'mselle five
shillings for obliging me. I hope your ladyship doesn't object to my
earning something extra now and then, so long as it doesn't interfere
with work?"

"Well," remarked Lady Turnour, taken aback by this extraordinary plea,
as well she might have been, "I don't like to tell a person out and out
that I don't believe a word he says, but I do go as far as this: I'll
believe you when I see you making the sketch. And as for earning extra
money, I should have thought Sir Samuel paid good enough wages for you
to be willing to smoke a pipe and rest when your day's work was done,
instead of gadding about corridors gossiping with lady's-maids who've no
business to be outside their own room. But if you're so greedy after
money--and if you want me to take Elise's word--"

"I'll just begin the sketch in your ladyship's presence, if I may be
excused," said Mr. Dane, briskly. And to my real surprise, as well as
relief, he whipped a small canvas-covered sketch-book out of his pocket.
It was almost like sleight of hand, and if he'd continued the exhibition
with a few live rabbits and an anaconda or two I couldn't have been much
more amazed.

"I'd like to have a look at that thing," observed Lady Turnour,
suspiciously, as in a business-like manner he proceeded to release a
neatly sharpened pencil from an elastic strap.

Without a word or a guilty twitch of an eyelid he handed her the book,
and we both stood watching while the fat, heavily ringed and rosily
manicured fingers turned over the pages.

He could sketch, I soon saw, better than I can, though I've (more or
less) made my living at it. There were types of French peasants done in
a few strokes, here and there a suggestion of a striking bit of mountain
scenery, a quaint cottage, or a ruined castle. Last of all there was a
very good representation of the Aigle, loaded up with the Turnours'
smart luggage, and ready to start. My lips twitched a little, despite
the strain of the situation, as I noted the exaggerated size of the
crest on the door panel. It turned the whole thing into a caricature;
but luckily her ladyship missed the point. She even allowed her face to
relax into a faint smile of pleasure.

"This isn't bad," she condescended to remark.

"I thought of asking your ladyship and Sir Samuel if there would be any
objection to my sending that to a Society motoring paper, and labelling
it 'Sir Samuel and Lady Turnour's new sixty-horse-power Aigle on tour
in Provence.' Or, if you would prefer my not using your name, I--"

"I see no reason why you should _not_ use it," her ladyship cut in
hastily, "and I'm sure Sir Samuel won't mind. Make a little extra money
in that way if you like, while we're on the road, as you have this
talent."

She gave him back the book, quite graciously, and the chauffeur began
sketching me. In three minutes there I was--the "abominable little
flirt!" in hat and veil, with Lady Turnour's bag in my hand, quite a
neat figure of a motor maid.

"You may put, if you like, 'Lady Turnour's maid,'" said that young
person's mistress, "if you think it would give some personal interest to
your sketch for the paper."

"Oh, this is for quite a different sort of thing," he explained. "Not
devoted to society news at all: more for caricatures and _funny_ bits."

"Oh, then I should certainly not wish my name to appear in _that_,"
returned her ladyship, her tone adding that, on the other hand, such a
publication was as suitable as it was welcome to a portrait of _me_.

"Now, Elise, I wish you to take those things off at _once_, and come to
my room," she finished. "Mind, I don't want you should keep me waiting!
And you can hand over that bag."

No hope of another word between us! Mr. Jack Dane saw this, and that it
would be unwise to try for it. Pocketing the sketch-book, he saluted
Lady Turnour with a finger to the height of his eyebrows, which gesture
visibly added to her sense of importance. Then, without glancing at me,
he turned and walked off.

It was not until he had disappeared round the bend of the corridor that
her ladyship thought it right to leave me.

I knew that she had made this little expedition in search of her maid
with the sole object of seeing what the mouse did while the cat was
away--a trick worthy of her lodging-house past! And I knew equally well
that before I tapped at her door a little later she had examined the
contents of the blue bag to make sure that I had extracted nothing. How
I pity the long procession of "slaveys" who must have followed each
other drearily in that lodging-house under the landlady's jurisdiction.
They, poor dears, could have had no chauffeur friends to save them from
daily perils, and it isn't likely that their mistress allowed such
luxuries as postmen or policemen.




CHAPTER XI


I decided to have my breakfast very early next morning, and would have
thought it a coincidence that Mr. Dane should walk into the couriers'
room at the same time if he hadn't coolly told me that he had been lying
in wait for me to appear.

"I thought, for several reasons, you would be early," he said. "So, for
all the same reasons and several more, I thought I'd be early too. I had
to know what the situation was to be."

"The situation?" I repeated blankly.

"Between us. Am I to understand that we've quarrelled?"

"We had," I said. "But even on good grounds, it's difficult to keep on
quarrelling with a person who has not only brought up your dinner and
sauced it with good advice, but saved you from--from the _dickens_ of a
scrape."

"I hope she didn't row you any more afterward?"

"No. She was too much interested, all the time I was undressing her, in
speculating about Monsieur Charretier to Sir Samuel. It seems that they
struck up an acquaintance over their coffee on the strength of a little
episode in the hall.

"Inadvertently I introduced them--threw them at each others' heads.
Monsieur Charretier--Alphonse, as he once asked me to call him!--told
her he was on his way to Cannes, where he heard that a friend of his,
whom it was very necessary for him to see, was visiting a Russian
Princess. He had stopped in Avignon, he said, because he was expecting
the latest news of the friend, a change of address, perhaps; and--I
don't know who proposed it, but anyway he arranged to go with Sir Samuel
and Lady Turnour to the Palace of the Popes at ten o'clock. Her ladyship
was quite taken with him, and remarked to Sir Samuel that there was
nothing so fascinating as a French gentleman of the _haut monde_. Also
she pronounced his broken English '_sweet_.' She wondered if he was
married, and whether the friend in Cannes was a woman or a man. Little
did she know that her maid could have enlightened her! Their joining
forces here is, as my American friend Pamela would say, 'the _limit_.'"

"Don't worry. The Palace of the Popes won't see him to-day," said the
chauffeur. "He's gone. Got a telegram. Didn't even wait for letters, but
told the manager to forward anything that came for him, Poste Restante,
Genoa."

"Oh, then you--"

"Acted for you on my own responsibility. There was nothing else to do,
if _anything_ were to be done; and you'd seemed to fall in with my
suggestion. It would have been a pity, I thought, if your visit to
Avignon were to be spoiled by a thing like that."

"Meaning Monsieur Charretier? I hardly slept last night for dwelling on
the pity of it."

"It's all right, then? I haven't put my foot into it?"

"Your foot! You've put your _brains_ into it. You said the other night
that I had presence of mind. It was nothing to yours."

"All's forgotten and forgiven, then?"

"It's forgotten that there was anything to forgive."

"And the 'motor maid' business? You didn't think it too clumsy?"

"I thought it most ingenious."

"It wasn't a lie, you know. I haven't a happy talent for lying. I do, or
rather did when I had nothing else on hand, send occasional sketches to
a paper. But the more I look at my 'motor maid,' the more I feel I
should like to keep her--in my sketch-book--if you're willing I should
have her?"

"Then I don't get my promised five shillings?" I laughed.

"I'll try and make up the loss to you in some other way."

"I have you to thank that I didn't lose my situation. So the debt is on
my side."

"You owe me the scolding you got. I oughtn't to have lured you into the
corridor."

"It was on my business. And there was no other way."

"It was my business to have thought of some other way."

"Are you your sister's keeper?"

"I wish I--Look here, mademoiselle _ma soeur_, I'm all out of repartees.
Perhaps I shall be better after breakfast. I shall be able to eat, now
that I know you've forgiven me."

"I don't believe you would care if I hadn't," I exclaimed. "You are so
stolid, so phlegmatic, you Englishmen!"

"Do you think so? Well, it would have been a little awkward for me to
have taken you about on a sightseeing expedition this morning if we were
at daggers drawn--no matter how appropriate the situation might have
been to Avignon manners of the Middle Ages, when everybody was either
torturing everybody else or fighting to the death."

"_Are_ you going to take me about?"

"That's for you to say."

"Isn't it for Lady Turnour to say?"

"Sir Samuel told me last night that I shouldn't be wanted till two
o'clock, as he was going to see the town with her ladyship. He wanted to
know if we could sandwich in something else this afternoon, as he
considered a whole day too much for one place. I suggested Vaucluse for
the afternoon, as it's but a short spin from Avignon, and I just
happened to mention that her ladyship might find use for you there, to
follow her to the fountain with extra wraps in case of mistral. I
thought, of all places you'd hate to miss Vaucluse. And we're to come
back here for the night."

I feared that Monsieur Charretier's sudden disappearance might upset the
Turnours' plans, but Mr. Dane didn't think so. He had impressed it upon
Sir Samuel that no motorist who had not thoroughly "done" Avignon and
Vaucluse would be tolerated in automobiling circles.

He was right in his surmise, and though her ladyship was vexed at losing
a new acquaintance whom it would have been "nice to know in Paris," she
resigned herself for the morning to the society of husband and
Baedeker. It was kind old Sir Samuel's proposal that I should be left
free to do some sight-seeing on my own account while they were gone (I
had meant to break my own shackles); and though my lady laughed to scorn
the idea that a girl of my class should care for historical
associations, she granted me liberty provided I utilized it in buying
her certain stay-laces, shoe-strings, and other small horrors for which
no woman enjoys shopping.

When she and Sir Samuel were out of the way, as safely disposed of as
Monsieur Charretier himself, I felt so extravagantly happy in reaction,
after all my worries, that I danced a jig in her ladyship's sacred
bedchamber.

Then I prepared to start for my own personally conducted expedition; and
this time I took no great pains to do my hair unbecomingly. Naturally, I
didn't want to be a jarring note in harmonious Avignon, so I made myself
look rather attractive for my jaunt with the chauffeur.

He was sauntering casually about the _Place_ before the hotel, where
long ago Marshal Brune was assassinated, and we walked away together as
calmly as if we had been followed by a whole drove of well-trained
chaperons. When one has joined the ranks of the lower classes, one might
as well reap some advantages from the change!

"What we'll do," said Mr. Dane, "is to look first at all the things the
Turnours are sure to look at last. By that plan we shall avoid them, and
as I know my way about Avignon pretty well, you may set your mind at
rest."

I can think of nothing more delightful than a day in Avignon, with an
agreeable brother and--a mind at rest. I had both, and made the most of
them.

When her ladyship's shoe-strings and stay-laces were off my mind and in
my coat pocket, we wandered leisurely about the modern part of the
wonderful town, which has been busier through the centuries in making
history than almost any other in France. Seen by daylight, I no longer
resented the existence of a new--comparatively new--Avignon. The pretty
little theatre, with its dignified statues of Corneill and Molière,
seemed to invite me kindly to go in and listen to a play by the
splendidly bewigged gentlemen sitting in stone chairs on either side of
the door. The clock tower with its "Jacquemart" who stiffly struck the
quarter hours with an automatic arm, while his wife criticized the
gesture, commanded me to stop and watch his next stroke; and the
curiosity shops offered me the most alluring bargains. People we met
seemed to have plenty of time on their hands, and to be very
good-natured, as if rich Provençal cooking agreed with their digestions.

Sure that the Turnours would be at the Palace of the Popes or in the
Cathedral, we went to the Museum, and searched in vain among a riot of
Roman remains for the tomb of Petrarch's Laura, which guide-books
promised. In the end we had to be satisfied with a memorial cross made
in the lovely lady's honour by order of some romantic Englishmen.

"Yet you say we're stolid and phlegmatic!" muttered Mr. Dane, as he read
the inscription. (Evidently that remark had rankled.)

We had not a moment to waste, but the Turnours had to be avoided; so my
brother proposed that we combine profit with prudence, and take a cab
along the road leading out to Port St. André. Where the ancient tower of
Philippe le Bel crowns a lower slope I should have my first sight of
that grim mountain of architecture, the Palace of the Popes. It was the
best place from which to see it, if its real grandeur were to be
appreciated, he said--or else to go to Villeneuve, across the Rhône,
which we dared not steal time to do; but the Turnours were certain not
to think of anything so esoteric in the way of sight-seeing.

The vastness of the stupendous mass of brick and stone took my breath
away for an instant, as I raised my eyes to look up, on a signal of
"Now!" from Mr. Dane. It seemed as if all the history, not alone of Old
Provence, but of France, might be packed away behind those tremendous
buttresses.

Of what romances, what tragedies, what triumphs, and what despairs could
those huge walls and towers tell, if the echoes whispering through them
could crystallize into words!

There Queen Jeanne of Naples--that fateful Marie Stuart of
Provence--stood in her youth and beauty before her accusers, knowing she
must buy her pardon, if for pardon she could hope. There the wretched
Bishop of Cahors suffered tortures incredible for plots his enemies
vowed he had conceived against the Pope. There came messages from
Western Kings and Eastern Emperors; there Bertrand du Guesclin, my
favourite hero, was excommunicated: and there great Rienzi lay in
prison.

"Now I think we might risk going to the Palace," said Mr. Dane, when we
had stood gazing in silence for more minutes than we could well afford.
So we made haste back, and walked up to the Rochers des Doms, where we
lurked cautiously in the handsome modern gardens, glorying in the view
over the old and new bridges, and to far off Villeneuve, where the Man
in the Iron Mask was first imprisoned. When we had admired the statue of
Althen the Persian, with his hand full of the beneficent madder that did
so much for Provence, we were rewarded for our patience by seeing Sir
Samuel and Lady Turnour rush out from the Papal Palace, looking furious.

"They look like that, because they've been inside," said the chauffeur.
"Their souls aren't artistic enough to resent consciously the ruin and
degradation of the place, but even they can be depressed by the hideous
whitewashed barracks which were once splendid rooms, worthy of kings.
You will look as they do if you go in."

"I hope my cheeks wouldn't be dark purple and my nose a pale lilac!" I
exclaimed.

"You're twenty, at most, and Lady Turnour's forty-five, at least," said
my brother. "You can stand the pinch of Mistral; but the inside of that
noble old pile is enough to turn the hair gray. It would be much more
original to let your imagination draw the picture."

"Then I will!" I cried, knowing that nothing pleases a man more in a
girl than taking his advice. By the lateness of the hour we judged that
the Turnours must have visited the Cathedral before they "did" the
Palace, so we went boldly on to Notre Dame des Doms, beloved of
Charlemagne.

No wonder, I said, that he had thought it worth restoring from the
ruins Saracens had left! Nothing could be more glorious than the
situation of the historic church, once first in importance, perhaps, in
all Christendom; and nothing could be more purely classic than the west
porch. We strained the muscles of our necks staring up at ancient,
fading frescoes, and rested them again in gazing at famous tombs; then
it was time to go, if we were not to start for Vaucluse too hungry to
feed satisfactorily on thoughts of Laura and Petrarch.

"Now to our own trough with the other beasts," I sighed. "What an
anti-climax! From the cathedral to the couriers' dining-room."

"I thought that we might have our own private trough, just this once, if
you don't object," said the chauffeur, almost wistfully. "It would be a
shame to spoil the memory of a perfect morning, wouldn't it, so don't
you think you might accept my humble invitation?"

I hesitated.

"Is it conventionality or economy that gives you pause?" he asked. "If
it's the latter, or rather a regard for my pocket, your conscience can
be easy. My pocket feels heavy and my heart light to-day. I remember a
little restaurant not far off where they do you in great style for a
franc or two. Will you come with me?"

He looked quite eager, and I felt myself unable to resist temptation.
"Yes," said I, "and thank you."

A biting wind, more like March than flowery April, nearly blew us down
into the town, and I was glad to find shelter in the warm, clean little
restaurant.

"_Is_ my nose lilac after all?" I inquired, when a dear old smiling
waiter had trotted off with our order, murmuring benevolently, "Doude de
zuide, M'sieur," like a true compatriot of Tartarin.

"A faint pink from the cheeks is undeniably reflected upon it," admitted
the chauffeur. "We're going to be let in for a cold snap as we get up
north," he went on. "I read in the papers this morning that there's been
a 'phenomenal fall of snow for the season' on the Cevennes and the
mountains of Auvergne. Do you weaken on the Gorges of the Tarn now I've
told you that?"

"Mine not to reason why. Mine but to do or die," I transposed, smiling
with conspicuous bravery.

"Not at all. It's yours to choose. I haven't even broken the Gorges,
yet, to the slaves of my hypnotic powers. I warn you that, if all the
papers say about snow is true, we may have adventures on the way. Would
you rather--"

"I'd rather have the adventures," I broke in, and had as nearly as
possible added "with you," but I stopped myself in time.

We lunched more gaily than double-dyed millionaires, and afterward,
while my host was paying away his hard-earned francs for our food, I
slipped out of the restaurant and into a little shop I had noticed close
by. The window was full of odds and ends, souvenirs of Avignon; and
there were picture-postcards, photographs, and coins with heads of
saints on them. In passing, on the way to lunch, I'd noticed a silver
St. Christopher, about the size of a two-franc piece; and as the Aigle
carries the saint like a figure-head, a glittering, golden statuette six
or seven inches high, I had guessed that St. Christopher must have been
chosen to fill the honourable position of patron saint for motors and
motorists.

"What's the price of that?" I asked, pointing to the coin.

It was ten francs, a good deal more than I could afford, more than half
my whole remaining fortune. "Could not madame make it a little cheaper?"
I pleaded with the fat lady whose extremely aquiline nose proclaimed
that she had no personal interest in saints. But no, madame could not
make it cheaper; the coin was of real silver, the figure well chased; a
recherché little pocket-piece, and a great luck-bringer for anybody
connected with the automobile. No accident would presume to happen to
one who carried _that_ on his person. Madame had, however, other coins
of St. Christopher, smaller coins in white metal which could scarcely be
told from silver. If mademoiselle wished to see them--

But mademoiselle did not wish to see them. It would be worse than
nothing to give a base imitation. Instead of feeling flattered, St.
Christopher would have a right to be annoyed, and perhaps to punish.
Recklessly I passed across the counter ten francs, and made the coveted
saint mine. Then I darted out, just in time to meet Mr. Dane at the door
of the restaurant.

"This is for you," I said. "It's to give you luck."

I pressed the coin into his hand, and he looked at it on his open palm.
For an instant I was afraid he was going to make fun of it, and my
superstition concerning it, which I couldn't quite deny if
cross-questioned. But his smile didn't mean that.

"You've just bought this--to give to me?" he asked.

"Yes," I nodded.

"Why? Not because you want to 'pay me back' for asking you to lunch--or
any such villainous thing, I hope, because--"

I shook my head. "I didn't think of that. I got it because I wanted to
bring you luck."

Then he slipped the coin into an inside pocket of his coat. "Thank you,"
he said. "But didn't I tell you that you'd brought me something better
than luck already?"

"What _is_ better than luck?"

"An interest in life. And the privilege of being a brother."




CHAPTER XII


It would be a singularly hard-headed, cold-hearted person who could set
out for Vaucluse without the smallest thrill; and hard heads and cold
hearts don't "run in our family." As we spun away from the Hotel de
l'Europe soon after two o'clock that afternoon I felt that I was largely
composed of thrill. Cold as the wind had grown, the thrill kept me warm,
mingling in my veins with ozone.

Inside the car the middle-aged honeymooners had an air of desperate
resignation which the consciousness of doing their duty according to
Baedeker gives to tourists. The tap was turned on in the newly invented
heating-apparatus in the car floor, through which hot water from the
radiator can be made to circulate; and I wondered, if this extreme
measure were resorted to already, what would be left to do when we
reached those high, white altitudes of which the chauffeur had been
speaking. I prayed that Lady Turnour might not read in the papers about
the "phenomenal fall of snow" in those regions, for if she did I was
afraid that even Mr. Dane's magnetic powers of persuasion might fail to
get her there. He might dangle Queen Margherita of Italy over her head
in vain, if worst came to worst: for what are queens to the most
inveterate tuft-hunters if the feet be cold? Yet now that "adventures"
were vaguely prophesied, I felt I could not give up the promised gorges
and mountains.

Out of Avignon we slid, past the old, old ramparts and the newer but
impressive walls, and turned at the right into the Marseilles road.
"Vaucluse!" said a kilometre-stone, and then another and another
repeated that enchanted and enchanting word, as we flew onward between
the Rhône and the Durance.

This was our own old way again, as far as the Pont de Bonpas; then our
road wound to the northeast, away from the world we knew--I said to
myself--and into a world of romance, a world created by the love of
Petrarch for Laura, and sacred to those two for ever more.

The ruined castle, with machicolated towers and haughty buttresses, on
the great rampart of a hill, was for me the porter's lodge at the
entrance gate of an enchanted garden, where poetic flowers of love
bloomed through seasons and centuries; laurels, roses, and lilies, and
pansies for remembrance. We didn't see those flowers with our bodies'
eyes, but what of that? What did it matter that to the Turnours in their
splendid glass cage this was just a road, with queer little gnome
dwellings scooped out of solid rock to redeem it from common-placeness,
with a fringe of deserted cottages farther on, and some ugly brickworks?
My spirit's eyes saw the flowers, and they clustered thicker and
brighter about Pieverde, where I insisted to Mr. Dane that Laura had
been born.

He was inclined to dispute this at first, and bring up the horrid theory
that the pure white star of Petrarch's life had been a mere Madame de
Sade, with a drove of uninteresting children. But eagerly I quoted
Petrarch himself, using all the arguments on which Pamela and I prided
ourselves at the Convent; and by the time we had got as far as that
sweet "little Venice full of water wheels," L'Isle, I'd persuaded him to
agree with me. In the midst of all that lovely, liquid music of running,
trickling, fluting water, who could go on callously insisting that Laura
resisted Petrarch merely because she was a fat married woman with a
large family?

All was green and pastoral here, and we seemed to have come into eternal
spring after the bleak, windy plains encircling Avignon. It was
beautiful to remember Petrarch's description of his golden-haired,
dark-eyed love, fair and tall as a lily, sitting in the grass among the
violets, where her bare feet gleamed whiter than the daisies when she
took off her sandals. Even Nicolete, flower of Provençal song, had no
whiter feet than Laura, I am sure!

We were slipping past the banks of a little river, clear as sapphires
and emeralds melted and mingled together. The sound of its singing
drowned the sound of the motor, so that we seemed to glide toward
Vaucluse noiselessly and reverently.

At the Inn of Petrarch and Laura the car had to stop; and looking up, we
could see on the height above the castle home of Petrarch's dearest
friend, Philippe de Cabassole, guardian of Queen Jeanne of Naples. Up
there on the cliff Petrarch's eyes must often have turned toward
Pieverde with longing thoughts of Laura, that "white dove" who was
always for him sixteen, as when he met her first.

No farther than the inn could any wheeled thing go; and having
justified my presence by buttoning Lady Turnour up in her coat, and
finding her muff under several rugs, I stood by the car, gazing after
the couple as they trudged off along the path to the hidden fairy
fountain of Vaucluse. When they should have got well ahead I meant to go
too, for if a cat may look at a king, a lady's maid may try to drink--if
she can--a few drops from the cup of a great poet's inspiration. At
first I resented those two ample, richly clad, prosaic backs marching
sturdily toward the magic fountain; then suddenly the back of Sir Samuel
became pathetic in my eyes. Hadn't he, I asked myself, loved his Emily
("Emmie, pet," as I've heard him call her) as long and faithfully as
Petrarch loved his Laura? Perhaps, after all, he had earned the right to
visit this shrine.

Rocks shut out from our sight the distant fountain, and the last
windings of the path that led to it, clasping the secret with great
stone arms, like those of an Othello jealously guarding his young wife's
beauty from eyes profane.

"Aren't you going now?" asked my brother, with a certain wistfulness.

"Ye-es. But what about you?"

"Oh, I've been here before, you know."

"Don't you believe in second times? Or is a second time always second
best?"

"Not when--Of course I want to go. But I can't leave the car alone."

My eyes wandered toward the inn door. "There's a boy there who looks as
if he were born to be a watch-dog," said I, basely tempting him.
"Couldn't you--"

"No, I couldn't," he said decidedly. "At a place like this, where there
are a lot of tourists about, it wouldn't be right. It was different at
Valescure, when I took you in to lunch."

"You mean I mustn't make that a precedent."

"I don't mean anything conceited."

"But you won't desert Mr. Micawber. I believe I shall name the car
Micawber! Well, then, I must go by myself--and if I should fall into the
fountain and be drowned--"

"Don't talk nonsense, and don't do anything foolish," said Mr. Dane,
sternly, whereupon I turned my back upon him, and plunged into the cool
shadows of the gorge. The great white cliff of limestone was my goal,
and always it towered ahead, as I followed the narrow pathway above the
singing water. I sighed as I paused to look at a garden which maybe once
was Petrarch's, for it was sad to find my way to fairyland, alone. Even
a brother's company would have been better than none, I thought!

Soon I met my master and mistress coming back.

There was nothing much to see, said her ladyship, sharply, and I mustn't
be long; but Sir Samuel ventured to plead with her.

"Let the girl have ten minutes or so, if she likes, dear," said he.
"We'll be wanting a cup of hot coffee at the inn. And it is a pretty
place." There was something in his voice which told me that he would
have felt the charm--if his bride had let him.

Pools of water, deep among the rocks, were purple-pansy colour or beryl
green; but the "Source" itself, in its cup of stone, was like a block of
malachite. There was no visible bubbling of underground springs fighting
their way up to break the crystal surface of the fountain,--this
fountain so unlike any other fountain; but to the listening ear came a
moaning and rushing of unseen waters, now the high crying of Arethusa
escaping from her pursuing lover, now rich, low notes as of an organ
played in a vast cavern.

Above the gorge, the towering rocks with their huge holes and archways
hollowed out by turbulent water in dim, forgotten ages, looked exactly
as if the whole front wall had been knocked off a giant's castle,
exposing its secret labyrinths of rough-hewn rooms, floor rising above
floor even to the attics where the giant's servants had lived, and down
to the cellars where the giant's pet dragons were kept in chains.

I hadn't yet exhausted my ten minutes, though I began to have a guilty
consciousness that they would soon be gone, when I heard a step behind
me, and turning, saw Mr. Dane.

"They're having coffee in the car," he said. "Sir Samuel proposed it to
his wife, as if he thought it would be rather more select and exclusive
for her than drinking it in the inn; but I have a sneaking suspicion
that it was because he wanted to let me off. Not a bad old boy, Sir
Samuel."

So we saw the fountain of Vaucluse together, after all. I don't know why
that should have seemed important to me, but it did--a little.

We didn't say much to each other, all the way back to Avignon, but I
felt that the day had been a brilliant success, and was sure that the
next could not be as good. "What--not with St. Remy and Les Baux?"
exclaimed my brother. But I knew very little about St. Remy, and still
less about Les Baux. For a minute I was ashamed to confess, but then I
told myself that this was a much worse kind of vanity than being pleased
with the colour of one's hair or the length of one's eyelashes. Mr. Jack
Dane was too polite to show surprise at my ignorance; but that evening,
just as I was getting ready to go down to dinner, up he came with a
tray, as he had the night before; and on the tray, among covered dishes,
was a book.

"Two of your chauffeur-admirers from Aix are in the dining-room," he
said, "so I thought you'd rather stop up in your room and read T.A.
Cook's 'Old Provence,' than go downstairs. Anyway, it will be better for
you."

I was half angry, half flattered that he should arrange my life for me
in this off-hand way, whether I liked it or not; but the French half of
me will do almost anything rather than be ungracious; and it would have
been ungracious to say I was tired of dining in my room, and could take
care of myself, when he had given himself the trouble of carrying up my
dinner. So I swallowed all less obvious emotions than meek gratitude for
food, physical and mental; and was soon so deeply absorbed in the
delightful book that I forgot to eat my pudding. I sat up late with
it--the book, not the pudding--after putting Lady Turnour to bed (almost
literally, because she thinks it refined to be helpless), and when
morning came I was no longer disgracefully ignorant of St. Remy and Les
Baux.

Mr. Dane had mapped out the programme of places to see, using Avignon as
a centre, and there were so many notabilities at the Hotel de l'Europe
following the same itinerary, with insignificant variations, that Lady
Turnour was quite contented with the arrangements made for her.

Morning was for St. Remy; afternoon was for Les Baux, "because the thing
is to see the sunset there," I heard her telling an extremely
rich-looking American lady, laying down the law as if she had planned
the whole trip herself, with a learned reason for each detail.

The way to St. Remy was along a small but pretty country road, which had
a misleading air, as if it didn't want you to think it was taking you to
a place of any importance. And yet we were in the heart of Mistral-land;
not Mistral the east wind, but Mistral the poet of Provence, great
enough to be worthy of the land he loves, great enough to carry on the
glory of it to future generations. At any moment we might meet a
Fellore. I looked with interest at each man we saw, and some looked back
at me with flattering curiosity; for a woman's eyes are almost as
mysterious behind a three-cornered talc window as behind a yashmak, or
zenana gratings.

St. Remy itself--birthplace of Nostradamus, maker of powders and
prophecies--was charming in the sunlight, with its straight avenue of
trees like the pillars of a long gray and green corridor in a vast
palace; but we swept on toward the "Plateau des Antiquities," up a
steep slope with St. Remy the modern at our backs; then suddenly I
found myself crying out with delight at sight of the splendid Triumphal
Archway and the gracious Monument we had come out to see.

Both looked more Greek than Roman, but that was because Greek workmen
helped to build them for Julius Cæsar, when he determined that posterity
should not forget his defeat of great Vercingetorix, and should do
justice to the memory of Marius.

When I was small I used to dislike poor Vercingetorix, and be glad that
he had to surrender, so that I might be rid of him, owing to the
dreadful difficulty of pronouncing his name; but when we had got out of
the car, and I saw him on the archway, a tall, carved captive, who had
kept his head through all the centuries, while Cæsar (with a hand on the
prisoner's shoulder) had lost his, my heart softened to him for the
first time.

I thought the Triumphal Monument to Marius even more beautiful than the
Archway, and felt as angry as Marius must, that the guide-books should
take it away from the hero and wrongfully call it a mausoleum for
somebody else. But Mr. Dane assured me with the obstinate air people
have when learned authorities back their opinions, that the Arch was
really the more interesting of the two--the first Triumphal Archway set
up outside Italy, said he, and bade me reflect on that; still, I would
turn my eyes toward the graceful monument, so wickedly annexed by the
three Julii, and then away over the wide plain that lay beneath this
ragged spur of the Alpilles. In the distance I could see Avignon, and
the pale, opal-tinted, gold-veined hills that fold in the fountain of
Vaucluse. Never, since we came into Provence, had I been able so clearly
to realize the wild fascination of her haggard beauty. "Here Marius
stood in his camp," I thought, "shading his eyes from the fierce sun,
and looking out over this strange, arid country for the Barbarians he
meant to conquer." My heart beat with an intoxicating excitement, such
as one feels on seeing great mountains or the ocean for the first time;
and then down I tumbled, with a bump, off my pedestal, when Lady Turnour
wanted to know what I supposed she'd brought me for, if not to put on
her extra cloak without waiting to be told.

Watches are really luxuries, not necessities, with the Turnours, because
their appetites always strike the hour of one, and if they're sometimes
a little in advance, they can be relied upon never to be behindhand. I
knew before I glanced at the little bracelet-watch Pamela gave me
(hidden under my sleeve) that it must be on the stroke of half-past
twelve when her ladyship began to complain of the sharp wind, and say we
had better be getting back to St. Remy. She was cross, as usual when she
is hungry, and said that if I continued to go about "like a snail in a
dream" whenever she fetched me to carry her things on these short
expeditions, she would leave me in the hotel to mend her clothes;
whereupon I became actually servile in my ministrations. I brushed a
microscopic speck of dust off her gown; I pushed in a hairpin; I tucked
up a flying end of veil; I straightened her toque, and made myself
altogether indispensable; for the bare idea of being left behind was a
box on the ear. I could not endure such a punishment--and the front
seat would look so empty, so unfinished, without me!

As we went back down the steep hill from old Glanum, St. Remy appeared a
little oasis of spring in the midst of a winter which had come back for
something it had forgotten. All its surrounding orchards and gardens,
screened from the shrewish Mistral by the shoulders of the Alpilles, and
again by lines of tall cypress trees and netted, dry bamboos, had begun
to bloom richly like the earlier gardens on the Riviera. There was a
pinky-white haze of apple blossoms; and even the plane trees in the long
main street were hung with dainty, primrose-coloured spheres, like
little fairy lanterns. Not only did every man seem a possible Felibre,
but every girl was a beauty. Some of them wore a charming and becoming
head-dress, such as I never saw before, and the chauffeur said it was
the head-dress of the women of Arles, where we would go day after
to-morrow.

Impertinent chauffeurs or couriers would have been more out of place in
poetic St. Remy than the sensational Nostradamus himself; and there was
no trouble of that sort for me in lunching at the pleasant, quiet hotel.
Mr. Dane had bought a French translation of Mistral's "Memoires," and as
we ate, he and I alone together, he read me the incident of the
child-poet and his three wettings in quest of the adored water-flowers.
Nothing could be more beautiful than the wording of the exquisite
thoughts, yet I wished we could have seen those thoughts embodied in
Provençal, the language practically created by Mistral, as Italian was
by Dante and Petrarch, or German by Goethe.

Not far away lay Mas du Juge, described in the book, where he was born,
and Maillane, where he lives, and I longed to drive that way; but as the
Turnours would be sure to say that there was nothing to see, the
chauffeur thought it wiser not to turn out of our road. We might find
the poet at Arles, perhaps, in his museum there, or lunching at the
Hotel du Forum, a favourite haunt of his on museum days.

Starting for Les Baux, we turned our faces straight toward the wild
little mountains loved by Mistral, his dear Alpilles. They soon
surrounded us in tumbling gray waves, piled up on either side of the
road as the Red Sea must have tumultuously fenced in the path of the
Israelites. Strange, hummocky mountains were everywhere, as far as we
could see; mountains of incredible, nightmare shapes, and of great
ledges set with gigantic busts of ancient heroes, some nobly carved,
some hideously caricatured, roughly hewn in gray limestone, or red rock
that looked like bronze. On we went, climbing up and up, a road like a
python's back; but not yet was there any glimpse of the old "robber
fortress" of Les Baux about which I had read, and later dreamed, last
night. I knew it would be wonderful, astonishing, a Dead City, a Pompeii
of the Feudal Age, yet different from any other ancient town the whole
world over--a place of tangled histories; yet I tried vainly to picture
what it would be like. Then, suddenly, we reached a turn in that strange
road which, if it had led downhill instead of up, would have seemed like
the way Orpheus took to reach Hades.

We had come face to face with a huge chasm in the rock, a gap with
sheer walls sliced clean down, like a cut in a great cheese; and I felt
instinctively that this must be the dark doorway through which we should
see Les Baux.

Through the cut in the stone cheese our road carried us; and the busts
on the rocky ledges were so near now we could almost have put out our
hands and touched them--but curiously enough, in this place of all
others, they were the likenesses of modern men. Mr. Dane and I picked
out an unmistakable Gladstone on the right, a characteristic
Beaconsfield on the left; and farther on Mr. Chamberlain's head was
fantastically grafted on to the body of a prehistoric animal. We were
just tracing Pierpont Morgan's profile, near a few of Hannibal's
elephants, when the car sprang clear of the chasm, out upon the other
side of the doorway; and there rose before us Les Baux, a hundred times
more wonderful, more tragic, than I had hoped to find it.

Far, far below our mountain road lay a valley so flat that it might have
been levelled on purpose for the tilting of knights in great
tournaments. Above and around us (for suddenly we were in as well as
under it) was a City of Ghosts.

Huge masses of rock, like Titan babies' playthings, had been hollowed
out for dwellings, fit houses for our late cousins the cave-dwellers.
There were colossal pillars and dark, high doorways such as one sees in
pictures of the temples at Thebes; but all this, said Mr. Jack Dane, was
merely a preface for what was yet to come, only an immense quarry whence
the stones to build Les Baux had been torn. We were still on the road to
the real Les Baux; and even as he spoke, the Aigle was clawing her way
bravely up a hill steeper than any we had mounted. At the top she turned
abruptly, and stopped in a queer, forlorn little place, where to my
astonishment our journey ended in front of a small house ambitiously
named Hotel Monte Carlo. Then I remembered the story I had read: how a
young prince of the Grimaldi family came begging Louis XIII. to protect
him from Spain; how Louis, who didn't want Spain to grab Monaco,
promptly gave soldiers; how the Grimaldi's shrewd wit did more to get
the Spanish out of the little principality than did the fighting men
from France; and how Louis, as a reward, turned poor, war-worn Les Baux
into a Grimaldi marquisate.

That little episode in history accounted for the Hotel Monte Carlo; and
I wondered if it were put up on the site of the Grimaldis' miniature
pleasure-palace, which the forest-burning revolutionists tore down just
before Les Baux, after all its strange passings from hand to hand,
became the property of the nation.

Against the rocks a few mean houses leaned apologetically, but on every
side rose the ruins of a proud, dead past: a past beginning with the
ruts of chariot-wheels graven on the rock-paved street. I thought, as I
looked at the sordid little village of to-day, which had crawled into
the very midst of the fortress, of some words I'd read last night: "a
rat in the heart of a dead princess."

Strange, haggard hill, whispered about by history ever since Christians
ran before Alaric the Visigoth, and hid in its caverns already echoing
with legends of mysterious Phoenician treasure! Strange robber house of
Les Baux, founded thirteen hundred years ago, and claiming half
Provence two centuries later! No wonder, after all the fighting and
plundering, loving and hating, that all it asks now is for its bleached,
picked bones to be left in peace!

I thought this, standing by the little Hotel Monte Carlo, waiting for my
mistress and her husband to be supplied with a guide. He was the most
intelligent and efficient-seeming guide imaginable, who looked as if he
had the whole history of Les Baux behind his bright dark eyes; and I
hoped that the humble maid and chauffeur might be allowed to follow the
"quality" within respectful earshot.

Soon they began to walk on, and I turned to look at my brother, who was
lingering by the car. Already the guide had begun to be interesting. I
caught a few words: "Celtic caverns"--"Leibulf, the first Count"--"the
terrible Turenne, called the 'Fléau de Provence'--the Lady Alix's
guardian"--which made me long to hear more; but I didn't want to crawl
on until my Fellow Worm could crawl with me.

"I can't go," he said. "It wouldn't do to leave the car here. There are
several gipsy faces at the inn window, you see. Why there should be
gipsies I don't know; but there are, for those are gipsies or I'll eat
my cap. And I've got to keep watch on deck."

"How horrid to leave you here alone, seeing nothing--not even the
sunset!" I exclaimed. "I think I shall stop with you, unless _she_ calls
me--"

"You'll do nothing of the kind," he had begun, when the summons came,
sooner than I had expected.




CHAPTER XIII


"Elise, come here and put what this guide is saying into English," was
the command, and I flew to obey. To hear him tell what he knew was like
turning over the leaves of the Book of Les Baux; and I tried to do him
justice in my translation; but it was disheartening to see Lady
Turnour's lack-lustre gaze wander as dully about the rock-hewn barracks
of Roman soldiers as if she had been in her own lodging-house cellar,
and to be interrupted by her complaints of the cold wind as we went up
the silent streets, past deserted palaces of dead and gone nobles,
toward the crown of all--the Château.

Nothing moved her to any show of interest in this grave of mighty
memories, of mighty warrior princes, and of lovely ladies with names
sweet as music and perfume of potpourri. Wandering in a splendid
confusion of feudal and mediæval relics--walls with carved doorways, and
doorways without walls; beautiful, purposeless columns whose occupation
had long been gone; carved marvels of fireplaces standing up sadly from
wrecked floors of fair ladies' boudoirs or great banqueting halls, the
stout, painted woman broke in upon the guide's story to talk of any
irrelevant matter that jumped into her mind. She suddenly bethought
herself to scold Sir Samuel about "Bertie," from whom a letter had
evidently been forwarded, and who had been spending too much money to
please her ladyship.

"That stepson of yours is a regular bad egg," said she.

"Never you mind," retorted Sir Samuel, defending his favourite. "Many a
bad egg has turned over a new leaf."

My lip quivered, but I fixed my eyes firmly upon the guide, who was now
devoting his attention entirely to his one respectful listener. I was
ashamed of my companions, but I couldn't help catching stray fragments
of the conversation, and the involuntary mixing of Bertie's affairs with
the Religious Wars, and the destruction of Les Baux by Richelieu's
soldiers, had a positively weird effect on my mind. Bertie, it
seemed--(or was it Richelieu?) was invited to visit at the château of a
French marquis called de Roquemartine (or was it good King René, who
inherited Les Baux because he was a count of Provence?), and the château
was near Clermont-Ferrand. Lady Turnour was of opinion that it would be
well to make a condition before sending the cheque which Bertie wanted
to pay his bridge debts (or was he in debt because the Lady Douce and
her sister Stephanette of Les Baux had quarrelled?). If the advice of
Dane, the chauffeur, were taken, they would be motoring to
Clermont-Ferrand; and why not say to Bertie: "No cheque unless you get
us an invitation to visit the Roquemartines while you are there?" (Or
was it that they wanted an invitation to the boudoir of Queen Jeanne,
René's beloved wife, who lived at Les Baux sometimes, and had very
beautiful things around her--tapestries and Eastern rugs, and wondrous
rosaries, and jewelled Books of Hours?) Really, it was very
bewildering; but in my despair one drop of comfort fell. That château
near Clermont-Ferrand would prove a lodestar, and help Mr. Jack Dane to
lure the Turnours through chill gorges and over snowy mountains.

"Lodestar" really was a good word for the attraction, I thought, and I
would repeat it to the chauffeur. But it rose over the horizon of my
intellect probably because the guide talked of Countess Alix, last
heiress of the great House of Les Baux. "As she lay dying," he said,
"the star that had watched over and guided the fortunes of her house
came down from the sky, according to the legend, and shone pale and sad
in her bedchamber till she was dead. Then it burst, and its light was
extinguished in darkness for ever."

Eventually Sir Samuel's eye brightened for the Tudor rose decoration, in
the ruined château, relic of an alliance between an English princess and
the House of Les Baux; and Lady Turnour didn't interrupt once when the
guide told of the latest important discovery in the City of Ghosts.
"Near the altar of the Virgin here," he began, in just the right, hushed
tone, "they found in a tomb the body of a beautiful young girl. There
she lay, as the tomb was opened, just for an instant--long enough for
the eye to take in the picture--as lovely as the loveliest lady of Les
Baux, that famed princess Cecilie, known through Provence as Passe-Rose.
Her long golden hair was in two great plaits, one over either shoulder,
and her hands were crossed upon her breast, holding a Book of Hours. But
in a second, as the air touched her, she was gone like a dream; her
sweet young face, white as milk, and half smiling, her long dark
eyelashes, even the Book of Hours, all crumbled into dust, fine as
powder. Only the golden hair, tied with blue ribbon, was left; and when
you go to Arles you can see it in the Museum of Monsieur Mistral."

"Make a note of hair for Arles, Sam," said her ladyship, gravely; and
just as solemnly he obeyed, scribbling a few words in the pocket
memorandum-book in which the poor man industriously puts down all the
things which his wife thinks he ought to remember.

"Anything else interesting ever been found here?" she wanted to know.
"Any jewels or things of that sort?"

I passed the question on to the guide.

Many things had been found, he said: coins, vases, pottery, and mosaics.
Occasionally such things were turned up, though usually, nowadays, of no
great value; but it was the hope of finding something which brought the
gipsies. Often there were gypsies at Les Baux. They would go to Les
Saintes Maries, the place of the sacred church where the two sainted
Maries came ashore from Palestine in their little boat, and they would
pray to Sarah, whose tomb was also in that wonderful church. Had we seen
it yet? No? But it was not far. Many people went, though the great day
was on May twenty-fourth, when the Archbishop of Aix lowered the ark of
relics from the roof, and healed those of the sick who were true
believers. It was for Sarah, though, that the gipsies made their
pilgrimages. They thought that prayers at her tomb would bring them
whatever they desired; and sometimes, when they were able to come on as
far as Les Baux, they would wish at the tomb to find the buried
Phoenician treasure, for which many had searched generation after
generation, since history began, but none had ever found.

I did not say anything about the gipsies at the inn-window, but I saw
now that Mr. Dane had done wisely in sticking to his post. A
sixty-horse-power Aigle might largely make up for a disappointment in
the matter of treasure, even if she had to be towed down into the valley
by a horse.

"Calvé, and all the great singers, come here sometimes by moonlight in
their motors," went on the guide, "after the great musical festival of
Orange in the month of August. They stand on the piles of stone among
the ruins when all is white under the moon, and they sing--ah! but they
sing! It is wonderful. They do it for their own pleasure, and there is
no audience except the ghosts--and me, for they allow me to listen. Yet
I think, if our eyes could be opened to such things, we would see
grouped round a noble company of knights and ladies--such a company as
would be hard to get together in these days."

"Well, I would rather sing here in August than April!" exclaimed Lady
Turnour, with the air of a spoiled prima donna. And then she shivered
and wanted to go down to the car without waiting for the sunset, which,
after all, could only be like any other mountain sunset, and she could
see plenty of better ones next summer in Switzerland. She felt so
chilled, she was quite anxious about herself, and should certainly not
dare to start for Avignon until she had had a glass of steaming hot rum
punch or something of that sort, at the inn. Did the guide think she
could get it--and have it sent out to her in the car, as nothing would
induce her to go inside that little den?

The guide thought it probable that something hot might be obtained,
though there might be a few minutes' delay while the water was made to
boil, as it would be an unusual order.

A few minutes! thought I, eagerly, looking at the sun, which was
hurrying westward. I knew what "a few minutes" at such an inn would
mean--half an hour at least; and apparently I was no longer needed as an
interpreter. Without a thought of me, now that I had ceased to be
useful, Lady Turnour slipped her arm into her husband's for support (her
high-heeled shoes and the rough, steep streets had not been made for
each other), and began trotting down the hill, in advance of the guide.
They had finished with him, too, and were already deep in a discussion
as to whether rum punch, or hot whisky-and-water with sugar and lemon
were better, for warding off a chill. I didn't see why I shouldn't
linger a little on the wide plateau, with the Dead City looming above me
like a skeleton seated on a ruined throne, and half southern France
spread out in a vast plain, a thousand feet below.

It was wonderful there, and strangely, almost terribly still. Once the
sea had washed the feet of the cliff, dim ages ago. Now my eyes had to
travel far to the Mediterranean, where Marseilles gloomed dark against
the burnished glimmer of the water. I could see the Etang de Berre, too,
and imagine I saw the Aurelian Way, and gloomy old Aigues-Mortes, which
we were to visit later. At lunch we had talked of a poem of Mistral's,
which a friend of Mr. Dane's had put into French--a poem all about a
legendary duel. And it was down there, in that far-stretching field,
that the duel was fought.

As I looked I realized that the clouds boiling up from some vast
cauldron behind the world were choking the horizon with their purple
folds. They were beautiful as the banners of a royal army advancing over
the horizon, but--they would hide the sun as he went down to bathe in
the sea. He was embroidering their edges with gold now. I was seeing the
best at this moment. If I started to go back, I should have time to
pause here and there, gazing at things the Turnours had hurried past.

I went down slowly, reluctantly, the melancholy charm of the place
catching at my dress as I walked, like the supplicating fingers of a
ghost condemned to dumbness. There was one rock-hewn house I had wanted
to see, coming up, which Lady Turnour had scorned, saying "when you've
been in one, you've been in all." And she had not understood the guide's
story of a legend that was attached to this particular house. Perhaps if
she had she would not have cared; but now I was free I couldn't resist
the temptation of going in, to poke about a little. You could go several
floors down, the guide had said; that was certain, but the tale was,
that a secret way led down from the lowest cellar of this cave house,
continuing--if one could only find it--to the enchanted cavern far
below, where Taven, the witch, kept and cured of illness the girl loved
by Mireio.

I didn't know who Mireio was, except that he lived in songs and legends
of Old Provence, but the story sounded like a beautiful romance; and
then, the guide had added that some people thought the Kabre d'Or, or
Phoenician treasure, was hidden somewhere between Les Baux and the
"Fairy Grotto," or the "Gorge of Hell," near by.

Caves have always had the most extraordinary, magical fascination for
me. When I was a child, I believed that if I could only go into one I
should be allowed to find fairyland; and even in an ordinary, every-day
cellar I was never quite without hope. The smell of a cellar suggested
the most cool, delightful, shadowy mysteries to me, at that time, and
does still.

It was as if the ghostly hand that had been pulling me back, begging me
not to leave Les Baux, led me gently but insistently through the doorway
of the rock house.

It was not yet dark inside. I tiptoed my way through some rough bits of
debris, to the back of the big room, crudely cut out of stone. There
were shelves where the dwellers had set lights or stored provisions, and
there was nothing else to see except a square hole in the floor, below
which a staircase had been hewn. A glimmer of light came up to me, gray
as a bat's wing, and I knew that there must be some opening for
ventilation below.

I felt that I would give anything to go down those rough stone stairs,
only half way down, perhaps; just far enough to see what lay underneath.
It was as if Taven herself had called me, saying: "Come, I have
something to show you."

I put a foot on the first step, then the other foot wanted a chance to
touch the next step, and so on, each demanding its own turn in
fairness. I had gone down eight steps, counting each one, when I heard a
faint rustling noise. I stopped, my heart giving a jump, like a bird in
a cage.

There were no windows in the underground room, which was much smaller
and less regular in shape than the one above, but a faint twilight
seemed to rain down into it in streaks, like spears of rain, and I
guessed that holes had been made in the rock to give light and
ventilation. Something alive was down there, moving. I was frightened; I
hardly dared to look. And I had a nightmare feeling of being struck dumb
and motionless. I tried to turn and run up the stairs but I had to look,
and the gray filtering light struck into a pair of eyes.




CHAPTER XIV


They were great black eyes, sunken into the face of an old woman. She
stood in a corner, and it occurred to me that she had perhaps run there,
as much afraid of me as I was of her. No eyes were ever like those, I
thought, except the eyes of a gipsy.

"What are you doing?" I stammered, in French, hardly expecting her to
understand and answer me; but she replied in an old, cracked voice that
sounded hollow and unreal in the cavern.

"I have been asleep," she said. "I am waiting for my sons. We are in Les
Baux on business. I thought, when I heard you, it was my boys coming to
fetch me. I can't go till they are here, because I have dropped my
rosary with a silver crucifix down below, and the way is too steep for
me. They must get it."

"Do they know you are here?" I asked.

"Oh, yes," she returned. "They will come at six. We shall perhaps have
our supper and sleep in this house to-night. Then we will go away in the
morning."

"It is only a little after five now," I told her. "You frightened me at
first."

She cackled a laugh. "I am nothing to be afraid of," she chuckled. "I am
very old. Besides, there is no harm in me. If you have the time, I could
tell your fortune."

"I'm afraid I haven't time," I said, though I was tempted. To have
one's fortune told in a cavern under a rock house where Romans had
lived, told by a real, live gipsy who looked as if she might be a lineal
descendant from Taven, and who was probably fresh from worshipping at
the tomb of Sarah! It would be an experience. No girl I knew, not even
Pam herself, who is always having adventures, could ever have had one as
good as this. If only I need not miss it!

"It would take no more than five minutes," she pleaded in her queer
French, which was barely understandable, and evidently not the tongue in
which she was most at home.

"Well, then," I said, hastily calculating that it was no more than ten
minutes since Lady Turnour and Sir Samuel left me, and that the water
for their punch couldn't possibly have begun to boil yet. "Well, then,
perhaps I might have five minutes' fortune, if it doesn't cost too much;
but I'm very poor--poorer than you, maybe."

"That cannot be, for then you would have less than nothing," said the
old woman, cackling again. "But it is your company I like to have, more
than your money. I have been waiting here a long time, and I am dull. No
fortune can be expected to come true, however, unless the teller's hand
be crossed with silver, otherwise I might give it you for nothing. But a
two-franc piece--"

"I think I have as much as that," I cut her short, as she paused on the
hint; and deciding not to ask her, as I felt inclined, to come to the
upper room lest we should be interrupted, I went down the remaining five
or six high steps, and got out my purse under a long, straight rod of
gray light.

There were only a few francs left, but I would have beggared myself to
buy this adventure, and thought it cheap at the price she named. I found
a two-franc piece--a bright new one, worthy of its destiny--and looking
up as I shut my purse, I saw the old woman's eyes fixed on me, and sharp
as gimlets. Used to the dusk now, I could see her dark face distinctly,
and so like a hungry crow did she look that I was startled. But it was
only for a second that I felt a little uncomfortable. She was so old and
weak, I was so young and strong, that even if she were an evil creature
who wanted to do me harm, I could shake her off and run away as easily
as a bird could escape from a tied cat.

"Make a cross with the silver piece on my palm," she said.

I did as she told me, and it was a dark and dirty palm, in the hollow of
which seemed to lie a tiny pool of shadow. Her eyes darted to the
bracelet-watch as my wrist slipped out of the protecting sleeve, and I
drew back my hand quickly. She plucked the coin from my fingers, and
then told me to give her my left hand.

"You can't see the lines," I said. "It's too dark."

"I see with my night eyes," she answered, as a witch might have
answered. "And I feel. I have the quick touch of the blind. I can feel
the pores in a flower-petal."

Impressed, I let her hold my hand in one of her lean claws while she
lightly passed the spread fingers of the other down the length of mine
from the tips to the joining with the palm, and then along the palm
itself, up and down and across. It was like having a feather drawn over
my hand.

"You have foreign blood in your veins," she said. "You are not all
French. But you have the charm of the Latin girl. You can make men love
you. You make them love you whether you wish or not, and whether _they_
wish or not. Sometimes that is a great trouble to you. You are anxious
now, for many reasons. One of the reasons is a man, but there is more
than one who loves you. You make one of them unhappy, and yourself
unhappy, too. The man you ought to love is young and handsome, and
dark--very dark. Do not think ever of marrying a fair man. You are on a
journey now. Something very unexpected will happen to you at the
end--something to do with a man, and something to do with a woman. Be
careful then, for your future happiness may depend on your actions in a
moment of surprise. You are not rich, but you have a lucky hand. You
could find things hidden if you set yourself to look for them."

"Hidden treasure?" I asked, laughingly, and venturing to break in
because she was speaking slowly now, as if she had come to the end of
her string of prophecies.

"Perhaps. Yes. If you looked for the hidden treasure here, you might be
the one to find it after all these hundreds of years. Who knows? These
things happen to the lucky ones."

"Well, if I believed that I'd been born for such luck, I'd try to come
back some day, and have a look," I said. "I should begin in this house,
I think."

"It is never so lucky to return for things as to try and get them at
the right time," the old woman pronounced. "If you would like to wait
till my sons come--"

"No, I wouldn't," I said. "I must go now."

"If you would at least do me a favour, for the good fortune I have told
you so cheap," she begged. "I, who in my day have had as much as two
louis from great ladies who would know their fortune!"

"What is the favour?" I asked.

"Oh, it is next to nothing. Only to go down to the foot of the stairs in
the cellar below this, and pick up my rosary, which I dropped, and which
I know is lying there."

"It's too dark," I said. "I couldn't see to find it--and you said your
sons were coming soon."

"Not soon enough, for when you are gone, and I am alone, I should like
to pray at the time of vespers. And it is not so dark as you think.
Besides, this will be the test of the fortune I have just told you. If
it's true that you have the lucky hand for finding you will put it on
the rosary in an instant. That will be a sign you can find anything.
Unless you are afraid, mademoiselle--"

"Of course I'm not afraid," I said, for I always have been ashamed of my
fear of the dark, and have forced myself to fight against it. "If the
rosary is at the foot of the staircase I'll try and get it for you, but
I won't go any farther."

Her corner was close by the opening where more steps were cut into the
rock. I could see the bottom, I thought, and started down quickly,
because I was in a hurry to come back and be on my way home--to the
Aigle.

Six, seven steps, and then--crash! down I came on my hands and knees.

Oh, how it hurt! And how it made my head ring! Fireworks went off before
my eyes, and I felt stupid, inclined to lie still. But suddenly the idea
flashed into my brain, like lightning darting among dark clouds, that
the old woman had made me do this thing on purpose. She had played me a
trick--and if she had, she must have some bad reason for doing it. Those
two sons of hers! I scrambled up, shocked and jarred by the fall, my
hands and knees smarting as if they were skinned.

"I've fallen down," I cried. "Do you hear?"

No answer.

I called again. It was as still as a grave up above. It seemed to me
that it could not be so unnaturally, so inhumanly still, if there were a
living, breathing creature there. I was sure now that the horrible old
thing had known what would happen, had wanted it to happen, and had gone
hobbling away to fetch her wicked gipsy sons. How she had looked at my
poor little purse! How she had looked at Pamela's watch!

I saw now how it was that I had been so stupid. The dim light from above
had lain on the last step and made it appear as if the floor were near;
but there was a gap between the stairway and the bottom of the cellar.
The lower steps had been hewn away--perhaps in a quest for the
ever-elusive treasure. Maybe a crack had appeared, and people, always
searching, had suspected a secret opening and tried to find it. Anyway,
there was the gap, and there was a rough pile of broken stone not far
off, which had once been the end of the rocky stairway. It was lucky
that I hadn't struck my forehead against it in falling--the only bit of
luck which the fortune-teller had brought me!

As it was, I was not seriously hurt. Perhaps I had torn my dress, and I
should certainly have to buy a new pair of gloves, whether I could
afford them or not; otherwise I didn't think I should suffer, except for
a few black-and-blue patches. But how was I to get out of this dark
hole? That was the question. I was too hot with anger against the sly
old fox of a woman, who had pretended that she wanted to say her
prayers, to feel the chill of fear; but I couldn't help understanding
that she had got me into this trap with the object of annexing my watch
and purse or anything else of value. Perhaps the gipsy sons would rob me
first, and then murder me, rather than I should live to tell; but if
they meant to do that they would have to come and be at it soon, or I
should be missed and sought.

This last fancy really did turn me cold, and the nice hot anger which
had kept me warm began to ooze out at my fingers and toes. I thought of
my brave new brother, who would fight ten gipsy men to save me if he
only knew; and then I wanted to cry.

But that would be the silliest thing I could do. Soon they would begin
to look for me (oh, how furious Lady Turnour would be that I should dare
keep her waiting, and at the fuss about a servant!) and if I screamed at
the top of my voice maybe some one would hear.

I took a long breath, and gave vent to a blood-curdling shriek which
would have made the fortune of an actress on the stage. Odd! I couldn't
help thinking of that at the time. One thinks of queer things at the
most inappropriate moments.

It was a glorious howl, but the rock walls seemed to catch it as a
battledore catches a shuttlecock, and send it bounding back to me. I
knew then that a cry from those depths would not carry far; and the fear
at my heart gave a sharp, rat-like bite.

If I could scramble up! I thought; and promptly tried.

It looked almost easy; but for me it was impossible. A very tall woman
might have done it, perhaps, but I have only five foot four in my
Frenchiest French heels; and the broken-off place was higher than my
waist. With good hand-hold I might have dragged myself up, but the steps
above did not come at the right height to give me leverage; and always,
though I tried again and again, till my cut hands bled, I couldn't climb
up. And how silly it seemed, the whole thing! I was just like a young
fly that had come buzzing and bumbling round an ugly old spider's web,
too foolish to know that it was a web. And even now how lightly the
fly's feet were entangled! A spring, and I should be out of prison.

    "Oh, the little more, and how much it is!
    And the little less, and what worlds away!"

The words came and spoke themselves in my ears, as if they were
determined to make me cry.

I was desperately frightened and homesick--homesick even for Lady
Turnour. I should have felt like kissing the hem of her dress if I could
only have seen her now--and I wasn't able to smile when I thought what a
rage she'd be in if I did it. She would have me sent off to an insane
asylum: but even that would be much gayer and more homelike than an
underground cellar in the Ghost City of Les Baux.

Dear old Sir Samuel, with his nice red face! I almost loved him. The car
seemed like a long-lost aunt. And as for the chauffeur, my brother--I
found that I dared not think of him. As in my imagination I saw his
eyes, his good dark eyes, clear as a brook, and the lines his brown face
took when he thought intently, the tears began running down my cheeks.

"Oh, Jack--Jack, come and help me!" I called.

That comes of _thinking_ people's Christian names. They will pop out of
your mouth when you least expect it. But it mattered little enough now,
except that the sound of the name and the echo of it fluttering back to
me made my tears feel boiling hot--hotter than the punch which the
Turnours must have finished by this time.

"Jack! Jack!" I called again.

Then I heard a stone rattle up above, somewhere, and a sick horror
rushed over me, because of the gipsy men coming back with their wicked
old mother.

It was only a very dark gray in the cellar, to my unaccustomed eyes, but
suddenly it turned black, with purple edges. I knew then I was going to
faint, because I've done it once or twice before, and things always
began by being black with purple edges.




CHAPTER XV


"For heaven's sake, wake up--tell me you're not hurt!" a familiar voice
was saying in my ear, or I was dreaming it. And because it was such a
good dream I was afraid to break it by waking to some horror, so I kept
my eyes shut, hoping and hoping for it to come again.

In an instant, it did come. "Child--little girl--wake up! Can't you
speak to me?"

His hand, holding mine, was warm and extraordinarily comforting.
Suddenly I felt so happy and so perfectly safe that I was paid for
everything. My head was on somebody's arm, and I knew very well now who
the somebody was. He was real, and not a dream. I sighed cozily and
opened my eyes. His face was quite close to mine.

"Thank God!" he said. "Are you all right?"

"Now you're here," I answered. "I thought they were coming to kill me."

"Who?" he asked, quite fiercely.

"An old gipsy woman and her sons."

"Those people!" he exclaimed. "Why, it was they who told me you were in
this place. If it hadn't been for them I shouldn't have found you so
soon--though I _would_ have found you. The wretches! What made you
think--"

"The old woman was in the room above," I said, "waiting for her sons;
and she begged me to look down here for a rosary she dropped. She must
have known the bottom steps were gone. She _wanted_ me to fall; and
though I called, she didn't answer, because she'd probably hobbled off
to find her sons and bring them back to rob me. I haven't hurt myself
much, but when I found I couldn't climb up I was so frightened! I
thought no one would ever come--except those horrible gipsies. And when
I heard a sound above I was sure they were here. I felt sick and
strange, and I suppose I must have fainted."

"I heard you call, just as I got into the upper room. Then, though I
answered, everything was still. Jove! I had some bad minutes! But you're
sure you're all right now?"

"Sure," I answered, sitting up. "Did I call you 'Jack'? If I did, it was
only because one can't shriek 'Mister,' and anyway you told me to."

"Now I _know_ you're all right, or you wouldn't bother about
conventionalities. I wish I had some brandy for you--"

"I wouldn't take it if you had."

"That sounds like you. That's encouraging! Are you strong enough to let
me get you up into the light and air?"

"Quite!" I replied briskly, letting him help me to my feet. "But how are
we to get up?"

"I'll show you. It will be easy."

"Let's look first for the wicked old creature's rosary. If it isn't
here, it's certain she's a fraud."

"I should think it's certain without looking. I'd like to put the old
serpent in prison."

"I wouldn't care to trouble, now I'm safe. And anyway, how could we
prove she meant her sons to rob me, since they hadn't begun the act, and
so couldn't be caught in it?"

"She didn't know you had a man to look after you. When the guide and I
came this way, searching, we met a gipsy woman with two awful brutes,
and asked if they'd seen a young lady in a gray coat. They were all
three on their way here, as you thought; but when they saw us close to
this house, of course, they dared not carry out their plan, and the old
woman made the best of a bad business. No doubt they're as far off by
this time as they could get. It might be difficult to prove anything,
but I'd like to try."

"_I_ wouldn't," I said. "But let's look for that rosary. Have you any
matches?"

"Plenty." He took out a match-case, and held a wax vesta for me to peer
about in the neighbourhood of the broken stairway.

"Here's something glittering!" I exclaimed, just as I had been about to
give up the search in vain. "She said there was a silver crucifix."

I slipped my fingers into a crack where the rock had been split in
breaking off the lower steps. A small, bright thing was there, almost
buried in débris, but I could not get my fingers in deep enough to
dislodge it. Impatiently I pulled out a hat-pin, and worked until I had
unearthed--not the rosary, but a silver coin.

"Somebody else has been down here, dropping money," I said, handing the
piece up for Mr. Dane to examine.

"Then it was a long time ago," he replied, "for the coin has the head of
Louis XIII. on it."

"Oh, then she was right!" I cried. "I _can_ find lost treasure. I'm
going to look for more. I believe that piece must have fallen out of a
hole I've found here, which goes back ever so far into the rock. I can
get my arm in nearly to the elbow."

"_Who_ was 'right'?" my brother wanted to know.

"The gipsy. She told my fortune. That was why I didn't refuse to look
for her rosary."

"I should have thought a child would have known better," he remarked,
scornfully; and his tone hurt my sensitiveness the more because his
voice had been so anxious and his words so kind when I was fainting. He
had called me "child" and "little girl." I remembered well, and the
words had been saying themselves over in my mind ever since. I rather
thought that they betrayed a secret--that perhaps he had been getting to
care for me a little. That idea pleased me, because he had been abrupt
sometimes, and I hadn't known what to make of him. Every girl owes it to
herself to understand a man thoroughly--at least, as much of his
character and feelings as may concern her. Besides, it is not soothing
to one's vanity to try--well, yes, I may as well confess that!--to _try_
and please a man, yet to know you've failed after days of association so
constant and intimate that hours are equal to the same number of months
in an ordinary acquaintance. Now, after thinking I'd made the discovery
that he really had found me attractive, it was a shock to be spoken to
in this way.

"Oh, you _are_ cross!" I exclaimed, still poking about in the hole under
the stairway.

"I'm not cross," he said, "but if I were, you'd deserve it, because you
know you've been foolish. And if you don't know, you ought to, so that
you may be wiser next time. The idea of a sensible young woman chumming
up in a lonely cave, with a dirty old gipsy certain to be a thief, if
not worse, letting her tell fortunes, and then falling into a trap like
this. I wouldn't have believed it of you!"

"I think you're perfectly horrid," said I. "I wish you had let the guide
find me. He would have done it just as well, and been much more polite."

"Doubtless he would have been more polite, but he isn't as young, and
might have had trouble in getting you out. There! that's my last match,
and you mustn't waste any more time looking for treasure which you won't
find."

"Which I _have_ found!" I announced. "I've got something more--away at
the back of the hole. Not that you deserve to see it!"

However, I held up my hand in its torn, bloodstained glove, with two
silver pieces displayed on the palm.

"A child's hidey-hole, I suppose," he said without showing as much
interest as the occasion warranted. "Otherwise there would be something
more valuable. A young servant of the Grimaldis, perhaps; these coins
are all of the same period--of no great value as antiques, I'm afraid."

"They're of value to me," I retorted. "They'll bring me luck." I would
of course have given him one, if he hadn't been so disagreeable; but now
I felt that he shouldn't have anything of mine if he were starving.

"You are very superstitious, among other childlike qualities," he
replied, laughing. So _that_ was what he thought of me, and _that_ was
why he had called me "child"! It was all spoiled now, from the
beginning; and the guide might as well have found me, as I had said,
without _quite_ meaning it at the time.

"If you don't like lucky things, you can throw away my St. Christopher,"
I said, coldly. "You must have thought it very silly."

"I thought it extremely kind of you to give it, and I've no intention of
throwing it away, or parting with it," said he. "Now, are you ready?"

"Yes," I snapped.

In an instant he had me by the waist between two hands which felt strong
as steel buckles, and swung me up like a feather on to the first step of
the broken stairs. Then, in another second, he was at my side,
supporting me to the top without a word, except a muttered "Don't be
childish!" when I would have pushed away his arm.

Strange to say, I forgot Lady Turnour and Sir Samuel until we saw the
guide, to whom long ago Mr. Dane had called up a reassuring _"Tout va
bien!_" Then, suddenly, the awful truth sprang into my mind. All this
time they had been waiting for me! What would they say? What would they
do?

In my horror, I even forgot my righteous anger with the chauffeur. "Oh!"
I gasped. "_The Turnours!_"

Then Mr. Dane spoke kindly again. "Don't worry," he said. "It's all
right. They've gone on."

"In the car?" I cried.

"No. Sir Samuel can't drive the car. And as Lady Turnour thought she had
a chill, rather than wait for me to find you they took a carriage which
was here, and drove down to St. Remy. They'll go on by rail to Avignon,
and--"

"There must have been a dreadful row!" I groaned.

"Not at all. You're not to worry. Lady Turnour behaved like a cad, as
usual, but what can you expect? Sir Samuel did the best he could. He
would have liked to wait, but if he'd insisted she would have had
hysterics."

"How came there to be a carriage here?" I asked the guide.

"The gentleman paid three young men who had driven up in it a good sum
to get it for himself," he explained, "and they are walking down. They
are of Germany."

"Was it a long time?" I went on. "Oh, it _must_ have been. It's nearly
dark now, except for the moonlight."

"It is perhaps an hour altogether since mademoiselle separated herself
from the others," the guide admitted. "But they have been gone for more
than half that time. They did not delay long, after the little dispute
with monsieur about the car."

"Oh, there was a dispute!" I caught him up, wheeling upon the chauffeur.
"You _must_ tell me."

"It was nothing much," he said, still very kindly, "and it was her
ladyship's fault, of course. If you were plain and elderly she'd have
more patience; but as it is, you've seen how quick she is to scold; so,
of course, she was angry when she'd finished her grog and you didn't
turn up."

"What did she say," I asked.

He laughed. "She was quite irrelevant."

"I must know!"

"Well, she seemed to lay most of the blame on the colour of your hair
and eyelashes."

"She said--"

"What could be expected of a girl that dyed her hair yellow and her
eyelashes black?"

"_Horrid_ woman! You don't believe I do, do you?"

"I must say it hadn't occurred to me to think of it."

Then I remembered how angry I was with him, and didn't pursue that
subject, but turned again to the other. However, I made a mental note
that there was one more thing to punish him for when I got the chance.

"What else did she say?"

"She began to turn purple when Sir Samuel would have defended you, and
said she wouldn't stand your taking such liberties. That it was
monstrous, and a few other things, to be kept freezing on mountains by
one's domestics, and that she should be ill if she waited. Sir Samuel
persuaded her to give you fifteen minutes' grace, but after that she was
determined to start. Of course, she didn't know that an accident had
happened. She thought you were simply dawdling, and wanted Sir Samuel to
arrange for you to drive down with the newly arrived German tourists.
Sir Samuel and I objected to this, and later it was settled for the
Turnours to do what her ladyship planned for you, without the company of
the tourists. Lady Turnour resents _lèse-majesté_."

"It's a miracle she consented to leave the car," I said.

"She couldn't use it without a chauffeur, and naturally I refused to go
without knowing what had happened to you."

"You refused!" I stammered.

"Of course. That was where the row came in. We had a few words, and
eventually I was deputed to look you up."

"Deputed!" I echoed, desperately. "They never 'deputed' you to do it,
I'm sure."

"They jolly well couldn't help themselves. You can't make a man drive a
car if he won't. So they went off in the Germans' carriage, and the
Germans were enchanted."

"Oh!" I exclaimed, so miserable now that anger leaked out of my heart
like water through a sieve. "It's all my fault. Did they discharge you?"

"I didn't give them the chance. After a few little things her ladyship
said, I felt rather hot in the collar, and discharged myself. That is, I
gave them notice that I would go as soon as they could get another
chauffeur. It would have been bad form to leave them in the lurch,
without anyone, on tour."

The tears came to my eyes, and I was thinking so little about myself
that I let them roll down without bothering to wipe them away. "Do, do
forgive me," I implored. "But you never can, of course. All through my
foolishness you're out of an engagement. And you depended upon it, I
know, from what you said."

"There's nothing to forgive, my dear little sister," he said. "It's you
who must forgive me, if I've distressed you by telling the story in a
clumsy way. It wasn't your fault. I couldn't stand that bounderess's
cruel tongue, so I have myself to blame, if anyone. And it's sure to
turn out right in the end."

"You refused to drive their car because you would stay behind and find
me--"

"Any decent chap would do that--even a chauffeur." He spoke lightly to
comfort me. "Besides, I wanted to stop. You're the only sister I ever
had."

"You must hate me," I moaned.

"I don't. Please don't cry. I shall faint if you do."

I was obliged to laugh a little through my tears.

"Come," he said, gently. "Let me take you down. Just a word with the
guide about those gipsies, and--"

"Oh, leave the wretched gipsies alone!" I begged. "Who cares, now? If
you say anything, they may call us as witnesses at St. Remy or some town
where we don't want to stop. Let them go."

"I suppose we might as well," he said, "for we can't prove anything
worth proving. Come, then." He slipped some money into the guide's hand,
and thanked him for his courtesy and kindness. But another pang shot
through my remorseful heart. More money spent by this man for me, when
he had so little, and had lost the engagement which, though unworthy his
rank in life, was the only present means he had of earning a livelihood.
I came, obeying in forlorn silence, and could not answer when he tried
to cheer me up as we walked down to the Hotel Monte Carlo. There stood
the Aigle in charge of a youth from the inn, and there was more money
to be paid to him. I wanted to give it, but saw that if I insisted Mr.
Dane would be vexed.

He suggested putting me inside, as the air was now very cold, with the
chill that falls after sunset; but I refused. "I want to sit by you!" I
implored, and he said no more. With the glass cage behind us empty, and
the great acetylene lamps alight, the Aigle turned and flew down the
hill.




CHAPTER XVI


For some time we did not speak, but my thoughts moved more quickly than
the beating of the engine. At last I said meekly, "Of course, I may as
well consider myself discharged, too. And even if I weren't, I should
go."

"I've been thinking about that," Mr. Dane answered. "It was the first
thought that came into my head when the row began. It isn't likely
she'll want you to leave, because she won't like getting on without a
maid. I think, in the circumstances, unless she is brutal, you'd better
stay with her till your friends can receive you. Someone _must_ come
forward and help you now."

"I wouldn't ask anyone but Pamela, who's gone to America," I protested.
"Besides, I can't stand Lady Turnour after what's happened--with you
gone."

(As I said this, I remembered again how I had dreaded to associate with
the chauffeur, and planned to avoid him. It was rather funny, as it had
turned out; but somehow I didn't feel like laughing.)

"Of course _you_ won't mind," I went on. "It's different for a man. If
you were left and I going, it wouldn't matter, because you'd have the
car. But I've nothing--except Lady Turnour's 'transformation.' Luckily,
she won't want me to stop."

"I think she will," he said, "because your only fault was in having an
accident. You weren't impudent, as she thinks I was in refusing to drive
the car. Also in letting her see that I thought her willingness to leave
a young girl in a place like this, alone for hours (she did propose to
let me drive back for you) was the most brutal thing I'd ever heard of."

"Oh, how good you were, to sacrifice yourself like that for me!" I
exclaimed.

"It wasn't entirely for you," he said. "One owes some things to oneself.
But when we get to Avignon, and it's settled between you and Lady
Turnour, promise to let me know what you mean to do and give me a chance
to advise you."

I promised. But I was so melancholy as to the future and so ashamed of
myself for the trouble brought upon my only friend, that his efforts to
cheer me were hopeless as an attempt to let off wet fireworks. Mine were
soaked; and instead of admiring the moonlight, which soon flooded the
wild landscape, it made me the more dismal.

The drive by day had seemed short, but now it was long, for I was in
haste to begin the expected battle.

"Courage! and be wise," said Mr. Dane, as he helped me out of the car in
front of the Hotel de l'Europe. "I shall bring up your dinner
again--it's no use saying you don't want anything--and we'll exchange
news."

When lions have to be faced, my theory is that the best thing is to open
the cage door and walk in boldly, not crawl in on your knees, saying:
"Please don't eat me."

I expected Lady Turnour to have a fine appetite for any martyrs lying
about loose, but to my surprise a faint "Come in!" answered my
dauntless knock, and I beheld her prostrate in bed.

She said that I had nearly killed her, and that she would probably not
be able to move for a week; but the story of my adventures with the
gipsy interested her somewhat, and she brightened when she heard of the
old coins found in a hole in the rock. There was not a word about
sending me away, and I suspected that a scene with Sir Samuel had
crushed the lady. Even a worm will turn, and Sir Samuel may be one of
those mild men who, when once roused, are capable of surprising those
who know them best. Quite meekly she desired that I would show her the
coins, and having seen them, she said that she would buy them off me.
Not that they were of any intrinsic value, but they might be "lucky,"
and she would give me a sovereign for the three.

Then an idea came and whispered in my ear. I thanked Lady Turnour
politely, but said I thought I had better keep the coins and show them
to an antiquary. They might be more valuable than we supposed, and I
should need all the money, as well as all the luck possible, now that I
was leaving her ladyship's service.

"Leaving!" she echoed. "But as you had an accident I've made up my mind
to excuse you this time, and not discharge you as I intended. You don't
know your business too well, but any maid is better than no maid on a
tour like this, as Sir Samuel pointed out to me."

"But, begging your ladyship's pardon," I ventured, "I understand that
the chauffeur is to go because he stopped at Les Baux to look for me. As
he very likely saved my life, I couldn't be so ungrateful as to stay on
in my situation when he is losing his for my sake."

"What nonsense!" snapped her ladyship. "As if that had anything to do
with you, and if it has, it _oughtn't_. Besides, if he will apologize,
he can stop. Sir Samuel says so."

"He doesn't seem to think he was in the wrong, my lady," said I. "As
your ladyship will probably be at Avignon some time before finding
another chauffeur, it will be easy to look for a maid at the same time."

"Be here some time!" she cried. "I won't! We want to get on to a château
where my stepson's visiting."

"I should be delighted to offer your ladyship two of the lucky coins for
nothing," said I, my impertinence wrapped in honey, "if she would
persuade Sir Samuel to _ask_ the chauffeur to stay."

"Why, that's just what Sir Samuel wants to do, if I would hear of it!"
The words popped out before she had stopped to think.

"It might be too late after this evening," I suggested. "The chauffeur
will perhaps take steps at once to secure some other engagement; and I
fear that a good man is always in great demand. I hope that your
ladyship will kindly understand that it would be nothing to _me_, if he
hadn't got into trouble for my sake."

"You can leave the coins, and call Sir Samuel, who is in his room next
door," remarked Lady Turnour with dignity. "I will talk with him."

The greedy creature was delighted to have the coins without paying for
them, and delighted with the excuse to do what she would have liked to
do without an excuse, if obstinacy had not forbidden. I kept one coin
for my own luck; I called Sir Samuel, who was sulking in his den, was
dismissed with an order for her ladyship's dinner, which she would have
in bed, and told to return with the menu.

A few minutes later, coming back, I met Mr. Jack Dane in the corridor.

"Have you seen Sir Samuel yet?" I inquired.

"No. He's sent for me, and I'm on my way to him now."

"He's going to ask you to stay," I said.

"I think you're mistaken there," replied the chauffeur. "The old boy
himself has a strong sense of justice, and would like to make everything
all right, no doubt, but his wife would give him no peace if he did."

"If he does, though, what shall you do?" I inquired anxiously.

Mr. Dane looked into space. "I think I'd better go in any case."

"Why?"

If he'd been a woman, I think he would have answered "Because," but
being a man he reflected a few seconds, and said he thought it would be
better for him in the end.

"Do you want to go?" I asked, drearily.

"No. But I ought to want to."

"Please stay," I begged. "Please--brother."

"Sir Samuel mayn't ask me; and you wouldn't have me crawl to him?"

"But if he does ask you."

"I'll stay," he said.

Impulsively, I held out my hand. He took it, and pressed it so hard
that it hurt, then dropped it suddenly. His manner is certainly very odd
sometimes. I suppose he doesn't want me to flatter myself that I am of
any importance in his scheme of existence. But he needn't worry. He has
shown me very plainly that he is one of those typical, unsusceptible
Englishmen French writers put in their books, men with hearts whose
every compartment is warranted love-tight.




CHAPTER XVII


Lady Turnour opened her heart and her wardrobe and gave me a blouse the
first thing in the morning, which act of generosity was the more
remarkable as morning is not her best time. I have found that it is the
early maid who catches the first snub, which otherwise might fall
innocuously upon a husband. The blouse was one which I had heard her
ladyship say she hated; but then her idea of true charity, combined, as
it should be, with economy, is always to give to the poor what you
wouldn't be found dead in yourself, because it is more blessed to give
than to receive badly made things. On the same principle I immediately
passed the gift on to a chambermaid of the hotel, who perhaps in her
turn dropped it a grade lower in the social scale, and so it may go on
forever, blouse without end; but all that is apart from the point. The
important part of the transaction was the token that the dead past was
to bury its dead; and possibly Sir Samuel timidly offered a waistcoat or
a pair of boots to the chauffeur.

Instead of lying in bed, as Lady Turnour had threatened to do for a
week, she was up earlier than usual, as well as ever she had been, and
not more than half as disagreeable. Although the sky looked as if it
might burst into tears at any moment, and although Orange has nothing
but historic remains and historic records to show, she was ready to
start, almost cheerfully, at ten o'clock.

I was allowed to be of the party, laden with mackintoshes for my master
and mistress; and I didn't admire the triumphal arch at Orange nearly as
much as I had admired the smaller and older one at St. Remy. But Lady
Turnour admired it far more, and was so nice to Sir Samuel that he
thought it _the_ arch of the world. They put their heads together over
the same volume of Baedeker, which was an exquisite pleasure to the poor
man, and he was so pathetic I could have cried into his footsteps, as he
read (pronouncing almost everything wrong) about the building of the
Arch of Tiberius. "Why, that's just like a sweet little statuette I used
to have standing on a table in my drawing-room window!" exclaimed Lady
Turnour, looking up at the beautiful Winged Victory. "You might think it
was a copy!"

Although the histories say Orange wasn't very important in Roman days,
it has taken revenge by letting everything not Roman fall into decay,
except, of course, its memories of the family through which William the
Silent of Holland became William of Orange. The house of the first
William of Orange, the hero of song who rode back wounded from
Roncesvalles to his waiting wife, is gone now, save for a wall and a
buttress or two on a lonely hill of the old town; yet the arch, which
was old when his château was begun, still towers dark yellow as
tarnished Etruscan gold against the sky; and the Roman theatre is the
grandest out of Italy. Lady Turnour could not see why the Comédie
Française should produce plays there, even once a year, when they could
do it so much more comfortably at any modern theatre in the provinces
if they _must_ travel; and as to the gathering of the Felibres, she
didn't even know what Felibres were, nor did she care, as she was
unlikely to meet any in society. She would have proposed going on
somewhere else, as there was so "little to see in Orange," but that rain
came sweeping down, cold from the east, when I had followed the pair a
quarter of a mile from the motor. They fled into their mackintoshes as a
hermit-crab flees into his borrowed shell, and I was the only one the
worse for wear when we reached the car. I didn't much mind the wetting,
but it was rather nice to be fussed over by a brother, and forced into a
coat of his, whether I liked or not. "The quality" must have seen me in
it, through the glass, but Lady Turnour ignored the sight. Altogether,
everything was agreeable, and the thunder-storm of last night, in
clearing, had turned us into quite a happy family party.

It rained all day, and I sat in my room before a blazing fire of olive
wood which a dear old waiter, exactly like a confidential servant of a
pope, bestowed upon me out of sheer Provençal good nature. As he's been
in the hotel for thirty years, he is a privileged person, and can do
what he likes.

Lady Turnour gave me a pile of stockings to look over, lest Satan should
find some more ornamental use for my idle hands; so I asked Mr. Dane for
his socks too; and pretended that I should consider it a slight upon my
skill if he refused.

That was our last night at Avignon, and early in the morning I packed
for Arles, where we would sleep. But on the way we stopped at Tarascon,
so splendid with its memories of Du Guesclin, and the towers of King
René's great château reflected in a water-mirror, that no Tartarin could
be blamed if he were born with a boasting spirit. And there are other
things in Tarascon for its Tartarins to be proud of, besides the noble
old castle where King René used to spend his springs and summers when he
was tired of living in state at Aix. There is the church of Saint
Martha, and the beautiful Hotel de Ville, and--almost best of all for
its quaintness, though far from beautiful--the great Tarasque lurking in
a dark and secret lair.

We couldn't go into the château, but perhaps it was better to see it
only from the outside, and remember it always in a crystal picture,
framed with the turquoise of the sky. Besides, not going in gave us more
time for Beaucaire, just across the river--Beaucaire of the Fair;
Beaucaire of sweet Nicolete and her faithful lover Aucassin.

I know a song about Nicolete of the white feet and hair of yellow gold,
and I sang it below my breath, sitting beside my brother Jack, as we
crossed the bridge. Although I sang so softly, he heard, and turned to
me for an instant. "You _can_ sing!" he said.

"You don't like singing," I suggested.

"Only better than most things--that's all."

"Yet you didn't want me to sing the other night."

"That was because your hair was down. I couldn't stand both together."

"I don't know what you mean."

"Don't you? All the better. Never mind trying to guess. Let's think
about the fair. Wouldn't you have liked to come here in the days when it
was one of the greatest shows in all France?"

"I couldn't have come in a motor then."

"You're getting to be an enthusiast. You'll have to marry a millionaire
with at least a forty-horse-power car."

"I happen to be running away from one now, in a sixty-horse-power car.
But I don't want to think of him in this romantic country. The idea of
Corn Plasters, near the garden where Nicolete's little feet tripped
among the daisies by moonlight, is too appalling."

"Up on the hill are the towers of the castle where Aucassin was in
prison for his love of Nicolete," said the chauffeur. "If only I can
induce them to go there, and walk in the garden on the battlements! It's
beautiful, full of great perfumed Provençal roses, and quantities of
fleur-de-lys growing wild under pine trees and peering out of formal yew
hedges. You never saw anything quite like it. Oh, I must manage the
thing somehow."

"I think you could, in their present mood," said I. "They're quite
properly honey-moony since the storm, which was a blessing in disguise.
They'll go up, and feel romantic and young; but as for me--"

"You'll go up, and _be_ the things they can only feel. I should like to
go with you there--" he broke off, looking wistful.

"Oh, do get some one to guard the car, and come," I begged him. "You've
seen it all before?"

"Yes."

"You look as if the place had sentimental memories for you."

He smiled. "There is a sentiment attaching to it. Someday I may tell
you--" he stopped again. "No, I don't think I'll do that."

Suddenly the thought of the garden was spoiled for me. I imagined that,
in happier days, he must have walked there with a girl he loved. Perhaps
he loved her still, only misfortune had come to him, and they could not
marry. In that case, I'd been misjudging him, maybe. His bluntnesses and
abruptnesses and coldnesses didn't mean that the compartments were
"love-tight," as I'd fancied, but that they were already full to
overflowing.

He did induce the Turnours to see the garden on the old battlements, and
he did find a suitable watch-dog for the car in order to be my
companion. And he was less self-conscious and happier in his manner than
he had been since the first day or two of our acquaintance. Also the
garden, starred with spring flowers, was even more lovely than I had
expected. I ought to have enjoyed every moment there; but--it is never
pleasant to be with a man when you think he is wishing that you were
another girl.

"Was she pretty?" I couldn't resist asking.

For an instant he looked bewildered; then he understood. "Very," he
replied, smiling. "About the prettiest girl I ever saw. The description
of Nicolete would fit her very well. 'The clear face, delicately fine,'
and all that. But I don't let my mind dwell much on girls in these days,
when I can help it, as you can well imagine."

"And when you can't help it?" I wanted to know.

"Oh, when I can't help it, I feel like a bear with a sore head, and no
honey in my hollow tree."

So that is why he is so disagreeable, sometimes! He is thinking of the
girl of the battlemented garden at Beaucaire. I shall try and find out
all about her; but I don't know that I shall feel better satisfied when
I have.




CHAPTER XVIII


The garden on the battlements at Beaucaire seemed to bring out all
that's best in Lady Turnour, and she was--for her--quite radiant when we
arrived at Arles. Not that it was much credit to her to be radiant, when
the road had been perfect, and the car had behaved like an angel, as
usual; but small favours from small natures are thankfully received; and
just as it is a blight upon the spirits of the whole party when her
ladyship frowns, so do we cheer up and hope for better things when she
smiles.

As we were to spend the night at Arles, and arrived at the quaint,
delightful Hôtel du Forum before lunch, even the working classes
(meaning my alleged brother and myself) could afford that pleasant,
leisured feeling which is the right of those more highly placed.

The moment we arrived I knew that I was going to fall in love with
Arles, and I hurried to get the unpacking done, so that I might be free
to make its acquaintance. Lady Turnour, still in her garden mood, told
me to do as I liked till time to dress her for dinner, but to mind and
have no more accidents, as all her frocks hooked at the back.

I am getting to be quite a skilled lady's-maid now, and am not sure it
ought not to be my permanent _métier_, though I do like to think I was
born for better things, and comfort myself by remembering how mother
used to say that a lady can always do everything better than a common
person if she chooses to try, even menial work, because she puts her
intelligence and love for daintiness into all she does. I unpacked my
master's and mistress's things with the flashing speed of summer
lightning and the neatness of a drill-sergeant. In a twinkling
everything was in exactly the right place, and my conscience felt as if
it were growing wings as I flew off to my luncheon. The whole afternoon
free, and the saints only knew what nice, unexpected adventures might
happen! Cousin Catherine used to say, not meaning to be complimentary,
that I "attracted adventures as some people seem to attract microbes,"
and I could almost hear them buzzing round my head as I ran down-stairs.

There, waiting for me as if he were an incarnate adventure, was the
chauffeur, who appeared to be quite excited. "You must have a peep into
the dining-room," he said. "The door's open. You can look in without
being noticed, and see the walls, which are painted with pictures from
Mistral's works. Also there's something else of interest, but I won't
tell you what it is. I want to see if you can discover it for yourself."

I peeped, and found the pictures charming. After following them with my
eyes all round the green walls which they decorate effectively, my gaze
lit upon a man sitting at one of the small tables. He was with two or
three friends who hung upon the words which he accompanied by the most
graceful, spirited, yet unconscious gestures. Old he may have been as
years go, but the fire of eternal youth was in his vivid dark eyes, and
his smile, which had in it the tenderness of great experience, of long
years lived in sympathy and love for mankind. His head was very noble;
and its shape, and the way he had of carrying it, would alone have shown
that he was Someone.

"Who is that man?" I whispered to Jack Dane. "That one who is so
different from all the others."

"Can't you guess?" he asked.

"Not Mistral?"

"Yes. It's one of his days here. He'll be in the museum after lunch.
I'll take you there, and if he sees that you're interested in things,
he'll talk to you."

"Oh, how glorious!" I breathed, quite awed at the prospect. "But if he
should find out that we're only lady's-maid and chauffeur?"

"Do you think it would matter to him _who_ we were--a great genius like
that? He wouldn't care if we were beggars, if we had souls and brains
and hearts."

"Well, we have got _some_ of those things," I said. "Do let's hurry, and
get to the museum before our betters. They can always be counted upon to
spend an hour and a half at lunch if there's a good excuse, such as
there's sure to be in this place, famous for rich Provençal cooking.
Whereas Monsieur Mistral looks as if he would grudge more than half an
hour on an occupation so prosaic as eating."

"Nothing could be prosaic to him," said Mr. Dane. "And that's the secret
of life, isn't it? I think you have it, too, and I'm trying to take
daily lessons from you. By the time we part I hope I shan't be quite
such a sulky, discontented brute as I am now."

"By the time we part!" The words gave me a queer, horrid little prick,
with just that nasty ache that comes when you jab a hatpin into your
head instead of into your hat, and have got to pull it out again. I have
grown so used to being constantly with him, and having him look after me
and order me about in his dictatorial but curiously nice way, that I
suppose I shall rather miss him for a week or two when this odd
association of ours comes to an end.

It is strange how one ancient town can differ utterly from its
neighbour, and what an extraordinary, unforgettable individuality each
can have.

The whole effect of Avignon is mediæval. In Arles your mind flies back
at once to Rome, and then pushes away from Rome to find Greece. All
among the red, pink, and yellow houses, huddled picturesquely together
round the great arena, you see Rome in the carved columns and dark piles
of brick built into mediæval walls. The glow and colour of the shops and
houses seem only to intensify the grimness and grayness of that Roman
background, the immense wall of the arena. Greece you see in the eyes of
the beautiful, stately women, young and old, in their classic features,
and the moulding of their noble figures. (No wonder Epistemon urged his
giant to let the beautiful girls of Arles alone!) You feel Greece, too,
in the soft charm of the atmosphere, the dreamy blue of the sky, and the
sunshine, which is not quite garish golden, not quite pale silver; a
special sky and special sunshine, which seem to belong to Arles alone,
enclosing the city in a dream of vanished days. The very gaiety which
must have sparkled there for happy Greek youths and maidens gives a
strange, fascinating sadness to it now, as if one felt the weight of
Roman rule which came and dimmed the sunlight.

It was delightful to walk the streets, to look at the lovely women in
their becoming head-dresses, and to stare into the windows of curiosity
shops. But there was the danger of committing _lèse-majesté_ by running
into the arms of the bride and groom at the museum, so "my brother"
hurried me along faster than I liked, until the fascination of the
museum had enthralled me; then I thanked him, for Mistral was there, for
the moment all alone.

Mr. Dane hadn't told me that they had met before, but Monsieur Mistral
greeted him at once as an acquaintance, smiling one of his illuminating
smiles. He even remembered certain treasures of the museum which the
chauffeur--in unchauffeur days--had liked best. These were pointed out
and their interest explained to me, best of all to my romantic, Latin
side being the "Cabelladuro d'Or," the lovely golden hair of the dead
Beauty of Les Baux, that enchanted princess whose magic sleep was so
rudely broken. We all talked together of the exquisite Venus of Arles,
agreeing that it was wicked to have transplanted her to the Louvre; and
Mistral's eyes rested upon me with something like interest for a moment
as I said that I had seen and loved her there. I felt flattered and
happy, forgetting that I was only a servant, who ought scarcely to have
dared speak in the presence of this great genius.

"She seems to understand something of the charm of Provence, which
makes our country different from any other in the world, does she not?"
the poet said at last to my companion. "She would enjoy an August fête
at Arles. Some day you ought to bring her."

Mr. Dane did not answer or look at me; and I was thankful for that,
because I was being silly enough to blush. It was too easy so see what
Monsieur Mistral thought!

"Why didn't you tell me you knew him already?" I asked, when we had
reluctantly left the museum (which might be invaded by the Philistines
at any minute) and were on our way to the famous Church of St. Trophime.
That we meant to see first, saving the theatre for sunset.

"Oh," answered the chauffeur evasively, "I wasn't at all sure he'd
remember me. He has so many admirers, and sees so many people."

"I have a sort of idea that your last visit to this part of the world
was paid _en prince_, all the same!" I was impertinent enough to say.

He laughed. "Well, it was rather different from this one, anyhow," he
admitted. "A little while ago it made me pretty sick to compare the past
with the present, but I don't feel like that now."

"Why have you changed?" I asked.

"Partly the influence of your cheerful mind."

"Thank you. And the other part?"

"Another influence, even more powerful."

"I should like to know what it is, so that I might try to come under it,
too, if it's beneficent," that ever-lively curiosity of mine prompted me
to say.

"I am inclined to think it is not beneficent," he answered, smiling
mysteriously. "Anyhow, I'm not going to tell you what it is."

"You never do tell me anything about yourself," I exclaimed crossly,
"whereas I've given you my whole history, almost from the day I cut my
first tooth, up to that when I--adopted my first brother."

"Or had him thrust upon you," he amended. "You see, you've nothing to
reproach yourself with in your past, so you can talk of it without
bitterness. I can't--yet. Only to think of some things makes me feel
venomous, and though I really believe I'm improving in the sunbath of
your example, which I have every day, the cure isn't complete yet. Until
I am able to talk of a certain person without wanting to sprinkle my
conversation with curses, I mean to be silent. But I owe it to you that
I don't _want_ to curse her any more. A short time ago it gave me actual
pleasure."

So it is to a woman he owes his misfortunes! As Alice said in
Wonderland, it grows "mysteriouser and mysteriouser." Also it grows more
romantic, when one puts two and two together; and I have always been
great at that. The "sentimental association" of the battlement garden
plus the inspiration to evil language, equal (in my fancy) one fair,
faithless lady, once loved, now hated. I hate her, too, whatever she
did, and I should like to box her ears. I hope she's _quite_ old, and
married, and that she makes up her complexion, and everything else which
causes men to tire of their first loves sooner or later. Not that it is
anything to me, personally; but one owes a little loyalty to one's
friends.

The porch and cloisters of St. Trophime's were too perfectly beautiful
to be marred by a mood; but my brother Jack's mysteriously wicked
sweetheart would keep coming in between me and the wonderful carvings in
the most disturbing way. Some women never know when they are wanted! But
I did my best to make Mr. Dane forget her by taking an intelligent
interest in everything, especially the things he cared for most, though
once, in an absent-minded instant, I did unfortunately say: "I don't
admire that type of girl," when we were talking about a sculptured
saint; and although he looked surprised I thought it too complicated to
try and explain.

The afternoon light was burnishing the ancient stone carvings to copper
when we left the cloisters of St. Trophime, took one last look at the
porch, and turned toward the amphitheatre. We were right to have waited,
for the vast circle was golden in the sunset, like a heavy bracelet,
dropped by Atlas one day, when he stretched a weary arm; and the
beautiful fragments of coloured marbles, which the Greeks loved and
Christians destroyed, were the jewels of that great bracelet. The place
was so pathetically beautiful in the dying day that a soft sadness
pressed upon me like a hand on my forehead, and echoes of the long-dead
past, when Greek Arles was a harbour of commerce by sea and river, or
when it was Roman Arelate, rich and cruel, rang in my ears as we
wandered through the cells of prisoners, the dens of lions, and the
rooms of gladiators, where the young "men about town" used to pat their
favourites on oiled backs, or make their bets on ivory tablets.

"If we were here by moonlight, we should see ghosts," I said. "Come,
let us go before it grows any darker or sadder. The shadows seem to
move. I think there's a lion crouching in that black corner."

"He won't hurt you, sister Una," said my brother Jack. "There's one
thing you must see here before I take you home--back to the hotel, I
mean; and that is the Saracen Tower, as they call it."

So we went into the Saracen Tower, and high up on the wall I saw the
presentment of a hand.

"That is the Hand of Fatima," explained the guide, who had been
following rather than conducting us, because the chauffeur knew almost
as much about the amphitheatre as he did. "You should touch it,
mademoiselle, for luck. All the young ladies like to do that here; and
the young men also, for that matter."

Instantly my brother lifted me up, so that I might touch the hand; and
then I would not be content unless he touched it too.

I had dinner in the couriers' room that evening, with my brother, when I
had dressed Lady Turnour for hers. We were rather late, and had the room
to ourselves, for the crowd which had collected there at luncheon time
had vanished by train or motor. There was a nice old waiter, who was
frankly interested in us, recognizing perhaps that, as a maid and
chauffeur, we were out of the beaten track. He wanted to know if we had
done any sight-seeing in Arles, and seemed to take it as a personal
compliment that we had.

"Mademoiselle touched the Hand of Fatima, of course?" he asked, letting
a trickle of sauce spill out of a sauce-boat in his friendly eagerness
for my answer.

"Oh, yes, I saw to it that she did that," replied Mr. Dane, with
conscious virtue in the achievement.

"It is for luck, isn't it?" I said, to make conversation.

"And more especially for love," came the unexpected answer.

"For love!" I exclaimed.

"But yes," chuckled the old man. "If a young girl puts her hand on the
Hand of Fatima at Arles, that hand puts love into hers. Her fate is
sealed within the month, so it is said."

"Nonsense!" remarked Mr. Dane, "I never heard that silly story before."
And he went on eating his dinner with extraordinary nonchalance and an
unusual, almost abnormal, appetite.




CHAPTER XIX


I shall always feel that I dreamed Aigues Mortes: that I fell asleep at
night--oh, but fell very far, so much farther than one usually falls
even when one wakes with the sensation of dropping from a great height,
that I went bumping down, down from century to century, until I touched
earth in a strange, drear land, to find I had gone back in time about
seven hundred years.

Not that there is a conspicuous amount either of land or earth at Aigues
Mortes, City of Dead Waters--if the place really does exist, which I
begin to doubt already; but I have only to shut my eyes to call it up;
and in my memory I shall often use it as a background for some mediæval
picture painted with my mind. For with my mind I can rival Raphael. It
is only when I try to execute my fancies that I fail, and then they "all
come different," which is heart breaking. But it will be something to
have the background always ready.

The dream did not begin while we spun gaily from Arles to Aigues Mortes,
through pleasant if sometimes puerile-seeming country (puerile only
because we hadn't its history dropping from our fingers' ends); but
there was time, between coming in sight of the huge, gray-brown towers
and driving in through the fortified gateway, for me to take that great
leap from the present far down into the past.

To my own surprise, I didn't want to think of the motor-car. It had
brought us to older places, but within this walled quadrangle it was as
if we had come full tilt into a picture; and the automobile was not an
artistic touch. Ingrate that I was, I turned my back upon the Aigle, and
was thankful when Sir Samuel and Lady Turnour walked out of my sight
around the corner of the picture. I pretended, when they had
disappeared, that I had painted them out, and that they would cease to
exist unless I relented and painted them in again, as eventually I
should have to do. But I had no wish to paint the driver of the car out
of my picture, for in spite of his chauffeur's dress he is of a type
which suits any century, any country--that clear-cut, slightly stern,
aquiline type which you find alike on Roman coins and in modern
drawing-rooms. He would have done very well for one of St. Louis's
crusaders, waiting here at Aigues Mortes to sail for Palestine with his
king, from the sole harbour the monarch could claim as his on all the
Mediterranean coast. I decided to let him remain in the dream picture,
therefore, and told him so, which seemed to please him, for his eyes
lighted up. He always understands exactly what I mean when I say odd
things. I should never have felt _quite_ the same to him again, I think,
if he had stared and asked "What dream picture?"

I had been brought on this expedition strictly for use, not for
ornament. We were going from Aigues Mortes to St. Gilles and from St.
Gilles to Nîmes, therefore Arles was already a landmark in our past. I
could walk about and amuse myself if I liked, but I must be at the inn
before the return of my master and mistress to arrange a light repast
collected at Arles, as we should have to lunch later at Nîmes, and the
resources of Aigues Mortes were not supposed to be worthy of
millionaires in search of the picturesque. There were several neat
packages, the contents of which would aid and abet such humble
refreshment as the City of Dead Waters could produce; but I had more
than an hour to play with; and much can be done in an hour by an
enthusiast with a good circulation.

I had not quite realized, however, how largely my brother's
companionship contributed to my pleasure on these excursions. We had
seen almost everything together, and suddenly it occurred to me that I
was taking his presence too much for granted. He would not go with me
now, because in so small a round we were certain to run up against the
Turnours, and her ladyship might be pleased to give me another lecture
like that of evil memory at Avignon. I would have risked future
punishment for the sake of present pleasure, and it was on my tongue to
say so; but I swallowed the words with difficulty, like an over-large
pill.

So it fell out that I wandered off alone, sustaining myself on high
thoughts of Crusaders as I gazed up at the statue of St. Louis, and
paced the sentinels' pathway round the gigantic ramparts, unchanged
since Boccanegra built them. Looking down from the ramparts the town,
enclosed in the fortress walls, was like a faded chessboard cast ashore
from the wreck of some ancient ship; and round the dark walls and towers
waves of yellow sand and wastes of dead blue waters stretched as far as
my gaze could reach, toward the tideless sea.

Louis bought this tangled desert of sand and water in the middle of the
thirteenth century from an Abbot of Psalmodi, so the guide told me, and
I liked the name of that abbot so much that I kept saying it over and
over, to myself. Abbot of Psalmodi! It was to the ear what an old,
illuminated missal is to the eye, rich with crimson lake, and gold, and
ultramarine. It was as if I heard an echo from King Arthur's day, that
dim, mysterious day when history was flushed with dawn; the Abbot of
Psalmodi!

The heart of Aigues Mortes for me was the great tower of Constance, but
a very wicked heart, full of clever and murderous devices, which was at
its wickedest, not in the dark ages, but in the glittering times of
Louis XIV. and of other Louis after him. That tower is the bad part of
the dream where horrors accumulate and you struggle to cry out, while a
spell holds you silent. In the days when Aigues Mortes was not a dream,
but a terrible reality to the prisoners of that cruel tower, how many
anguished cries must have broken the spell; cries from hideous little
dungeons like rat-holes, cries from the far heights of the tower where
women and children starved and were forgotten!

I was almost glad to get away; yet now that I am away I shall often go
back--in my dream.

Alexander Dumas the elder went from Aigues Mortes to St. Gilles, driving
along the Beaucaire Canal, on that famous tour of his which took him
also to Les Baux; and we too went from Aigues Mortes to St. Gilles,
though I'm sure the Turnours had no idea that it was a pilgrimage in
famous footprints. Only the humble maid and chauffeur had the joy of
knowing that. We had both read Dumas' account of his journey, and we
laughed over the story of the little saint he stole at Les Baux.

It was a pleasant run to St. Gilles, though there was a shrewish nip in
the wind which made me hope that Lady Turnour's mind was not running
ahead to the mountains and gorges in front of her, not far away by days
or miles now. I wanted her to get tangled up in them before she had time
to think of the cold, and then it would be too late to turn tail.

I had just begun to call the little town of St. Gilles an "ugly hole,"
and wonder what St. Louis saw to love in it, when, coming out of a
squalid, hilly street through which I had tried to pick my way on foot,
alone, suddenly the façade of the wonderful old church burst upon my
sight, a vision of beauty.

No self-respecting motor-car would have condescended to trust itself in
such a street, and as a rabble of small male St. Gillesites swarmed
round the Aigle when she stopped at the beginning of the ascent, Mr.
Dane had to play guardian angel. "I've been here before," he said, as
usual, for this whole tour seems to be a twice-told tale for him. A few
days ago I should have pitied him aloud for not being able to blow the
dust off his old impressions; but now, when he speaks of past
experiences, I think: "Oh, I wonder if this is another place associated
in his mind with that _horrid_ woman?" For on mature deliberation I have
definitely niched her among the Horrors in my mental museum. In front of
me walked Sir Samuel and Lady Turnour, whose very backs cried out their
loathing of St. Gilles; but abruptly the expression of their shoulders
changed; they had seen the façade, and even they could not help feeling
vaguely that it must be unique in the world, that of its kind nothing
could be more beautiful.

That was before I saw it, for a respectful distance must be maintained
between Those Who Pay and Those Who Work; but I guessed from the backs
that something extraordinary was about to be revealed. Then it was
revealed, and I would have given a good deal to have some one to whom I
could exclaim "Isn't it glorious!"

Still, I am luckily very good chums with myself, and it is never too
much trouble to think out new adjectives for my own benefit, or to
indicate quaint points of view. I was soon making the best of my own
society in the way of intelligent companionship, shaking crumbs of
half-forgotten history out of my memory, and finding a dried currant of
fact here and there. In convent days there was hardly a saint or
saintess with whom I hadn't a bowing acquaintance, and although a good
many have cut me since, I can generally recall something about them, if
necessary, as title worshippers can about the aristocracy. I thought
hard for a minute, and suddenly up rolled a curtain in my mind, and
there in his niche stood St. Gilles. He was born in Athens, and was a
most highly connected saint, with the blood of Greek kings in his veins,
all of which was eventually spilled like water in the name of religion.
It seemed very suitable that such perfection of carving and proportion
as was shown in steps, towers, façade, and frieze should be dedicated to
a Greek saint, who must have adored and understood true beauty as few of
his brother saints could.

Mr. Dane had said, just before I started, that there was a gem of a
spiral staircase, called the Vis de St. Gilles, which I ought to see,
and a house, unspoiled since mediæval days; but the question of these
sights was settled adversely for me by my master and mistress. The
frieze they did admire, but it sufficed. Their inner man and woman
clamoured for a feast, and the eyes must be sacrificed.

As for me, I did not count even as a sacrifice, of course, but I
followed them back to the car as I'd followed them from it, and the car
flew toward Nîmes.

Just at first, for a few moments which I hate to confess to myself now,
I was disappointed in Nîmes. The town looked cold, and modern, and
conceited after the melancholy charm of Arles and the mediæval aspect of
Avignon; but that was only as we drove to our stately hotel in its
large, dignified square. Afterward--after the inevitable lunching and
unpacking--when I started out once again in the society of my adopted
relative, I prayed to be forgiven.

A gale was blowing, but little cared we. A toque or a picture-hat make
all the difference in the world to a woman's impressions, even of
Paradise--if the wind be ever more than a lovely zephyr there. Lady
Turnour had insisted on changing her motoring hat for a Gainsborough
confection which would, I was deadly certain, cause her to loathe Nîmes
while memory should last; but the better part was mine. Toqued and
veiled, the mistral could crack its cheeks if it liked; it couldn't hurt
mine, or do unseemly things to my hair.

In the gardens of Louis XIV. I gave myself to Nîmes as devotee forever;
and as the glories of the past slowly dawned upon me, that Past round
which the King had planted his flowers and formal trees, and placed
vases and statues, I wished I were a worthier worshipper at the shrine.

I think that there can be no more beautiful town in the world than Nîmes
in springtime. The wind brought fairy perfumes, and lovely little green
and golden puff-balls fell from the budding trees at our feet, as if
they wanted to surprise us. The fish in the crystal clear water of the
old Roman baths, which King Louis tried to spoil but couldn't, swam back
and forth in a golden net of sunshine. We two children of the twentieth
century amused ourselves in attempting to reconstruct the baths as they
must have looked in the first century; and the glimmering columns under
the green water, now lost to the eye, now seen again, white and elusive
as mermaids playing hide and seek, helped our imagination.

Far easier was it to go back to Rome in the Temple of Diana, so
beautiful in ruin and so little changed except by time, as to bring to
the heart a pang of mingled joy and pain, of sadness which women love
and men resent--unless they are poets. Doves were cooing softly there,
the only oracles of the temple in these days; and what they said to each
other and to us seemed more mysterious than the sayings of common doves,
because their ancestors had no doubt handed down much wisdom to them,
from generation to generation, ever since Diana was taken seriously as a
goddess, or perhaps even since the dim days when Celtic gods were
reigning powers.

From the gardens we went slowly to that other temple which unthinking
people and guide-books have named the Maison Carrée, the most lovely
temple out of Greece, and the one which has suffered most from sheer,
uncompromising stupidity in modern days. Now it rests from persecution,
though it shows its scars; and I wondered dully, as I stood gazing at
the Corinthian columns--strong, yet graceful--how so dull a copy as the
Madeleine could possibly have been evolved from such perfection.

Inside in the museum was the dearest old gentleman in a tall hat, who
explained to us with ingenuous pride and dignity the splendid collection
of coins which he himself had given to the town. It was easy to see that
they were the immediate jewels of his soul; there was not one piece
which he did not know and love as if it had been his child, though there
were so many thousands that he alone could keep strict count of them. He
insisted gravely upon the superlative value of the least significant in
appearance, but he could joke a little about other things than coins.
There was an old mosaic which we admired, with a faded God of Love
riding a winged steed.

"_L'Amour s'en va_," he chuckled, pointing to the half-obliterated
figure. "_N'est pas?_" and he turned to me for confirmation. "I don't
know yet," I answered.

"Mademoiselle is very fortunate--but very young," said the dear old
gentleman, looking like a late eighteenth-century portrait as he smiled
under his high hat. "And what thinks monsieur?"

"That it is better not to give him a chance to fly away, by keeping the
door shut against him in the beginning," replied Mr. Dane, as coldly as
if he kept his heart on ice.

Sunset was fading, like Love on the mosaic, when we came to the
amphitheatre; but the sky was still stained red, and each great arch of
stone framed a separate ruby. It was a strange effect, almost sinister
in its splendour, and all the air was rose-coloured.

"Is it a good omen or an evil one for our future?" I asked.

"Means storms, I think," the chauffeur answered in the laconic way he
affects sometimes, but there was an odd smile in his eyes, almost like
defiance--of me, or of Fate. I didn't know which but I should have liked
to know.




CHAPTER XX


The wind sang me to sleep that night in Nîmes--sang in my dreams, and
sang me awake when morning turned a white searchlight on my eyelids.

I was glad to see sunshine, for this was the day of our flight into the
north, and if the sky frowned on the enterprise Lady Turnour might frown
too, in spite of Bertie and his château.

It was cold, and I trembled lest the word "snow" should be dropped by
the bridegroom into the ear of the bride; but nothing was said of the
weather or of any change in the programme, while I and paint and powder
and copper tresses were doing what Nature had refused to do for her
ladyship.

"Cold morning, madame!" remarked the porter, who came to bring more wood
for the sitting-room fire before breakfast. He was a polite and pleasant
man, but I could have boxed his ears. "Madame departs to-day in her
automobile? Is it to go south or north? Because in the north--"

With great presence of mind I dropped a pile of maps and guide-books.

"What a clumsy creature you are!" exclaimed her ladyship, playing into
my hands. "I couldn't understand the last part of what he said."

Luckily by this time the man was gone; and my memory of his words was
extraordinarily vague. But a dozen things contrived to keep me in
suspense. Every one who came near Lady Turnour had something to say
about the weather. Then, for the first time, it occurred to the Aigle to
play a trick upon us. Just as the luggage was piled in, after numerous
little delays, she cast a shoe; in other words, burst a tyre, apparently
without any reason except a mischievous desire to be aggravating.
Another half hour wasted! And fat, silvery clouds were poking up their
great white heads over the horizon in the north, where, perhaps, they
were shaking out powder.

The next thing that happened was a snap and a tinkle in our inner
workings, rather like the sound you might expect if a giantess dropped a
hairpin. "Chain broken!" grumbled the chauffeur, as he stopped the car
on the level of a long, straight road, and jumped nimbly down. "We
oughtn't to have boasted yesterday."

"Who's superstitious now?" I taunted him, as he searched the tool-box in
the same way a child ransacks a Christmas stocking.

"Oh, about motor-cars! That's a different thing," said he calmly. "Cold,
isn't it? My fingers are so stiff they feel as if they were all thumbs."

"Et tu, Brute," I wailed. "For _goodness_' sake, don't let _her_ hear
you. She's capable even now of turning back. The invitation to the
château hasn't come--and we're not safely in the gorges yet."

"Nor shan't be soon, if this sort of thing keeps on," remarked the
chauffeur. "We shall have to lunch at Alais."

"You say that as if it was the devil's kitchen."

"There's probably first rate cooking in the devil's kitchen; I'm not so
sure about the inns at Alais."

"But it's arranged to picnic on the road to-day for the first time, you
know. They put up such good things at Nîmes, and I was to make coffee in
the tea-basket."

"That's why I wanted to get on. Picnic country doesn't begin till after
Alais. Who could lunch on a dull roadside like this? Only a starving
tramp wouldn't get indigestion."

It was true, and I began to detest the unknown Alais. Perhaps, after
all, we might sweep through the place, I thought, without the idea of
lunch occurring to the passengers. But Mr. Dane's heart-to-heart talk
with the Aigle resulted in quite a lengthy argument; and no sooner did a
town group itself in the distance than Sir Samuel knocked on the glass
behind us.

"What place is this?" he asked.

"Alais," was the answer the chauffeur made with his lips, while his
eyebrows said "I told you so!" to me.

"I think we'd better lunch here," Sir Samuel went on. And the arrival of
a princely blue motor car at the nearest inn was such a shock to the
nerves of the landlady and her staff that the interval before lunch was
as long and solemn as the Dead March in Saul. To show what he could do
in an emergency, the chef slaughtered and cooked every animal within
reach for miles around.

They appeared in a procession, according to their kind, when necessary
disguised in rich and succulent sauces which did credit to the creator's
imagination; and there were reserve forces of cakes, preserves, and
puddings, all of which coldly furnished forth the servants' meal when
they had served our betters.

It was nearly three o'clock when we were ready to leave Alais, and the
chauffeur had on his bronze-statue expression as he took his seat beside
me after starting the car.

"What's the matter?" I asked.

"Nothing," said he, "except that I don't know where we're likely to lay
our heads to-night."

"Where do you want to lay them?" I inquired flippantly. "Any gorge will
do for mine."

"It won't for Lady Turnour's. But it may have to, and in that case she
will probably snap yours off."

"Cousin Catherine has often told me it was of no use to me, except to
show my hair. But aren't there hotels in the gorge of the Tarn?"

"There are in summer, but they're not open yet, and the inns--well, if
Fate casts us into one, Lady Turnour will have a fit. My idea was: a
splendid run through some of the wildest and most wonderful scenery of
France--little known to tourists, too--and then to get out of the Tarn
region before dark. We may do it yet, but if we have any more trouble--"

He didn't finish the sentence, because, as if he had been calling for
it, the trouble came. I thought that an invisible enemy had fired a
revolver at us from behind a tree, but it was only a second tyre,
bursting out loud, instead of in a ladylike whisper, like the other.

Down got Mr. Dane, with the air of a condemned criminal who wants every
one to believe that he is delighted to be hanged. Down got I also, to
relieve the car of my weight during the weird process of "jacking up,"
though the chauffeur assured me that I didn't matter any more than a fly
on the wheel. Our birds of paradise remained in their cage, however,
Lady Turnour glaring whenever she caught a glimpse of the chauffeur's
head, as if he had bitten that hole in the tyre. But before us loomed
mountains--disagreeable-looking mountains--more like _embonpoints_
growing out of the earth's surface than ornamental elevations. On the
tops there was something white, and I preferred having Lady Turnour
glare at the chauffeur, no matter how unjustly, than that her attention
should be caught by that far, silver glitter.

Suddenly my brother paused in his work, unbent his back, stood up, and
regarded his thumb with as much intentness as if he were an Indian fakir
pledged to look at nothing else for a stated number of years. He pinched
the nail, shook his hand, and then, abandoning it as an object of
interest, was about to inflate the mended tyre when I came forward.

"You've hurt yourself," I said.

"I didn't know you were looking," he replied, fixing the air-pump. "Your
back seemed to be turned."

"A girl who hasn't got eyes in the back of her head is incomplete. What
have you done to your hand?"

"Nothing much. Only picked up a splinter somehow. I tried to get it out
and couldn't. It will do when we arrive somewhere."

"Let me try," I said.

"Nonsense! A little flower of a thing like you! Why, you'd faint at the
sight of blood."

"Oh, is it bleeding?" I asked, horrified, and forgetting to hide my
horror.

He laughed. "Only a drop or two. Why, you're as white as your name,
child."

"That's only at the thought," I said. "I don't mind the _sight_,
although I _do_ think if Providence had made blood a pale green or a
pretty blue it would have been less startling than bright red. However,
it's too late to change that now. And if you don't show me your thumb,
I'll have hysterics instantly, and perhaps be discharged by Lady Turnour
on the spot."

At this awful threat, which I must have looked terribly capable of
carrying out, he obeyed without a word.

A horrid little, thin slip of iron had gone deep down between the nail
and the flesh, and large drops of the most sensational crimson were
splashing down on to the ground.

"The idea of your driving like that!" I exclaimed fiercely. But my voice
quivered. "One, two, three!" I said to myself, and then pulled. I wanted
to shut my eyes, but pride forbade, so I kept them as wide open as if my
lids had been propped up with matches. Out came the splinter of metal,
and seeing it in my hand--so long, so sharp--things swam in rainbow
colours for a few seconds; but I was outwardly calm as a Stoic, and
wrapped the thumb in my handkerchief despite my brother's protests.

"Brave child," he said. "Thank you."

I looked up at him, and his eyes had such a beautiful expression that a
queer tenderness began stirring in my heart, just as a young bird stirs
in a nest when it wakes up. I couldn't help having the impression that
he felt the same thing for me at the moment. It was as if our thoughts
rushed together, and then flew away in a hurry, frightened at something
they'd seen. He dashed back to his tyre pumping, and I pranced away down
the road to look intently at a small white stone, as if it had been a
pearl of price.

Afterward I stooped and picked it up. "You're a kind of little milestone
in my life," I said to it. "I think I'd like to keep you, I hardly know
why." And I slipped it into the pocket of my coat.

Every sort of work that you do on a motor-car always seems to take
exactly half an hour. You may _think_ it will be twenty minutes, but you
know in your heart that it will be thirty, to the last second. The
people in the glass-house lost count of time after the first, through
playing some ghastly kind of double dummy bridge, and as they seemed
cheerful Lady Turnour and her dummy were evidently winning. But Mr. Dane
did not lose count, I was sure; and when we had started again, and got a
mile or two beyond Alais, he looked somewhat sternly at the mountains
which no longer appeared ill-shapen. We mounted toward them over the
heads of their children the foothills, and came into a region which
promised wild picturesqueness. There was an extra thrill, too, because
the mountains were the Cévennes, where Robert Louis Stevenson wandered
with his Modestine, and slept under the stars. Judging from the gravity
of the chauffeur's face he was not sure that we, too, might not have to
sleep under the stars (if any), a far less care-free company than
"R.L.S." and his donkey.

Sir Samuel has now exchanged cards for a Taride map, which he often
studied with no particular result beyond mental satisfaction, as he
generally held it upside down and got his information by contraries. But
at a straggling hillside village where two roads bifurcated he suddenly
became excited. Down went the window, and out popped his head.

"You go to the left here!" he shouted, as the Aigle was winging
gracefully to the right.

"I think you're mistaken, sir," replied the chauffeur, stopping while
the car panted reproachfully. "I know the 'Routes de France' says left,
but they told me at Alais a new road had now been finished, and the old
one condemned."

"Well, I'd take anything I heard there with a grain of salt," said Sir
Samuel. "How should they know? Motor-cars are strange animals to them.
If there were a new road the 'Routes' would give it, and _I_ vote for
the left."

"Whose car is it, anyway?" Lady Turnour was heard to murmur, not having
forgiven my Fellow Worm two burst tyres and a broken chain.

Since chauffeurs should be seen and not heard, Mr. Jack Dane looked
volumes and said not a word. Backing the big Aigle, who was sulking in
her bonnet, he put her nose to the left. Now we were making straight,
almost as the crow flies, for the Cevennes; but luckily for Lady
Turnour's peace of mind the snowy tops were hidden from sight behind
other mountains' shoulders as we approached. A warning chill was in the
air, like the breath of a ghost; but it could not find its way through
the glass; and a few cartloads of oranges which we passed opportunely
looked warm and attractive, giving a delusive suggestion of the south to
our road.

It was gipsy-land, too, for we met several tramping families: boldly
handsome women, tall, dark men and boys with eagle eyes, and big silver
buttons so well cared for they must have been precious heirlooms.
"'Steal all you can, and keep your buttons bright,' is a gipsy father's
advice to his son," said Jack Dane, as we wormed up the road toward a
pass where the brown mountains seemed to open a narrow, mysterious
doorway. So, fold upon fold shut us in, as if we had entered a vast maze
from which we might never find our way out; and soon there was no trace
of man's work anywhere, except the zigzag lines of road which, as we
glanced up or down, looked like thin, pale brown string tied as a child
ties a "cat's-cradle." We were in the ancient fastnesses of the
Camisards; and this world of dark rock under clouding sky was so stern,
so wildly impressive, that it seemed a country hewn especially for
religious martyrs, a last stand for such men as fought and died praying,
calling themselves "enfants de Dieu." Bending out from the front seat of
the motor, my gaze plunged far down into the beds of foaming rivers, or
soared far up to the dazzling white world of snow and steely sky toward
which we steadily forged on. Oh, there was no hope of hiding the snow
now from those whom it might concern! But Lady Turnour still believed,
perhaps, that we should avoid it.

The higher the Aigle rose, climbing the wonderful road of snakelike
twistings and turnings above sheer precipices, the more thrilling was
the effect of the savage landscape upon our souls--those of us who
consciously possess souls.

We had met nobody for a long time now; for, since leaving the region of
pines, we seemed to have passed beyond the road-mender zone, and the
zone of waggons loaded with dry branches like piled elks' horns. Still,
as one could never be sure what might not be lurking behind some rocky
shoulder, where the road turned like a tight belt, our musical siren
sang at each turn its gay little mocking notes.

After a lonely mountain village, named St. Germain-en-Calberte, and
famous only because the tyrant-priest Chayla was burned there, the
surface of the road changed with startling abruptness. Till this moment
we'd known no really bad roads anywhere, and almost all had been as
white as snow, as pink as rose leaves, and smooth as velvet; but
suddenly the Aigle sank up to her expensive ankles in deep, thick mud.

"Hullo, what's this bumping? Anything wrong with the car?"

Out popped Sir Samuel's anxious head from its luxurious cage.

"The trouble is with the road," answered the chauffeur, without so much
as an "I told you so!" expression on his face. "I'm afraid we've come to
that _déclassée_ part."

Poor Sir Samuel looked so humble and sad that I was sorry for him. "My
mistake!" he murmured meekly. "Had we better turn after all?"

"I fear we can't turn, or even run back, sir," said Mr. Dane. "The
road's so bad and so narrow, it would be rather risky."

This was a mild way of putting it; and he was considerate in not
mentioning the precipice which fell abruptly down under the uneven shelf
he generously called a road.

Sir Samuel gave a wary glance down, and said no more. Luckily Lady
Turnour, sitting inside her cage, on the side of the rock wall we were
following up the mountains, could not see that unpleasant drop under the
shelf, or even quite realize that she was on a shelf at all. Her husband
sat down by her side, more quietly than he had got up, even forgetting
to shut the window; but he was soon reminded of that duty.

"Are you frightened?" the chauffeur asked me; and I thought it no harm
to answer: "Not when you're driving."

"Do you mean that? Or is it only an empty little compliment?" he
catechized me, though his eyes did not leave the narrow slippery road,
up which he was steering with a skill of a woman who aims for the eye of
a delicate needle with the end of a thread a size too big.

"I mean it!" I said.

"I'm glad," he answered. "I was going to tell you not to be nervous, for
we shall win through all right with this powerful car. But now I will
save my breath."

"You may," I said, "I'm very happy." And so I was, though I had the most
curious sensation in my toes, as if they were being done up in curl
papers.

On we climbed, creeping along the high shelf which was so untidily
loaded with rough, fallen stones and layers of mud, powdered with bits
of ice from the rocky wall that seemed sheathed in glass. Icicles
dangled heavy diamond fringes low over the roof of the car; snow lay in
dark hollows which the sun could never reach even in summer noons; and
as we ploughed obstinately on, always mounting, the engine trembling,
our fat tyres splashed into a custardy slush of whitish brown. The shelf
had been slippery before; now, slopping over with this thick mush of
melting snow or mud, it was like driving through gallons of ice pudding.
The great Aigle began to tremble and waltz on the surface that was no
surface; yet it would have been impossible to go back. I saw by my
companion's set face how real was the danger we were in; I saw, as the
car skated first one way, then another, that there were but a few inches
to spare on either side of the road shelf; the side which was a rocky
wall, the side which was a precipice; I saw, too, how the man braced
himself to this emergency, when three lives besides his own depended on
his nerve and skill, almost upon his breath--for it seemed as if a
breath too long, a breath too short, might hurl us down--down--I dared
not look or think how far. Yet the fixed look of courage and
self-confidence on his face was inspiring. I trusted him completely, and
I should have been ashamed to feel fear.

But it was at this moment, when all hung upon the driver's steadiness of
eye and hand, that Lady Turnour chose to begin emitting squeaks of
childish terror. I hadn't known I was nervous, and only found out that I
was highly strung by the jump I gave at her first shriek behind me. If
the chauffeur had started--but he didn't. He showed no sign of having
heard.

I would not venture to turn, and look round, lest the slightest movement
of my body so near his arm might disturb him; but poor Sir Samuel,
driven to desperation by his wife's hysterical cries, pushed down the
glass again.

"Good Lord, Dane, this is appalling!" he said. "My wife can't bear it.
Isn't it possible for us to--to--" he paused, not knowing how to end so
empty a sentence.

"All that's possible to do I'm doing," returned the chauffeur, still
looking straight ahead. And instead of advising the foolish old
bridegroom to shake the bride or box her ears, as surely he was tempted
to do, he added calmly that her ladyship must not be too anxious. We
were going to get out of this all right, and before long.

"Tell him to go back. I _shall_ go back!" wailed Lady Turnour.

"Dearest, we can't!" her husband assured her.

"Then tell him to stop and let me get out and walk. This is too awful.
He wants to kill us."

"_Can_ you stop and let us get out?" pleaded Sir Samuel.

"To stop here would be the most dangerous thing we could do," was the
answer.

"You hear, Emmie, my darling."

"I hear. Impudence to dictate to you! Whatever _you_ are willing to do,
_I_ won't be bearded."

One would have thought she was an oyster. But she was quite right in not
wishing to add a beard to her charms, as already a moustache was like
those coming events that cast a well-defined shadow before. For an
instant I half thought that Mr. Dane would try and stop, her tone was so
furious, but he drove on as steadily as if he had not a passenger more
fit for Bedlam than for a motor-car.

Seeing that Dane stuck like grim death to his determination and his
steering-wheel, Sir Samuel shut the window and devoted himself to
calming his wife who, I imagine, threatened to tear open the door and
jump out. The important thing was that he kept her from doing it,
perhaps by bribes of gold and precious stones, and the Aigle moved on,
writhing like a wounded snake as she obeyed the hand on the wheel. If
the slightest thing should go wrong in the steering-gear, as we read of
in other motor-cars each time we picked up a newspaper--but other cars
were not in charge of Mr. Jack Dane. I felt sure, somehow, that nothing
would ever go wrong with a steering-gear of whose destiny he was master.

Not a word did he speak to me, yet I felt that my silence of tongue and
stillness of body was approved of by him. He had said that we would be
"out of this before long," so I believed we would; but suddenly my eyes
told me that something worse than we had won through was in store for us
ahead.




CHAPTER XXI


All this time we'd been struggling up hill, but abruptly we came to the
top of the ascent, and had to go sliding down, along the same shelf,
which now seemed narrower than before. Looking ahead, it appeared to
have been bitten off round the edge here and there, just at the stiffest
zigs and zags of the nightmare road. And far down the mountain the way
went winding under our eyes, like the loops of a lasso; short, jerky
loops, as we came to each new turn, to which the length of our chassis
forced us to bow and curtsey on our slippery, sliding skates. Forward
the Aigle had to go until her bonnet hung over the precipice, then to be
cautiously backed for a foot or two, before she could glide ticklishly
down the next steep gradient.

Involuntarily I shrank back against the cushions, bit my lip, and had to
force myself not to catch at the arm of the seat in those giddy seconds
when it felt as if we were dropping from sky to earth in a leaky
balloon; but if the blood in your veins has been put there by decent
ancestors who trail gloriously in a long line behind you, I suppose it's
easier for you not to be a coward than it is for people like the
Turnours, who have to be their own ancestors, or buy them at auctions.

The first words my companion spoke to me came as the valley below us
narrowed. "Look there," he said, nodding; and my gaze followed the
indication, to light joyously upon a distant _col_, where clustered a
friendly little group of human habitations.

The sight was like a signal to relax muscles, for though there was a
long stretch still of the appalling road between us and the _col_, the
eye seemed to grasp safety, and cling to it.

"Beyond that _col_ we shall strike the _route nationale_, which we
missed by coming this way," said Mr. Dane; and then it was the motor
only which gave voice, until we were close to the oasis in our long
desert of danger. That comforting voice was like a song of triumph as
the Aigle paused to rest at last before a _gendarmerie_ and a rough,
mountain inn. Some men who had been standing in front of the buildings
gave us a hearty cheer as we drew up at the door, and grinned a pleasant
welcome.

"We have been watching you a long way off," said a tall gendarme to the
chauffeur, "and to tell the truth we were not happy. That road has been
_déclassée_ for some time now, and is one of the worst in the country,
even in fine weather. It was not a very safe experiment, monsieur; but
we have been saying to each other it was a fine way to show off your
magnificent driving."

Laughing, Jack Dane assured the gendarme that it was not done with any
such object, and Sir Samuel, out of the car by this time, with the
indignant Lady Turnour, wanted the conversation translated. I obeyed
immediately, and he too praised his chauffeur, in a nice manly way which
made me the more sorry for him because he had succeeded in marrying his
first love.

"I should like to pay you compliments too," said I hurriedly, in a low
voice, when Sir Samuel and Lady Turnour had gone to the inn door to
revive themselves with blood-warming cordials after their thrilling
experience. "I should like to, only--it seems to go beyond compliments."

"I hate compliments, even when I deserve them, which I don't now,"
replied the young man whom I'd been comparing sentimentally in my mind
with the sun-god, steering his chariot of fire up and down the steeps of
heaven from dawn to sunset. "And I'd hate them above all from my--from
my little pal."

Nothing he could have named me would have pleased me as well. During the
wild climb, and wilder drop, we had hardly spoken to each other, yet I
felt that I could never misunderstand him, or try frivolously to
aggravate him again. He was too good for all that, too good to be played
with.

"You are a man--a real _man_," I said to myself. I felt humble compared
with him, an insignificant wisp of a thing, who could never do anything
brave or great in life; and so I was proud to be called his "pal." When
he asked if I, too, didn't need some cordial, I only laughed, and said I
had just had one, the strongest possible.

"So have I," he answered. "And now we ought to be going on. Look at
those shadows, and it's a good way yet to Florac, at the entrance of the
gorge."

Already night was stretching long gray, skeleton fingers into the late
sunshine, as if to warm them at its glow before snuffing it out.

It was easier to say we ought to go, however, than to induce Lady
Turnour to get into the car again, after all she had endured, and after
that "bearding" which evidently rankled still. She had not forgiven the
chauffeur for the courage which for her was merely obstinacy and
impudence, nor her husband for encouraging him; but the glow of the
cordial in her veins warmed the cockles of her heart in spite of herself
(I should think her heart was _all_ cockles, if they are as bristly as
they sound); and as it would be dull to stop on this _col_ for the rest
of her life, she at last agreed to encounter further dangers.

"Come, come, that's my brave little darling!" we heard Sir Samuel coo to
her, and dared not meet each other's eyes.

The road, from which we ought never to have strayed, was splendid in
engineering and surface, and we winged down to earth in a flight from
the clouds. Ice and snow were left behind on the heights, and the Aigle
gaily careered down the slopes like a wild thing released from a weary
bondage. As we whirled earthwards, embankments and railway bridges
showed here and there by our side, but we lost all such traces of
feverish modern civilization as we swept into the dusky hollow at the
bottom of which Florac lay, like a sunken town engulfed by a dark lake.

We did not pause in the curiously picturesque place, which looked no
more than a village, with its gray-brown houses and gray brown shadows
huddled confusedly together. Probably it looked much the same when the
Camisards used to hide themselves and their gunpowder in caves near by;
and certainly scarce a stone or brick had been added or removed since
Stevenson's eyes saw the town, and his pen wrote of it, as he turned
away there from the Tarn region, instead of being the first Englishman
to explore it. And what a wild region it looked as we and the Aigle were
swallowed up in the yawning mouth of the gorge!

In an every-day world, above and outside, no doubt it was sunset, as on
other evenings which we had known and might know again; but this hidden,
underground country had no place in an every-day world. It seemed almost
as if my brother and I (I can't count the Turnours, for they were so
unsuitable that they temporarily ceased to exist for us) were explorers
arriving in an air-ship, unannounced, upon the planet Mars.

The moon, a glinting silver shield, shimmered pale through ragged red
clouds like torn and blood-stained flags; and the walls of the gorge
into which we penetrated, bleakly glittering here and there where the
moon touched a vein of mica, were the many-windowed castles of the
Martians, who did not yet know that they had visitors from another
world.

There were fantastic villages, too, whose builders and inhabitants must
have drawn their architectural inspiration from strange mountain forms
and groupings, after the fashion of those small animals who defend
themselves by looking as much as possible like their surroundings. And
if by some mistake we hadn't landed on Mars, we were in gnome-land,
wherever that might be.

There was no ordinary twilight here. The brown-gray of rocks and wild
rock-villages was flushed with red and shadowed with purple; but as the
moon drank up the ruddy draught of sunset, the landscape crouched and
hunched its shoulders into shapes ever more extraordinary. The white
light spilled down from the tilted crescent like silver rain, and
bleached the few pink peach-blossoms, which bloomed timidly under the
shelter of snow-mountains, to the pallor of fluttering night-moths,
throwing out their clusters in sharp contrast against dark rocks. The
River Tarn, gliding onward through the gorge toward the Garonne, was
scaled with steel on its emerald back, like a twisting serpent. Over a
bed of gravel, white as scattered pearls, the sequined lengths coiled
on; and the snake-green water, the strange burnt-coral vegetation like a
trail of blood among the pearls, the young foliage of trees, filmy as
wisps of blowing gauze, were the only vestiges of colour that the moon
allowed to live in the under-world which we had reached. But above, on
the roof of that world--"les Causses"--where we had left ice and snow,
we could see purple chimneys of rock rising to an opal sky, and now and
then a mountain bonfire, like a great open basket of witch-rubies,
glowing beneath the moon.

"This is the last haunt of the fairies," I said under my breath, but the
man by my side heard the murmur.

"I thought you'd find that out," he said. "Trust you to get telepathic
messages from the elf-folk! Why, this gorge teems with fairy tales and
legends of magic, black and white. The Rhine Valley and the Black Forest
together haven't as many or as wonderful ones. I should like you to hear
the stories from some of the village people or the boatmen. They believe
them to this day."

"Why, _of course_," I said, gravely. Then, a question wanted so much to
be asked, that when I refused it asked itself in a great hurry, before
I could even catch it by its lizard-tail. "Was _she_ with you when you
were here before?"

"She?" he echoed. "I don't understand."

"The lady of the battlement garden," I explained, ashamed and repentant
now that it was too late.

He did not answer for a moment. Then he laughed, an odd sort of laugh.
"Oh, my romance of the battlement garden? Yes, she was with me in this
gorge. She is with me now."

"I wonder if she is thinking about you to-night?" I asked, knowing he
meant that the mysterious lady was carried along on this journey in his
spirit, as I was in the car.

"Not seriously, if at all," he answered, with what seemed to me a forced
lightness. "But I am thinking of her--thoughts which she will probably
never know."

Then I did wish that I, too, had a hidden sorrow in my life, a man in
the background, but as unlike Monsieur Charretier as possible, for whose
love I could call upon my brother's sympathy. And I suppose it was
because he had some one, while I had no one, in this strange, hidden
fairyland like a secret orchard of jewelled fruits, that I felt suddenly
very sad.

He pointed out Castlebouc, a spellbound château on a towering crag that
held it up as if on a tall black finger, above a village which might
have fallen off a canvas by Gustave Doré. Farther on lay a strange place
called Prades, memorable for a huge buttress of rock exactly like the
carcass of a mammoth petrified and hanging on a wall. Then, farther on
still, over the black face of the rocks flashed a whiteness of waving
waters, pouring cascades like bridal veils whose lace was made of
mountain snows.

"Here we are at Ste. Enemie," said Mr. Dane. "Don't you remember about
her--'King Dagobert's daughter, ill-fated and fair to look upon?' Well,
at this village of hers we must either light our lamps or rest for the
night, which ever Sir Samuel--I mean her ladyship--decides."

So he stopped, in a little town which looked a place of fairy
enchantment under the moon. And as the song of the motor changed into
jogging prose with the putting on of the brakes, open flew the door of
an inn. Nothing could ever have looked half so attractive as the rosy
glow of the picture suddenly revealed. There was a miniature hall and a
quaint stairway--just an impressionist glimpse of both in play of
firelight and shadow. With all my might I willed Lady Turnour to want to
stay the night. The whole force of my mind pressed upon that part of her
"transformation" directly over the deciding-cells of her brain.

The chauffeur jumped down, and respectfully inquired the wishes of his
passengers. Would they remain here, if there were rooms to be had, and
take a boat in the morning to make the famous descent of the Tarn, while
the car went on to meet them at Le Rosier, at the end of the Gorge? Or
would they, in spite of the darkness, risk--

"We'll risk nothing," Lady Turnour promptly cut him short. "We've run
risks to-day till I feel as if I'd been in my grave and pulled out
again. No more for me, by dark, _thank_ you, if I have to sleep in the
car!"

"I hope your ladyship won't have to do that," returned my Fellow Worm,
alive though trodden under foot. "I have never spent a night in Ste.
Enemie, but I've lunched here, and the food is passable. I should think
the rooms would be clean, though rough--"

"I don't find this country attractive enough to pay us for any
hardships," said the mistress of our fate. "I never was in such a
dreary, God-forsaken waste! Are there no decent hotels to get at?"

Patiently he explained to her, as he had to me, how the better hotels
which the Gorge of the Tarn could boast were not yet open for the
summer. "If we had not had such a chapter of accidents we should have
run through as far as this early in the day, and could then have
followed the good motoring road down the gorge, seeing its best sights
almost as well as from the river; but--"

"Whose fault were the accidents, I should like to know?" demanded the
lady. But obviously there was no answer to that question from a servant
to a mistress.

"Shall I inquire about rooms?" the chauffeur asked, calmly.

And it ended in Sir Samuel going in with him, conducted by a smiling and
somewhat excited young person who had been holding open the door.

They must have been absent for ten minutes, which seemed half an hour.
Then, when Lady Turnour had begun muttering to herself that she was
freezing, Sir Samuel bustled back, in a cheerfulness put on awkwardly,
like an ill-fitting suit of armour in a pageant.

"My dear, they're very full, but two French gentlemen were kind enough
to give up their room to us, and the landlady'll put them out
somewhere--"

"What, you and I both squashed into one room!" exclaimed her ladyship,
forgetful, in haughty horror, of her lodging-house background.

"But it's all they have. It's that or the motor, since you won't risk--"

"Oh, very well, then, I suppose it can't _kill_ me!" groaned the bride,
stepping out of the car as if from tumbril to scaffold.

What a way to take an adorable adventure! I was sorry for Sir Samuel,
but dimly I felt that I ought to be still sorrier for a woman
temperamentally unable to enjoy anything as it ought to be enjoyed. Next
year, maybe, she will look back on the experience and tell her friends
that it was "fun"; but oh, the pity of it, not to gather the flowers of
the Present, to let them wither, and never pluck them till they are
dried wrecks of the Past!

I was ready to dance for joy as I followed her ladyship into the
miniature hall which, if not quite so alluring when viewed from the
inside, had a friendly, welcoming air after the dark mountains and cold
white moonlight. I didn't know yet what arrangements had been made for
my stable accommodation, if any, but I felt that I shouldn't weep if I
had to sit up all night in a warm kitchen with a purry cat and a snory
dog.

The stairs were bare, and our feet clattered crudely as we went up,
lighted by a stout young girl with bared arms, who carried a candle.
"What a hole!" snapped Lady Turnour; but when the door of a bedroom was
opened for her by the red-elbowed one, she cried out in despair. "Is
_this_ where you expect me to sleep, Samuel? I'm surprised at you! I'm
not sure it isn't an insult!"

"My darling, what can _I_ do?" implored the unfortunate bridegroom.

The red-elbowed maiden, beginning to take offence, set the candlestick
down on a narrow mantelpiece, with a slap, and removed herself from the
room with the dignity of a budding Jeanne d'Arc. We all three filed in,
I in the rear; and for one who won't accept the cup of life as the best
champagne the prospect certainly was depressing.

The belongings of the "two gentlemen" who were giving up their rights in
a lady's favour, had not yet been transferred to the "somewhere
outside." Those slippers under the bed could have belonged to no species
of human being but a commercial traveller; and on the table and one
chair were scattered various vague collars, neckties, and celluloid
cuffs. There was no fire in the fireplace, nor, by the prim look of it,
had there ever been one in the half century or so since necessity called
for an inn to be built.

I snatched from the chair a waistcoat tangled up in some suspenders, and
Lady Turnour, flinging herself down in her furs, burst out crying like a
cross child.

"If this is what you call adventure, Samuel, I hate it," she whimpered.
"You _would_ bring me motoring! I want a fire. I want hot water. I want
them now. And I want the room cleared and all these awful things taken
away this instant. I don't consider them _decent_. Whatever happens, I
shan't dream of getting into that bed to-night, and I don't feel now as
if I should eat any dinner."

Distracted, Sir Samuel looked piteously at me, and I sprang to the
rescue. I assured her ladyship that everything should be made nice for
her before she quite knew what had happened. If she would have patience
for _five_ minutes, _only_ five, she should have everything she wanted.
I would see to it myself. With that I ran away, followed by Sir Samuel's
grateful eyes. But, once downstairs, I realized what a task I had set
myself.

The whole establishment had gone mad over us. There had been enough to
do before, with the house full of _ces messieurs_, _les commis
voyageurs_, but it was comparatively simple to do for them. For _la
noblesse Anglaise_ it was different.

There were no men to be seen, and the three or four women of the
household were scuttling about crazily in the kitchen, like hens with
their heads cut off. The patronage was so illustrious and so large;
there was so much to do and all at once, therefore nobody tried to do
anything but cackle and plump against one another.

Enter Me, a whirlwind, demanding an immediate fire and hot water for
washing. Landlady and assistants were aghast. There had never been
anything in any bedroom fireplace of the inn less innocent than paper
flowers; bedroom fireplaces were for paper flowers; while as for washing
it was a _bêtise_ to want to do so in the evening, especially with hot
water, which was a madness at any time, unless by doctor's orders.
Besides, did not mademoiselle see that everybody had more than they
could do already, in preparing dinner for the great people! There was
plenty of time to put the bedroom in order when it should be bedtime. If
the noble lady were so fatigued that she must lie down, why, the bed
had only been slept in for one night by two particularly sympathetic
messieurs. It would be _presque un crime_ to change linen after so brief
an episode, nevertheless for a client of such importance it should
eventually be done.

For a moment I was dashed by this volume of eloquence, but not for long,
for I was pledged. A wild glance round the kitchen showed me a kettle
standing empty in a corner. I seized it, and though it was heavy, swung
it to an open door near which I could see a ghostly pump. I flew out,
and seized that ghost by its long and rigid arm.

"Let me," said a voice.

It was the voice of Mr. Jack Dane.




CHAPTER XXII


"You dear!" I thought. But I only said, "How sweet of you!" in a nice,
ladylike tone. And while he pumped the wettest and coldest water I ever
felt, he drily advised me to call him "Adversity" if I found his "uses
sweet," since he wasn't to be Jack for me. What if he had known that I
always call him "Jack" to myself?

He not only pumped the kettle full, but carried it into the kitchen, and
bullied or flattered the goddesses there until they gave him the hottest
place for it on the red-hot stove. Meanwhile, as my eyes accustomed
themselves to darkness after light, I spied in the courtyard of the pump
a shed piled with wood; and my uncomfortably prophetic soul said that if
Lady Turnour were to have a fire, the woodpile and I must do the trick
together. Souls can be mistaken though, sometimes, if consciences never
can; and Brother Adversity contradicted mine by darting out again to see
what I was doing, ordering me to stop, and doing it all himself.

I ran to beg for immediate bed-linen while he annexed a portion of the
family woodpile, and we met outside my mistress's door. On the threshold
I confidently expected her grateful ladyship to say: "What _are_ you
doing with that wood, Dane?" But she was too much crushed under her own
load of cold and discomfort to object to his and wish it transferred to
me. I'd knelt down to make a funeral pyre of paper roses, when in a
voice low yet firm my brother ordered me to my feet. This wasn't work
for girls when men were about, he grumbled; and perhaps it was as well,
for I never made a wood fire in my life. As for him, he might have been
a fire-tamer, so quickly did the flames leap up and try to lick his
hands. When it was certain that they couldn't go stealthily crawling
away again, he shot from the room, and in two minutes was back with the
big kettle of hot water under whose weight I should have staggered and
fallen, perhaps.

By this time I had made the bed, and tumbled all reminders of the two
"sympathetic messieurs" ruthlessly into no-man's land outside the door.
Things began to look more cheerful. Lady Turnour brightened visibly; and
when appetizing smells of cooking stole through the wide cracks all
round the door she decided that, after all, she would dine.

It was not until after I had seen her descend with her husband, and had
finished unpacking, that I had a chance to think of my own affairs. Then
I did wonder on what shelf I was to lie, or on what hook hang, for the
night. I had no information yet as regarded my own sleeping or eating,
but both began to assume importance in my eyes, and I went down to learn
my fate. Where was I to dine? Why, in the kitchen, to be sure, since the
_salle à manger_ was in use as a sitting-room until bedtime. As for
sleeping--why, that was a difficult matter. It was true that the English
milord had spoken of a room for me, but in the press of business it had
been forgotten. What a pity that the chauffeur and I were not a married
couple, _n'est pas?_ That would make everything quite simple. But--as
it was, no doubt there was a box-room, and matters would arrange
themselves when there was time to attend to them.

"Matters have already arranged themselves," announced Mr. Jack Dane,
from the door of the pump-court. "I heard Sir Samuel speak about your
accommodation, and I saw that nothing was being done, so I discovered
the box-room, and it is now ready, all but bed-covering. And for fear
there might be trouble about that, I've put Lady Turnour's cushions and
rugs on the alleged bed. Would you like to have a look at your quarters
now, or are you too hungry to care?"

"I'm not too hungry to thank you," I exclaimed. "You are a kind of
genie, who takes care of the poor who have neither lamps nor rings to
rub."

"Better not thank me till you've seen the place," said he. "It's a
villainous den; but I didn't think any one here would be likely to do
better with it than I would. Anyhow, you'll find hot water. I
unearthed--literally--another kettle. And it's the first door at the top
of the back stairs."

I flew, or rather stumbled, up the ladder-like stairway, with a candle
which I snatched from the high kitchen mantelpiece, and at the top I
laughed out, gaily. In the narrow passage was a barricade of horrors
which my knight had dragged from the box-room. On strange old hairy
trunks of cowhide he had piled broken chairs, bandboxes covered with
flowered wall-paper, battered clocks, chipped crockery, fire-irons,
bundles done up in blankets, and a motley collection of unspeakable odds
and ends that would have made a sensational jumble sale. I opened the
low door, and peeped into the room with which such liberties had been
taken for my sake. Although it was no more than a store cupboard, my
wonderful brother had contrived to give it quite an air of coziness. The
tiny window was open, and was doing its best to drive out mustiness. A
narrow hospital cot stood against the wall, spread with a mattress quite
an inch thick, and piled with the luxurious rugs and cushions from the
motor car. I was sure Lady Turnour would have preferred my sitting up
all night or freezing coverless rather than I should degrade her
possessions by making use of them; but Mr. Dane evidently hadn't thought
her opinion of importance compared with her maid's comfort. Two wooden
boxes, placed one upon another, formed a wash-hand stand, which not only
boasted a beautiful blue tin basin, but a tumbler, a caraffe full of
water, and a not-much-cracked saucer ready for duty as a soap-dish. The
top box was covered with a rough, clean towel, evidently filched from
the kitchen, and this piece of extra refinement struck me as actually
touching. A third box standing on end and spread with another towel,
proclaimed itself a dressing-table by virtue of at least half a looking
glass, lurking in one corner of a battered frame, like a sinister,
partially extinguished eye. Other furnishings were a kitchen chair and a
small clothes-horse, to compensate for the absence of wall-hooks or
wardrobe. On the bare floor--oh, height of luxury!--lay the fleecy white
rug whose high mission it was to warm the toes of Lady Turnour when
motoring. On the floor beside the box wash-hand stand, a small kettle
was pleasantly puffing, doing its best to heat the room with its gusty
breath; and the clothes-horse had a saddle of towels which I shrewdly
suspected had been intended for her ladyship or some other guest of
importance in the house.

How these wonders had been accomplished in such a short space of time,
and by a man, too, would have passed my understanding, had I not begun
to know what manner of man the chauffeur was. And to think that there
was a woman in the world who had known herself loved by him, yet had
been capable of sending him away! If he would do such things as these
for an acquaintance, at best a "pal," what would he not do for a woman
beloved? I should have liked to duck that creature under the pump in the
court, on just such a nipping night as this.

He had not forgotten my dressing bag, which was on the bed, but I could
not stop to open it. I had to run down to the kitchen again, and tell
him what I thought of his miracles. He was not there, but, at the sound
of my voice, he appeared at the door of the court, drying his hands,
having doubtless been making his toilet at the accommodating pump. In
the crude light of unshaded paraffin lamps with tin reflectors, he
looked tired, and I was sharply reminded of the nervous strain he had
gone through in that ordeal on the mountains, but he smiled with the
delight of a boy when I burst into thanks.

"It was jolly good exercise, and limbered me up a bit, after sitting
with my feet on the brake for so long," said he. "May I have my dinner
with you?"

My answer was rather enthusiastic, and that seemed to please him, too.
A quarter of an hour later I came down again, having made myself tidy
meanwhile, in the room which he had retrieved from the jungle. Had the
landlady but had the ordering of the change, my quarters would have been
fifty per cent. less attractive, I was sure, and told my brother so.

We were both starving, but there was too much to do in the dining-room
for domestics to expect attention. As for Monsieur le Chauffeur, he was
informed that the presence of a mechanician would be permitted in the
_salle à manger_, though a _femme de chambre_ might not enter there. I
begged him to go, but, of course, I should have been surprised if he
had. "I have a plan worth two of that," he said to me. "Do you remember
the picnic preparations we brought from Nîmes? It seems about a week
ago, but it was only this morning. We might as well try to eat on a
battlefield as in this kitchen, at present, and if we're kept waiting,
we may develop cannibal propensities. What about a picnic _à deux_ in
the glass cage, with electric illuminations? The water's still hot in
the automatic heater under the floor, and you shall be as warm as toast.
Besides, I'll grab a jug of blazing soup for a first course, and come
back for coffee afterward."

I clapped my hands as I used to when a child and my fun-loving young
parents proposed an open air fête. "Oh, how too nice!" I cried. "If you
don't think the Turnours would be angry?"

"I think the labourers are worthy of their hire," said he. "I'll fetch
your coat for you. No, you're not to come without it."

The car, it appeared, was lodged in the court; and my brother's
prophecies for the success of the picnic were more than fulfilled. Never
was such a feast! I got out the gorgeous tea-basket, trembling with a
guilty joy, and Jack washed the white and gold cups and plates at the
pump between courses, I drying them with cotton waste, which the car
generously provided. Besides the cabbage soup and good black coffee,
foraging expeditions produced apricot tarts, nuts, and raisins. We both
agreed that no food had ever tasted so good, and probably never would
again; but I kept to myself one thought which crept into my mind. It
seemed to me that nothing would ever be really interesting in my life,
when the chauffeur--the terrible, dreaded chauffeur--should have gone
out of it forever. In a few weeks--but I wouldn't think ahead; I put my
soul to enjoying every minute, even the tidying of the tea-basket after
the picnic was over, for that business he shared with me, like the rest.
And when I dreamed, by-and-by in my box-room, that he was polishing my
boots, Lady Turnour's boots, the boots of the whole party, I waked up to
tell myself that it was most likely true.




CHAPTER XXIII


"You selfish little brute!" was my first address to myself as I realized
my Me-ness, between waking and sleeping, in the morning at Ste. Enemie.
I had never asked Jack where and how he was going to spend the night.
Think of that, after all he had done for me!

It was only just dawn, but already there was a stirring under my window.
Perhaps it was that which had roused me, not the early prick of an
awakening conscience.

The first thing I did to-day was (as it had been yesterday) to bounce up
and climb on to a chair to look out of the high window; but it was a
very different window and a very different scene. I now discovered that
my room gave on the pump court, and to my surprise, I saw that through
the blue silk blinds of the Aigle which were all closely drawn, a light
was streaming. This was very queer indeed, and must mean something
wrong. My imagination pictured a modern highwayman inside, with the
electric lamps turned on to help him rifle the car, and I stood on
tiptoe, peering out of the tiny aperture which was close under the low
ceiling of the box-room. Ought I to scream, and alarm the household,
since I knew not where to go and call the chauffeur?

To be sure, there was very little, if anything, of value, which a thief
could carry away, but an abandoned villain might revenge himself for
disappointment by slashing the tyres, or perhaps even by setting the car
on fire.

At the thought of such a catastrophe, which would bring the trip to an
end and separate me at once from the society of my brother (I'm afraid I
cared much more about losing him than for the Turnours' loss of their
Aigle) I was impelled to run down in my nightgown and _mules_ to do
battle single-handed with the ruffian; but suddenly, before I had quite
decided, out went the light in the blue-curtained glass cage. In another
instant the car door opened, and Jack Dane quietly got out.

In a second I understood. I knew now, without asking, where he had spent
his night. Poor fellow--after such a day!

Someone spoke to him--someone who had been making that disturbing noise
in the woodshed. The household was astir, and I would be astir, too. I
didn't yet know what was to happen to-day, but I wanted to know, and I
was prepared to find any plan good, since, in a country like this, all
roads must lead to Adventures. My one fear was, that if the Turnours
took to a boat, I should have to go with them to play cloak-bearer, or
hot-water-bag-carrier, while the car whirled away, free and glorious.
The thought of a whole day in my master's and mistress's society,
undiluted by the saving presence of my adopted brother, was like bolting
a great dry crust of yesterday's bread. What an indigestion I should
have!

I was too wise, however, to betray the slightest anxiety one way or the
other; for if her ladyship suspected me of presuming to have a
preference she would punish me by crushing it, even if inconvenient to
herself. I was exquisitely meek and useful, lighting her fire (with wood
brought me by Jack) supplying her with hot water, and wrangling with the
landlady over her breakfast, which would have consisted of black coffee
and unbuttered bread, had it not been for my exertions. Breakfasts more
elaborate were unknown at Ste. Enemie; but coaxings and arguments
produced boiled eggs, goats' milk, and _confiture_, which I added to the
repast, and carried up to Lady Turnour's room.

No definite plans had been made even then; but harassed Sir Samuel told
his chauffeur to engage a boat, and have it ready "in case her ladyship
had a whim to go in it." The motor was to be in readiness
simultaneously, and then the lady could choose between the two at the
last moment.

Thus matters stood when my mistress appeared at the front door, hatted
and coated. At last she must decide whether she would descend the rapids
of the Tarn (quite safe, kind rapids, which had never done their worst
enemies any harm), or travel by a newly finished road through the gorge,
in the car, missing a few fine bits of scenery and an experience, but,
it was to be supposed, enjoying extra comfort. There was the big blue
car; there was the swift green river, and on the river a boat with two
respectful and not unpicturesque boatmen.

"Ugh! the water looks hideously cold and dangerous," she sighed,
shivering in the clear sunlight, despite her long fur coat. "But I have
a horror of the motor, since yesterday. I _may_ get over it, but it will
take me days. It's a hateful predicament--between _two_ evils, one as
bad as the other. I oughtn't to have been subjected to it."

"Dane says everyone does go by the river. It's the thing to do,"
ventured Sir Samuel, becoming subtle. "They've put a big foot-warmer in
the boat, and you can have your own rugs. There's a place where we land,
by the way, to get a hot lunch."

With a moan, the bride pronounced for the boat, which was a big
flat-bottomed punt, as reliable in appearance as pictures of John Bull.
I fetched her rugs from the car. She was helped into the boat, and then,
as my fate remained to be settled, I asked her in a voice soft as silk
what were her wishes in regard to her handmaiden.

"Why, you'll come with us in the boat, of course. What else did you
dream?" she replied sharply.

Down went my heart with a thump like a fish dropping off its hook. But
as I would have moved toward the pebbly beach, a champion rode to my
defence.

"Your ladyship doesn't think a load of five might disturb the balance of
the boat?" mildly suggested the chauffeur. "The usual load is two
passengers and two boatmen; and though there's no danger in the rapids
if--"

She did not give him time to finish. "Oh, very well, you must stop with
the car, Elise," said she. "It is only one inconvenience more, among
many. No doubt I can put up with it. Get me the brandy flask out of the
tea-basket."

I would have tried to scoop all the green cheese out of the moon for
her, if she had asked me, I was so delighted. And part of my joy was
mixed up with the thought that _he_ wanted me to be with him. He had
actually schemed to get me! I envied no one in the world, not even the
lovely lady of the battlement garden. He was mine for to-day, in spite
of her--so there!

Sir Samuel got into the boat, and wrapped his wife in rugs. The boatmen
pushed off. Away the flat-bottomed punt slid down the clear green
stream, the sun shining, the cascades sparkling, the strange precipices
which wall the gorge, copper-tinted in the morning light. It was the
most wonderful world; yet Lady Turnour was cackling angrily. Was she
afraid? Had she changed her mind? No, the saints be praised! She was
only burning holes in her petticoat on the brazier supplied by the
hotel! I turned away to hide a smile almost as wicked as a grin, and
before I looked round again, the swift stream had swept the boat out of
sight round a jutting corner of rock. We were safe. This time it really
_was_ our world, our car, and our everything. We didn't even need to
"pretend."

Ste. Enemie is only at the gates of the gorge--a porter's lodge, so to
speak, and in the Aigle we sped on into the fairyland of which we'd had
our first pale, moonlit peep last night. There were castles made by man,
and castles made by gnomes; but the gnomes were the better architects.
Their dwellings, carved of rock, towered out of the river to a giddy
height, and some were broken in half, as if they had been rent asunder
by gnome cannon, in gnome battles. There were gnome villages, too, which
looked exactly like human habitations, with clustering roofs plastered
against the mountain-side. But the hand of man had not placed one of
these stones upon another.

There were gigantic rock statues, and watch-towers for gnomes to warn
old-time gnome populations, perhaps, when their enemies, the
cave-dwellers, were coming that way from a mammoth-hunt; and there was a
wonderful grotto, fitted with doors and windows, a grotto whose
occupants must surely have inherited the mansion from their ancestors,
the cave-dwellers. Every step of the way History, gaunt and war-stained,
stalked beside us, followed hot-foot by his foster-mother, Legend; and
the first stories of the one and the last stories of the other were
tangled inextricably together.

Legend and history were alike in one regard; both told of brave men and
beautiful women; and the people we met as we drove, looked worthy of
their forebears who had fought and suffered for religion and
independence, in this strange, rock-walled corridor, shared with fairies
and gnomes. The men were tall, with great bold, good-natured eyes and
apple-red cheeks, to which their indigo blouses gave full value. The
women were of gentle mien, with soft glances; and the children were even
more attractive than their elders. Tiny girls, like walking dolls, with
dresses to the ground, bobbed us curtseys; and sturdy little boys,
curled up beside ancient grandfathers, in carts with old boots
protecting the brakes, saluted like miniature soldiers, or pulled off
their quaint round caps, as they stared in big-eyed wonder at our grand,
blue car. For them we were prince and princess, not chauffeur and maid.

Sometimes our road through the gorge climbed high above the rushing
green river, and ran along a narrow shelf overhanging the ravine, but
clear of snow and ice; sometimes it plunged down the mountain-side as if
on purpose to let us hear the music of the water; and one of these
sudden swoops downward brought us in sight of a château so enchanting
and so evidently enchanted, that I was sure a fairy's wand had waved for
its creation, perhaps only a moment before. When we were gone, it would
disappear again, and the fairy would flash down under the translucent
water, laughing, as she sent up a spray of emeralds and pearls.

"Of course, it isn't real!" I exclaimed. "But do let's stop, because
such a knightly castle wouldn't be rude enough to vanish right before
our eyes."

"No, it won't vanish, because it's a most courteous little castle, which
has been well brought up, and even though its greatness is gone, tries
to live up to its traditions," said Jack. "It always appears to everyone
it thinks likely to appreciate it; and I was certain it would be here in
its place to welcome you."

We smiled into each other's eyes, and I felt as if the castle were a
present from him to me. How I should have loved to have it for mine, to
make up for one poor old château, now crumbled hopelessly into ruin, and
despised by the least exacting of tourists! Coming upon it unexpectedly
in this green dell, at the foot of the precipice, seeing it rise from
the water on one side, reflected as in a broken mirror, and draped in
young, golden foliage on the other, it really was an ideal castle for a
fairy tale. A connoisseur in the best architecture of the Renaissance
would perhaps have been ungracious enough to pick faults; for to a
critical eye the turrets and arches might fall short of perfection; and
there was little decoration on the time-darkened stone walls, save the
thick curtain of old, old ivy; but the fairy grace of the towers rising
from the moat of glittering, bright green water was gay and sweet as a
song heard in the woods.

"Some beautiful nymph ought to have lived here," I said dreamily, when
we had got out of the car. "A nymph whose beauty was celebrated all over
the world, so that knights from far and near came to this lovely place
to woo her."

"Why, you might have heard the story of the place!" said Jack. "It's the
Château de la Caze, usually called the Castle of the Nymphs, for instead
of one, eight beautiful nymphs lived in it. But their beauty was their
undoing. I don't quite know why they were called 'nymphs,' for nymphs
and naiads had gone out of fashion when they reigned here as Queens of
Beauty, in the sixteenth century. But perhaps in those days to call a
girl a 'nymph' was to pay her a compliment. It wouldn't be now, when
chaps criticize the 'nymphery' if they go to a dance! Anyhow, these
eight sisters, were renowned for their loveliness, and all the unmarried
gentlemen of France--according to the story--as well as foreign knights,
came to pay court to them. The unfortunate thing was, when the cavaliers
saw the eight girls together, they were all so frightfully pretty it
wasn't possible to choose between them, so the poor gentlemen fought
over their rival charms, and were either killed or went away unable to
make up their minds. The sad end was, if you'll believe me, that all
the eight maidens died unmarried, martyrs to their own incomparable
charms."

"I can quite believe it," I answered, "and it wasn't at all sad, because
I'm sure any girl who had once had this place for her home would have
pined in grief at being taken away, even by the most glorious knight of
the world."

"Come in and see their boudoir," said the knight who worked, if he did
not fight, for me.

So we went in, without the trouble of using battering rams; for alas,
the family of the eight nymphs grew tired of their château and the gorge
in the dreadful days of the religious wars, and now it is an hotel. It
would not receive paying guests until summer, but a good-natured
caretaker opened the door for us, and we saw a number of stone-paved
corridors, and the nymphs' boudoir.

Their adoring father had ordered their portraits to be painted on the
ceiling; and there they remain to this day, simpering sweetly down upon
the few bits of ancient furniture made to match the room and suit their
taste.

They smiled amiably at us, too, the eight little faces framed in
Henrietta Maria curls; and their eyes said to me, "If you want to be
happy, _m'amie_, it is better not to be too beautiful; or else not to
have any sisters. Or if Providence _will_ send you sisters, go away
yourself, and visit your plainest friend, till you have got a husband."

Gazing wistfully back, as one does gaze at places one fears never to see
again, the Castle of the Nymphs looked like a fantastic water-flower
standing up out of the green river, on its thick stem of rock. Then it
was gone; for our time was not quite our own, and we dared not linger,
lest the boat with our Betters should arrive at the meeting place before
we reached it in the car. But there were compensations, for almost with
every moment the gorge grew grander. Cascades sparkled in the sun like
blowing diamond-dust. The rocks seemed set with jewels, or patterned
with mosaic; and there were caves--caves almost too good to be true. Yet
if we could believe our eyes, they were true, even the dark cavern
where, once upon a time, lived a scaly dragon who terrorized the whole
country for miles around, and had no relish for his meals unless they
were composed of the most exquisite young maidens--though he would
accept a child as an _hors d'oeuvre_. In such a strange world as this,
after all, it was no harder to believe in dragons, than in hiding
countesses, fed and tended for months upon months by faithful servants,
while the red Revolution raged; yet the countess and her cave were
vouched for by history, which ignored the dragon and his.

Not only had each mountain at least one cavern, but every really
eligible crag had its ruined castle; and each ruin had its romance,
which clung like the perfume of roses to a shattered vase. There were
rocks shaped like processions of marching monks following uplifted
crucifixes; and farther on, one would have thought that half the animals
had scrambled out of the ark to a height where they had petrified before
the flood subsided. As we wound through the gorge the landscape became
so strange, hewn in such immensity of conception, that it seemed
prehistoric. We, in the blue car, were anachronisms, or so I felt until
I remembered how, in pre-motoring days, I used to think that owning an
automobile must be like having a half-tamed minotaur in the family. As
for the Aigle, she was a friendly, not a vicious, monster, and as if to
make up for her mistakes of yesterday, she was to-day more like a
demi-goddess serving an earthly apprenticeship in fulfilment of a vow
than a dragon of any sort. Swinging smoothly round curve after curve,
the noble car running free and cooing in sheer joy of fiery life, as she
swooped from height to depth, I, too, felt the joy of life as I had
hardly ever felt it before. The chauffeur and I did not speak often, but
I looked up at him sometimes because of the pleasure I had in seeing and
re-seeing the face in which I had come to have perfect confidence; and I
fancied from its expression that he felt as I felt.

So we came to Les Vignes, and lunched together at a table set out of
doors, close to the car, that she might not be left alone. We had for
food a strange and somewhat evil combination; wild hare and wild boar;
but they seemed to suit the landscape somehow, as did the mystical music
of the conch-shells, blown by passing boatmen. It was like being waked
from a dream of old-time romance, by a rude hand shaking one's shoulder,
to hear the voices of Sir Samuel and Lady Turnour, he mildly arguing,
she disputing, as usual.

Poetry fled like a dryad of some classic wood, scared by a motor
omnibus; and, though the gorge as far as Le Rozier was magnificent, and
the road all the way to Millau beautiful in the sunset, it was no longer
_our_ gorge, or _our_ road. That made a difference!




CHAPTER XXIV


There was a telegram from "Bertie" at Millau. The invitation to the
château where he was stopping near Clermont-Ferrand, had been asked for
and given. I heard all about it, of course, from the conversation
between the bride and groom; for Lady Turnour prides herself on
discussing things in my presence, as if I were deaf or a piece of
furniture. She has the idea that this trick is a habit of the "smart
set"; and she would allow herself to be tarred and feathered, in
Directoire style, if she could not be smart at smaller cost.

Nothing was ever more opportune than that telegram, for her ladyship had
burnt her frock and chilled her liver in the boat, and though the hotel
at Millau was good, she arrived there with the evident intention of
making life a burden to Sir Samuel. The news from Bertie changed all
that, however; and though the weather was like the breath of icebergs
next morning, Lady Turnour was warmed from within. She chatted
pleasantly with Sir Samuel about the big luggage which had gone on to
Clermont-Ferrand, and asked his advice concerning the becomingness of
various dresses. The one unpleasant thing she allowed herself to say,
was that "certainly Bertie wasn't doing this for nothing," and that his
stepfather might take her word for it, Bertie would be neither slow nor
shy in naming his reward. But Sir Samuel only grinned, and appeared
rather amused than otherwise at the shrewdness of his wife's insight
into the young man's character.

I was conscious that my jacket hadn't been made for motoring, when I
came out into the sharp morning air and took my place in the Aigle. I
was inclined to envy my mistress her fur rugs, but to my surprise I saw
lying on my seat a Scotch plaid, plaider than any plaid ever made in
Scotland.

"Does that belong to the hotel?" I asked the chauffeur, as he got into
the car.

"It belongs to you," said he. "A present from Millau for a good child."

"Oh, you mustn't!" I exclaimed.

"But I have," he returned, calmly. "I'm not going to watch you slowly
freezing to death by my side; for it won't be exactly summer to-day. Let
me tuck you in prettily."

I groaned while I obeyed. "I've been an expense to you all the way,
because you wouldn't abandon me to the lions, even in the most expensive
hotels, where I knew you wouldn't have stayed if it hadn't been for me.
And now, _this!_"

"It cost only a few francs," he tried to reassure me. "We'll sell it
again--afterward, if that will make you happier. But sufficient for the
day is the rug thereof--at least, I hope it will be. And don't flaunt
it, for if her ladyship sees there's an extra rug of any sort on board
she'll be clamouring for it by and by."

Northward we started, in the teeth of the wind, which made mine chatter
until I began to tingle with the rush of ozone, which always goes to my
head like champagne. Our road was a mere white thread winding loosely
through a sinuous valley, and pulled taut as it rose nearer and nearer
to the cold, high level of _les Causses_, the roof of that gnome-land
where we had journeyed together yesterday. From snow-covered billows
which should have been sprayed with mountain wild-flowers by now, a
fierce blast pounced down on us like a swooping bird of prey. We felt
the swift whirr of its wings, which almost took our breath away, and
made the Aigle quiver; but like a bull that meets its enemy with lowered
horns, the brave car's bonnet seemed to defy the wind and face it
squarely. We swept on toward the snow-reaches whence the wind-torrent
came. Soon we were on the flat plateau of the Causse, where last year's
faded grass was frosted white, and a torn winding-sheet wrapped the
limbs of a dead world. There was no beauty in this death, save the wild
beauty of desolation, and a grandeur inseparable from heights. Before us
grouped the mountains of Auvergne, hoary headed; and looking down we
could see the twistings of the road we had travelled, whirling away and
away, like the blown tail of a kite trailed over mountain and foothill.

"The people at Millau told me I should get up to St. Flour all right, in
spite of the fall of snow," said the chauffeur, his eyes on the great
white waves that piled themselves against a blue-white sky, "but I begin
to think there's trouble before us, and I don't know whether I ought to
have persisted in bringing you."

"Persisted!" I echoed, defending him against himself. "Why, do you
suppose wild horses would have dragged Lady Turnour in any other
direction, now that she's actually invited to be the guest of a marquis
in a real live castle?"

"A railway train could very well have dragged her in the same direction
and got her to the castle as soon, if not a good deal sooner than she's
likely to get in this car, if we have to fight snow. I proposed this way
originally because I wanted you to see the Gorge of the Tarn, and
because I thought that you'd like Clermont-Ferrand, and the road there.
It was to be _your_ adventure, you know, and I shall feel a brute if I
let you in for a worse one than I bargained for. Even this morning it
wasn't too late. I could have hinted at horrors, and they would have
gone by rail like lambs, taking you with them."

"Lady Turnour can do nothing like a lamb," I contradicted him. "I should
never have forgiven you for sending me away from--the car. Besides, Lady
Turnour wants to teuf-teuf up to the château in her sixty-horse-power
Aigle, and make an impression on the aristocracy."

"Well, we must hope for the best now," said he. "But look, the snow's an
inch thick by the roadside even at this level, so I don't know what we
mayn't be in for, between here and St. Flour, which is much higher--the
highest point we shall have to pass in getting to the Château de
Roquemartine, a few miles out of Clermont-Ferrand."

"You think we may get stuck?"

"It's possible."

"Well, that _would_ be an adventure. You know I love adventures."

"But I know the Turnours don't. And if--" He didn't finish his
sentence.

Higher we mounted, until half France seemed to lie spread out before us,
and a solitary sign-post with "Paris-Perpignans" suggested unbelievable
distances. The Aigle glided up gradients like the side of a somewhat
toppling house, and scarcely needed to change speed, so well did she
like the rarefied mountain air. I liked it too, though I had to be
thankful for the plaid; and above all I liked the wild loneliness of the
Causse, which was unlike anything I ever saw or imagined. The savage
monotony of the heights was broken just often enough by oases of pine
wood; and the plains on which we looked down were blistered with conical
hills, crowned by ancient castles which would have rejoiced the hearts
of mediæval painters, as they did mine. Severac-le-Château, perched on
its naked pinnacle of rock, was best of all, as we saw it from our
bird's-eye view, and then again, almost startlingly impressive when we
had somehow whirled down below it, to pass under its old huddled town,
before we flew up once more to higher and whiter levels.

Never had the car gone better; but Lady Turnour had objected to the
early start which the chauffeur wanted, and the sun was nearly overhead
when many a huge shoulder of glittering marble still walled us away from
our journey's end. The cold was the pitiless cold of northern midwinter,
and I remembered with a shiver that Millau and Clermont-Ferrand were
separated from one another by nearly two hundred and fifty kilometres of
such mountain roads as these. Oh yes, it was an experience, a splendid,
dazzling experience; nevertheless, my cowardly thoughts would turn,
sunflower-like, toward warmth; warm rooms, even stuffy rooms, without a
single window open, fires crackling, and hot things to drink. Still, I
wouldn't admit that I was cold, and stiffened my muscles to prevent a
shudder when my brother asked me cheerfully if I would enjoy a visit to
the Gouffre de Padirac, close by.

A "gouffre" on such a day! Not all the splendours of the posters which I
had often seen and admired, could thrill me to a desire for the
expedition; but I tried to cover my real feelings with the excuse that
it must now be too late to make even a small détour. Mr. Jack Dane
laughed, and replied that he had no intention of making it; he had only
wanted to test my pluck. "I believe you'd pretend to be delighted if I
told you we had plenty of time, and mustn't miss going," said he. "But
don't be frightened; this isn't a Gouffre de Padirac day, though it
really is a great pity to pass it by. What do you say to lunch instead?"

And we rolled through a magnificent mediæval gateway into the ancient
and unpronounceable town of Marvejols.

Before he had time to make the same suggestion to his more important
passengers, it came hastily from within the glass cage. So we stopped at
an inn which proudly named itself an hotel; and chauffeur and maid were
entertained in a kitchen destitute of air and full of clamour.
Nevertheless, it seemed a snug haven to us, and never was any soup
better than the soup of "Marvels," as Sir Samuel and Lady Turnour called
the place.

The word was "push on," however, for we had still the worst before us,
and a long way to go. The Quality had promised to finish its luncheon in
an hour; and well before the time was up, we two Worms were out in the
cold, each engaged in fulfilling its own mission. I was arranging rugs;
the chauffeur was pouring some libation from a long-nosed tin upon the
altar of his goddess when our master appeared, wearing such an "I
haven't stolen the cream or eaten the canary" expression that we knew at
once something new was in the wind.

He coughed, and floundered into explanations. "The waiter, who can speak
some English, has been frightening her ladyship," said he. "After the
day before yesterday she's grown a bit timid, and to hear that the cold
she has suffered from is nothing to what she may have to experience
higher up, and later in the day, as the sun gets down behind the
mountains, has put her off motoring. It seems we can go on from here by
train to Clermont-Ferrand and that's what she wants to do. I hate
deserting the car, but after all, this _is_ an expedition of pleasure,
and if her ladyship has a preference, why shouldn't it be gratified?"

"Quite so, sir," responded the chauffeur, his face a blank.

"My first thought on making up my mind to the train was to have the car
shipped at the same time," went on Sir Samuel, "but it seems that can't
be done. There's lots of red tape about such things, and the motor might
have to wait days on end here at Marvels, before getting off, to say
nothing of how long she might be on the way. Whereas, I've been
calculating, if you start now and go as quick as you can, you ought to
be at the château" (he pronounced it 'chattoe') "before us. Our train
doesn't leave for more than an hour, and it's a very slow one. Still, it
will be warm, and we have cards and Tauchnitz novels. Then, you know,
you can unload the luggage at the château and run back to the railway
station at Clermont-Ferrand, see to having our big boxes sent out
(they'll be there waiting for us) and meet our train. What do you think
of the plan?"

"It ought to do very well--if I'm not delayed on the road by snow."

"Do you expect to be?"

"I hope not. But it's possible."

"Well, her ladyship has made up her mind, and we must risk it. I'll
trust you to get out of any scrape."

The chauffeur smiled. "I'll try not to get into one," he said. "And I'd
better be off--unless you have further instructions?"

"Only the receipt for the luggage. Here it is," said Sir Samuel. "And
here are the keys for you, Elise. Her ladyship wants you to have
everything unpacked by the time she arrives. Oh--and the rugs! We shall
need them in the train."

"Isn't mademoiselle going with you?" asked my brother, showing surprise
at last.

"No. Her mistress thinks it would be better for her to have everything
ready for us at the 'chattoe.' You see, it will be almost dinner-time
when we get there."

"But, sir, if the car's delayed--"

"Well," cut in Sir Samuel, "we must chance it, I'm afraid. The fact is,
her ladyship is in such a nervous state that I don't care to put any
more doubts into her head. She's made up her mind what she wants, and
we'd better let it go at that."

If I'd been near enough to my brother I should have stamped on his foot,
or seized some other forcible method of suggesting that he should kindly
hold his tongue. As it was, my only hope lay in an imploring look, which
he did not catch. However, in pity for Sir Samuel he said no more; and
before we were three minutes older, if her ladyship had yearned to have
me back, it would have been too late. We were off together, and another
day had been given to us for ours.

The chauffeur proposed that I should sit inside the car; but I had
regained all my courage in the hot inn-kitchen. I was not cold, and
didn't feel as if I should ever be cold again.

The road mounted almost continuously. Sometimes, as we looked ahead, it
seemed to have been broken off short just in front of the car, by some
dreadful earth convulsion; but it always turned out to be only a sudden
dip down, or a sharp turn like the curve of an apple-paring. At last we
had reached the highest peak of the Roof of France--a sloping,
snow-covered roof; but steep as was the slant, very little of the snow
appeared to have slipped off.

The Cévennes on our right loomed near and bleak; the Auvergne stretched
endlessly before us, and the virgin snow, pure as edelweiss, was
darkened in the misty distance by patches of shadow, purple-blue, like
beds of early violets.

At first but a thin white sheet was spread over our road, but soon the
lace-like fabric was exchanged for a fleecy blanket, then a thick quilt
of down, and the motor began to pant. The winds seemed to come from all
ways at once, shrieking like witches, and flinging their splinters of
ice, fine and small as broken needles, against our cheeks. Still I would
not go inside. I could not bear to be warm and comfortable while Jack
faced the cold alone. I knew his fingers must be stiff, though he
wouldn't confess to any suffering, and I wished that I knew how to drive
the car, so that we might have taken turns, sitting with our hands in
our pockets.

In the deepening snow we moved slowly, the wheels slipping now and then,
unable to grip. Then, on a steep incline, there came a report like a
revolver shot. But it didn't frighten me now. I knew it meant a
collapsed tyre, not a concealed murderer; but there couldn't have been a
much worse place for "jacking up." Nevertheless, it's an ill tyre that
blows up for its own good alone, and the forty minutes out of a waning
afternoon made the chauffeur's cold hands hot and the hot engine cold.

Starting on again, we had ten miles of desolation, then a tiny hamlet
which seemed only to emphasize that desolation; again another ten-mile
stretch of desert, and another hamlet; here and there a glimpse of the
railway line, like a great black snake, lost in the snow; now and then
the gilded picture of an ancient town, crowning some tall crag that
stood up from the flat plain below like a giant bottle. And there was
one thrilling view of a high viaduct, flinging a spider's web of
glittering steel across a vast and shadowy ravine. "Garabit!" said the
chauffeur, as he saw it; and I remembered that this road was not new
for him. He did not talk much. Was he thinking of the companion who
perhaps had sat beside him before? I wondered. Was it because he thought
continually of her that he looked at me wistfully sometimes, often in
silence, wishing me away, maybe, and the woman who had spoilt his life
by his side again for good or ill?

Suddenly we plunged into a deep snow-bank which deceitfully levelled a
dip in the road, and the car stopped, trembling like a horse caught by
the hind leg while in full gallop.

On went the first speed, most powerful of all, but not powerful enough
to fight through snow nearly up to the hubs. The Aigle was prisoned like
a rat in a trap, and could neither go back nor forward.

"Well?" I questioned, half laughing, half frightened, at this fulfilment
of the morning's prophecy.

"Sit still, and I'll try to push her through," said Jack jumping out
into the deep snow. "It's only a drift in a hollow, you see; and we
should have got by the worst, just up there at St. Flour."

I looked where his nod indicated, and saw a town as dark and seemingly
as old as the rock out of which it grew, climbing a conical hill, to
dominate all the wide, white reaches above which it stood, like an
armoured sentinel on a watch-tower. As I gazed, struck with admiration,
which for an instant made me forget our plight, he began to push. The
car, surprised at his strength and determination, half decided to move,
then changed her mind and refused to budge. In a second, before he could
guess what I meant to do, I had flashed out of my seat into the snow,
and was wading in his tracks to help him when he snatched me up--a hand
on either side of my waist--and swung me back into my place again.

"Little wretch!" he exclaimed. "How dare you disobey me?"

Then I was vexed, for it was ignominious to be treated as a child, when
I had wanted to aid him like a comrade.

"You are very unkind--very rude," I said. "You wouldn't dare to do that,
or speak like that to _Her_."

He laughed loudly. "What--haven't you forgotten 'Her?'" (As if I ever
could!) "Well, I may tell you, it's just because I did dare to 'speak
like that' to a woman, that I'm a chauffeur stuck in the snow with
another man's car, and the--"

"The rest is another epithet which concerns me, I suppose," I remarked
with dignity, though suddenly I felt the chill of the icy air far, far
more cruelly than I had felt it yet. I was so cold, in this white
desolation, that it seemed I must die soon. And it wouldn't matter at
all if I were buried under the drifts, to be found in the late spring
with violets growing out of the places where my eyes once had been.

"Yes," said he, in that cool way he has, which can be as irritating as a
chilblain. "It was an epithet concerning you, but luckily for me I
stopped to think before I spoke--an accomplishment I'm only just
beginning to learn."

I swallowed something much harder and bigger than a cannon ball, and
said nothing.

"Of course you're covered with snow up to your knees, foolish child!" He
was glaring ferociously at me.

"It doesn't matter."

"It does matter most infernally. Don't you know that you make no more
than a featherweight of difference to the car?"

"I feel as if I weighed a thousand pounds, now."

"It's that snow!"

"No. It's you. Your crossness. I _can't_ have people cross to me, on
lonely mountains, just when I'm trying to help them."

His glare of rage turned to a stare of surprise. "Cross? Do you think I
was cross to you?"

"Yes. And you just stopped in time, or you would have been worse."

"Oh, I see," he said. "You thought that the 'epithet' was going to be
invidious, did you?"

"Naturally."

"Well, it wasn't. I--no, I _won't_ say it! That would be the last folly.
But--I wasn't going to be cross. I can't have you think that, whatever
happens. Now sit still and be good, while I push again."

I weighed no more than half the thousand pounds now, and the cannon ball
had dissolved like a chocolate cream; but the car stood like a rock,
fixed, immutable.

"There ought to be half a dozen of me," said the chauffeur. "Look here,
little pal, there's nothing else for it; I must trudge off to St. Flour
and collect the missing five. Are you afraid to be left here alone?"

Of course I said no; but when he had disappeared, walking very fast, I
thought of a large variety of horrors that might happen; almost
everything, in fact, from an earthquake to a mad bull. As the sun leaned
far down toward the west, the level red light lay like pools of blood
in the snow-hollows, and the shadows "came alive," as they used when I
was a child lying awake, alone, watching the play of the fire on wall
and ceiling.

Long minutes passed, and at last I could sit still no longer. Gaily
risking my brother's displeasure, now I knew that he wasn't "cross," I
slipped out into the snow again, opened the car door, stood in the
doorway, hanging on with one hand, and after much manoeuvring extricated
the tea-basket from among spare tyres and luggage on the roof. Then,
swinging it down, planted it inside the car, opened it, and scooped up a
kettleful of snow. As soon as the big white lump had melted over a rose
and azure flame of alcohol, I added more snow, and still more, until the
kettle was filled with water. By the time I had warmed and dried my feet
on the automatic heater under the floor, the water bubbled; and as jets
of steam began to pour from the spout I saw six figures approaching,
dark as if they had been cut out in black velvet against the snow.

"Tea for seven!" I said to myself; but the kettle was large, if the cups
were few.

It took half an hour to dig the car out, and push her up from the hollow
where the snow lay thickest. When she stood only a foot deep, she
consented readily to move. We bade good-bye to the five men, for whom we
had emptied our not-too-well filled pockets, and forged, bumbling, past
St. Flour. It was a great strain for a heavy car, and the chauffeur only
said, "I thought so!" when a chain snapped five or six miles farther on.

"What a good thing Lady Turnour isn't here!" said I, as he doctored the
wounded Aigle.

[Illustration: "_It took half an hour to dig the car out, and push her
up from the hollow where the snow lay thickest_"]

"Lots of girls would be in a blue funk," said he. "I could shake that
beastly woman for not taking you with her."

"Oh!" I exclaimed. "When I'm not doing you _any_ harm!"

He glanced up from his work, and then, as if on an irresistible impulse,
left the chain to come and stand beside me, as I sat wrapped up in his
gift "for a good girl."

He gazed at me for a moment without speaking, and I wonderingly returned
the gaze, not knowing what was to follow.

The moon had come sailing up like a great silver ship, over the snow
billows, and gleamed against a sky which was still a garden of
full-blown roses not yet faded, though sunset was long over. The soft,
pure light shone on his dark face, cutting it out clearly, and he had
never looked so handsome.

"You don't mean to do _me_ any harm, do you?" he said.

"I couldn't if I would, and wouldn't if I could," I answered in
surprise.

"Yet you _do_ me harm."

"You're joking!"

"I never was further from joking in my life. You do me harm because you
make me wish for something I can't have, something it's a constant fight
with me, ever since we've been thrown together, not to wish for, not to
think of. Yet you say I'm cross! Now, do you know what I mean, and will
you help me a little to remain your faithful brother, instead of
tempting me--tempting me, however unconsciously, to--to
wish--for--for--what a fool I am! I'm going to finish my mending."

I sat perfectly still, with my mouth open, feeling as if it were _my_
chain, not the car's, which had broken!

Of course if it hadn't been for all his talk of _Her_, I should have
known, or thought that I knew, well enough what he meant. But how could
I take his strange words and stammered hints for what they seemed to
suggest, knowing as I did, from his own veiled confessions, that he was
in love with some beautiful fiend who had ruined his career and then
thrown him over!

I longed to speak, to ask him just one question, but I dared not. No
words would come; and perhaps if they had, I should have regretted them,
for I was so sure he was not a man who would fall out of love with one
woman to tumble into love for another, that I didn't know what to make
of him; but the thought which his words shot into my mind, swift and
keen, and then tore away again, showed me very well what to make of
myself.

If I hadn't quite known before, I knew suddenly, all in a minute, that I
was in love, oh, but humiliatingly deep in love, with the chauffeur! It
seemed to me that no nice, well-regulated girl could ever have let
herself go tobogganing down such a steep hill, splash into such a sea of
love, unless the man were at the bottom in a boat, holding out his arms
to catch her as she fell. But the chauffeur hadn't the slightest
intention of holding out his arms to the poor little motor maid. He went
on mending the chain, and when he got into the car beside me again he
began to talk about the weather.




CHAPTER XXV


It was ten o'clock when we came into Clermont-Ferrand, which looked a
beautiful old place in the moonlight, with the great, white Puy de Dome
floating half way up the sky, like a marble dream-palace.

I trembled for our reception at the château, for everything would be our
fault, from the snow on the mountains to Lady Turnour's lack of a dinner
dress; and the consciousness of our innocence would be our sole comfort.
Not for an instant did we believe that it would help our case to stop at
the railway station and arrange for the big luggage to be sent the first
thing in the morning; nevertheless, we satisfied our consciences by
doing it, though we were so hungry that everything uneatable seemed
irrelevant.

A young woman in a book, who had just pried into the depths of her soul,
and discovered there a desperate love, would have loathed the thought of
food; but evidently I am unworthy to be a heroine, for my imagination
called up visions of soup and steak; and because it seemed so extremely
important to be hungry, I could quite well put off being unhappy until
to-morrow.

It is only three miles from Clermont-Ferrand to the Château de
Roquemartine, and we came to it easily, without inquiries, Jack having
carefully studied the road map with Sir Samuel. He had only to stop at
the porter's lodge to make sure we were right, and then to teuf-teuf up
a long, straight avenue, sounding our musical siren as an announcement
of our arrival. It was only when I saw the fine old mansion on a
terraced plateau, its creamy stone white as pearl in the moonlight, its
rows upon rows of windows ablaze, that I remembered my position
disagreeably. I was going to stay at this charming place, as a servant,
not as a member of the house-party. I would have to eat in the servants'
hall--I, Lys d'Angely, whose family had been one of the proudest in
France. Why, the name de Roquemartine was as nothing beside ours. It had
not even been invented when ours was already old. What would my father
say if he could see his daughter arriving thus at a house which would
have been too much honoured by a visit from him? I was suddenly ashamed.
My boasted sense of humour, about which I am usually such a Pharisee,
sulked in a corner and refused to come out to my rescue, though I called
upon it. Funny it might be to eat in the kitchens of inns, but I could
not feel that it was funny to be relegated to the servants' brigade in
the private house of a countryman of my father.

What queerly complicated creatures we little human animals are! An
avalanche of love hadn't destroyed my hunger. A knife-thrust in my
vanity killed it in an instant; and I can't believe this was simply
because I'm female. I shouldn't be surprised if a man might feel exactly
the same--or more so.

"Oh, dear!" I sighed. "It's going to be horrid here. But"--with a stab
of remorse for my self-absorption--"it's just as bad for you as for me.
_You_ don't need to stay in the house, though. You're a man, and free.
Don't stop for my sake. I won't have it! Please live in an inn. There's
sure to be one near by."

"I'm not going to look for it," said my brother. "You needn't worry
about me. I've got pretty callous. I shall have quarters for nothing
here--you're always preaching economy."

But I wouldn't be convinced. "Pooh! You're only saying that, so that I
won't think you're sacrificing yourself for me. Do you know anything
about the Roquemartines?"

"A little."

"Good gracious, I hope you've never met them?"

"I believe I lunched here with them once three years ago, with a
motoring friend of theirs."

He stated this fact so quietly, that, if I hadn't begun to know him and
his ways, I might have supposed him indifferent to the situation; but--I
can hardly say why--I didn't suppose it. I supposed just the contrary;
and I respected him, and his calmness, twenty times more than before, if
that were possible. Besides, I would have loved him twenty times more,
only that was impossible. How much stronger and better he was than I--I,
who blurted out my every feeling! I, a stranger, felt the position
almost too hateful for endurance, simply because it was ruffling to my
vanity. He, an acquaintance of these people, who had been their guest,
resigned himself to herding with their servants, because--yes, I knew
it!--because he would not let me bear annoyances alone.

"You can't, you _shan't_ stop in the house!" I gasped. "Leave me and the
luggage. Drive the car to the nearest village."

"I don't _want_ to leave you. Can't you understand that?" he said. "I'm
not sacrificing myself."

We were at the door. We had been heard. If I had suddenly been endowed
with the eloquence of Demosthenes, the gift would have come too late.
The door was thrown open, not by servants, but by a merry, curious crowd
of ladies and gentlemen, anxious to see the arrival of the belated, no
doubt much talked of, automobile. Light streamed out from a great hall,
which seemed, at first glance, to be half full of people in evening
dress, girls and young men, gay and laughing. Everybody was talking at
the same time, chattering both English and French, nobody listening to
anybody else, all intent on having a glimpse of the car. I believe they
were disappointed not to see it battered by some accident; sensations
are so dear to the hearts of idle ones.

Sir Samuel Turnour came out, with two young men and a couple of girls,
while Lady Turnour, afraid of the cold, remained on the threshold in a
group of other women among whom she was violently conspicuous by the
blazing of her jewels. The others were all in dinner dress, with very
few jewels. She had attempted to atone for her blouse and short skirt by
putting on all her diamonds and a rope or two of pearls. Poor woman! I
knew her capable of much. I had not supposed her capable of this.

Instinct told me that one of the young men with Sir Samuel was the
Marquis de Roquemartine, and I trembled with physical dread, as if under
a lifted lash, of his greeting to Jack. But the _pince-nez_ over
prominent, near-sighted eyes, gave me hope that my chauffeur might be
spared an unpleasant ordeal. Joy! the Marquis did not appear to
recognize him, and neither did the Marquise, if she were one of the
young women who had run out to the car. Maybe, if he could escape
recognition now, he might escape altogether. Once swept away among the
flotsam and jetsam below stairs, he would be both out of sight and out
of mind. I did not care about myself now, only for him, and I was
beginning to cheer up a little, when I noticed that the other young man
was gazing at the chauffeur very intently.

His flushed face, and small fair moustache, his light eyes and hair,
looked as English as the Marquis' short, pointed chestnut beard and
sleek hair _en brosse_, looked French. "Bertie!" I said to myself,
flashing a glance at him from under my veil.

Bertie, if Bertie it was, did not speak. He simply stared, mechanically
pulling an end of his tiny moustache, while Sir Samuel talked. But he
was so much interested in his stepfather's chauffeur that when the
really very pretty girl near him spoke, over his shoulder, he did not
hear.

"Well, we began to think you'd tumbled over a precipice!" exclaimed Sir
Samuel, with the jovial loudness that comes to men of his age from good
champagne or the rich red wines of Southern France.

Jack explained. The fair-haired young man let him finish in peace, and
then said, slowly, "Isn't your name Dane?"

"It is," replied my brother.

"Thought I knew your face," went on the other. "So you've taken to
chauffeuring as a last resort--what?"

He was intended by Providence to be good looking, but so snobbish was
his expression as he spoke, so cruelly sarcastic his voice, that he
became hideous in my eyes. A bleached skull grinning over a tall collar
could not have seemed more repulsive than the pink, healthy features of
that young man with his single eye-glass and his sneer.

Jack paid no more attention than if he had not heard, but the slight
stiffening of his face and raising of his eyebrows as he turned to Sir
Samuel, made him look supremely proud and distinguished, incomparably
more a gentleman in his dusty leather livery, than Bertie in his
well-cut evening clothes.

"I called at the railway station, and the luggage will be here before
eight to-morrow morning," he said, quietly.

"All right, all right," replied Sir Samuel, slow to understand what was
going on, but uncomfortable between the two young men. "I didn't know
that you were acquainted with my stepson, Dane."

"It was scarcely an acquaintance, sir," said the chauffeur. "And I
wasn't aware that Mr. Stokes was your stepson."

"If you had been, you jolly well wouldn't have taken the
engagement--what?" remarked Bertie, with a hateful laugh.

This time Jack condescended to look at him; from the head down, from the
feet up. "Really," he said, after an instant's reflection, "it wouldn't
have been fair to Sir Samuel to feel a prejudice on account of the
relationship. If one of the servants would kindly show me the garage--"




CHAPTER XXVI


If it hadn't been for the hope of seeing Jack again, I should have said
that I wanted nothing to eat, when I was asked; but I thought that he
might come to the servants' dining-room, if only because he would expect
to find me there; and I was right: he came.

"What an imbroglio!" I whispered, as he joined me at the table, where
hot soup and cold chicken were set forth.

"Not at all," said he, cheerfully. "Things are better for me than I
thought. Roquemartine didn't recognize me, I'm sure, for if he had, he
would have said so. He isn't a snob. But I rather hoped he would have
forgotten. I came as a stranger, brought by a friend of his and mine,
was here only for a meal (we were motoring then, too)--and it's three
years ago."

"But the marquise?"

"She's a bran new one. I fancied I'd heard that the wife died. This one
has the air of a bride, and I should say she's an American."

"Yes. She is. The maid who showed me my room told me. The other girl who
came out of doors, is her sister. They're fearfully rich, it seems, and
that young brute wants to marry her."

"Thank you for the descriptive adjective, my little partizan, but you're
troubling yourself for me more than you need. I don't mind, really.
It's all in a life-time, and I knew when I went in for this business,
that I should have to take the rough with the smooth. I was down on my
luck, and glad to get anything. What I have got is honest, and something
that I know I can do well--something I enjoy, too; and I'm not going to
let a vulgar young snob like that make me ashamed of myself, when I've
nothing to be ashamed of."

"You ought to be proud of yourself, not ashamed!" I cried to him, trying
to keep my eyes cold.

"Heaven knows there's little enough to be proud of. You'd see that, if I
bored you with my history--and perhaps I will some day. But anyhow, I've
nothing which I need to hide."

"As if I didn't know that! But Bertie hates you."

"I don't much blame him for that. In a way, the position in which we
stand to each other is a kind of poetical justice. I don't blame myself,
either, for I always did loathe a cad and Stokes is a cad par
excellence. He visited, more or less on suffrance, at two or three
houses where I used to go a good deal, in my palmy days. How he got
asked, originally, I don't exactly know, for the people weren't a bit
his sort; but money does a lot for a man in these days; and once in, he
wasn't easy to get rid of. He had a crawling way with any one he hoped
to squeeze any advantage out of--"

"I suppose he crawled to you then," I broke in.

"He did try it on, a bit, because I knew people he wanted to know; but
it didn't work. I rather put myself out to be rude to him, for I
resented a fellow like that worming himself into places where he had no
earthly right to be--no right of brains, or heart, or breeding. I must
admit, now I think of it, that he has several scores to wipe off; and
judging from the way he begins, he will wipe hard. Let him!"

"No, no," I protested. "You mustn't let him. It's too much. You will
have to tell Sir Samuel that he must find a new chauffeur at once. It
hurts me like a blow to think of such a creature humiliating you. I
couldn't see it done."

He looked at me very kindly, with quite all a brother's tenderness. "My
dear little pal," he said, "you won't have to see it."

"You mean--you will go?" Of course, I wanted him to take my advice, or I
wouldn't have offered it, yet it gave me a heartache to think he was
ready to take it so easily.

"I mean that I'm not the man to let myself be humiliated by a Bertie
Stokes. Possibly he may persuade his stepfather to sack me, but I don't
think he'll succeed in doing that, even if he tries. Sir Samuel, I
suppose, has given him every thing he has; sent him to Oxford (I know he
was there, and scraped through by the skin of his teeth), and allows him
thousands enough to mix with a set where he doesn't belong; but though
the old boy is weak in some ways, he has a strong sense of justice, and
where he likes he is loyal. I think he does like me, and I don't believe
he'd discharge me to please his stepson. Not only that, I should be
surprised if the promising Bertie wanted me discharged. It would be more
in his line to want me kept on, so that he might take it out of me."

I shuddered; but Jack smiled, showing his white teeth almost merrily.
"You may see some fun," he said, "but it shan't be death to the frogs;
not so bad as that. And I shall have you to be kind to me."

"Kind to you!" I echoed, rather tremulously. (If he only knew how kind I
should like to be!) "Yes, I will be kind. But I can't do anything to
make up for what you'll have to bear. You had better go."

"Perhaps I would, if I could take you away with me, but that can't be.
And, no, even in that case, I should prefer to stick it out. I shouldn't
like to let that young bounder drive me from a place, whether I wanted
to go or not. And do you think I would clear out, and leave him to worry
you?"

"He can't," I said.

"I wish I were sure of that. When the beast sees you without your
veil--oh, hang it, you mustn't let him come near you, you know."

"He isn't likely to take the slightest notice of his stepfather's wife's
maid," said I, "especially as he's dying to marry the American heiress
here."

"Anyhow, be careful."

"I shan't look at him if I can help it. And we shall be gone before
long. I believe the Turnours' invitation, which their Bertie was bribed
to ask for, is only for two or three days. How you _must_ have been
feeling when you were told to drive here! But you showed nothing."

"I had a qualm or two when I was sure of the place; but then it was
over. It's far worse for you than for me. And I told you I've been
learning from you a lesson of cheerfulness. I was merely a Stoic
before."

"It's nothing for me, comparatively," I said, and by this time, I was
quite sincere; but I didn't know then what the next twenty-four hours
were to bring.

We were not left alone for long, but in ten minutes we had had our talk
out, while we played at eating the meal we had looked forward to with
eagerness before our appetites were crowded into the background. A fat
_sous chef_ flitted about; maids and valets glanced in; nevertheless, we
found time for a heart-warming hand pressure before we parted for the
night. Altogether, I had not had more than fifteen minutes in the
dining-room; yet when I left I felt a hundred times braver and more
cheerful.

Already I had been to my mistress's quarters. The maid who took charge
of me on my arrival showed me that room before she showed me mine, and
explained the way from one to the other. My "bump of locality" was
tested, however, in getting back to her ladyship's part of the house,
for the castle has its intricacies.

The word "château," in France, covers a multitude of comfortable,
unpretentious family mansions, as I had not to find out now, for the
first time; and the dwelling of the Roquemartines, though a fine old
house of the seventeenth century, is no more imposing, under its high,
slate roof, than many another. It is Lady Turnour's first experience,
though, as a visitor in the "mansions of the great," and when I had been
briskly unpacking for half an hour or so, she came in, somewhat subdued
by her new emotions. I think that she was rather glad to see a familiar
face, to have someone to talk to of whom she did not feel in awe, with
whom she need not be afraid of making some mistake; and she seemed
quite human to me, for the first time.

Never had I seen her in such an expansive mood, not even when she gave
me the blouse. Instead of the cross words I had braced myself to expect,
she was almost friendly. She had felt a fool, she said, not being able
to dress for dinner, but then no one else could touch her, for jewels;
and didn't every one just stare, at the table, though, of course, she
hadn't put on her tiara, as that wouldn't have been suitable with a
blouse and short skirt! Sir Samuel's stepson had been quite nasty and
superior about the jewels, when he got at her, afterward, and she
believed would have been rude if he'd dared, but luckily he didn't know
her well enough for that; and he'd better be careful how far he went, or
he'd find things very different from what they'd been with him, since
his mother married Sir Samuel. As if men knew when women ought to wear
their jewels, and when not! But he was green with jealousy of the things
his stepfather had given her; wanted everything himself.

She went on to describe the other members of the house party, and
mouthed their titles with delight, though she had only her own maid to
impress. Everyone had a title, it seemed, except Bertie, and the
American girl he wanted to marry, Miss Nelson, a sister of the young
marquise. Some of the titles were very high ones, too. There were
princes and princesses, and dukes and duchesses all over the place,
mostly French and Italian, though one of the duchesses was American,
like the marquise and her sister.

"Not the Duchesse de Melun!" I exclaimed, before I stopped to think.

"Yes, that's the name," said her ladyship, twisting round to look up at
me, as I wound her back hair in curling-pins. "What do you know about
her?"

How I wished that I knew nothing--and that I hadn't spoken!

The name had popped out, because the Duchesse de Melun is the only
American-born duchess of my acquaintance, and because I was hoping very
hard that the duchess of the Château de Roquemartine might _not_ be the
Duchesse de Melun. What bad luck that the Roquemartines had selected
that particular duchess for this particular house party, when they must
know plenty, and could just as well have chosen another specimen!

"I have heard her name," I admitted, primly. And so I had, too often. "A
friend of mine was--was with her, once."

"As her maid?"

"Not exactly."

"Another sort of servant, I suppose?"

As her ladyship stated this as a fact, rather than asked it as a
question, I ventured to refrain from answering. Fortunately she didn't
notice the omission, as her thoughts had jumped to another subject. But
mine were not so readily displaced. They remained fastened to the
Duchesse de Melun; and while Lady Turnour talked, I was wondering
whether I could successfully contrive to keep out of the duchess's way.
She is quite intimate with Cousin Catherine; and I told myself that she
was pretty sure already to have heard the truth about my disappearance.
Or, if even with her friends, Cousin Catherine clings to
conventionalities, and pretends that I'm visiting somewhere by her
consent, people are almost certain to scent a mystery, for mysteries are
popular. "If that duchess woman sees me, she'll write to Cousin
Catherine at once," I thought. "Or I wouldn't put it _past_ her to
telegraph!"

("Put it past" is an expression of Cousin Catherine's own, which I
always disliked; but it came in handy now.)

I tried to console myself, though, by reflecting that, if I were
careful, I ought to be able to avoid the duchess. The ways of great
ladies and little maids lie far apart in grand houses and--

"There is going to be a servants' ball to-morrow night," announced Lady
Turnour, while my thoughts struggled out of the slough of despond. "And
I want you to be the best dressed one there, for _my_ credit. We're all
going to look on, and some of the young gentlemen may dance. The
marquise and Miss Nelson say they mean to, too, but I should think they
are joking. _I_ may not be a French princess nor yet a marquise, but I
_am_ an English lady, and I must say I shouldn't care to dance with my
cook, or my chauffeur."

Her chauffeur would be at one with her there! But I could think of
nothing save myself in this crisis. "Oh, miladi, I _can't_ go to a
servants' ball!" I exclaimed.

She bridled. "Why not, I should like to know? Do you consider yourself
above it?"

"It isn't that," I faltered. (And it wasn't; it was that duchess!)
"But--but--" I searched for an excuse. "I haven't anything to wear."

"I will see to that," said my mistress, with relentless generosity. "I
intend to give you a dress, and as you have next to nothing to do
to-morrow, you can alter it in time. If you had any gratitude in you,
Elise, you'd be out of yourself with joy at the idea."

"Oh, I am out of myself, miladi," I moaned.

"Well, you might say 'Thank your ladyship,' then."

I said it.

"When you have unpacked the big luggage in the morning, I will give you
the dress. I have decided on it already. Sir Samuel doesn't like it on
me, so I don't mind parting with it; but it's very handsome, and cost me
a great deal of money when I was getting my trousseau. It is scarlet
satin trimmed with green beetle-wing passementerie, and gold fringe."

My one comfort, as I gasped out spasmodic thanks, was this: I would look
such a vulgar horror in the scarlet satin trimmed with green
beetle-wings and gold fringe, that the Duchesse de Melun might fail to
recognize Lys d'Angely.




CHAPTER XXVII


I dusted and shook out every cell in my brain, during the night, in the
hope of finding any inspiration which might save me from the servants'
ball; but I could think of nothing, except that I might suddenly come
down with a contagious disease. The objection to this scheme was that a
doctor would no doubt be sent for, and would read my secret in my lack
of temperature.

When morning came, I was sullenly resigned to the worst. "Kismet!" said
I, as I unfolded her ladyship's dresses, and was blinded by the glare of
the scarlet satin.

"Try it on," commanded my mistress. "I want to get an idea how you will
look."

Naturally, the red thing was a Directoire thing; and putting it on over
my snug little black frock, I was like a cricket crawling into an empty
lobster-shell. But to my surprise and annoyance, the lobster-shell was
actually becoming to the cricket.

I didn't want to look nice and be a credit to Lady Turnour. I wanted to
look a fright, and didn't care if I were a disgrace to her. But the
startling scarlet satin was Liberty satin, and therefore had a sheen,
and a soft way of folding that redeemed it somewhat. Its bright poppy
colour, its emerald beetle-wings shading to gold, and its glittering
fringes that waved like a wheat-field stirred by a breeze, all gave a
bizarre sort of "value," as artists say, to my pale yellow hair and dark
eyes. I couldn't help seeing that the dreadful dress made my skin pearly
white; and I was afraid that, when I had altered the thing, instead of
looking like a frump, I should only present the appearance of a rather
fast little actress. I should be looked at in my scarlet abomination.
People would stare, and smile. The Duchesse de Melun would say to the
Marquise de Roquemartine: "Who is that young person? She looks exactly
like someone I know--that little Lys d'Angely the millionaire-man,
Charretier, is so silly about."

"You see, you can alter it very easily," said Lady Turnour.

"Yes, miladi."

"Have you got any dancing slippers?"

"No--that is--I don't know--"

"Don't be stupid. I will give you ten francs to buy yourself a pair of
red stockings and red slippers to match. The stockings needn't be silk.
They won't show much. Dane can take you in the car to Clermont-Ferrand
this afternoon. I want you to be all right, from head to feet--different
from any of the other maids."

I didn't doubt that I would be different--very different.

Tap, tap, a knock at the door.

"Ontray!" cried her ladyship.

The door opened. Mr. Herbert Stokes stood on the threshold.

"I say, Lady T--" he began, when he saw the scarlet vision, and stopped.

"What is it?" inquired the wife of his stepfather--rather a complicated
relation.

"I--er--wanted--" drawled Bertie. "But it doesn't matter. Another
time."

"You needn't mind _her_," said Lady Turnour, with a nod toward me. "It's
only my maid. I'm giving her a dress for the servants' ball to-night."

Bertie gave vent to the ghost of a whistle, below his breath. He looked
at me, twisting the end of his small fair moustache, as he had looked at
Jack Dane last night; and though his expression was different, I liked
it no better.

"Thought it was a new guest," said he.

"I suppose you didn't take her for a lady, did you?" my mistress was
curious to know. "You pride yourself on your discrimination, your
stepfather says."

"There's nothing the matter with my discrimination," replied the young
man, smiling. But his smile was not for her ladyship. It was for me; and
it was meant to be a piquant little secret between us two.

How well I remembered asking the chauffeur, "_Could_ you know a Bertie?"
And how he answered that he had known one, and consequently didn't want
to know another. Here was the same Bertie; and now that I too knew him,
I thought I would prefer to know another, rather than know more of him.
Yet he was good-looking, almost handsome. He had short, curly light
hair, eyes as blue as turquoises, seen by daylight, full red lips under
the little moustache, a white forehead, a dimple in the chin, and a very
good figure. He had also an educated, perhaps too well educated, voice,
which tried to advertise that it had been made at Oxford; and he had
hands as carefully kept as a pretty woman's, with manicured,
filbert-shaped nails.

"You're making her jolly smart," he went on. "She'll do you credit."

"I want she should," retorted her ladyship, gratified and ungrammatical.

"She must give me a dance--what?" condescended the gilded youth. "Does
she speak English?"

"Yes. So you'd better be careful what you say before her."

Bertie telegraphed another smile to me. I looked at the faded damask
curtains; at the mantelpiece with its gilded clock and two side-pieces,
Louis Seize at his worst, considered good enough for a bedroom; at the
drapings of the enormous bed; at the portière covering the door of Sir
Samuel's dressing-room; at the kaleidoscopic claret-and-blue figures on
the carpet; in fact, at everything within reach of my eyes except Mr.
Herbert Stokes.

"I've nothing to say that she can't hear," said he, virtuously. "I only
wanted to know if you'd like to see the gardens? The marquise sent me to
ask. Several people who haven't been here before are goin'. It's a lot
warmer this mornin', so you won't freeze."

Lady Turnour said that she would go, and ordered me to find her hat and
coat. As I turned to get them, Bertie smiled at me again, and threw me a
last glance as he followed my mistress out of the room.

I begin to be afraid there is an innate vanity in me which nothing can
thoroughly eradicate without tearing me up by the roots; for when I was
ready to alter that red dress, instead of trying to make it look as
ridiculous as possible, something forced me to do my best, to study
fitness and becomingness. I do hope this is self-respect and not
vanity; but to hope that is, I fear, like believing in a thing which you
know isn't true.

I worked all the morning at ensmalling the gown (if one can enlarge, why
can't one ensmall?) and by luncheon time it was finished. I had seen
Jack at breakfast, but had no chance for a word with him alone, although
he succeeded valiantly in keeping other chauffeurs, and valets, from
making my acquaintance. As I stopped only long enough for a cup of
coffee and a roll, I didn't give him too much trouble; but at luncheon
it was different. Everyone was chattering about the ball in the evening
(a privilege promised, it seemed, as a reward for hard work on the
occasion of a real ball above stairs), and house servants and visitors
alike were all so gay and good-natured that it would have been stupid to
snub them. Jack saw this, and though he protected me as well as he could
in an unobtrusive way, he put out no bristles.

The general excitement was contagious, and if it hadn't been for the
panic I was in about the duchess, I should have thrown myself wholly
into the spirit of the hive, buzzing like the busiest bee in it. Even as
it was, I couldn't help entering into the fun of the thing, for it was
fun in its queer way. Something like being on the stage of a third-rate
theatre in the midst of a farce, where the actors mistake you for one of
themselves, calling upon you to play your part, while you alone know
that you are a leading member of the Comédie Française, just dropped in
at this funny place to look on.

Here, the stage was on a much grander scale, and the play more amusing
than in the couriers' dining-rooms at the hotels where I had been. At
the hotels, the maids and valets scarcely knew each other. Some were in
a hurry, others were tired or in a bad humour. Here the little company
had been together for days. Meals were a relaxation, a time for
flirtation and gossip about their own and each other's masters and
mistresses. Each servant felt the liveliest interest in the "Monsieur"
or "Madame" of his or her neighbour; and the stories that were
exchanged, the criticisms that were made, would have caused the hair of
those _messieurs_ and those _mesdames_ to curl.

If I was openly approved by the gentlemen's gentlemen, Mr. Jack Dane had
the undisguised admiration of the ladies' ladies; and he received their
advances with tact. Dances for the evening were asked for and promised
right and left, among the assemblage, always dependent upon summons from
Above. It was agreed that, if a Monsieur or Madame wished to dance with
you, no previous engagement was to stand, for all the castles and big
houses from far and near would be emptied in honour of the ball, from
drawing-rooms to servants' halls, and quality was to mingle with
quantity, as on similar occasions in England, whence--the chef
explained--came the fashion. It was a feature of _l'entente cordiale_,
and the same agreeable understanding was to level all barriers, for the
night, between high and low.

Some of the visitors' _femmes de chambres_ were pretty, coquettish
creatures, and I was delighted to find that they were all called by
their mistresses' titles. The maid of my _bête noire_ was "Duchesse";
she who pertained to our hostess was "Marquise," and I blossomed into
"Miladi." The girls were looking forward to rivalling their mistresses
in _chic_, and also in the admiration of the real princes and dukes and
counts; that they would have an exclusive right to the attentions of
these gentlemen's understudies also seemed to be expected.

After half an hour at table in the servants' hall, there was nothing
left for me to find out about the owners of the castle and their guests;
but the principal interest of everyone seemed to centre upon the affair
between Mr. Herbert Stokes and the heiress sister of Madame la Marquise.
There were even bets among the valets as to how it was to end, and
Bertie's man, who looked as if he could speak volumes if he would, was a
person of importance.

All the men admired Miss Nelson extremely, but the women were divided in
opinion. Her own maid, a bilious Frenchwoman, with a jealous eye, said
that the American miss was _une petite chatte_, who was playing off Mr.
Stokes against the Duc de Divonne, and it was a pity that the handsome
young English monsieur could not be warned of her unworthiness. The duke
was not handsome, and he was neither young nor rich, but--these
Americans were out for titles, just as titles were out for American
money. Why else had the marriage of Madame la Marquise, Miss Daisy's
elder sister, made itself? Miss Daisy liked Mr. Stokes, but he could not
give her a title. The duke could--_if_ he would. But would he? She was
rich, but there were others richer. People said that he was wary. Yet he
admired Miss Daisy, it was true, and if by her flirtation with Mr.
Stokes she could pique him into a proposal, she would have her triumph.

This was only one of many dramas going on in the house, but it was the
most interesting to me, as to others, and I determined to look with all
my might at the duke and at pretty Miss Nelson, of whom I had only had a
glimpse on arriving. If she were really nice, I did hope that Bertie
wouldn't get her!

My costume pressed as weightily on her ladyship's mind, as if I had been
a favourite poodle about to be sent, all ribboned and clipped, to a dog
show. She did not forget the slippers and stockings, and the chauffeur
was ordered to take me into Clermont-Ferrand to buy them. Fortunately
she didn't know how much I looked forward to the excursion!

At precisely three o'clock I walked out to the castle garage, near the
stables, and found Jack getting the car ready; but I did not find him
alone. The garage is a big and splendid one, and not only were the three
household dragons in their stalls, but four or five strange beasts, pets
of visitors; and the finest of these (after our blue Aigle) was the
white Majestic of the Duc de Divonne. That gentleman, whom I recognized
easily from a description breathed into my ear by a countess's countess,
at luncheon, was in the garage when I arrived, showing off his
automobile to Miss Nelson. The ducal chauffeur lurked in the background,
duster in hand, and Mr. Herbert Stokes occupied as large a space as
possible in the foreground.

Nobody deigned to take any open notice of me, though Bertie threw me a
stealthy smile of recognition, carefully screened from Miss Nelson, but
as the Aigle was swallowing a last refreshing draught of petrol, I had
time to observe the actors in the little drama whose plot I had already
heard.

Yes, though Miss Daisy Nelson looked even prettier than I thought her
last night, I could quite believe the bilious maid's statement that she
was _une petite chatte_. Her green-gray eyes, very effective under thick
masses of auburn hair, were turned up at the outer corners in a
fascinating, sly little way; and her cupid-bow lips, which turned down
at _their_ corners, were a bit redder than Nature's formula ordains.
Nevertheless I couldn't help liking her, just as one likes a lovely,
playful Persian kitten which may rub its adorable nose against your
hand, or scratch with its naughty claws. And she was enjoying herself so
much, the pretty, expensive-looking creature! As Pamela would say, it
was evident that she was "having the time of her life," revelling in the
admiration and rivalry of the two men; delighted with her own power over
them, and her importance as a beauty and an heiress, the only unmarried
girl in the house party; amusing herself by making one man miserable and
the other happy, sending them up and down on a mental sea-saw, by turns.

As for the little Duc de Divonne, his profile is of the Roman Emperor
order, and his eyes like the last coals in a dying fire. I said to
myself that, if Miss Nelson should become a duchess, she would have to
pay for some of her girlish antics in pre-duchess days. Still, I decided
that if I had to choose, it would be the duke before Bertie.

The girl kept both her men busy, and after the first glance Bertie
ignored my existence: but the Duke, fired by a moment's neglect, flamed
out with an inspiration. He "dared" Miss Nelson to take a lesson from
him in driving his car, with no other chaperon than the chauffeur. "All
right, I will," said she, "and I bet you I'll be an expert after one
trial."

"What do you bet?" asked the Duke.

She smiled flirtatiously in answer and Bertie stood forlorn, his nice
pink complexion turning an ugly salmon colour. In a minute the white car
was off, Miss Nelson beside the duke, the chauffeur like a small nut in
a large shell, lolling in the tonneau. Bertie turned to us, and having
looked kindly at me, sharply demanded of Jack where he was going.

"Mademoiselle has an errand."

"Ah! then I'll drive Mademoiselle. Wish I had a tenner for every time
I've driven an Aigle! You can sit inside, in case there's work to do."

My eyes opened widely, but I said nothing. I glanced at Jack, and saw
his face harden.

"I have been told to drive the car, and it is my duty to drive it unless
I receive different orders," said he.

"I'm giving you different orders," said Bertie.

"I take my orders only from the owner of the car."

"You're beastly impertinent," snapped Bertie, "and I'll report you to
Sir Samuel."

"As you choose," returned Jack, turning the starting-handle.

"Why don't you say 'sir' when you speak to me? You don't seem to have
trained into chauffeur manners yet."

"If I were your chauffeur, you would have the right to criticize. As I'm
not, and never will be, you haven't. Mademoiselle, the car's ready. Will
you get in?"

I jumped into my usual place, beside the driver's seat.

"Ah, you sit by the chauffeur, do you?" said Bertie. "I don't wonder he
wants to keep his job."

For an instant I was afraid that Jack would strike him.

My blood rushed to my head, and I half rose from the seat, with a
choked, warning whisper of "Jack!"

It was the first time I'd called him that, except to myself, and I saw
him give the faintest start. He looked at the other man, and then,
though Bertie stepped quickly forward as if to open the car door and
jump in, he sprang to his place, and we were off.

"He means mischief," I said, when I felt able to speak.

"So do I, if he does," answered Jack.

"I wish you'd do me a favour," I went on. "Keep away from that awful
ball to-night."

"What! With you there? I know my business better."

I couldn't help laughing. "Your present business, I believe," said I,
"is that of a chauffeur."

"With extra duty as watch-dog."

"I can't bear to have you see me in the ridiculous get-up Lady Turnour
is making me wear, that's the selfish part of my reason--and--and it
will be so _horrid_ for you, in every way."

"I'm callous to anything they can do now, except one thing."

"What?"

"If you don't know already, I mean where you're concerned."

"You're very kind to me."

"Kind? Yes, I am very 'kind.' A man has to be abnormally 'kind' to want
to look after a girl like you."

"How bitterly you speak!" I exclaimed, hardly understanding him.

"I feel bitter sometimes. Do you wonder? But for heaven's sake, don't
let's talk of me. Let's talk of something pleasant. Would you care to do
a little sight-seeing in Clermont-Ferrand, if your shopping doesn't take
us too long?"

I assured him that it would not take ten minutes; and it didn't take
more. I saved a franc on the transaction, too, which would console her
ladyship if I got back a few minutes late; and with that thought in my
mind, I abandoned myself to the joy of the expedition. We went to the
Petrifying Fountain, and inspected its strange menagerie of stone
animals; we made a dash into the Cathedral where St. Louis was married,
and looked at the beautiful thirteenth-century glass in the windows, and
the strange frescoes; we rushed in and out of Notre Dame du Port,
stopping on the way in the _Place_ where the first Crusade was
proclaimed, and to gaze at the house and statue of Pascal. Jack would
squander some of his extremely hard earned money on a box of the burnt
almonds for which Clermont-Ferrand is celebrated; and when we had seen
everything I dared stop to see, he ran the car to Montferrand, to show
me some ancient and wonderful houses, famous all over France. Eventually
he threatened to spin me out to Royat, but I pleaded the certainty that
Lady Turnour would wish to change into her smartest tea-gown for "feef
oclocky" and that I must be there to assist at the ceremony.

So we turned castleward, with all the speed the law allows, if not a
little more; and I arrived with a pair of red stockings, cheap
high-heeled slippers, a franc in change, and a queer presentiment of
dangerous things to happen.




CHAPTER XXVIII


Although a good many neighbours were coming to the Château de
Roquemartine to look on at the servants' ball, they were all to drive or
motor over in their ordinary dinner dress; it was only the servants
themselves who were to "make toilettes."

Lady Turnour, however, who regretted having missed the smart ball for
the great world, given a few nights before, determined that people
should be forced to appreciate her wealth and position; and the wardrobe
of Solomon in all his glory could hardly have produced anything to
exceed her gold tissue, diamanté.

When I had squeezed, and poked, and pushed her into it, and was
bejewelling her, Sir Samuel came, as usual, to have his white cravat
tied by me. Bertie, too, appeared, dressed for dinner, and watched me
with silent amusement as I performed my evening duty for his stepfather.

"Pretty gorgeous, aren't you?" he remarked to Lady Turnour; but she was
flattered rather than annoyed by the criticism, and sailed away
good-natured, leaving me to gather up the few jewels of her collection
which she had discarded. Lately I had been trusted with her treasures,
and felt the responsibility disagreeably, especially as my
mistress--when she remembered it--counted everything ostentatiously
over, after relieving me of my charge.

To-night I had just begun picking up the brooches, bracelets, diamond
stars, coronets and bursting suns which illuminated the dressing-table
firmament, when Bertie walked in again, through the door that he had
left ajar.

"I came back because my necktie's a failure," said he. "My man must be
in love, I should think. Probably with you! Anyhow, something's the
matter; his fingers are all thumbs. But you turned out my old governor
rippin'ly. You'll do me, won't you?"

As he spoke, he untied his cravat, and produced another.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I don't know how to do _that_ kind of tie."

"What--what?" he stared. "It's just the same as the governor's--only a
little better. Come along, there's a dear." He had pushed the door to;
now he shut it.

I walked to the other end of the room, and began folding a blouse.
"You'd better give your valet another trial," I said. "I'm _not_ a
valet. I'm Lady Turnour's maid."

"She's in luck to get you."

"I'm engaged to wait upon _her_."

"You are stiff! You do the governor's tie."

"Sir Samuel's very kind to me."

"Well, I'll be kind, too. I'd like nothing better. I'll be a lot kinder
than he'd dare to be. I say, I've got a present for you--something
rippin', that you'll like. You can wear it at the ball to-night, but
you'd better not tell anyone who gave it to you--what? You shall have
it for tyin' my necktie. Now, don't you call that 'kind'?"

I stopped folding the blouse, and increased my height by at least an
inch. "No," I said, "I call it impertinent, and I shall be obliged if
you will leave Lady Turnour's room. That's the only thing you can do for
me."

"By Jove!" said Bertie. "What theatre were you at before you took to
lady's maidin'?"

To this I deigned no answer.

"Anyhow, you're a rippin' little actress."

Silence.

"And a pretty girl. As pretty as they make 'em."

I invented a new kind of sigh, a cross between a snarl and a moan.

"Tell me, what's the mystery? There is a mystery about you, you know.
Not a bit of good tryin' to deceive me.... You might as well own up. I
can keep a secret as well as the next one."

A tapping of my foot. A slamming of a wardrobe door, which was able to
squeak furiously without loss of dignity.

"What _were_ you before my lady took you on?... Look here, if you don't
answer, I shall begin to think the secret's got to do with _those_." And
he pointed to the dressing table, where the jewels still lay. He even
put out his hand and took up the bursting sun. (How I sympathized with
it for bursting!) "Worth somethin'--what?"

"You can think whatever you like," I flashed at him, "if only you'll go
out of this room."

"Pity your chauffeur isn't at hand for you to run to," Bertie half
sneered, half laughed, for he was keeping his hateful, teasing good
nature. "And by the way, talkin' of him, since you're such a little
prude, I'll just warn you in a friendly way to look out for that chap.
You don't know his history--what? I'm sure the governor doesn't."

"Sir Samuel knows he can drive, and that he's a _gentleman_," said I,
with meaning emphasis.

"Well, I've warned you," replied Bertie, injured. "You may see which one
of us is really your friend, before you're out of this galley. But if
you want to be a good and happy little girl, you'd best be nice to me. I
shall find out all about you, you know."

That was his exit speech; and the only way in which I could adequately
express my opinion of it was to bang the door on his back.

       *       *       *       *       *

The ball was in a huge vault of a room which had once been a granary.
The stone floor had been worn smooth by many feet and several centuries,
and the blank gray walls were brightened with drapery of flags, yards of
coloured cotton, paper flowers and evergreens, arranged with an effect
which none save Latin hands could have given. Dinner above and below
stairs was early, and before ten the guests began to assemble in the
ballroom. All the servant-world had dined in ball costume, excepting
Jack and myself, and it was only at the last minute that the cricket
hopped upstairs and wriggled into its neatly reduced lobster shell.

I had visions of my brother lurking gloomily yet observantly in obscure
corners, ready at any moment for a _sortie_ in my defence; but when I
sneaked, sidled, and slid into the ballroom, making myself as small as
possible that I might pass unobserved in spite of my sensational
redness, I had a surprise. Near the door stood the chauffeur in evening
dress, out-princing and out-duking every prince and duke among the
Marquise de Roquemartine's guests. And I, who hadn't even known that he
possessed evening clothes, could not have opened my eyes wider if my
knight had appeared in full armour.

I had broken the news of the scarlet dress to him, nevertheless I saw it
was a shock. To each one, the other was a new person, as we stood and
talked together. I said not a word about my scene with Bertie, for there
was trouble enough between the two already; but when Jack told me that,
if I were asked to dance by anyone objectionable, I must say I was
engaged to him, I knew which One loomed largest and ugliest in his mind.

A glance round the big, bright room showed me many strangers. All were
servants, however, for the grand people had not yet come down to play
their little game of condescension. A band from Clermont-Ferrand was
making music, but the ball was to be opened by the marquise and her
guests, who were to honour their servants by dancing the first dance
with them. Each noble lady was to select a cook, butler, footman,
chauffeur, or groom, according to her pleasure; and each noble lord was
to lead out the female worm which least displeased his eye.

Hardly had I time to dive deep into the wave of domesticity, when the
great moment arrived, and a spray of aristocracy sprinkled the top of
that heavy wave, with the dazzling sparkle of its jewels and its beauty.
Really it was a pretty sight! I had to admire it; and in watching the
play of light and colour I forgot my private worries until I saw Bertie
bowing before me.

The marquise had just honoured her own butler. The marquis was offering
his arm to the housekeeper; the Duc de Divonne had led out Miss Nelson's
bilious maid, appalling in apple-green: Miss Nelson was returning the
compliment by giving her hand to his valet: why should not this young
gentleman dance with his step-mother-in-law's maid?

There seemed no reason why not, except the maid's disinclination; and
sudden side-slip of the brain caused by the glassy impudence in Mr.
Stokes's eye so disturbed my equilibrium that I forgot Jack's offer. He
did not forget, however--it would hardly have been Jack, if he had--but
stepped forward to claim me as I began to stammer some excuse.

"Oh, come, that isn't playin' the game," said Bertie. "We're all dancin'
with servants this turn. Go ask a lady, Dane."

"I have asked a lady, and she has promised to dance with me," said Jack.
"Miss d'Angely--"

"Oh, that's the lady's name, is it? I'm glad to know," mumbled Bertie,
as Jack whisked me away from under his nose.

"By Jove, I oughtn't to have let that out, ought I?" said Jack,
remorseful. "The less he knows about you, the better; and as Lady
Turnour has no idea of pronunciation, if it hadn't been for my
stupidity--"

"Don't call it that," I stopped him, as we began to dance. "It doesn't
matter a bit--unless it should occur to the Duchesse de Melun to ask
him questions about me. And I'd rather not think about that possibility,
or anything else disagreeable, to spoil this heavenly waltz."

"You _can_ dance a little, can't you?" said Jack, in a tone and with a
look that made the words better than any compliment any other man had
ever paid me on my dancing, though I'd been likened to feathers, and
vine-tendrils, and various poetically airy things.

"You aren't so bad yourself, brother," I retorted, in the same tone.
"Our steps suit, don't they?"

He muttered something, which sounded like "Just a little better than
anything else on earth, that's all"; but of course it couldn't really
have been what my ears tried to make my vanity believe.

When we stopped--which we didn't do while there was music to go on
with--I was conscious that people were looking at us, and nobody with
more interest than the Duchesse de Melun. I glanced hastily away before
my eye had quite caught hers; but no female thing needs to give a whole
eye to what is going on around her. I knew, although my back was soon
turned in her direction, that the Duchesse de Melun was talking to Lady
Turnour, and I guessed the subject of the conversation. Thank goodness,
my mistress's mind had never compassed more than a misleading "Elise,"
and thank goodness, also, many of the great folk were preparing to leave
us humble ones to ourselves, now that their condescension had been
proved in the first dance. Would the duchess go? Yes--oh joy!--she gets
up from her seat. She moves toward the door. Lady Turnour has risen too,
but sits down again, lured by the proximity of a princess. All will be
well, perhaps! The duchess mayn't think of catechizing Bertie, now that
my mistress has put her off the track. He, with several other young men,
evidently means to stop and see the fun out. If only he would sit still,
now, beside the marquise! But no. Miss Nelson and the Duc de Divonne are
going out together. Bertie must needs jump up and dash across the room
for a word with the girl. Discouraged by some laughing answer flung over
her shoulder, he almost bumps against the duchess. Horror! She speaks to
him quite eagerly. She puts a question. He replies. She bends her head
near to him. They walk slowly out of the room, talking, talking. All is
up with Lys d'Angely! The next thing that Meddlesome Matty of a
duchess will do, is to wire Cousin Catherine Milvaine. Crash!
thunder--lightning--hail!--Monsieur Charretier on my track again.

       *       *       *       *       *

I resolved, as I saw myself lying shattered at my own feet, to pick up
the bits and say nothing to Jack, lest he should blame his own
inadvertent dropping of my name for all present and future mischief.
Being a man, he can see things only with his eyes; and as he happened to
be looking at me, he missed the pantomime at the other end of the room.
I was looking at him too, but of course that didn't prevent me from
seeing other things; and while I was chatting with him, and wondering
how long it might be before the thunderbolt (Monsieur Charretier) should
fall, I received another invitation to dance. This time it was from a
delightful old boy who looked sixty and felt twenty-one.

He was ruddy-brown, with tight gray curls on his head, and deep dimples
in his cheeks. If anyone had told me that he was not an English admiral
I should have known it was a fib.

"I hope you aren't engaged for this next waltz?" said he. "I should like
very much to have it with you." And he spoke as nicely as he would to a
young girl of his own world, although he must have heard from someone
that I was a lady's maid.

I glanced at Jack, but evidently he approved of admirals as partners for
his sister. He kept himself in the background, smiling benevolently, and
I skipped away with my brown old sailor, as the music for the dance
began.

"Heard you spoke English," said he, encircling my Directoire waist with
the arm of a sea-going Hercules, "otherwise I shouldn't have had the
courage to come up and speak to you."

I laughed. "A Dreadnought afraid of a fishing-smack!"

"My word, if you were a fishin'-smack, my little friend, you wouldn't
lack for fish to catch," chuckled the old gentleman, who was waltzing
like an elderly angel--as all sailors do. Now, if Bertie had said what
he said, I should have been offended, but coming from the admiral it
cheered me up.

"You _are_ an admiral, aren't you?" I was bold enough to ask.

"Who told you that?" he wanted to know.

"My eyes," said I.

"They're bright ones," he retorted. "But I suppose I do look an old
sea-dog--what? A regular old salt-water dog. But by George, it's hot
water I've got into to-night. D'ye see that stout lady we're just
passin'?--the one in the red wig and yellow frock covered with paste or
diamonds?"

(If she could have heard the description! It was Lady Turnour, in her
gold tissue, her Bond Street jewellery shop, and, my charge, her
beautifully undulated, copper-tinted transformation.)

"Yes, I see her," I said faintly, as we waltzed past; and I wondered why
she was glaring.

"I suppose you didn't notice me doin' the first dance with her? Well, I
asked her because they said we'd all got to invite servants to begin
with, and as the best were snapped up before I got a chance, I walked
over to her like a man. Give you my word, where all are dressed like
duchesses, I took her for a cook."

I laughed so much that I shook my feet out of time with the music.

"Did you treat her like a cook, too?" I gurgled. "Ask her to give you
her favourite recipe for soup?"

"Heaven forbid, no. I treated her like a countess. One would a cook, you
know. It was afterward I got into the hot water. I popped her down in a
seat when we'd scrambled through a turn or two of the dance, and that
was all right; but instead of stoppin' where she was put, she must have
stood up with some other poor chap when my back was turned, and been
plamped down somewhere else. Anyhow, I danced the end of the waltz with
the Marquise de Roquemartine, when she'd finished doin' the polite to
the butler, and when we sat down to breathe at last, for the sake of
somethin' to say I asked if the fat lady in yellow was her own cook, or
a visitor's cook. Anyhow, I was certain of the _cook_: fancied myself on
spottin' a cook anywhere. Well, the marquise giggled 'Take care!' and
nearly had a fit. And if there wasn't my late partner close to my
shoulder. 'That's Lady Turnour, one of my guests,' said the marquise.
Little witch, she looked more pleased than shocked; but 'pon my honour,
you could have knocked me down with a feather. I hope the good lady
didn't hear, but my friends tell me I talk as if I were yellin' through
a megaphone, so I'm afraid she got the news."

"What did you do?" I gasped.

"Do? I jumped up as if I'd been shot, and trotted over to ask you to
dance. But I expect it will get about."

Now I knew why Lady Turnour had glared. Poor woman! I was really sorry
for her--on this, her happy night!




CHAPTER XXIX


"It never rains, but it pours, after dry weather," says Pamela de Nesle.
And so it was for the Turnour family. They had had their run of luck,
and everything determinedly went wrong for them that night.

For her ladyship, there was the dreadful douche of the admiral's
mistake, and the Marquise de Roquemartine's coming to hear of it.
(Wicked little witch, I'm sure she couldn't resist telling the story to
everyone!) For Bertie, the blow of an announcement, before the ball was
over, that Miss Nelson was going to marry the Duc de Divonne (she went
out of the room to get engaged to him). For Sir Samuel, a telegram from
his London solicitors advising him to hurry home and straighten out some
annoying business tangle.

After all, however, I doubt that the telegram ought to be classed among
disasters, as it gave the family a good excuse to escape without delay
from the château which they had so much wished to enter.

Lady Turnour had hysterics in her bedroom, having retired early on
account of a "headache." She pretended that her rage was caused by a
rent in her golden train, made by "that clumsy Admiral Gray who came
over with the Frasers, and had the impudence to almost _force_ me to
dance with him--gouty old horror!" But I know it was the rent in her
vanity, not her dress, which made her gurgle, and wail, and choke, until
frightened Sir Samuel patted her on the back, and she stopped short, to
scold him.

Bertie came in, ostensibly to learn his father's plans, but really, I
surmised, to suggest some of his own; and Lady Turnour relieved her
feelings by stirring up evil ones in him. "So sure you were going to get
the girl! Why, you wrote your stepfather the other day, you were
practically engaged," she sneered, delighted that she was not the only
one who had suffered humiliations at the castle.

"If she hadn't seen you, I believe it would have been all right,"
growled Bertie, vicious as a chained dog who has lost his bone. And then
Lady Turnour had hysterics all over again, and Sir Samuel told Bertie
that he was an ungrateful young brute. The three raged together, and I
could not go, because I had to hold sal-volatile under her ladyship's
nose. Lady Turnour said that the marquise was no lidy, and for her part
she was glad she wasn't going to have that cat of a sister in _her_
family. She'd leave the beastly chattoe that night, if she could; but
anyhow, she'd go the first thing in the morning as ever was, so there!
People that let their visitors be insulted, and did nothing but
laugh!--_She'd_ show them, if they ever came to London, _that_ she
would, though she mightn't be a marquise herself, exactly. Not one of
the lot should ever be invited to her house, not if they were all
married to Bertie. And who was Bertie, anyhow?

Sir Samuel said 'darling' to her, and quite different words that began
with "d" to his stepson; and Bertie, seeing the error of his ways,
apologized humbly. His apologies were eventually accepted; and when he
had intimated to her ladyship that she should be introduced to all his
"swell friends" in England, it was settled that he should make one of
the party in the car, his valet travelling by train. As this arrangement
completed itself, Mr. Bertie suddenly remembered my presence, and
flashed me a look of triumph.

I, listening silently, had been rejoicing in the development of the
situation as far as I was concerned; for the sooner we got away from the
château, the less likely was Monsieur Charretier to succeed in catching
us up. But when I heard that we were to have Bertie with us, my heart
sank, especially as his look told me that I counted for something in his
plan. The chauffeur counted for something, too, I feared. In any case,
the rest of the tour was spoiled, and if it hadn't been for the thought
that when it was over, Jack and I might meet no more, I should have
wished it cut short.

Good-byes were perfunctory in the morning, and nobody seemed heartbroken
at parting from the Turnour family. The big luggage, packed early and in
haste, was sent on to Paris; and when the chauffeur had disposed of
Bertie's additions to the Aigle's load, hostilities began.

"Put down that seat for me," said Mr. Stokes to Mr. Dane, indicating one
of the folding chairs in the glass cage, and carefully waiting to do so
until I was within eye and earshot.

They glared at each other like two tigers, for an instant, and then Jack
put the seat down--I knew why. A refusal on his part to do such a
service for his master's stepson would mean that he must resign or be
discharged--and leave me to deal unaided with a cad. I think Bertie
knew, too, why he was unhesitatingly obeyed; and racked his brain for
further tests. It was not long before he had a brilliant idea.

The car stopped at a level crossing, to let a train go by, and Bertie
availed himself of the opportunity to get out.

"Sir Samuel's going' to let me try my hand at drivin'," said he. "I
don't think much of your form, and I've been tellin' him so. My best pal
is a director of the Aigle company, and I've driven his car a lot of
times. Her ladyship will let Elise sit inside, and I'll watch your style
a bit before I take the wheel."

Not a word said Jack. He didn't even look at me as he helped me down
from the seat which had been mine for so many happy days. I crept
miserably into the stuffy glass cage, where, in the folding chair, I sat
as far forward as my own shape and the car's allowed; Sir Samuel's fat
knees in my back, Lady Turnour's sharp voice in my ears. And for
scenery, I had Bertie's aggressive shoulders and supercilious
gesticulations.

The road to Nevers I scarcely saw. I think it was flat; but Bertie's
driving made it play cup and ball with the car in a curious way, which a
good chauffeur could hardly have managed if he tried. We passed Riom,
Gannat, Aigueperse, I know; and at Moulins, in the valley of the Allier,
we lunched in a hurry. To Nevers we came early, but it was there we were
to stop for the night, and there we did stop, in a drizzle of rain which
prevented sight-seeing for those who had the wish, and the freedom, to
go about. As for me, I was ordered by Lady Turnour to mend Mr. Stokes's
socks, he having made peace by offering to "give her a swagger dinner in
town."

Bertie's cleverness was not confined to ingratiating himself with her
ladyship. He contrived adroitly to damage the steering-gear by grazing a
wall as he turned the Aigle into the hotel courtyard, and by this feat
disposed of the chauffeur's evening, which was spent in hard work at the
garage. Such dinner as Jack got, he ate there, in the shape of a furtive
sandwich or two, otherwise we should not have been able to leave in the
morning at the early hour suggested by Mr. Stokes.

Warned by the incidents of yesterday, Sir Samuel desired his chauffeur
to take the wheel again from Nevers to Paris. But--no doubt with the
view of keeping us apart, and devising new tortures for his
enemy--Bertie elected to play Wolf to Jack's Spartan Boy, and sit beside
him. This relegated me to the cage again, with back-massage from Sir
Samuel's knees.

Before Fontainebleau, I found myself in a familiar land. As far as
Montargis I had motored with the Milvaines more than once, conducted by
Monsieur Charretier, in a great car which might have been mine if I had
accepted it, not "with a pound of tea," but with two hundred pounds of
millionaire. I knew the lovely valley of the Loing, and the forest which
makes the world green and shadowy from Bourrau to Fontainebleau, a world
where poetry and history clasp hands. I should have had plenty to say
about it all to Jack, if we had been together, but I was still inside
the car, and by this time Bertie had induced his stepfather to consent
to his driving again. He pleaded that there had been something wrong
with the ignition yesterday. That was why the car had not gone well. It
had not been his fault at all. Sir Samuel, always inclined to say "Yes"
rather than "No" to one he loved, said "Yes" to Bertie, and had cause to
regret it. Close to Fontainebleau Mr. Stokes saw another car, with a
pretty girl in it. The car was going faster than ours, as it was higher
powered and had a lighter load. Naturally, being himself, it occurred to
Bertie that it would be well to show the pretty girl what he could do.
We were going up hill, as it happened, and he changed speed with a
quick, fierce crash. The Aigle made a sound as if she were gritting her
teeth, shivered, and began to run back. Bertie, losing his head, tried a
lower speed, which had no effect, and Lady Turnour had begun to shriek
when Jack leaned across and put on the hand-brake. The car stopped, just
in time not to run down a pony cart full of children.

No wonder the poor dear Aigle had gritted her teeth! Several of them
turned out to be broken in the gear box.

"We're done!" said Jack. "She'll have to be towed to the nearest garage.
Pity we couldn't have got on to Paris."

"Can't you put in some false teeth?" suggested Lady Turnour, at which
Bertie laughed, and was thereupon reproached for the accident, as he
well deserved to be.

Then the question was what should be the next step for the passengers. I
expected to be trotted reluctantly on to Paris by train, leaving Jack
behind to find a "tow," and see the dilemma through to an end of some
sort, but to my joyful surprise Bertie used all his wiles upon the
family to induce them to stop at Fontainebleau. It was a beautiful
place, he argued, and they would like it so much, that they would come
to think the breakdown a blessing in disguise. In any case, he had
intended advising them to pause for tea, and to stay the night if they
cared for the place. They would find a good hotel, practically in the
forest; and he had an acquaintance who owned a château near by, a very
important sort of chap, who knew everybody worth knowing in French
society. If the Governor and "Lady T." liked, he would go dig his friend
up, and bring him round to call. Maybe they'd all be invited to the
château for dinner. The man had a lot of motors and would send one for
them, very likely--perhaps would even lend a car to take them on to
Paris to-morrow morning.

I listened to these arguments and suggestions with a creepy feeling in
the roots of my hair, for I, too, have an "acquaintance" who owns a
château near Fontainebleau: a certain Monsieur Charretier. He, also, has
a "lot of motors" and would, I knew, if he were "in residence" be
delighted to lend a car and extend an invitation to dinner, if informed
that Lys d'Angely was of the party. Could it be, I thought, that Mr.
Stokes was acquainted with Monsieur Charretier, or that, not being
acquainted, he had heard something from the Duchesse de Melun, and was
making a little experiment with me?

Perhaps I imagined it, but it seemed that he glanced my way
triumphantly, when Lady Turnour agreed to stay in the hope of meeting
the nameless, but important, friend; and I felt that, whatever
happened, I must have a word of advice from Jack.

The discussion had taken place in the road, or rather, at the side of
the road, where the combined exertions of Jack and Bertie had pushed the
wounded Aigle. The chauffeur, having examined the car and pronounced her
helpless, walked back to interview a carter we had passed not long
before, with the view of procuring a tow. Now, just as the discussion
was decided in favour of stopping over night at Fontainebleau, he
appeared again, in the cart.

We were so near the hotel in the woods that we could be towed there in
half an hour, and, ignominious as the situation was, Lady Turnour
preferred it to the greater evil of walking. I remained in the car with
her, the chauffeur steered, the carter towed, and Sir Samuel and his
stepson started on in advance, on foot.

At the hotel Jack was to leave us, and be towed to a garage; but, in
desperation, I murmured an appeal as he gave me an armful of rugs. "I
_must_ ask you about something," I whispered. "Can you come back in a
little less than an hour, and look for me in the woods, somewhere just
out of sight of the hotel?"

"Yes," he said. "I can and will. You may depend on me."

That was all, but I was comforted, and the rugs became suddenly light.

Rooms were secured, great stress being laid upon a good sitting-room (in
case the important friend should call), and I unpacked as usual. When my
work was done, I asked her ladyship's permission to go out for a little
while. She looked suspicious, clawed her brains for an excuse to refuse,
but, as there wasn't a buttonless glove, or a holey stocking among the
party, she reluctantly gave me leave. I darted away, plunged into the
forest, and did not stop walking until I had got well out of sight of
the hotel. Then I sat down on a mossy log under a great tree, and looked
about for Jack.

A man was coming. I jumped up eagerly, and went to meet him as he
appeared among the trees.

It was Mr. Herbert Stokes.




CHAPTER XXX


"I followed you," he said.

"I thought so," said I. "It was like you."

"I want to talk to you," he explained.

"But I don't want to talk to you," I objected.

"You'll be sorry if you're rude. What I came to say is for your own
good."

"I doubt that!" said I, looking anxiously down one avenue of trees after
another, for a figure that would have been doubly welcome now.

"Well, I can easily prove it, if you'll listen."

"As you have longer legs than I have, I am obliged to listen."

"You won't regret it. Now, come, my dear little girl, don't put on any
more frills with me. I'm gettin' a bit fed up with 'em."

(I should have liked to choke him with a whole mouthful of "frills," the
paper kind you put on ham at Christmas; but as I had none handy, I
thought it would only lead to undignified controversy to allude to
them.)

"I had a little conversation about you with the Duchesse de Melun night
before last," Bertie went on, with evident relish. "Ah, I thought that
would make you blush. I say, you're prettier than ever when you do that!
It was she began it. She asked me if I knew your name, and how Lady T.
found you. Her Ladyship couldn't get any further than 'Elise,' for, if
she knew any more, she'd forgotten it; but thanks to your friend the
shuvver, I could go one better. When I told the duchess you called
yourself d'Angely, or something like that, she said 'I was sure of it!'
Now, I expect you begin to smell a rat--what?"

"I daresay you've been carrying one about in your pocket ever since," I
snapped, "though I can't think what it has to do with me. I'm not
interested in dead rats."

"This is your own rat," said Bertie, grinning. "What'll you give to know
what the duchess told me about you?"

"Nothing," I said.

"Well, then, I'll be generous and let you have it for nothing. She told
me she thought she recognized you, but until she heard the name, she
supposed she must be mistaken; that it was only a remarkable resemblance
between my stepmother's maid and a girl who'd run away under very
peculiar circumstances from the house of a friend of hers. What do you
think of that?"

"That the duchess is a cat," I replied, promptly.

"Most women are."

"In _your_ set, perhaps."

"She said there was a man mixed up with the story, a rich middle-aged
chap of the name of Charretier, with a big house in Paris and a new
château he'd built, near Fontainebleau. She gave me a card to him."

"He's sure not to be at home," I remarked.

Bertie's face fell; but he brightened again. "Anyhow you admit you know
him."

"One has all sorts of acquaintances," I drawled, with a shrug of my
shoulders.

"You're a sly little kitten--if you're not a cat. You heard me say I
thought of calling at the château."

"And you heard me say the owner wasn't at home."

"You seem well acquainted with his movements."

"I happened to see him, on his way south, at Avignon, some days ago."

"Did he see you?"

"Isn't that my affair--and his?"

"By Jove--you've got good cheek, to talk like this to your mistress's
stepson! But maybe you think you won't have difficulty in finding a
place that pays you better--what?"

"I couldn't find one to pay me much worse."

"Look here, my dear, I'm not out huntin' for repartee. I want to have an
understanding with you."

"I don't see why."

"Yes, you do, well enough. You know I like you--in spite of your
impudence."

"And I dislike you because of yours. Oh, do go away and leave me, Mr.
Stokes."

"I won't. I've got a lot to say to you. I've only just begun, but you
keep interruptin' me, and I can't get ahead."

"Finish then."

"Well, what I want to say is this. I always meant we should stop at
Fontainebleau."

"Oh--you damaged your stepfather's car on purpose! He would be obliged
to you."

"Not quite that. I intended to get them to have tea here, and while
they were moonin' about I was going to have a chat with you. I was goin'
to tell you about that card to Charretier, and somethin' else. That the
duchess asked me where we would stop in Paris, and I told her at the
best there is, of course--Hotel Athenée. She said she'd wire her friends
you'd run away from, that they could find you there; and if Charretier
wasn't at Fontainebleau when we passed through, these people would
certainly know where to get at him. I warned you the other night, didn't
I? that if you wouldn't be good and confide in me I'd find out what you
refused to tell me yourself; and I have, you see. Clever, aren't I?"

"You're the hatefullest man I ever _heard_ of!" I flung at him.

"Oh, I say! Don't speak too soon. You don't know all yet. If you don't
want me to, I won't call on Charretier. Lady T. and her tuft-huntin' can
go hang! And you shan't stop at the Athenée to be copped by the
Duchess's friends, if you don't like. That's what I wanted to see you
about. To tell you it all depends on yourself."

"How does it depend on myself?" I asked, cautiously.

"All you have to do, to get off scot free is to be a little kind to poor
Bertie. You can begin by givin' him a kiss, here in the poetic and
what-you-may-call-'em forest of Fontainebleau."

"I wouldn't kiss you if you were made of gold and diamonds, and I could
have you melted down to spend!" I exclaimed. And as I delivered this
ultimatum, I turned to run. His legs might be longer than mine, but I
weighed about one-third as much as he, which was in my favour if I chose
to throw dignity to the winds.

As I whisked away from him, he caught me by the dress, and I heard the
gathers rip. I had to stop. I couldn't arrive at the hotel without a
skirt.

"You're a cad--a _cad_!" I stammered.

"And you're a fool. Look here, I can lose you your job and have you sent
to the prison where naughty girls go. See what I've got in my pocket."

Still grasping my frock, he scooped something out of an inner pocket of
his coat, and held it for me to look at, in the hollow of his palm. I
gave a little cry. It was Lady Turnour's gorgeous bursting sun.

"I nicked that off the dressin' table the other night, when you weren't
looking. Has Lady T. been askin' for it?"

"No," I answered, speaking more to myself than to him. "She--she's had
too much to think of. She didn't count her things that night; and at
Nevers she didn't open the bag."

"So much the worse for you, my pet, when she does find out. She left her
jewels in your charge. When I came into the room, they were all lyin'
about on the dressin' table, and you were playin' with 'em."

"I was putting them back into her bag."

"So you say. Jolly careless of you not to know you hadn't put this thing
back. It's about the best of the lot she hadn't got plastered on for the
servants' ball."

"It was careless," I admitted. "But it was your fault. You came in, and
were so horrid, and upset me so much that I forgot what I'd put into
the bag already, and what I hadn't."

"Lady T. doesn't know I went back to her room."

"I'll tell her!" I cried.

"I'll bet you'll tell her, right enough. But I can tell a different
story. I'll say I didn't go near the room. My story will be that I was
walkin' through the woods this afternoon on my way to Charretier's
château when I saw you with the thing in your hands, lookin' at it.
Probably goin' to ask the shuvver to dispose of it for you--what? and
share profits."

"Oh, you coward!" I exclaimed, and snatched the diamond brooch from him.

Instantly he let go my dress, laughing.

"_That's_ right! That's what I wanted," he said. "Now you've got it, and
you can keep it. I'll tell Lady T. where to look for it--unless you'll
change your mind, and give me that kiss."

I was so angry, so stricken with horror and a kind of nightmare fear
which I had not time to analyze, that I stood silent, trembling all
over, with the brooch in my hand. How silly I had been to play his game
for him, just like the poor stupid cat who pulled the hot chestnut out
of the fire! I don't think any chestnut could ever have been as hot as
that bursting sun!

I wanted to drop it in the grass, or throw it as far as I could see it,
but dared not, because it would be my fault that it was lost, and Lady
Turnour would believe Bertie's story all the more readily. She would
think he had seen me with the jewel, and that I'd hidden it because I
was afraid of what he might do.

"To kiss, or not to kiss. _That's_ the question," laughed Bertie.

"Is it?" said Jack. And Jack's hand, inside Mr. Stokes's beautiful, tall
collar, shook Bertie back and forth till his teeth chattered like
castanets, and his good-looking pink face grew more and more like a
large, boiled beetroot.

I had seen Jack coming, long enough to have counted ten before he came.
But I didn't count ten. I just let him come.

Bertie could not speak: he could only gurgle. And if I had been a Roman
lady in the amphitheatre of Nîmes, or somewhere, I'm afraid I should
have wanted to turn my thumb down.

"What was the beast threatening you with?" Jack wanted to know.

"The beast was threatening to make Lady Turnour think I'd stolen this
brooch, which he'd taken himself," I panted, through the beatings of my
heart.

"If you didn't kiss him?"

"Yes. And he was going to do lots of other horrid things, too. Tell
Monsieur Charretier--and let my cousins come and find me at the Hotel
Athenée, in Paris, and--"

"He won't do any of them. But there are several things I am going to do
to him. Go away, my child. Run off to the house, as quick as you can."

I gasped. "What are you going to do to him?"

"Don't worry. I shan't hurt him nearly as much as he deserves. I'm only
going to do what the Head must have neglected to do to him at school."

[Illustration: "_Jack's hand, inside Mr. Stokes's beautiful, tall
collar, shook Bertie back and forth till his teeth chattered like
castanets_"]

Bertie had come out into the woods with a neat little stick, which
during part of our conversation he had tucked jauntily under his arm. It
now lay on the ground. I saw Jack glance at it.

"Ah!"--I faltered. "Do--do you think you'd _better_?"

"I know I had. Go, child."

I went.

I had great faith in Jack, faith that he knew what was best for
everyone.




CHAPTER XXXI


Unfortunately I forgot to ask for instructions as to how I should behave
when I came to the hotel. And I had the bursting sun still in my hand.

I thought things over, as well as I could with a pounding pulse for
every square inch in my body.

If I were a rabbit, I could scurry into my hole and "lay low" while
other people fought out their destiny and arranged mine; but being a
girl, tingling with my share of American pluck, and blazing with French
fire, rabbits seemed to me at the instant only worthy of being made into
pie.

Bertie, at this moment, was being made into pie--humble pie; and I don't
doubt that the chauffeur, whom he had consistently tortured (because of
me) would make him eat a large slice of himself when the humble pie was
finished--also because of me. And because it was because of me, I
knocked at the Turnours' sitting-room door with a bold, brave knock, as
if I thought myself their social equal.

They had had tea, and were sitting about, looking graceful in the
expectation of seeing Bertie and his French friend.

It was a disappointment to her ladyship to see only me, and she showed
it with a frown, but Sir Samuel looked up kindly, as usual.

I laid the bursting sun on the table, and told them everything, very
fast, without pausing to take breath, so that they wouldn't have time to
stop me. But I didn't begin with the bursting sun, or even with the
beating that Bertie was enjoying in the woods; I began with the Princess
Boriskoff, and Lady Kilmarny; and I addressed Sir Samuel, from beginning
to end. Somehow, I felt I had his sympathy, even when I rushed at the
most embarrassing part, which concerned his stepson and the necktie.

Just as I'd told about the brooch, and Bertie's threat, and was coming
to his punishment, another knock at the door produced the two young men,
both pale, but Jack with a noble pallor, while Bertie's was the sick
paleness of pain and shame.

"I've brought him to apologize to Miss d'Angely, in your presence, Sir
Samuel, and Lady Turnour's," said the chauffeur. "I see you know
something of the story."

"They know all now," said I. For Bertie's face proved the truth of my
words, if they had needed proof. His eyes were swimming in tears, and he
looked like a whipped school-boy.

But suddenly a whim roused her ladyship to speak up in his defence--or
at least to criticize the chauffeur for presuming to take her stepson's
chastisement into his hands.

"What right have you to set yourself up as Elise's champion, anyway?"
she demanded, shrilly. "Have you and she been getting engaged to each
other behind our backs?"

"It would be my highest happiness to be engaged to Miss d'Angely if she
would marry me," said Jack, with such a splendidly sincere ring in his
voice that I could almost have believed him if I hadn't known he was in
love with another woman. "But I am no match for her. It's only as her
friend that I have acted in her defence, as any decent man has a right
to act when a lady is insulted."

Then Bertie apologized, in a dull voice, with his eyes on the ground,
and mumbled a kind of confession, mixed with self-justification. He had
pocketed the brooch, yes, meaning to play a trick, but had intended no
harm, only a little fun--pretty girl--lady's-maids didn't usually mind a
bit of a flirtation and a present or two; how was he to know this one
was different? Sorry if he had caused annoyance; could say no more--and
so on, and so on, until I stopped him, having heard enough.

Poor Sir Samuel was crestfallen, but not too utterly crushed to reproach
his bride with unwonted sharpness, when she would have scolded me for
carelessness in not putting the brooch away. "Let the girl alone!" he
grumbled, "she's a very good girl, and has behaved well. I wish I could
say the same of others nearer to me."

"Of course, Sir Samuel, after what's happened, you wouldn't want me to
stay in your employ, any more than I would want to stay," said Jack.
"Unfortunately the Aigle will be hung up two or three days, till new
pinions can be fitted in, at the garage. I can send them out from Paris,
if you like; but no doubt you'll prefer to have my engagement with you
to come to an end to-day. Mr. Stokes has driven the car, and can again."

"Not if I have anything to say about it," murmured her ladyship.
"Scattering the poor thing's teeth all over the place!"

"There are plenty of good chauffeurs to be got at short notice in
Paris," Jack suggested, "and you are certain to find one by the time
you're ready to start."

"You're right, Dane. We'll have to part company," said Sir Samuel. "As
for Elise here--"

"She'll have to go too," broke in her ladyship. "It's most inconvenient,
and all your stepson's fault--though she's far from blameless, in my
humble opinion, whatever yours may be. Don't tell me that a young man
will go about flirting with lady's maids unless they encourage him!"

"I shall leave of course, immediately," said I, my ears tingling.

"Who wants you to do anything else? Though nobody cares for _my_
convenience. _I_ can always go to the wall. But thank heaven there are
maids in Paris as well as chauffeurs. And talking of that combination,
my advice to you is, if Dane's willing to have you, don't turn up your
nose at him, but marry him as quickly as you can. I suppose even in your
class of life there's such a thing as _gossip_."

I was scarlet. Somehow I got out of the room, and while I was scurrying
my few belongings into my dressing bag, and spreading out the red satin
frock to leave as a legacy to Lady Turnour (in any case, nothing could
have induced me to wear it again), Sir Samuel sent me up an envelope
containing a month's wages, and something over. I enclosed the
"something over" in another envelope, with a grateful line of refusal,
and sent it back.

Thus ends my experience as a motor maid!

       *       *       *       *       *

What was going to become of me I didn't know, but while I was jamming in
hatpins and praying for ideas, there came a knock at the door. A
pencilled note from the late chauffeur, signed hastily, "Yours ever,
J.D.," and inviting me down to the couriers' dining-room for a
conference. There would be no one there but ourselves at this hour, he
said, and we should be able to talk over our plans in peace.

What a place to say farewell forever to the only man I ever had, could
or would love--a couriers' dining room, with grease spots on the
tablecloth! However, there was no help for it, since I was facing the
world with fifty francs, and could not afford to pay for a romantic
background.

After all that had happened, and especially after certain impertinent
references made to our private affairs, I felt a new and very
embarrassing shyness in meeting the man with whom I'd been playing that
pleasant little game called "brother and sister." He was waiting for me
in the couriers' room, which was even dingier and had more grease spots
than I had fancied, and I hurried into speech to cover my nervousness.

"I don't know how I'm going to thank you for all you've done for me," I
stammered. "That horrible Bertie--"

"Let's not talk of him," said Jack. "Put him out of your mind for ever.
He has no place there, or in your life--and no more have any of the
incidents that led up to him. You've had a very bad time of it, poor
little girl, and now--"

"Oh, I haven't," I exclaimed. "I've been happier than ever before in my
life. That is--I--it was all so novel, and like a play--"

"Well, now the play's over," Jack broke in, pitying my evident
embarrassment. "I wanted to ask you if you'd let me advise and perhaps
help you. We _have_ been brother and sister, you know. Nothing can take
that away from us."

"No," said I, in a queer little voice. "Nothing can."

"You want to go to England, I know," he went on. "And--if you'll forgive
my taking liberties, you haven't much money in hand, you've almost told
me. I suppose you haven't changed your mind about your relations in
Paris? You wouldn't like to go back to them, or write, and tell them
firmly that you won't marry the person they seem to have set their
hearts on for you? That you've made your own choice, and intend to abide
by it; but that if they'll be sensible and receive you, you're willing
to stop with them until--until the man in England--"

"_What_ man in England?" I cut him short, in utter bewilderment.

"Why, the--er--you didn't tell me his name, of course, but that rich
chap you expected to meet when you got over to England. Don't you think
it would be better if he came to you at your cousins', if they--"

"There _isn't_ any 'rich chap'," I exclaimed. "I don't know what you
mean--oh, _yes_, I do, too. I did speak about someone who was very rich,
and would be kind to me. I rather think--I remember now--I _guessed_
you imagined it was a man; but that seemed the greatest joke, so I
didn't try to undeceive you. Fancy your believing that, all this time,
though, and thinking about it!"

"I've thought of it on an average once every three minutes," said Jack.

"You're chaffing now, of course. Why, the person I hoped might be kind
to me in England is an old lady--oh, but such a funny old lady!--who
wanted me to be her companion, and said, no matter when I came, if it
were years from now, I must let her know, for she would like to have me
with her to help chase away a dragon of a maid she's afraid of. I met
her only once, in the train the night before I arrived at Cannes; but
she and I got to be the greatest friends, and her bulldog, Beau--."

"Her bulldog, Beau!"

"A perfect lamb, though he looks like a cross between a crocodile and a
gnome. The old lady's name is Miss Paget--"

"My aunt!"

I stared at Jack, not knowing how to take this exclamation. The few
Englishmen I met when mamma and I were together, or when I lived with
the Milvaines, were rather fond of using that ejaculation when it was
apparently quite irrelevant. If you told a youthful Englishman that you
were not allowed to walk or bicycle alone in the Bois, he was as likely
as not to say "My aunt!" In fact, whatever surprised him was apt to
elicit this cry. I have known several young men who gave vent to it at
intervals of from half to three-quarters of an hour; but I had never
before heard Jack make the exclamation, so when I had looked at him and
he had looked at me in an emotional kind of silence for a few seconds, I
asked him, "Why 'My aunt'?"

"Because she is my aunt."

"Surely not my Miss Paget?"

"I should think it highly improbable that your Miss Paget and my Miss
Paget could be the same, if you hadn't mentioned her bulldog, Beau.
There can't be a quantity of Miss Pagets going about the world with
bulldogs named Beau. Only my Miss Paget never does go about the world.
She hates travelling."

"So does mine. She said that being in a train was no pursuit for a
gentlewoman."

"That sounds like her. She's quite mad."

"She seemed very kind."

"I'm glad she did--to you. She has seemed rather the contrary to me."

"Oh, what did she do to you?"

"Did her best to spoil my life, that's all--with the best intentions, no
doubt. Still, by Jove, I thank her! If it hadn't been for my aunt I
should never have seen--my sister."

"Thank you. You're always kind--and polite. Do you mean it was because
of _her_ you took to what you call 'shuvving'?"

"Exactly."

"But I thought--I thought--"

"What?"

"I--don't dare tell you."

"I should think you might know by this time that you can tell me
anything. You _must_ tell me!"

"I thought it was the beautiful lady who was with you the first time
you saw the battlement garden at Beaucaire, who ruined your life?"

"Beautiful lady--battlement garden? Good heavens, what extraordinary
things we seem to have been thinking about each other: I with my man in
England; you with your beautiful lady--"

"She's a different thing. You _talked_ to me about her," I insisted.
"Surely you must remember?"

"I remember the conversation perfectly. I didn't explain my meaning as a
professor demonstrates a rule in higher mathematics, but I thought you
couldn't help understanding well enough, especially a vain little thing
like you."

"I, vain? Oh!"

"You are, aren't you?"

"I--well, I'm afraid I am, a little."

"You could never have looked in the glass if you weren't. Didn't you
see, or guess, that I was talking about an Ideal whom I had conjured
into being, as a desirable companion in that garden? I can't understand
from the way the conversation ran, how you could have helped it. When I
first went to the battlement garden I was several years younger, steeped
with the spirit of Provence and full of thoughts of Nicolete. I was just
sentimental enough to imagine that such a girl as Nicolete was with me
there, and always afterward I associated the vision of the Ideal with
that garden. I said to myself, that I should like to come there again
with that Ideal in the flesh. And then--then I did come again--with
you."

"But you said--you thought of her always--that because you couldn't
have her--or something of the sort--"

"Well, all that was no surprise to you, was it? You must have known
perfectly well--ever since that night at Avignon when you let your hair
down, anyhow, if not before, that I was trying desperately hard not to
be an idiot about you--and not exactly radiant with joy in the thought
that whoever the man was who would get you, it couldn't be I?"

"O-oh!" I breathed a long, heavenly breath, that seemed to let all the
sorrows and worries pour out of my heart, as the air rushed out of my
lungs. "O-oh, you _can't_ mean, truly and really, that you're in love
with Me, can you?"

"Surely it isn't news to you."

"I should think it was!" I exclaimed, rapturously. "Oh, I'm so happy!"

"Another scalp--though a humble one?"

"Don't be a beast. I'm so horribly in love with you, you know. It's been
hurting so _dreadfully_."

Then I rather think he said "My darling!" but I'm not quite sure, for I
was so busy falling into his arms, and he was holding me so very, very
tightly.

We stayed like that for a long time, not saying anything, and not even
thinking, but feeling--feeling. And the couriers' dining-room was a
princess's boudoir in an enchanted palace. The grease spots were stars
and moons that had rolled out of heaven to see how two poor mortals
looked when they were perfectly happy. Just a poor chauffeur and a motor
maid: but the world was theirs.




CHAPTER XXXII


After a while we talked again, and explained all the cross-purposes to
each other, with the most interesting pauses in between the
explanations. And Jack told me about himself, and Miss Paget.

It seems that her only sister was his mother, and she had been in love
with his father before he met the sister. The father's name was Claud,
and Jack was named after him. It was Miss Paget's favourite name,
because of the man she had loved. But the first Claud wasn't very lucky.
He lost all his own money and most of his wife's, and died in South
America, where he'd gone in the hope of making more. Then the wife,
Jack's mother, died too, while he was at Eton. After that Miss Paget's
house was his home. Whenever he was extravagant at Oxford, as he was
sometimes, she would pay his debts quite happily, and tell him that
everything she had would be his some day, so he was not to bother about
money. Accordingly, he didn't bother, but lived rather a lazy life--so
he said--and enjoyed himself. A couple of years before I met him he got
interested, through a friend, in a newly invented motor, which they both
thought would be a wonderful success. Jack tried to get his aunt
interested, too, but she didn't like the friend who had invented
it--seemed jealous of Jack's affection for him--and refused to have
anything to do with the affair. Jack had gone so far, however, while
taking her consent for granted, that he felt bound to go on; and when
Miss Paget would have nothing to do with floating the new invention,
Jack sold out the investments of his own little fortune (all that was
left of his mother's money), putting everything at his friend's
disposal. Miss Paget was disgusted with him for doing this, and when the
motor wouldn't mote and the invention wouldn't float, she just said, "I
told you so!"

It was at this time, Jack went on to tell me, that Miss Paget bought
Beau. She had had another dog, given her by Jack, which died, and she
collected Beau herself. Only a few days after Beau's arrival, Jack went
down into the country to see his aunt and talk things over; for she had
brought him up to expect to be her heir; and as she wanted him with her
continually, as if he had been her son, she had objected to his taking
up any profession. Now that he'd lost his own money in this unfortunate
speculation, he felt he ought to do something not to be dependent upon
her, his income of two hundred a year having been sunk with the
unfloatable motor invention. He meant to ask Miss Paget to lend him
enough to go in as partner with another friend, who had a very thriving
motor business, and to suggest paying her back so much a year. But
everything was against him on that visit to his aunt's country house.

In the first place, she was in a very bad humour with him, because he
had gone against her wishes, and she didn't want to hear anything more
about motors or motor business. Then, there was Beau, as a _tertium
quid_.

Beau had been bought from a dreadful man who had probably stolen, and
certainly ill-treated him. The dog was very young, and owing to his late
owner's cruelty, feared and hated the sight of a man. Since she had had
him Miss Paget had done her very best to spoil the poor animal,
encouraging him to growl at the men-servants, and laughing when he
frightened away any male creature who had come about the place. While
she and Jack were arguing over money and motors, who should stroll in
but Beau, who at sight of a stranger--a man--closeted with his indulgent
mistress, flew into a rage. He seized Jack by the trouser-leg and began
to worry it, and Jack had to choke him before the dog would let go his
grip.

The sight of this dreadful deed threw Miss Paget into hysterics. She
shrieked that her nephew was cruel, ungrateful--that he had never loved
her, that he cared only for her money, and now that he grudged her the
affection of a dog with which _he_ had had nothing to do; that the dog's
dislike for him was a warning to her, and made her see him in his true
light at last. "Go--go--out of my sight--or I'll set my poor darling at
you!" she cried, and Jack went, after saying several rather frank
things.

At heart he was fond of his aunt, in spite of her eccentricities, and
believed that she was of him, therefore he expected a letter of apology
for her injustice and a request to come back. But no such letter ever
arrived. Perhaps Miss Paget thought it was _his_ place to apologize, and
was waiting for him to do so. In any case, they had never seen each
other again; and after a few weeks, Jack received a formal note from
his aunt's solicitor saying that, as she realized now he had "no real
affection for her or _hers_" he need look for no future advantages from
her, but was at liberty to take up any line of business he chose. Miss
Paget would "no longer attempt to interfere with his wishes or direct
his affairs."

This must have been a pleasant letter for a penniless young man, just
robbed of all his future prospects. His own money gone, and no hope of
any to put into a profession or business! Jack lived as he could for
some months, trying for all sorts of positions, making a few guineas by
sketches and motoring articles for newspapers, and somehow contriving to
keep out of debt. He went to France to "write up" a great automobile
race, as a special commission; but the paper which had given the
commission--a new one devoted to the interests of motoring--suddenly
failed. Jack found himself stranded; advertised for a position as
chauffeur, and got it. There was the history which he "hadn't inflicted
on me before, lest I should be bored."

He was interested to hear of Miss Paget's journey to Italy, and knew all
about the cousin who had died, leaving her money which she didn't need,
and a castle in Italy which she didn't want. He laughed when I told him
how the redoubtable Simpkins refused to trust herself upon that "great
nasty wet thing," which was the Channel: but nothing could hold his
attention firmly except _our_ affairs. For his affairs and my affairs
were not separate any longer. They were joined together for weal or woe.
Whatever happened, however imprudent the step might be, he decided that
we must be married. We loved each other; each was the other's world, and
nothing must part us. Besides, said Jack, I needed a protector. I had no
home, and he could not have me persecuted by creatures who produced Corn
Plasters. His idea was to take me to England at once, and have me there
promptly made Mrs. John Dane, by special licence. He had a few pounds,
and a few things which he could sell would bring in a few more. Then,
with me for an incentive, he should get something to do that was worth
doing.

I said "Yes" to everything, and Jack darted away to converse with a nice
man he had met in the garage, who had a motor, and was going to Paris
almost immediately. If he had not gone yet, perhaps he would take us.

Luckily he had not gone, and he did take us. He took us to the Gare du
Nord, where we would just have time to eat something, and catch the boat
train for Calais. We should be in London in the morning, and Jack would
apply for a special licence as early as possible.

I stood guarding our humble heap of luggage, while Jack spent his
hard-earned sovereigns for our tickets, when suddenly I heard a voice
which sounded vaguely familiar. It was broken with distress and
excitement; still I felt sure I had heard it before, and turned quickly,
exclaiming "Miss Paget!"

There she was, with a dressing bag in one hand, and a broken dog-leash
in the other. Tears were running down her fat face (not so fat as it had
been) under spectacles, and her false front was put on anyhow.

"Oh, my dear girl!" she wailed, without showing the slightest sign of
astonishment at sight of me. "What a mercy you've turned up, but it's
just like you. Have you seen my Beau anywhere?"

"No," I said, rather stiffly, for I couldn't forgive her or her dog for
their treatment of my Jack.

"Oh, dear, what shall I do!" she exclaimed. "He hates railway stations.
You can't think the awful time we've had since you left me in the train
at Cannes. And now he's broken his leash, and run away, and I can't
speak any French, except to ask for hot water in Italian, and I don't
see how I'm going to find my darling again. They'll snatch him up, to
fling him into some terrible, murderous waggon, and take him to a lethal
home, or whatever they call it. For heaven's sake, go and ask everybody
where he is--and if you find him you can have anything on earth I've
got, especially my Italian castle which I can't sell. You can come to
England with me and Beau, when you've got him, and I'll make you happy
all the rest of your life. Oh, go--_do_ go. I'll look after your
luggage."

"It's half your own nephew's, Jack Dane's, luggage," said I, breathless
and pulsing. "I'm going to England with him, and _he's_ going to make me
happy all the rest of my life, for we mean to be married, in spite of
your cruelty which has made him poor, and turned him into a chauffeur.
But--here he comes now. And--why, Miss Paget, there's _Beau_ walking
with him, without any leash. Beau must remember him."

"Beau with Jack Dane!" gasped the old lady. "Jack Dane's found Beau?
_Beau's_ forgiven him! Then so will I. You can both have the Italian
castle--and everything that goes with it. And everything else that's
mine, too, except Beau."

"Hello, aunt, here's your dog," said Jack.

Beau licked his foot.



    *    *    *    *    *



Transcriber's note:

In converting this book the following evident typographical
errors were corrected, causing differences from the original:
   p. 65, correct spelling of "Gaspard de Besse";
   p. 79, correct accent in "Hyères";
   p. 102, correct spelling of "Le Buisson Ardent";
   p. 140, insert t in "At first";
   p. 291, change "be began" to "he began."