Ainslee's Magazine/Foreign Exchange/Chapter 5
CHAPTER V.
At the words, “I am the Comtesse De Savergne,” Jack Hardy stood transfixed. His hand fell like lead from the canvas. Slowly he turned and advanced a step toward the pathetic figure upon the settle. And so his dream lady had faded away, back into the land of dreams! His whole soul was up in revolt. He felt that Fortune had made him the butt of a practical joke, and a very poor one at that. It was cruel, cruel to have all his fancy palaces tumbled about his ears like that. But still he must pull himself together. What mattered the past or the future? The present had to be faced. After all, Love was a terrible swindler, always calling upon Hope, who rarely honored his draft.
He forced himself to recover his equilibrium and said, with a husky break in his voice: “You! You are the Comtesse De Savergne! I might have known it.” Then, with an attempt at cheerfulness and some formality in his manner, he added: “My name is Hardy, Jack Hardy. I'll be glad if I can be of any service to you.”
Knowing nothing whatever of the stress of feeling that was racking him, she responded monotonously: “All I want is to be set on my road again.”
He laughed, a queer strident laugh, and scarcely knowing what he was saying, but remembering subconsciously what the prince had told him, remarked:
“Oh, yes, you're looking for—though it scarcely seems serious enough to have brought you out to-night. Perhaps you've heard the legend of this tower, how the De Savergnes once walled up a countess of the name here.”
She shuddered as she looked into the fire, which seemed to be picturing scenes of horror to her eyes.
“Yes. It was because she told family secrets.”
“I thought it might have been because she insisted on wandering through this breakneck valley, looking for a lost dog that has probably gone home of its own accord,” he said flippantly, afraid at that moment to address her—his lady of dreams—in any other way.
“What in the world are you saying?” asked Nancy in blank amazement.
He was trying to ward off the effects of the unexpected blow which had been dealt him. Like Desdemona, he was not merry, but he did beguile the thing he was by seeming otherwise.
“Indirectly, I am talking about the dog you're looking for.”
“Aren't you mistaking me for some one else?”
“Oh, no.” And then, gently satirical, he proceeded to quote the prince: “You're the happiest woman in the world, though a roadside painter, catching a glimpse of you, mightn't have thought so. Ah, yes—and when you look most troubled you are planning a game of tennis. Also, you have, perhaps, too much of that good characteristic of our good race—self-reliance—and are too likely to act for yourself. You see, I know you quite well, Madame De Savergne, and I should say the description suited you pretty closely, from your coming on foot and alone to look for a lost dog to-night.”
“Who told you that?” she demanded sharply.
“A friend of yours who was here a few moments ago looking for you.”
With a joyful cry she started to her feet. “Oh, I see! It was an excuse to ask for me. I was to have met him at the shrine at the top of the hill, but I lost the road. Were a little boy and a nurse with him in the carriage?”
It was Hardy's turn to be puzzled, but he answered seriously:
“No, he was alone in an automobile, and I think he was rather alarmed about you—and your dog.”
Her eyes widened. “In an automobile? Alone? Then it wasn't Did you know him?”
“Yes, it was the Prince De Savergne.”
She started violently, and a slow chill crept through her veins.
“The Prince De Savergne has been here?” she gasped.
“Just before you came.”
“He told you this story—that I was looking for a lost dog?”
“Yes.”
Her lips curled in a bitter smile. “I might have known he would try to cover it with ridicule,” she said in a low, monotonous tone, as though speaking to herself.
Hardy was far from being a fool, and he saw that there was some mystery here. But as he gazed at the startled, exquisite face before him, the face of his lady of dreams, he then and there devoted himself to her service, and if she were in trouble he would help and defend her with all that there was in him of physical and mental strength.
“He was not the friend you were expecting to meet?” he asked, with gentle deference.
She did not answer the question, but said appealingly: “Won't you be good enough to show me the road that goes up to the shrine?”
“Somebody is waiting for you there.”
“Yes, with a carriage. I shall be quite safe if you'll only help me that far.”
He hesitated. “It's a mile of bad hill road,” he said meditatively. “I could go up there for you.”
She put out one hand imploringly. “Please listen,” she pleaded, her sweet voice tremulous. “I'm sure you mean to be kind, but you don't understand. It's more important to me than I can tell you. I must go there myself somehow, and quickly.”
Hardy was studying her intently. Although she was conscious of his scrutiny, for some reason or other she did not resent it.
“The prince might come back this way in his car,” he said tentatively.
“Yes, yes, he might,” she cried, with a shudder, which told Hardy much. “Please, please, if it isn't too much to ask of you”
“You'd rather not meet the prince?”
“Oh, can't you see?” she exclaimed desperately.
“You're afraid of him,” he returned gravely.
She nodded her head with a pitiful motion. “So afraid of him.”
For an instant there was silence between them, broken only by the noise of the storm without. Then Hardy said with sudden determination:
“Madame De Savergne, I'm going to ask you an impertinent question. Are you running away?”
She flashed him a glance under her long lashes, and then smiled. It was the first time that Hardy had seen her smile, and he thought it the most bewitching thing in the world.
“Mr. Hardy, you invite an answer equally impertinent. but” She paused an instant, and concluded archly: “I won't make it.”
“You're afraid to meet the prince,” he said directly, and with sudden energy, “and somebody's carriage is waiting for you at the top of the hill Now, for a moment, won't you just think of the fact that I'm an American, that I'd do anything to help you, and tell me—well, doesn't it seem to you that you have told me too much—or too little?”
“What do you want to know?” she asked rather helplessly, impressed by his earnestness.
“I met your father and mother to-day,” he began, “and I learned that you were the happiest woman in the world”
“Oh,” she interrupted, with a gleam of humor, “I would be if you'd show me to the top of that hill where my friend is waiting.”
“Your friend is a man, you said?” he put in quickly.
“Yes."
They looked at each other steadily for a moment; and then, reading his thought, she drew back in astonishment, and began to laugh deliciously.
“You—you don't mean to say you think Oh, poor Albert!” She faced Hardy again, all smiles. “Mr. Hardy, I'm running away, but I'm not eloping.”
He breathed a sigh of relief. “The happiest woman in the world running away!”
Instantaneously her expression changed, and she answered quickly, and very earnestly:
“And asking you to help her, Mr. Hardy.” She went to him and laid her hand upon his arm; a touch, light though it was, which sent the blood tingling through his veins. “I haven't any way to show you that what I am doing is right. Of course, you don't understand. How could you, when my own—when nobody understands. Could you,” falteringly, “could you believe that I had to do it, and—and—just help me?”
His answer was brief, but eminently satisfactory. “I could—and will,” he declared, taking down a raincoat which was hanging against the wall.
She gazed at him with cheeks and eyes enkindled—a prey to an emotion she could not have explained, even to herself,
“And believe that I'll be grateful to you always, and always, and always,” she added warmly. “Oh, if you'll only put me into my friend's hands, I will”
“You're sure he's there?” asked Hardy, getting into his coat.
“He must be,” she replied, consulting her watch. “I had to trust the kind, good soul to get my little boy and nurse out of the château.”
Hardy put on a slouch hat, and picking up an old-fashioned lantern, lighted it. “I'll find that carriage, and see you safely to it,” he said, with great determination.
She darted toward him and impulsively offered her hand. “Thank you, Mr. Hardy. As they used to say over home, you're all right! Oh—what's that?”
Some one was banging loudly, insistently, upon the door.
“It's probably your friend come to look for you,” Hardy said reassuringly. “He could see my light from the top of the hill.”
“No! No!” she cried, fright on every feature. “It might be the prince come back. Can't you”
Hardy pointed to the door of the sleeping room. “Wait in there. If it's he, I'll get rid of him.”
She quickly obeyed; while Hardy threw off his hat and coat and set the lantern down on an old-fashioned carved oak chest. Then he opened the door and admitted the dripping figure of Albert De Raimbault, who entered breathlessly.
“Monsieur,” De Raimbault began without preamble, “you are the American who has hired the Tour De Savergne, aren't you? I must ask you if you have seen a lady, also American, who might have got herself lost in these woods,”
“Yes, perhaps,” replied Hardy coldly.
“You have seen her?” excitedly.
“I think she might have been looking for a friend of hers.”
“That is I! I am that friend.”
Hardy fixed his eyes on the other's face, and scarcely removed them during the rest of the interview. He was determined to probe this young man to the depths—his character and his motives.
“You were to meet her?”
“At the top of that hill. I am the Vicomte Albert De Raimbault.”
“I wanted to be sure you were the man. You've got the boy and his nurse, all right?”
The viscount started. “No,” he replied shortly; “but the carriage is there. That is enough.”
“Where are the nurse and the little boy?” insisted Hardy, with a sternness he could not quite keep out of his voice.
“Mon Dieu! Where did you see this lady?” impatiently.
“I'll tell you that when you tell me where the boy and his nurse are.”
“But they are at the château where they should be,” snapped De Raimbault, infuriated.
“Why didn't you bring them?”
“You are very curious,” with angry sneer.
Hardy's eyebrows came together in a threatening frown as he said slowly and determinedly: “I'm going to have my curiosity satisfied before I tell you which way she went.”
The viscount threw out his hands in despair at this obstinacy. “Good heavens! We've no time! You are a man of the world; you should perceive. You see me, and you have seen a lady who is looking for me. Already there is pursuit. I have had to hide my carriage in the trees from an automobile which passed me on the search.”
“But she told you to bring the nurse and the little boy. Why didn't you do it?”
“I have just called you a man of the world,” returned De Raimbault disgustedly, raging at the delay. “It seems I was mistaken. How could I get those two from the château?”
“Didn't you tell her you would?”
“Monsieur, I shall go desperate to explain. Even if you are an American, have you no comprehension what one would promise a pretty woman who leaves her husband? Look at me again! Think of such a man in such an affair, with a Swiss nurse and a baby boy to his coat tails. All France would laugh when it hears the story; it would take a god to survive the ridicule. I am not a god. Baby boys and Swiss nurses! Do you think she will miss them? To-morrow we are across the Alps; and once in Italy, where it is sunshine and music and flowers, she will forget all that has troubled her. Now, are you satisfied?”
“Yes, I'm satisfied,” Hardy replied in a dull, cold monotone, exerting all his self-restraint to keep his fist from the face of the conceited libertine.
“Then where is the lady?” asked the viscount again, this time in a peremptory manner.
“She came here looking for the road to the top of the hill.”
“But I have just come by that road.”
“How do you know you didn't pass her?”
“Ah! In such a darkness one could pass a regiment.” He moved toward the door.
“There's a footpath just to the left of the tower here.” said Hardy, opening the door for him. “If you take that you will reach the carriage as soon as she will.”
“I shall do so. Mon Dieu! What a night for an affair!” He turned up his coat collar, and, without a word of farewell, darted through the door.
Hardy closed it behind him, and stood for a minute in thought. He glanced toward the bedroom as if in doubt; then he turned resolutely to his desk, scribbled a note, and directed it to “Mr. or Mrs. Baxter.” This done, he went to the kitchen, summoned Celestine, and explaining to her, not without compunction, the necessity of some one taking the note to the château, dispatched her on the errand.
As soon as he had seen Celestine off, well muffled up against the weather, and bearing the old-fashioned lantern, Hardy crossed to the bedroom door, and knocked softly.
The countess appeared immediately. “It was the prince?” she cried anxiously.
“No.”
“Then who was it?”
For a moment Hardy did not reply.
“Who was it?” she repeated nervously.
“Madame De Savergne,” he began, as if measuring every word, “I know I annoyed you a while ago; now I must do it again.”
“Only please, please hurry!”
“No,” he replied, with the same deliberation, “we can't hurry now.”
“But why don't you answer my question? Who was it that came?”
“It was the friend you were expecting to meet,” he answered levelly.
His mind was now made up; and, while he would have given his life's blood to spare her pain, he felt that his decision was irrevocable and he must go on ruthlessly to the end.
“Where is he?”
“I sent him away.”
“You sent him for the carriage?”
“No; he won't be back.”
She stared at him in amazement a moment, then cried accusingly:
“You didn't let him know I was here?”
“No.”
“And you kept me from knowing he was here!” Her eyes flashed fire as she confronted him with angry condemnation. “You misled him! You misled us both! What for?”
Hardy lowered his eyes, but his voice was steady as he replied:
“I decided that you'd get along better without his help.”
She stood aghast. “You decided!” she burst out. “What possible right had you to decide?”
“No right,” he acknowledged quietly.
“I never knew anything so unparalleled!” She turned abruptly away.
“Where are you going?” he asked, worried.
“I'm going to find him.”
“You couldn't. I know the path I set him on fairly well in daylight, but even I couldn't find him now.”
“In spite of that I shall try,” she announced, with a defiant tilt of her chin.
“Madame De Savergne,” he protested, “your friend will be lucky if he finds himself before to-morrow. I give you my word it's quite useless.”
But she refused to be dissuaded. “At least I can find the carriage with my little boy and his nurse,” she said.
Hardy hesitated a moment. She was evidently far from suspecting the truth, and what effect would it have upon her when she knew it? But at last he concluded to venture something.
“Your friend didn't bring your little boy and the nurse,” he told her bluntly.
“He failed?” she asked, still unsuspicious.
“Yes, he failed,” he responded dryly.
“Then there's only one thing to do,” she declared, with finality.
“I'm glad you see it.”
She turned upon him in passionate protest. “Do you think I'll give up now and go back to the château? My boy shall be sent to me. I couldn't spend another night there, I couldn't.”
Hardy's whole heart went out to her. Every moment that he had been with this lovely woman, every glance of her dark eyes, every intonation of her musical voice, had but served to forge the links of love's chain. He knew now, past all peradventure, that she was the one woman to him, and that there would never be another. And yet he had to steel himself against any betrayal. So when he spoke it was very clearly and without the least quiver of emotion in his voice.
“I'm going to be impertinent again, and offer you some advice; that is, to sit down by the fire and get your shoes really dry.”
But she had snatched up her wraps and was already at the door. “Thank you,” she said curtly. “Good night, Mr. Hardy.”
She must not be allowed to go. But how could he stop her?
“You said you were running away—not eloping,” he cried quickly.
“Good night.”
“That's what it will be called,” he warned her sharply.
Something in his intonation as well as his words gave her pause. She halted abruptly and turned to face him, “An elopement?” she murmured dazedly.
“Precisely that,” he affirmed steadily. “I don't question your right to go, I accept as truth all that you have told me; but you can't go now and not have it said, published, and believed that you have eloped.”
The color rushed in a crimson flood to her cheeks. Whether it was anger against him or not he could not tell. She came impulsively forward.
“That I eloped with the Vicomte De Raimbault,” she said, with bitter raillery, “that I eloped with the one simple, honest soul I could turn to for help! Mr. Hardy, I believe you are even funnier than you are impertinent.”
He winced at this. She had struck him on the quick. And before he could collect himself, he said with force:
“Wouldn't I seem still more foolish if I tried to tell you that your friend isn't to be trusted as you've trusted him to-night?”
Startled, she looked at him with a quick, questioning glance; then parried his thrust by a counterquestion.
“Wouldn't that seem a little foolish to yourself—a man I'd never seen before acting as my protector against the one true friend who has shown real devotion for me? Ah!” as he made no reply. “Why should you have interfered?”
“Just because I am your protector for the moment against that one true friend and your own mistake,” he said earnestly,
She felt a qualm at her heart. This young man had an honest face, he was her own countryman, and—yes, she liked and trusted him. Had she made a mistake? For the first time the possibility was borne in upon her.
Nevertheless she said lamely: “But you are doing harm with your protection. Why should you”
The continuous strain was telling upon the artist. He interrupted her, speaking rapidly and very gravely:
“Does a man know why these things happen? I only know I have to do as I am doing.” His voice sank into definite pleading, which touched her in spite of herself and struck some chord of her heartstrings which had not vibrated for years. “I took something on faith from you. Can't you take this on faith from me?”
But before she could reply there came again a knock on the door—a knock of authority.
“Ah!” cried Nancy, half triumphantly, a mischievous smile twitching the corners of her mouth. “Monsieur De Raimbault has found that path easier than you thought. He has come back for me!”
“If he has”
“Please open your door and let him in.”
“Will you wait in there?” asked Hardy, pointing with a troubled look to her former refuge.
“Thank you,” replied Nancy gayly. “Not this time.”
“You won't go with him?” implored Hardy.
“Ah,” she said, still smiling, “it would have been so much simpler if you had shown me the way in the first place. But I'm not vindictive. I won't tell Monsieur De Raimbault how you delayed me. Open the door, please.”
There was nothing for Hardy to do but obey, and he threw open the door.
Nancy's smile died away. Her face grew rigid, and she stared around with hunted eyes.
It was the Prince De Savergne!
He bowed low to the countess, and laid his hand on Hardy's shoulder.
“Did I not foretell that the countess' anxiety would bring her out, even in such wicked weather?” he cried; and then, turning laughingly to his niece-in-law: “My child, I am even such a prophet that I predicted to our young friend here that you might lose your way home and do him the honor to accept his hospitality. I foretold to myself, after I had gone, that I must stop here as I returned, and I could have foretold to you that you could not lose yourself anywhere so distantly that your good old uncle would not find you. Surely again you will not cause him this anxiety.”
Nancy crushed back the fear with which this man always inspired her, and, without making any answer, moved toward the door; but the prince as if by accident, stepped between her and it.
“You see,” he said to Hardy, “she is still troubled over the loss of that little pet animal.”
“I see,” said Hardy gravely.
The prince turned again to Nancy.
“It is time we returned to the château.”
“I'm not going there.”
“She will not give up the search,” exclaimed the prince in mock despair.
“No,” she returned between her teeth, “I will not give up this—search.”
“Your indulgent uncle is the last to oppose you,” he declared, with an airy wave of his hand. “There is his motor car at your disposal.”
“Thank you!”
He offered his arm.
“And his arm to lean upon.”
“I do not need your help,” said Nancy, starting to pass him.
But he deftly prevented her. “I am going with you.”
“I do not mean to use your car,” she cried angrily.
“What!” he laughed. “On foot again? And I with my rheumatism!”
“I told you I am not going with you!”
The prince smiled urbanely.
“The men of my family have always been the slaves of woman. My young friend,” to Hardy, “can you spare a lantern?”
“My servant has taken it,” replied Hardy. “I sent her on an errand.”
Jack Hardy sensed vaguely that there was something closely approaching a tragedy beneath all this, and he wondered if, after all, he had done right to summon the Baxters.
The prince smiled, but it was a smile that recalled vividly to Hardy—Mephistopheles. So could that arch-fiend have smiled at his triumph over Marguerite!
“Then we shall detach a lamp from the automobile,” the prince announced, with a sort of elegant burlesque, addressing Hardy. “From your window you shall see this will-o'-the-wisp staggering through the darkness, a sacred flame borne by a humble and romantic devotee of the goddess Caprice.” He bowed to Nancy, who looked at him with pathetic indecision. “Let us be upon our pilgrimage. Since I must follow, I await your leading. We have the whole delectable night before us.”
Nancy's eyes fell before his. She turned and walked slowly to the fireplace. The prince followed her.
“Couldn't you find a better weapon than ridicule?” she asked, choking a little,
Instantaneously the prince's manner changed, and he now spoke sharply, meaningly: “Many others, but none that I needed to use to-night.”
He fixed her with his cold, uncompromising eyes. She felt stifled, and she had to draw a long breath before she could speak.
“Ridicule hasn't sufficed,” she said at last. “I suppose you're strong enough to follow me, but that's brute force, isn't it? Ridicule is only your goad. Do you think ridicule could make me go back to keep on bearing the things I can't bear? Endure the shame that was forced on me to-day?”
“Tut! Tut!” he scoffed. “We won't refer to that now.”
“No! No! No!” she cried passionately. “Don't refer to it! Don't speak of it! Let such things be. Let them exist. Talk of them yourselves, but make it unmannerly for your wives to do so. But,” in hopeless appeal, “what is a wife to do if she feels them?”
For the second time that evening there came the honk of an automobile. The storm had abated, and it was heard to stop outside.
“You hold a reception, Mr. Hardy,” said the prince. “Others are coming.”
Hardy paid no attention to him, but he said to Nancy:
“It is your father. I sent for him.”
The prince, with an exclamation, cast a quick glance of approval at Hardy; then he threw off his coat and tossed it onto the chest. Crossing quickly to the phonograph, he set it going. The machine resumed “Way Down Upon the Suwanee River.” He threw himself into a chair beside it, and, placing a cigarette between his lips, assumed an attitude of elaborate ease.
Hardy came close to the countess. “I am sorry,” he murmured. “It was the only way.” And then he opened the door, to admit Celestine, followed by Mr. and Mrs. Baxter.
Nancy rose to her feet. She felt as if entrapped, caught in meshes which she could not undo. She turned, with a gesture of despair, upon the smiling prince.
“Oh,” she cried in a voice vibrant with emotion, “I think the woman the De Savergnes walled up in that room must have been glad when she thought of these stout walls protecting her from the shame that had been around her. What a great peace she must have felt when she saw the last block put in place!”