although she formed an immediate, instinctive distaste for Mr.
Gianapolis. But he made such obvious attempts to please, and was so
really entertaining a talker, that she unbent towards him a little. His
admiration, too, was unconcealed; and no pretty woman, however great her
common sense, is entirely admiration-proof.
“Do you not think 'Our Lady of the Poppies' remarkable?” said
Gianapolis, pleasantly.
“I think,” replied Denise Ryland,--to whom, also, the Greek had been
presented by Olaf van Noord, “that it indicates... a disordered...
imagination on the part of... its creator.”
“It is a technical masterpiece,” replied the Greek, smiling, “but hardly
a work of imagination; for you have seen the original of the principal
figure, and”--he turned to Helen Cumberly--“one need not go very far
East for such an interior as that depicted.”
“What!” Helen knitted her brows, prettily--“you do not suggest that such
an apartment actually exists either East or West?”
Gianapolis beamed radiantly.
“You would, perhaps, like to see such an apartment?” he suggested.
“I should, certainly,” replied Helen Cumberly. “Not even in a stage
setting have I seen anything like it.”
“You have never been to the East?”
“Never, unfortunately. I have desired to go for years, and hope to go
some day.”
“In Smyrna you may see such rooms; possibly in Port Said--certainly
in Cairo. In Constantinople--yes! But perhaps in Paris; and--who
knows?--Sir Richard Burton explored Mecca, but who has explored London?”
Helen Cumberly watched him curiously.
“You excite my curiosity,” she said. “Don't you think”--turning to
Denise Ryland--“he is most tantalizing?”
Denise Ryland distended her nostrils scornfully.
“He is telling... fairy tales,” she declared. “He thinks... we are...
silly!”
“On the contrary,” declared Gianapolis; “I flatter myself that I am too
good a judge of character to make that mistake.”
Helen Cumberly absorbed his entire attention; in everything he sought to
claim her interest; and when, ere taking their departure, the girl
and her friend walked around the studio to view the other pictures,
Gianapolis was the attendant cavalier, and so well as one might judge,
in his case, his glance rarely strayed from the piquant beauty of Helen.
When they departed, it was Gianapolis, and not Olaf van Noord, who
escorted them to the door and downstairs to the street. The red lips
of the Eurasian smiled upon her circle of adulators, but her eyes--her
unfathomable eyes--followed every movement of the Greek.
XXVII
GROVE OF A MILLION APES
Four men sauntered up the grand staircase and entered the huge
smoking-room of the Radical Club as Big Ben was chiming the hour of
eleven o'clock. Any curious observer who had cared to consult the
visitor's book in the hall, wherein the two lines last written were not
yet dry, would have found the following entries:
VISITOR RESIDENCE INTROD'ING
MEMBER
Dr. Bruce Cumberly London John Exel
M. Gaston Paris Brian Malpas
The smoking-room was fairly full, but a corner near the big open grate
had just been vacated, and here, about a round table, the four disposed
themselves. Our French acquaintance being in evening dress had perforce
confined himself in his sartorial eccentricities to a flowing silk
knot in place of the more conventional, neat bow. He was already upon
delightfully friendly terms with the frigid Exel and the aristocratic
Sir Brian Malpas. Few natures were proof against the geniality of the
brilliant Frenchman.
Conversation drifted, derelict, from one topic to another, now seized
by this current of thought, now by that; and M. Gaston Max made no
perceptible attempt to steer it in any given direction. But presently:
“I was reading a very entertaining article,” said Exel, turning his
monocle upon the physician, “in the Planet to-day, from the pen of Miss
Cumberly; Ah! dealing with Olaf van Noord.”
Sir Brian Malpas suddenly became keenly interested.
“You mean in reference to his new picture, 'Our Lady of the Poppies'?”
he said.
“Yes,” replied Exel, “but I was unaware that you knew van Noord?”
“I do not know him,” said Sir Brian, “I should very much like to meet
him. But directly the picture is on view to the public I shall certainly
subscribe my half-crown.”
“My own idea,” drawled Exel, “was that Miss Cumberly's article probably
was more interesting than the picture or the painter. Her description
of the canvas was certainly most vivid; and I, myself, for a moment,
experienced an inclination to see the thing. I feel sure, however, that
I should be disappointed.”
“I think you are wrong,” interposed Cumberly. “Helen is enthusiastic
about the picture, and even Miss Ryland, whom you have met and who is a
somewhat severe critic, admits that it is out of the ordinary.”
Max, who covertly had been watching the face of Sir Brian Malpas, said
at this point:
“I would not miss it for anything, after reading Miss Cumberly's account
of it. When are you thinking of going to see it, Sir Brian? I might
arrange to join you.”
“Directly the exhibition is opened,” replied the baronet, lapsing again
into his dreamy manner. “Ring me up when you are going, and I will join
you.”
“But you might be otherwise engaged?”
“I never permit business,” said Sir Brian, “to interfere with pleasure.”
The words sounded absurd, but, singularly, the statement was true. Sir
Brian had won his political position by sheer brilliancy. He was utterly
unreliable and totally indifferent to that code of social obligations
which ordinarily binds his class. He held his place by force of
intellect, and it was said of him that had he possessed the faintest
conception of his duties toward his fellow men, nothing could have
prevented him from becoming Prime Minister. He was a puzzle to all who
knew him. Following a most brilliant speech in the House, which would
win admiration and applause from end to end of the Empire, he would,
perhaps on the following day, exhibit something very like stupidity
in debate. He would rise to address the House and take his seat again
without having uttered a word. He was eccentric, said his admirers, but
there were others who looked deeper for an explanation, yet failed to
find one, and were thrown back upon theories.
M. Max, by strategy, masterful because it was simple, so arranged
matters that at about twelve o'clock he found himself strolling with Sir
Brian Malpas toward the latter's chambers in Piccadilly.
A man who wore a raincoat with the collar turned up and buttoned tightly
about his throat, and whose peculiar bowler hat seemed to be so tightly
pressed upon his head that it might have been glued there, detached
himself from the shadows of the neighboring cab rank as M. Gaston Max
and Sir Brian Malpas quitted the Club, and followed them at a discreet
distance.
It was a clear, fine night, and both gentlemen formed conspicuous
figures, Sir Brian because of his unusual height and upright military
bearing, and the Frenchman by reason of his picturesque cloak and
hat. Up Northumberland Avenue, across Trafalgar Square and so on up to
Piccadilly Circus went the two, deep in conversation; with the tireless
man in the raincoat always dogging their footsteps. So the procession
proceeded on, along Piccadilly. Then Sir Brian and M. Max turned into
the door of a block of chambers, and a constable, who chanced to be
passing at the moment, touched his helmet to the baronet.
As the two were entering the lift, the follower came up level with the
doorway and abreast of the constable; the top portion of a very red
face showed between the collar of the raincoat and the brim of the hat,
together with a pair of inquiring blue eyes.
“Reeves!” said the follower, addressing the constable.
The latter turned and stared for a moment at the speaker; then saluted
hurriedly.
“Don't do that!” snapped the proprietor of the bowler; “you should know
better! Who was that gentleman?”
“Sir Brian Malpas, sir.”
“Sir Brian Malpas?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And the other?”
“I don't know, sir. I have never seen him before.”
“H'm!” grunted Detective-Sergeant Sowerby, walking across the road
toward the Park with his hands thrust deep in his pockets; “I have! What
the deuce is Max up to? I wonder if Dunbar knows about this move?”
He propped himself up against the railings, scarcely knowing what he
expected to gain by remaining there, but finding the place as well
suited to reflection as any other. He shared with Dunbar a dread that
the famous Frenchman would bring the case to a successful conclusion
unaided by Scotland Yard, thus casting professional discredit upon
Dunbar and himself.
His presence at that spot was largely due to accident. He had chanced to
be passing the Club when Sir Brian and M. Max had come out, and, fearful
that the presence of the tall stranger portended some new move on the
Frenchman's part, Sowerby had followed, hoping to glean something by
persistency when clues were unobtainable by other means. He had had no
time to make inquiries of the porter of the Club respecting the identity
of M. Max's companion, and thus, as has appeared, he did not obtain the
desired information until his arrival in Piccadilly.
Turning over these matters in his mind, Sowerby stood watching the block
of buildings across the road. He saw a light spring into being in a room
overlooking Piccadilly, a room boasting a handsome balcony. This took
place some two minutes after the departure of the lift bearing Sir Brian
and his guest upward; so that Sowerby permitted himself to conclude that
the room with the balcony belonged to Sir Brian Malpas.
He watched the lighted window aimlessly and speculated upon the nature
of the conversation then taking place up there above him. Had he
possessed the attributes of a sparrow, he thought, he might have flown
up to that balcony and have “got level” with this infernally clever
Frenchman who was almost certainly going to pull off the case under the
very nose of Scotland Yard.
In short, his reflections were becoming somewhat bitter; and persuaded
that he had nothing to gain by remaining there any longer he was about
to walk off, when his really remarkable persistency received a trivial
reward.
One of the windows communicating with the balcony was suddenly thrown
open, so that Sowerby had a distant view of the corner of a picture, of
the extreme top of a book-case, and of a patch of white ceiling in the
room above; furthermore he had a clear sight of the man who had opened
the window, and who now turned and reentered the room. The man was Sir
Brian Malpas.
Heedless of the roaring traffic stream, upon the brink of which he
stood, heedless of all who passed him by, Sowerby gazed aloft, seeking
to project himself, as it were, into that lighted room. Not being an
accomplished clairvoyant, he remained in all his component parts upon
the pavement of Piccadilly; but ours is the privilege to succeed where
Sowerby failed, and the comedy being enacted in the room above should
prove well deserving of study.
To the tactful diplomacy of M. Gaston Max, the task of securing from
Sir Brian an invitation to step up into his chambers in order to smoke
a final cigar was no heavy one. He seated himself in a deep armchair, at
the baronet's invitation, and accepted a very fine cigar, contentedly,
sniffing at the old cognac with the appreciation of a connoisseur, ere
holding it under the syphon.
He glanced around the room, noting the character of the ornaments,
and looked up at the big bookshelf which was near to him; these rapid
inquiries dictated the following remark: “You have lived in China, Sir
Brian?”
Sir Brian surveyed him with mild surprise.
“Yes,” he replied; “I was for some time at the Embassy in Pekin.”
His guest nodded, blowing a ring of smoke from his lips and tracing its
hazy outline with the lighted end of his cigar.
“I, too, have been in China,” he said slowly.
“What, really! I had no idea.”
“Yes--I have been in China... I”...
M. Gaston grew suddenly deathly pale and his fingers began to twitch
alarmingly. He stared before him with wide-opened eyes and began to
cough and to choke as if suffocating--dying.
Sir Brian Malpas leapt to his feet with an exclamation of concern. His
visitor weakly waved him away, gasping: “It is nothing... it will...
pass off. Oh! mon dieu!”...
Sir Brian ran and opened one of the windows to admit more air to
the apartment. He turned and looked back anxiously at the man in the
armchair.
M. Gaston, twitching in a pitiful manner and still frightfully pale, was
clutching the chair-arms and glaring straight in front of him. Sir Brian
started slightly and advanced again to his visitor's side.
The burning cigar lay upon the carpet beside the chair, and Sir
Brian took it up and tossed it into the grate. As he did so he looked
searchingly into the eyes of M. Gaston. The pupils were extraordinary
dilated....
“Do you feel better?” asked Sir Brian.
“Much better,” muttered M. Gaston, his face twitching nervously--“much
better.”
“Are you subject to these attacks?”
“Since--I was in China--yes, unfortunately.”
Sir Brian tugged at his fair mustache and seemed about to speak, then
turned aside, and, walking to the table, poured out a peg of brandy and
offered it to his guest.
“Thanks,” said M. Gaston; “many thanks indeed, but already I recover.
There is only one thing that would hasten my recovery, and that, I fear,
is not available.”
“What is that?”
He looked again at M. Gaston's eyes with their very dilated pupils.
“Opium!” whispered M. Gaston.
“What! you... you”...
“I acquired the custom in China,” replied the Frenchman, his voice
gradually growing stronger; “and for many years, now, I have regarded
opium, as essential to my well-being. Unfortunately business has
detained me in London, and I have been forced to fast for an unusually
long time. My outraged constitution is protesting--that is all.”
He shrugged his shoulders and glanced up at his host with an odd smile.
“You have my sympathy,” said Sir Brian....
“In Paris,” continued the visitor, “I am a member of a select and cozy
little club; near the Boulevard Beaumarchais....”
“I have heard of it,” interjected Malpas--“on the Rue St. Claude?”
“That indeed is its situation,” replied the other with surprise. “You
know someone who is a member?”
Sir Brian Malpas hesitated for ten seconds or more; then, crossing the
room and reclosing the window, he turned, facing his visitor across the
large room.
“I was a member, myself, during the time that I lived in Paris,” he
said, in a hurried manner which did not entirely serve to cover his
confusion.
“My dear Sir Brian! We have at least one taste in common!”
Sir Brian Malpas passed his hand across his brow with a weary gesture
well-known to fellow Members of Parliament, for it often presaged the
abrupt termination of a promising speech.
“I curse the day that I was appointed to Pekin,” he said; “for it was in
Pekin that I acquired the opium habit. I thought to make it my servant;
it has made me”...
“What! you would give it up?”
Sir Brian surveyed the speaker with surprise again.
“Do you doubt it?”
“My dear Sir Brian!” cried the Frenchman, now completely restored, “my
real life is lived in the land of the poppies; my other life is but a
shadow! Morbleu! to be an outcast from that garden of bliss is to me
torture excruciating. For the past three months I have regularly met in
my trances.”...
Sir Brian shuddered coldly.
“In my explorations of that wonderland,” continued the Frenchman, “a
most fascinating Eastern girl. Ah! I cannot describe her; for when, at
a time like this, I seek to conjure up her image,--nom d'un nom! do you
know, I can think of nothing but a serpent!”
“A serpent!”
“A serpent, exactly. Yet, when I actually meet her in the land of the
poppies, she is a dusky Cleopatra in whose arms I forget the world--even
the world of the poppy. We float down the stream together, always in
an Indian bark canoe, and this stream runs through orange groves.
Numberless apes--millions of apes, inhabit these groves, and as we
two float along, they hurl orange blossoms--orange blossoms, you
understand--until the canoe is filled with them. I assure you, monsieur,
that I perform these delightful journeys regularly, and to be deprived
of the key which opens the gate of this wonderland, is to me like being
exiled from a loved one. Pardieu! that grove of the apes! Morbleu! my
witch of the dusky eyes! Yet, as I have told you, owing to some trick of
my brain, whilst I can experience an intense longing for that companion
of my dreams, my waking attempts to visualize her provide nothing but
the image”...
“Of a serpent,” concluded Sir Brian, smiling pathetically. “You are
indeed an enthusiast, M. Gaston, and to me a new type. I had supposed
that every slave of the drug cursed his servitude and loathed and
despised himself.”...
“Ah, monsieur! to ME those words sound almost like a sacrilege!”
“But,” continued Sir Brian, “your remarks interest me strangely; for two
reasons. First, they confirm your assertion that you are, or were, an
habitue of the Rue St. Claude, and secondly, they revive in my mind an
old fancy--a superstition.”
“What is that, Sir Brian?” inquired M. Max, whose opium vision was a
faithful imitation of one related to him by an actual frequenter of the
establishment near the Boulevard Beaumarchais.
“Only once before, M. Gaston, have I compared notes with a fellow
opium-smoker, and he, also, was a patron of Madame Jean; he, also, met
in his dreams that Eastern Circe, in the grove of apes, just as I”...
“Morbleu! Yes?”
“As I meet her!”
“But this is astounding!” cried Max, who actually thought it so. “Your
fancy--your superstition--was this: that only habitues of Rue St.
Claude met, in poppyland, this vision? And in your fancy you are now
confirmed?”
“It is singular, at least.”
“It is more than that, Sir Brian! Can it be that some intelligence
presides over that establishment and exercises--shall I call it a
hypnotic influence upon the inmates?”
M. Max put the question with sincere interest.
“One does not ALWAYS meet her,” murmured Sir Brian. “But--yes, it is
possible. For I have since renewed those experiences in London.”
“What! in London?”
“Are you remaining for some time longer in London?”
“Alas! for several weeks yet.”
“Then I will introduce you to a gentleman who can secure you admission
to an establishment in London--where you may even hope sometimes to find
the orange grove--to meet your dream-bride!”
“What!” cried M. Gaston, rising to his feet, his eyes bright with
gratitude, “you will do that?”
“With pleasure,” said Sir Brian Malpas, wearily; “nor am I jealous!
But--no! do not thank me, for I do not share your views upon the
subject, monsieur. You are a devout worshiper; I, an unhappy slave!”
XXVIII
THE OPIUM AGENT
Into the Palm Court of the Hotel Astoria, Mr. Gianapolis came, radiant
and bowing. M. Gaston rose to greet his visitor. M. Gaston was arrayed
in a light gray suit and wore a violet tie of very chaste design; his
complexion had assumed a quality of sallowness, and the pupils of his
eyes had acquired (as on the occasion of his visit to the chambers of
Sir Brian Malpas) a chatoyant quality; they alternately dilated and
contracted in a most remarkable manner--in a manner which attracted the
immediate attention of Mr. Gianapolis.
“My dear sir,” he said, speaking in French, “you suffer. I perceive
how grievously you suffer; and you have been denied that panacea
which beneficent nature designed for the service of mankind. A certain
gentleman known to both of us (we brethren of the poppy are all
nameless) has advised me of your requirements--and here I am.”
“You are welcome,” declared M. Gaston.
He rose and grasped eagerly the hand of the Greek, at the same
time looking about the Palm Court suspiciously. “You can relieve my
sufferings?”
Mr. Gianapolis seated himself beside the Frenchman.
“I perceive,” he said, “that you are of those who abjure the heresies of
De Quincey. How little he knew, that De Quincey, of the true ritual of
the poppy! He regarded it as the German regards his lager, whereas
we know--you and I--that it is an Eleusinian mystery; that true
communicants must retreat to the temple of the goddess if they would
partake of Paradise with her.”
“It is perhaps a question of temperament,” said M. Gaston, speaking in a
singularly tremulous voice. “De Quincey apparently possessed the type
of constitution which is cerebrally stimulated by opium. To such a being
the golden gates are closed; and the Easterners, whom he despised for
what he termed their beastly lethargies, have taught me the real secret
of the poppy. I do not employ opium as an aid to my social activities; I
regard it as nepenthe from them and as a key to a brighter realm. It
has been my custom, M. Gianapolis, for many years, periodically to
visit that fairyland. In Paris I regularly arranged my affairs in such a
manner that I found myself occasionally at liberty to spend two or three
days, as the case might be, in the company of my bright friends who
haunted the Boulevard Beaumarchais.”
“Ah! Our acquaintance has mentioned something of this to me, Monsieur.
You knew Madame Jean?”
“The dear Madame Jean! Name of a name! She was the hierophant of my
Paris Temple”...
“And Sen?”
“Our excellent Sen! Splendid man! It was from the hands of the worthy
Sen, the incomparable Sen, that I received the key to the gate! Ah! how
I have suffered since the accursed business has exiled me from the”...
“I feel for you,” declared Gianapolis, warmly; “I, too, have
worshiped at the shrine; and although I cannot promise that the London
establishment to which I shall introduce you is comparable with that
over which Madame Jean formerly presided”...
“Formerly?” exclaimed M. Gaston, with lifted eyebrows. “You do not tell
me”...
“My friend,” said Gianapolis, “in Europe we are less enlightened
upon certain matters than in Smyrna, in Constantinople--in Cairo. The
impertinent police have closed the establishment in the Rue St. Claude!”
“Ah!” exclaimed M. Gaston, striking his brow, “misery! I shall return to
Paris, then, only to die?”
“I would suggest, monsieur,” said Gianapolis, tapping him confidentially
upon the breast, “that you periodically visit London in future. The
journey is a short one, and already, I am happy to say, the London
establishment (conducted by Mr. Ho-Pin of Canton--a most accomplished
gentleman, and a graduate of London)--enjoys the patronage of several
distinguished citizens of Paris, of Brussels, of Vienna, and elsewhere.”
“You offer me life!” declared M. Gaston, gratefully. “The commoner
establishments, for the convenience of sailors and others of that class,
at Dieppe, Calais,”--he shrugged his shoulders, comprehensively--“are
impossible as resorts. In catering for the true devotees--for those
who, unlike De Quincey, plunge and do not dabble--for those who seek to
explore the ultimate regions of poppyland, for those who have learnt the
mystery from the real masters in Asia and not in Europe--the enterprise
conducted by Madame Jean supplied a want long and bitterly experienced.
I rejoice to know that London has not been neglected”...
“My dear friend!” cried Gianapolis enthusiastically, “no important city
has been neglected! A high priest of the cult has arisen, and from a
parent lodge in Pekin he has extended his offices to kindred lodges in
most of the capitals of Europe and Asia; he has not neglected the Near
East, and America owes him a national debt of gratitude.”
“Ah! the great man!” murmured M. Gaston, with closed eyes. “As an old
habitue of the Rue St. Claude, I divine that you refer to Mr. King?”
“Beyond doubt,” whispered Gianapolis, imparting a quality of awe to his
voice. “From you, my friend, I will have no secrets; but”--he
glanced about him crookedly, and lowered his voice to an impressive
whisper--“the police, as you are aware”...
“Curse their interference!” said M. Gaston.
“Curse it indeed; but the police persist in believing, or in pretending
to believe, that any establishment patronized by lovers of the magic
resin must necessarily be a resort of criminals.”
“Pah!”