CHAPTER XIV
I am glad I devoted last night and the past hour this morning to
bringing up to date this trivial record, for I have a premonition that
the time is rapidly approaching when I shall no longer have the
strength of will or body to continue it. The little pain has increased
in intensity and frequency the last few days, and though I try to
delude myself into the belief that otherwise I am as strong as ever, I
know in my heart that I am daily growing weaker, daily losing
vitality. I shall soon have to call in a doctor to give me some
temporary relief, and doubtless he will put me to bed, feed me on
slops, cut off alcohol, forbid noise and excitement, and keep me in a
drugged, stupefied condition until I fall asleep, to wake up in the
Garden of Prosperpine. Death is nothing; it is the dying that is such
a nuisance. It is going through so much for so little. It is as bad as
the campaign before a parliamentary election. It offends one's sense
of proportion. In a well-regulated universe there would be no tedious
process of decay, either before or after death. You would go about
your daily avocation unconcerned and unwarned, and then at the moment
appointed by an inscrutable Providence for your dissolution--phew!--
and your clothes would remain standing for a surprised second, and
then fall down in a heap without a particle of you inside them. If we
have to die, why doesn't Providence employ this simple and sensible
method? It would save such a lot of trouble. It would be so clean, so
painless, so picturesque. It would add to the interest of our walks
abroad. Fancy a stout, important policeman vanishing from his uniform
--the helmet falling over the collar, the tunic doubling in at the
belt, the knees giving way, and the unheard, merry laughter of the
disenuniformed spirit winging its way truncheonless into the Empyrean.
But if you think you are going to get any fun out of dying in the
present inconvenient manner, you are mistaken. Believe one who is
trying.
I will remain on my feet, however, as long as my will holds out. In
this way I may continue to be of service to my fellow creatures, and
procure for myself a happy lot or portion. Even this morning I have
been able to feel the throb of eumoiriety. A piteous letter came from
Latimer, and a substantial cheque lies on my table ready to be posted.
I wonder how much I have left? So long as it is enough to pay my
doctor's bills and funeral expenses, what does it matter?
The last line of the above was written on December 21st. It is now
January 30th, and I am still alive and able to write. I wish I
weren't. But I will set down as plainly as I can what has happened in
the interval.
I had just written the last word, seated at my hotel window in the
sunshine, and enjoying, in spite of my uncheerful thoughts, the scents
that rose from the garden, when I heard a knock at my door. At my
invitation to enter, Anastasius Papadopoulos trotted into the room in
a great state of excitement carrying the familiar bunch of papers. He
put his hat on the floor, pitched the papers into the hat, and ran up
to me.
"My dear sir, don't get up, I implore you. And I won't sit down. I
have just seen the ever beautiful and beloved lady."
I turned my chair away from the table, and faced him as he stood
blowing kisses with one little hand, while the other lay on his heart.
In a flash he struck a new gesture; he folded his arms and scowled.
"I was with her. She was opening her inmost heart to me. She knows I
am her champion. A servant came up announcing Monsieur Vauvenarde. She
dismissed me. I have come to my patron and friend, the English
statesman. Her husband is with her now."
I smiled. "Madame Brandt told me that she had asked for an interview."
"And you allow it? You allow her to contaminate her beautiful presence
with the sight of that traitor, that cheat at cards, that murderer,
that devil? Ah, but I will not have it! I am her champion. I will save
her. I will save you. I will take you both away to Egypt, and surround
you with my beautiful cats, and fan you with peacock's feathers."
This was sheer crackedness of brain. For the first time I feared for
the little man. When people begin to talk that way they are not
allowed to go about loose. He went on talking and the three languages
he used in his jargon got clotted to the point of unintelligibility.
He spoke very fast and, as far as I could understand, poured abuse on
the head of Captain Vauvenarde, and continued to declare himself
Lola's champion and my devoted friend. He stamped up and down the room
in his tightly buttoned frock-coat from the breastpocket of which
peeped the fingers of his yellow dogskin gloves. At last he stopped,
and drawing a chair near the window perched on it with a little hop
like a child. He held out his hand.
"Do you believe I am your friend?"
"I am sure of it, my dear Professor."
"Then I'll betray a sacred confidence. The /carissima signora/ loves
you. You didn't know it. But she loves you."
I stared for a moment at the dwarf as if he had been a reasonable
being. Something seemed to click inside my head, like a clogged cog-
wheel that had suddenly freed itself, and my mind went whirling away
straight through the past few weeks. I tried to smile, and I said:
"You are quite mistaken."
"Oh, no," he replied, wagging his Napoleonic head. "Anastasius
Papadopoulos is never mistaken. She told me so herself. She wept. She
put her beautiful arms round my neck and sobbed on my shoulder."
I found myself reproving him gently. "You should not have told me
this, my dear Professor. Such confidences are locked up in the heart
of /un galant homme/, and are not revealed even to his dearest
friend."
But my voice sounded hollow in my own ears, and what he said for the
next few minutes I do not remember. The little man had told the truth
to me, and Lola had told the truth to him. The realisation of it
paralysed me. Why had I been such a fool as not to see it for myself?
Memories of a hundred indications came tumbling one after another into
my head--the forgotten glove, the glances, the changes of mood, the
tears when she learned of my illness, the mysterious words, the abrupt
little "You?" of yesterday. The woman was in love, deeply in love, in
love with all the fervour of her big nature. And I had stood by and
wondered what she meant by this and by that--things that would have
been obvious to a coalheaver. I thought of Dale and I felt miserably
guilty, horribly ashamed. How could I expect him to believe me when I
told him that I had not wittingly stolen her affections from him. And
her affections? /Bon Dieu/! What on earth could I do with them? What
is the use of a woman's love to a dead man? And did I want it even for
the tiny remainder of life?
Anastasius, perceiving that I paid but scant attention to his
conversation, wriggled off his chair and stood before me with folded
arms.
"You adore each other with a great passion," he said. "She is my
Madonna, and you are my friend and benefactor. I will be your
protection and defence. I will never let her go away with that
infamous, gambling and murdering scoundrel. My gigantic combinations
have matured. I bless your union."
He lifted his little arms in benediction. The situation was cruelly
comical. For a moment I hated the mournful-visaged, posturing monkey,
and had a wild desire to throw him out of the window and have done
with him. I rose and, towering over him, was about to lecture him
severely on his impertinent interference, when the sight of his scared
face made me turn away with a laugh. What would be the use of
reproaching him? He would only sit down on the floor and weep. So I
paced the room, while he followed me with his eyes like an uncertain
spaniel.
"Look here, Professor," said I at last. "Now that you've found Captain
Vauvenarde, brought Madame Brandt and him together, and told me that
she is in love with me, don't you think you've done enough? Don't you
think your cats need your attention? Something terrible may be
happening to them. I dreamed last night," I added with desperate
mendacity, "that they were turned into woolly lambs."
"Monsieur," said the dwarf loftily, "my duty is here. And I care not
whether my cats are turned into the angels of Paradise."
I groaned. "You are wasting a great deal of money over this affair," I
urged.
"What is money to my gigantic combinations?"
"Tell me," I cried with considerable impatience. "What are your
confounded combinations?"
He began to tremble violently. "I would rather die," said he, "than
betray my secret."
"It's all some silly nonsense about that wretched horse!" I exclaimed.
He covered his ears with his hands. "Blasphemy! Blasphemy! Don't utter
it!"
In another moment he was cowering on his knees before me.
"You, of all men, mustn't blaspheme. You whom I love like my master.
You whom the divine lady loves. I can't bear it!" He continued to
gibber unintelligibly.
He was stark mad. There was no question of it. For a moment I stood
irresolute. Then I lifted him to his feet and patted his head
soothingly.
"Never mind," said I. "I was wrong. It was a beautiful horse. There
never was such a horse in the world. If I had a picture of him I would
hang it up on the wall over my bed."
"Would you?" he cried joyfully. "Then I will give you one."
He trotted over to the bundle of papers that reposed in his hat on the
floor, searched through them, and to my dismay handed me a faded,
unmounted, and rather torn and crumpled photograph of the wonderful
horse.
"There!" said he.
"I could not rob you of it," I protested.
"It will be my joy to know that you have it--that it is hanging over
your bed. See--have you a pin? I myself will fix it for you."
While he was searching my table for pins the chasseur of the hotel
came with a message from Madame Brandt. Would Monsieur come at once to
Madame in her private room?
"I'll come now," I said. "Professor, you must excuse me."
"Don't mention it. I shall occupy myself in hanging the picture in the
most artistic way possible."
So I left him, his mind apparently concentrated on the childish task
of pinning the photograph of the ridiculous horse on my bedroom wall,
and went with the most complicated feelings downstairs and through the
corridors to Lola's apartments.
She rose to meet me as I entered.
"It's very kind of you to come," she said in her fluent but Britannic
French. "May I present my husband, Monsieur Vauvenarde."
Monsieur Vauvenarde and I exchanged bows. I noticed at once that he
wore the Frenchman's costume when he pays a /visite de ceremonie/,
frock-coat and gloves, and that a silk hat lay on the table. I was
glad that he paid her this mark of respect.
"I have had the pleasure of meeting you before, Monsieur," said he,
"in circumstances somewhat different."
"I remember perfectly," said I.
"And your charming but inexperienced little friend--is he well?"
"He is at present decorating my room with photographs of Madame's late
horse, Sultan," said I.
He was startled, and gave me a quick, sharp look. I did not notice it
at the time, but I remembered it later. Then he broke into an
indulgent laugh.
"The poor animal!" He turned to Lola. "How jealous I used to be of
him! And how quickly the time flies. But give yourself the trouble of
seating yourself, Monsieur."
He motioned me to a chair and sat down. He was a man of polished
manner and had a pleasant voice. I guessed that in the days when he
paid court to Lola, he had been handsome in his dark Norman way, and
possessed considerable fascination. Evil living and sordid passions
had coarsened his features, produced bagginess under the eyes and a
shiftiness of glance. Idleness and an inverted habit of life were
responsible for the nascent paunch and the rolls of fat at the back of
his neck. He suggested the revivified corpse of a fine gentleman that
had been unnaturally swollen. I had disliked him at the Cercle
Africain; now I detested him heartily. The idea of Lola entering the
vitiated atmosphere of his life was inexpressibly repugnant to me.
Contrary to her habit, Lola sat bolt upright on the stamped-velvet
suite, the palms of her hands pressing the seat on either side of her.
She caught the shade of disgust that swept over my face, and gave me a
quick glance that pleaded for toleration. Her eyes, though bright,
were sunken, like those of a woman who has not slept.
"Monsieur," said Vauvenarde, "my wife informs me that to your
disinterested friendship is due this most charming reconciliation."
"Reconciliation?" I echoed. "It was quickly effected."
"/Mon Dieu/," he said. "I have always longed for the comforts of a
home. My wife has grown tired of a migratory existence. She comes to
find me. I hasten to meet her. There is nothing to keep us apart. The
reconciliation was a matter of a few seconds. I wish to express my
gratitude to you, and, therefore, I ask you to accept my most cordial
thanks."
"It has always been a pleasure to me," said I very frigidly, "to place
my services at the disposal of Madame Brandt."
"Vauvenarde, Monsieur," he corrected with a smile.
"And is Madame Vauvenarde equally satisfied with the--reconciliation?"
I asked.
"I think Monsieur Vauvenarde is somewhat premature," said Lola, with a
trembling lip. "There were conditions--"
"A mere question of protocol." He waved an airy hand.
"I don't know what that is," said Lola. "There are conditions I must
fix, and I thought the advice of my friend, Monsieur de Gex--"
"Precisely, my dear Lola," he interrupted. "The principle is affirmed.
We are reconciled. I proceed logically. The first thing I do is to
thank Monsieur de Gex--you have a French name, Monsieur, and you
pronounce it English fashion, which is somewhat embarrassing-- But no
matter. The next thing is the protocol. We have no possibility of
calling a family council, and therefore, I acceded with pleasure to
the intervention of Monsieur. It is kind of him to burden himself with
our unimportant affairs."
The irony of his tone belied the suave correctitude of his words. I
detested him more and more. More and more did I realise that the dying
eumoirist is capable of petty human passions. My vanity was being
sacrified. Here was a woman passionately in love with me proposing to
throw herself into another man's arms--it made not a scrap of
difference, in the circumstances, that the man was her husband--and
into the arms of such a man! Having known me to decline--etcetera,
etcetera! How could she face it? And why was she doing it? To save
herself from me, or me from herself? She knew perfectly well that the
little pain inside would precious soon settle that question. Why was
she doing it? I should have thought that the first glance at the puffy
reprobate would have been enough to show her the folly of her idea.
However, it was comforting to learn that she had not surrendered at
once.
"If I am to have the privilege, Monsieur," said I, "of acting as a
family council, perhaps you may forgive my hinting at some of the
conditions that doubtless are in Madame's mind."
"Proceed, Monsieur," said he.
"I want to know where I am," said Lola in English. "He took everything
for granted from the first."
"Are you willing to go back to him?" I asked also in English.
She met my gaze steadily, and I saw a woman's needless pain at the
back of her eyes. She moistened her lips with her tongue, and said:
"Under conditions."
"Monsieur," said I in French, turning to Vauvenarde, "forgive us for
speaking our language."
"Perfectly," said he, and he smiled meaningly and banteringly at us
both.
"In the first place, Monsieur, you are aware that Madame has a little
fortune, which does not detract from the charm you have always found
in her. It was left her by her father, who, as you know, tamed lions
and directed a menagerie. I would propose that Madame appointed
trustees to administer this little fortune."
"There is no necessity, Monsieur," he said. "By the law of France it
is hers to do what she likes with."
"Precisely," I rejoined. "Trustees would prevent her from doing what
she liked with it. Madame has indeed a head for affairs, but she also
has a woman's heart, which sometimes interferes with a woman's head in
the most disastrous manner."
"Article No. 1 of the protocol. /Allez toujours/, Monsieur."
I went on, feeling happier. "The next article treats of a little
matter which I understand has been the cause of differences in the
past between Madame and yourself. Madame, although she has not entered
the arena for some time, has not finally abandoned it." I smiled at
the look of surprise on Lola's face. "An artist is always an artist,
Monsieur. She is willing, however, to renounce it for ever, if you, on
your side, will make quite a small sacrifice."
"Name it, Monsieur."
"You have a little passion for baccarat----"
"Surely, Monsieur," said he blandly, "my wife would not expect me to
give up what is the mere recreation of every clubman."
"As a recreation pure and simple--she would not insist too much,
but----" I shrugged my shoulders. I flatter myself on being able to do
it with perfect French expressiveness. I caught, to my satisfaction,
an angry gleam in his eye.
"Do you mean to say, Monsieur, that I play for more than recreation?"
"How dare I say anything, Monsieur. But Madame is prejudiced against
the Cercle Africain. For a bachelor there is little to be said against
it--but for a married man--you seize the point?" said I.
"/Bien/, Monsieur," he said, swallowing his wrath. "And Article 3?"
"Since you have left the army--would it not be better to engage in
some profession--unless your private fortune dispenses you from the
necessity."
He said nothing but: "Article 4?"
"It would give Madame comfort to live out of Algiers."
"/Moi aussi/," he replied rather unexpectedly. "We have the whole of
France to choose from."
"Would not Madame be happier if she lived out of France, also? She has
always longed for a social position."
"/Eh, bien/? I can give her one in France."
"Are you quite sure?" I asked, looking him in the eyes.
"Monsieur," said he, rising and giving his moustache a swashbuckler
twist upward, "what are you daring to insinuate?"
I leaned back in my chair and fingered the waxed ends of mine.
"Nothing, Monsieur; I ask a simple question, which you surely can have
no difficulty in answering."
"Your questions are the height of indiscretion," he cried angrily.
"In that case, before we carry this interview further, the Family
Council and Madame would do well to have a private consultation."
"Monsieur," he cried, completely losing his temper. "I forbid you to
use that tone to me. You are making a mock of me. You are insulting
me. I bore with you long enough to see how much further your insolence
would dare to go. I'm not to have a hand in the administration of my
wife's money? I'm to forsake a plentiful means of livelihood? I'm to
become a commercial traveller? I'm to expatriate myself? I'm to
explain, too, the reasons why I left the army? I would not condescend.
Least of all to you."
"May I ask why, Monsieur?"
"/Tonnerre de Dieu/!" He stamped his foot. "Do you take me for a fool?
Here I am--I came at my wife's request, ready to take her back as my
wife, ready to condone everything--yes, Monsieur, as a man of the
world--you think I have no eyes, no understanding--ready to take her
off your hands--"
I leaped to my feet.
"Monsieur!" I thundered.
Lola gave a cry and rushed forward. I pushed her aside, and glared at
him. I was in a furious rage. We glared at each other eye to eye. I
pointed to the door.
"/Monsieur, sortez/!"
I went to it and flung it wide. Anastasius Papadopoulos trotted into
the room.
His entrance was so queer, so unexpected, so anti-climatic, that for
the moment the three of us were thrown off our emotional balance.
"I have heard all, I have heard all," shrieked the little man. "I know
you for what you are. I am the champion of the /carissima signora/ and
the protector of the English statesman. You are a traitor and
murderer--"
Vauvenarde lifted his hand in a threatening gesture.
"Hold your tongue, you little abortion!" he shouted.
But Anastasius went on screaming and flourishing his bundle of papers.
"Ask him if he remembers the horse Sultan; ask him if he remembers the
horse Sultan!"
Lola took him by the shoulders.
"Anastasius, you must go away from here--to please me. It's my
orders."
But he shook himself free, and the silk hat which he had not removed
fell off in the quick struggle.
"Ask him if he remembers Saupiquet," he screamed, and then banged the
door.
A malevolent devil put a sudden idea into my head and prompted speech.
"/Do/ you remember Saupiquet?" I asked ironically.
"Monsieur, meddle with your own affairs and let me pass. You shall
hear from me."
The dwarf planted himself before the door.
"You shall not pass till you have answered me. Do you remember
Saupiquet? Do you remember the five francs you gave to Saupiquet to
let you into Sultan's stable? Ah! Ha! Ha! You wince. You grow pale. Do
you remember the ball of poison you put down Sultan's throat?"
Lola started forward with flaming eyes and anguished face.
"You--you?" she gasped. "You were so ignoble as to do that?"
"The accursed brute!" shouted Vauvenarde. "Yes, I did it. I wish I had
burned out his entrails."
Anastasius sprang at him like a tiger cat. I had a quick vision of the
dwarf clinging in the air against the other's bulky form, one hand at
his throat, and then of an incredibly swift flash of steel. The dwarf
dropped off and rolled backwards, revealing something black sticking
out of Vauvenarde's frock-coat--for the second I could not realise
what it was. Then Vauvenarde, with a ghastly face, reeled sideways and
collapsed in a heap on the ground.
