various comments. Herbert, with his head again out of the window,
advanced the opinion that the hospitality of madame la marquise had been
so overwhelming, and her beauty and charm so compelling, that Marc's
only way out was to introduce her among us. Louis kept his nose in the
air. Brierley, from the opposite side of the court, indulged in a
running fire of good-natured criticism in which Marc was described as
the prize imbecile who needed a keeper. As for me, sitting on the
window-sill watching the by-plays going on below--especially Louis, who
demanded an immediate answer for Gaston--there was nothing left, of
course, but a--"Why certainly, Louis, any friend of Marc's will be most
welcome, and say that we dine at seven."
And yet before the day was over--so subtly does the feminine make its
appeal--that despite our assumed disgust, each and every man of us had
resolved to do his prettiest to make the distinguished lady's visit a
happy one. As a woman of the world she would, of course, overlook the
crudities of our toilettes. And then, as we soon reasoned to ourselves,
why shouldn't our bachelor reunions be enlivened, at least for once, by
a charming woman of twenty-five--Marc never bothered himself with any
older--who would bring with her all the perfume, dash, and chic of the
upper world and whose toilette in contrast with our own dull clothes
would be all the more entrancing? This, now that we thought about it,
was really the touch the Marmouset needed.
It was funny to see how everybody set to work without a word to his
fellow. Herbert made a special raid through the garden and nipped off
the choicest October roses--buds mostly--as befitted our guest. Louis,
succumbing to the general expectancy, occupied himself in painting the
menus on which Watteau cupids swinging from garlands were most
pronounced. Brierley, pretending it was for himself, spent half the
morning tuning up the spinet with a bed-key, in case this rarest of
women could sing, or should want any one else to, while Lemois, with
that same dry smile which his face always wears when his mind is
occupied with something that amuses him, ordered Pierre to begin at once
the preparation of his most famous dish, Poulet Vallée d'Auge, spending
the rest of the morning in putting a final polish on his entire George
III coffee service--something he never did except for persons, as he
remarked, of "exceptional quality."
Not to be outdone in courtesy I unhooked the great iron key of the
wine-cellar from its nail in Pierre's kitchen, and swinging back the old
door on its rusty hinges, drew from among the cobwebs a bottle of
Chablis, our heavier Burgundies being, of course, too heating for so
dainty a creature. This I carried in my own hands to the Marmouset,
preserving its long-time horizontal so as not to arouse a grain of the
sediment of years, tucking it at last into a crib of a basket for a
short nap, only to be again awakened when my lady's glass was ready.
When the glad hour arrived and we were drawn up to receive her--every
man in his best outfit--best he had--with a rosebud in his
button-hole--and she emerged from the darkness and stood in the light of
the overhead candles--long, lank Marc bowing and scraping at her side,
there escaped from each one of us, all but Lemois, a half-smothered
groan which sounded like a faint wail.
What we saw was not a paragon of delicate beauty, nor a vision of
surpassing loveliness, but a parallelogram stood up on end, fifty or
more years of age, one unbroken perpendicular line from her shoulders to
her feet--or rather to a brown velvet, close-fitting skirt that reached
to her shoe-tops--which were stout as a man's and apparently as big.
About her shoulders was a reefing jacket, also of brown velvet, fastened
with big horn buttons; above this came a loose cherry-red scarf of
finest silk in perfect harmony with the brown of the velvet; above this
again was a head surmounted by a mass of fluffy, partly gray hair,
parted on one side--as Rosa Bonheur wore hers. Then came two brilliant
agate eyes, two ruddy cheeks, and a sunny, happy mouth filled with
pearl-white teeth.
One smile--and it came with the radiance of a flashlight--and all
misgivings vanished. There was no question of her charm, of her
refinement, or of her birth. Neither was there any question as to her
thorough knowledge of the world.
"I knew you were all down here for a good time," she began in soft, low,
musical tones, when the introductions were over, "and would understand
if I came just as I was. I have been hunting all day--tramping the
fields with my dogs--and I would not even stop to rearrange my hair. It
was so good of you to let me come; and I love this room--its atmosphere
is so well bred, and it is never so charming as when the firelight
dances about it. Ah, Monsieur Lemois! I see some new things. Where did
you get that duck of a sauce-boat?--and another Italian mirror! But then
there is no use trying to keep up with you. My agent offered what I
thought was three times its value for that bit of Satsuma, and I nearly
broke my heart over it--and here it is! You really _should_ be locked up
as a public nuisance!"
We turned instinctively toward Lemois, remembering his queer, dry smile
when he referred to her coming, but his only reply to her comment was a
low bow to the woman of rank, with the customary commonplace, that all
of his curios were at her disposal if she would permit him to send them
to her, and with this left the room.
"And now where shall I sit?" she bubbled on. "Next to you, I hope, my
dear Monsieur Herbert. You do not know me--never heard of me,
perhaps--but I know all about you and the wonderful things you have
accomplished. And you too, Monsieur Louis. I remember your first success
as I do those of most of the young men who have won their medals for
twenty years back. And you, Monsieur Brierley--and--can I say
it?--Monsieur High-Muck"--and she nodded gayly at me. "And now you will
all please give your imagination free rein. Try and remember that I am
not a hideous old woman in corduroys and high boots, but a most
delightful and bewitching demoiselle; and please remember, too, that I
can wear a décolleté gown if I please, only I don't please, and haven't
pleased for ten years or more."
Her perfect poise and freedom from all conventionality put us at once at
our ease, making us forget she had only been among us a few minutes.
"And how clever you are to have chosen this room for these delightful
meetings, of which Monsieur Marc has told me," she continued, her eyes
wandering again over the several objects, while her personality
completely dominated everything. "Nobody but Lemois would have brought
them all together. What a genius he is! Think of his putting that wooden
angel where its golden crown can become an aureole in the candle-light:
he has done that since my last visit. And that other one--really the
rarest thing he owns--in the dark corner by the fireplace. May I tell
you about it before he comes back? It is of the fifteenth century, and
is called the 'Bella Nigra'--the Black Virgin. Look at it, all of you,
while I hold the candle. You see the face is black, the legend running,
'I am beautiful though black because the sun has looked at me so long.'
You notice, too, that she has neither arms nor legs--a symbol of
nobility, showing she need neither work nor walk, and the triple crown
means that she is Queen of Heaven, Earth, and Sea. Why he pokes her in a
dark corner I cannot imagine, except that it is just like him to do the
queerest things--and say them too. And yet, he is _such_ a dear--and
_so_ funny! You cannot think what funny things he does and says until
you watch him as I have. Why is it, Monsieur Brierley, that you have
never put him into one of your books--you who write such charming
stories of our coast? Only this summer something occurred which I laugh
over every time I think of it. The Cabourg races were on and the
court-yard outside was packed with people who had come for luncheon
before the Prix Lagrange was run. They were making a good deal of
noise--a thing the old gentleman hates, especially from loudly dressed
women. I was at the next table, sheltered from the others, and was
enjoying the curious spectacle--such people always interest me--when I
noticed Monsieur Lemois rubbing his hands together, talking to himself,
his eyes fixed on the group. I knew one of his storms was brewing, and
was wondering what would happen, when I saw him start forward as another
uproarious laugh escaped one of the most boisterous.
"'Mademoiselle,' he said in his softest and most courteous tone, hat in
hand, bowing first to her and then to her male companions;
'mademoiselle, I love to hear you laugh; I built this place for
laughter, but when you laughed so _very_ loud a moment ago my flowers
were so ashamed they hung their heads,' and then he kept on bowing, his
hat still in his hand, his face calm, his manner scrupulously polite.
Nobody was offended. They seemed to think it was some kind of a
compliment; the rebuked woman even turned her head toward the big
hydrangeas as if trying to find out how they really felt about it.
Oh!--he is too delicious for words."
And so it went on until before the dinner was over she had captured
every man in the room--both by what she said and the way she said
it--her eyes flashing like a revolving light, now dim, now brilliant
with the thoughts behind them, her white teeth gleaming as she talked.
Marc seemed beside himself with pride and happiness. "Never was there
such a woman," he was pouring into Herbert's ear; "and you should see
her pictures and her stables and her gun-room. Really the most
extraordinary creature I have ever known! Does just as she pleases--a
tramp one day and a duchess the next. And you should watch her at the
head of her table in her château--then you will know what a real 'Grande
Dame' is."
While the others were crowding about her, Marc eager to anticipate her
every wish in the way of cushions, footstools, and the like, I went to
find Lemois, who was just outside, his hands laden with a tray of
cordials.
"You know her then?"
"Oh, for years," he whispered back. "I did not tell you, for I wanted to
see your surprise and surrender. It is always the same story with her.
She does not live here except for a month or so in the autumn, when the
small villa on the bluff above Buezval--two miles from here--is opened;
a little box of a place filled with costly bric-à-brac. Her great
château--the one in which she really lives--is on an estate of some
thousands of acres near Rouen, and is stocked with big game--boar and
deer. The marquis--and a great gentleman he was--died some twenty years
ago. Madame paints, carves ivories, binds books, shoots, fishes, speaks
five languages, has lived all over the world and knows everybody worth
knowing. No one in her youth was more beautiful, but the figure has
gone, as you see--and it is such a pity, for it was superb; only the
eyes and the teeth are left--and the smile. That was always her greatest
charm, and still is--except her charities, which never cease."
Her musical voice was still vibrating through the room as I re-entered.
"No, I don't agree with you, Monsieur Herbert," she was saying. "It is
shameful that we do not keep closer to the usages and requirements of
the old régime. In my time a woman would have excited comment who did
not wear her finest gown and her choicest jewels in so select a company
as this; and often very extraordinary things happened when any one
defied the mandate. I remember one very queer instance which I wish I
could tell you about--and it resulted in all sorts of dreadful
complications. I became so adept a fibber in consequence that I wasn't
able to speak the truth for months afterward--and all because this most
charming girl wouldn't wear a low gown at one of our dinners."
Herbert beat the air with his hand. "Keep still, everybody--madame la
marquise is going to tell us a story."
"Madame la marquise is going to do nothing of the kind. She has enough
sins of her own to answer for without betraying those of this poor
girl."
"Hold up your hands and swear secrecy, every one of you!" cried Louis.
"But who will absolve me from breaking the commandment? You will never
have any respect for me again--you remember the rule--all liars shall
have their portion--don't you?"
"If madame will permit me," said Lemois with a low bow, "I will be her
father-confessor, for I alone of all this group know how good she really
is."
"Very well, I take you at your word, Fra Lemois, and to prove how good
_you_ are, you shall send me the Satsuma with your compliments, and pick
from my collection anything that pleases you. But you must first let me
have a cigarette. Wait"--she twisted back her arm and drew a gold case
from the side pocket of her jacket--"yes, I have one of my own--one I
rolled myself, and I cure my own tobacco too, if you please. No! no more
Burgundy" (she had declined my carefully selected Chablis and had drank
the heavier wine with the rest of us). "That Romanée Conti I know, and
it generally gets into my head, and I don't like anything in my head
except what I put there myself. What did you want me to do? Oh, yes,
tell you that story of my youth.
"Well, one day my dear husband received a letter from an English
officer, a dear friend of his with whom he had had the closest relations
when they were both stationed in Borneo. This letter told us that his
daughter, whom, as we knew, had been captured by the Dyaks when she was
a child of eight, had been found some three years before by a scouting
party and returned to the English agent at the principal seaport, the
name of which I forget. Since that time she had been living with a
relative, who had sent her to school. She had now completed her
education, the letter went on to say, and was on her way back to England
to join him, he being an invalided officer on half-pay. Before reaching
him he wanted her to see something of the world, particularly of French
life, and knew of no one with whom he would be more willing to trust her
than ourselves. She was just grown--in her eighteenth year--and,
although she had passed seven years of her life among a wild tribe, was
still an English girl of prepossessing appearance.
"Well, she came--a beautifully formed, graceful creature, with flashing
black eyes, a clear skin, and with a certain barbaric litheness when she
moved that always reminded me of a panther, it was so measured, and had
such meaning in it. She brought some expensive clothes, but no décolleté
dresses of any kind, which surprised me, and when I offered to lend her
my own--we were of about the same size--she refused politely but
firmly, which surprised me all the more, and went right on wearing her
high-necked gowns, which, while good in themselves--for her people were
not poor--were not exactly the kind of toilettes my husband and my
guests had been accustomed to--certainly not at dinners of twenty.
"At every other function she was superb, and for each one had the proper
outfit and of the best make. She rode well, danced well, sang like a
bird, could shoot and hunt with any of us, and, with the exception of
this curious whim--for her form was faultless--was one of the most
delightful creatures who ever stayed with us--and we had had, as you may
suppose, a good many. The subjects she avoided were her captivity and
the personnel of those with whom she had lived. When pressed she would
answer that she had told the story so often she was tired of it; had
banished it from her mind and wished everybody else would.
"Then the expected happened. Indeed I had begun to wonder why it had not
happened before. A young Frenchman, the only son of one of our oldest
families, a man of birth and fortune, fell madly in love with her. The
mother was up in arms, and so was the father. She was without title,
and, so far as they knew, without fortune in her own right; was English,
and the match could not and should not take place.
"How the girl felt about it we could not find out. Sometimes she would
see him alone, generally in the dusk of the evening on the lawn, but
though she was English, and we had given the full limit of her freedom,
she always kept within sight of the veranda. At other times she refused
to see him altogether, sending word she was ill, or engaged, or had
friends, all of which I found extraordinary. This went on until matters
reached a crisis. She knew she must either send him about his business
or succumb: this was _her_ problem. _His_ problem was to win her whether
or no; if not here, then in England, where he would follow her; and he
took no pains to conceal it. His persistence was met by a firm refusal,
and finally by a command to leave her alone. The dismissal was given one
night after dinner when they were together for a few minutes in the
library, after which, so my maid told me, she went to her room and threw
herself on her bed in an agony of tears.
"But there is nothing for sheer obstinacy like a Frenchman in love.
Indeed he was too far gone to believe a word she said or take no for an
answer, and as my grounds were next to his mother's, and the two
families most intimate, he still kept up his visits to the house, where,
I must say, he was always welcome, for my husband and I liked him
extremely, and he deserved it. His mother, objecting to the marriage,
wanted to keep him away. She insisted--all this I heard afterward--that
the girl was half savage and looked and moved like one; that she had
doubtless been brought up among a lawless tribe who robbed every one
around them; that there was no knowing what such a girl had done and
would not do, and that she would rather see her son lying dead at her
feet--the usual motherly exaggeration--than see him her victim. This
brought him at last to his senses, for he came to me one day and wanted
me to tell him what I knew of her antecedents as well as the story of
her captivity and life with the savages. This was a difficult situation
to face, and I at first refused to discuss her private affairs. Then I
knew any mystery would only make him the more crazy, and so I told him
what I knew, omitting the more intimate details. Strange to say,
Frenchman-like, it only maddened him the more--so much so that he again
waylaid her and asked her some questions which made her blaze like coals
of fire, and again the poor girl went to bed in a flood of tears.
"Then the most puzzling and inexplicable thing happened. I had a very
deep topaz of which I was passionately fond--one given me by my dear
husband shortly after we were married. I generally kept it in my small
jewel case, to which only my maid and I had the key. This night when I
opened it the jewel was gone. My maid said she remembered distinctly my
putting it, together with the chain, in the box, for my guest was with
me at the time and had begged me to wear it because of its rich color,
which she always said matched my eyes. At first I said nothing to any
one--not even my husband--and waited; then I watched my maid; then my
butler, about whom I did not know much, and who was in love with the
maid, and might have tempted her to steal it. And, last of all--why I
could not tell, and cannot to this day, except for that peculiar
pantherlike movement about my guest--I watched the girl herself. But
nothing came of it.
"Then I began to talk. I told my husband; I told the young man's mother,
my intimate friend, who told her son, she accusing the girl, of course,
without a scintilla of proof; I told my butler, my maid--I told
everybody who could in any way help to advertise my loss and the reward
I was willing to pay for its recovery. Still nothing resulted and the
week passed without a trace of the jewel or the thief.
"One morning just after luncheon, when I was alone in my little boudoir
and my husband and the young man were having their coffee and cigarettes
on the veranda outside, the girl walked in, made sure that no one was
within hearing, and held out her hand. In the palm was my lost topaz.
"'Here is your jewel,' she said calmly; 'I stole it, and now I have
brought it back.'
"'You!' I gasped. 'Why?'
"'To disgust him and make him hate me so that he will never see me
again. I love him too much to give myself to him. In my madness I
thought of this.'
"'And you want him to know it!' I cried out. I could hardly get my
breath, the shock was so great.
"'Yes--_here!_--NOW!' She stepped to the door. 'Monsieur,' she called,
'I have something to tell you. I have just brought back her jewel--I
stole it! Now come, madame, to my room and I will tell you the rest!'
"I followed her upstairs, leaving the horror-stricken young man dazed
and speechless. She shut the door, locked it, and faced me.
"'I have lied to both of you, madame. I did not steal your jewel; nobody
stole it. I found it a few minutes ago under the edge of the rug where
it had rolled; you dropped it in my room the night you wore it. In my
agony to find some way out I seized on this. It came to me in a flash
and I ran downstairs clutching it in my hand, knowing I would be lost if
I hesitated a moment. It is over now. He will never see me again!'
"I stood half paralyzed at the situation; she erect before me, her eyes
blazing, her figure stretched to the utmost, like an animal in pain.
"'And you deliberately told him you were a thief!' I at last managed to
stammer out. 'Why?'
"'Because it was the only way to escape--it was the only way out. I never
want him to think of me in any other light--I want to be dead to him
forever! Nothing else would have done; I should have yielded, for I
could no longer master my love for him. Look!'
"She was fumbling at her dress, loosening the top buttons close under
her chin; then she ripped it clear, exposing her neck and back.
"'This is what was done to me when I was a child!'
"I leaned forward to see the closer. The poor child was one mass of
hideous tattoo from her throat to her stays!
"'Now you know the whole story,' she sobbed, her eyes streaming tears;
'my heart is broken but I am satisfied. I could have stood anything but
his loathing.'
"With this she fastened her dress and walked slowly out of the room, her
head down, her whole figure one of abject misery."
Madame leaned forward, picked up her goblet of water, and remarking that
walking in the wind always made her thirsty, drained its contents. Then
she turned her head to hide her tears.
"A most extraordinary story, madame. Did the young fellow ever speak of
the theft?" asked Herbert, the first of her listeners to speak.
"No," she answered slowly, in the effort to regain her composure, "he
loved her too much to hear anything against her. He knew she had stolen
it, for he had heard it from her own lips."
"And you never tried to clear her character?"
"How could I? It was her secret, not mine. To divulge it would have led
to her other and more terrible secret, and that I was pledged to keep.
She is dead, poor girl, or I would not have told you now."
"And what did you do, may I ask?" inquired Brierley.
"Nothing, except tell fibs. After she had gone the following morning I
excused her to him, of course, on every ground that I could think of. I
argued that she had a peculiar nature; that owing to her captivity she
had perhaps lost that fine sense of what was her own and what was
another's; that she had many splendid qualities; that she had only
yielded to an impulse, just as a Bedouin does who steals an Arab horse
and who, on second thought, returns it. That I had forgiven her, and had
told her so, and as proof of it had tried, without avail, to make her
keep the topaz. Only my husband knew the truth. 'Let it stay as it is,
my dear,' he said to me; 'that girl has more knowledge of human nature
than I credited her with. Once that young lover of hers had learned the
cruel truth he wouldn't have lived with her another hour.'"
"I think I should have told him," remarked Louis slowly; the story
seemed to have strangely moved him. "If he really loved her he'd have
worn green spectacles and taken her as she was--I would. Bad business,
this separating lovers."
"No, you wouldn't, Louis," remarked Herbert, "if you'd ever seen her
neck. I know something of that tattoo, although mine was voluntary, and
only covered a part of my arm. Madame did just right. There are times
when one must tell anything but the truth."
Everybody looked at the speaker in astonishment. Of all men in the world
he kept closest to the exact hair-line; indeed, one of Herbert's
peculiarities, as I have said, was his always understating rather than
overstating a fact.
"Yes," he continued, "the only way out is to 'lie like a gentleman,' as
the saying is, and be done with it. I've been through it myself and
know. Your story, madame, has brought it all back to me."
"It's about a girl, of course," remarked Louis, flashing a smile around
the circle, "and your best girl, of course. Have a drop of cognac, old
man," and he filled Herbert's tiny glass. "It may help you tell the
_whole_ truth before you get through."