Mary was not comfortable at the Dauntreys', and the house depressed her;
but it was a refuge from the Hôtel de Paris, where Prince Giovanni Della
Robbia was; and Lady Dauntrey was so kind, so affectionate, that Mary
felt it her duty to be grateful. Almost strangers as they were, her
hostess poured into her ears a great many intimate confidences, and
asked her guest's advice as well as sympathy. Mary was touched by this,
for Lady Dauntrey seemed a strong woman; and, besides, the slight put
upon her by Vanno had left a raw wound which appreciation from others
helped superficially to heal. She had been so openly admired and
flattered at Monte Carlo that vanity had blossomed in her nature like a
quick-growing flower, though she had no idea that she had become vain.
Men looked at her with the look which is a tribute from the whole sex.
She could hardly bear it that the One Man should disapprove.
Those impecunious painters who haunt the open-air restaurants at Monte
Carlo, on the chance of selling a five-minute portrait, had buzzed round
her like bees round a honey-pot, but they were not the only ones. Two
artists of some renown had got themselves introduced through
acquaintances the Casino had given her, and begged her to sit to them.
Also it was true, as gossip said, that the artist she had met in the
train had arrived, and hastened to renew the acquaintance. He had
painted her portrait. She had paid for it and--burnt it. She, the quiet
schoolgirl, the earnest postulant, the novice who had never thought of
her own face, who for a year had not seen it in a mirror or missed the
sight of it, knew herself now for a beauty, a charming figure of
importance in this strange, concrete little world where Hercules
entertained his guests. And then, to be despised by the one person who
occupied her thoughts, despised and thrust away at the very moment when
he confessed to loving her! It was a blow to the woman's pride which had
not consciously stooped to unworthiness, and a still sharper hurt to her
new vanity.
She wanted to show Vanno, if he still thought of her, that others burned
incense to her beauty, though he had not placed her on an altar. The
discomforts of the Villa Bella Vista mattered little to the girl who had
gone through a hard novitiate in a Scotch convent. She made her own bed
and dusted her room. She did not care what she ate; and she tried to
throw her whole heart into the life of the household, that amazing
household which was unlike anything she could have imagined out of a
disordered dream.
Always after coming to the Dauntreys' she continued to lose at the
Casino, often large sums, occasionally picking up a little, as if luck
hovered near, awaiting its cue to return, only to be frightened away
again. But after a few days' time, in which more than two hundred
thousand francs slipped through her fingers, Lady Dauntrey suggested
that Miss Grant should "rest" for a while, meantime letting Dauntrey
play his system for her benefit and with her capital. This idea did not
amuse Mary.
The "gambler's blood," of which she had been warned by her father,
warmed to the excitement of the game. She craved this excitement, and
felt lost without it, now that the interest of Prince Vanno's distant
presence in her life was gone. Still, she could not bring herself to
refuse an offer which seemed meant in kindness. She gave Lord Dauntrey
one thousand louis, the smallest capital, he explained, necessary to
exploit his system with five-franc pieces at roulette. He assured her
that with pleasure he would add this money to the same sum of his own,
and play for her as well as himself, the syndicate he had originally
formed being now dissolved. Dodo hinted that operations had been stopped
because the whole capital was lost, but Lord Dauntrey had already
mentioned to Mary that a few slight reverses had frightened the
"shareholders." This cowardice, he said, had so disgusted him that he
had given back the capital to each one intact, and politely refused to
play any longer for the syndicate. A position of such responsibility was
only possible if he were upheld by the confidence of all concerned.
Otherwise, he preferred to gamble only for himself, or for a personal
friend or two who trusted him.
Each night, after Mary placed her thousand louis in his hands, Lord
Dauntrey gave her five hundred francs. This was as high a percentage, he
made clear to her, as could be got out of the capital except at a risk
of heavy losses, and he "did not care to run big risks for a woman." On
a thousand louis, Lord Dauntrey explained, five hundred francs profit
nightly represented 900 per cent. a year, which was of course enormous;
and regarded thus, her risk was an investment, not a speculation.
When some of Lady Dauntrey's bright particular stars left her firmament
(as they did leave occasionally with the quick flight of comets) she
hastened to fill the vacancies with any small luminaries available. The
Villa Bella Vista remained full, even when Mrs. Ernstein went suddenly
to Cannes, where "villa life" might be considered even more aristocratic
than at "Monte"; and Dom Ferdinand took himself and his ally out of
danger's way when Dodo refused to understand that only flirtation, not
marriage, was possible with a "commoner." The price of Dauntrey
hospitality had, however, fallen. Those who could be attracted by the
bait of their barren title had now to be looked for low in the social
scale: and it was difficult to get eligible _partis_ with whom to dazzle
heiresses. The slender Austrian count, whom Dodo scornfully pronounced a
"don't count," vanished mysteriously soon after Mary's arrival. He did
not even say goodbye; and Dodo, who vowed that she had often heard him
groaning behind the thin partition which divided her room from his,
went whispering about the house that he had committed suicide in the
Casino gardens.
"Why not?" she argued almost convulsively, when Mary protested that
surely such a dreadful thing could not have been kept secret. "Would the
Dauntreys tell, if they knew? No, of course they'd hush it up, and get
rid of anything he'd left--in one way or another. Not that there was
much to get rid of, for the Mont de Pieté was a kind of home from home
for the Count. He used to run back and forth between there and the
Casino, like a distracted rabbit: pawn his watch; play with the money;
win; race back and get his watch; lose again; and so on a dozen times a
day, till he was stripped of jewellery down to his studs and collar
buttons. It all came from his obstinacy in believing that the croupiers
at trente et quarante were signalling to him whether it was going to be
_inverse_ or _couleur_, when they were really only licking their thumbs
to deal the cards better! _I_ say, if you must have a fetish, have a
reasonable one, like playing for neighbours of zero at roulette. But
that silly boy thought himself too smart for roulette, and he wouldn't
take any advice, so this is what comes of it. I feel in my bones that
_his_ are in the suicide's cemetery this minute. Has nobody told you
that there are no inquests of coroners here in this principality? And a
jolly good thing, too! Why make the rest of us gloomy by putting nasty
details in the papers, when we've come here to enjoy ourselves? _They_
don't ask people to gamble, they merely make it nice for 'em if they're
determined to, and anyhow it's honest gambling. They don't want you to
play if you can't afford it and are going to be an idiot, because they
hate rows and scandal. It's all for _our_ benefit! If a man's cad enough
to blow his brains out at the tables, all over a lady's dress, he is
whisked away so quick nobody has time to realize what's up before a
glass door in the wall has opened with a spring and shut again as if
nothing had happened. Not a croupier stops spinning. I call it
magnificent. But it does make you feel a bit creepy when anybody you've
known disappears into space!"
Lord Burden, the dilapidated earl imported as a _parti_, was of opinion
that the Austrian count had merely applied for the _viatique_; and being
granted by the management a sum large enough to pay his fare and his
food, had departed without caring to show his face again at the villa.
Others were inclined to agree with Dodo, especially the women, who were
of the type that secretly enjoys mystery and horror, when unconnected
with themselves. No one ever really knew, however (unless perhaps the
Dauntreys), what had become of the youth with hair _en brosse_, and wasp
waist so slim that the body seemed held together by a mere ligament. He
was gone: that was all, and his small place in the household was more
than filled by a German couple, an ex-officer with an adoring wife, both
of whom spent half their days in bed, testing on a roulette watch
various exciting systems which, now they had come from afar off, they
lacked courage to play at the Casino. Their name was so intricate that
Dodo Wardropp said it ought to be kept a secret. As nobody could
pronounce it, however, it amounted to that, in the end.
They did not stay long; and indeed, after the disappearance of the
Austrian count, a microbe pricking people to departure seemed to
multiply in the Villa Bella Vista. The sailor went suddenly, on receipt
of a letter from the Admiralty, that prying institution having learned
and disapproved of the way in which he was spending his leave and his
pay. Lord Burden followed Mrs. Ernstein to Cannes; and Dodo, who never
ceased to want good value for her money, was bitterly dissatisfied with
the unmarried men who remained.
The principal one had at first attracted not only Dodo but every other
woman, with the exception of Mary. He spoke English well, yet appeared
to be equally at home in all socially useful languages. He looked like a
Russian, dressed like a Frenchman, claimed to have estates in Italy,
copper mines in Spain, a shooting in Hungary, and told delightful
anecdotes of his intimate friendship with most existing sovereigns. Not
a king or queen of any standing but--according to him--came often to his
"little place" in this country or that, and addressed him as "Dear
Alfred." His manner, his voice, were so smooth that they oiled the
creaking wheels of life at the villa; and his stories, told at the
table, distracted guests' attention from the skeleton at the feast--a
premature skeleton of a once muscular chicken, or a lamb that had seen
its second childhood. Unfortunately, however, a journalist who knew
everybody and everything in the world was brought in to luncheon by Lord
Dauntrey one day, and recognized the favourite of the household as a
famous Parisian furrier. He had supplied enough sable coat linings for
kings and ermine cloaks for queens to give him food for a lifetime of
authentic anecdotes. His acquaintance with royalties was genuine of its
kind, but it was not of a kind that appealed to the paying guests at
Lady Dauntrey's. Dodo turned a cold shoulder upon him, and for a day or
two gave her attention to the only other man in the house who pluckily
advertised himself as unmarried. He advertised himself also as a
millionaire, and not without reason, though Lord Dauntrey had cleverly
picked him up in the Casino. When he mentioned, however, that he was a
Sydney man, Miss Wardropp ceased to talk at him across the table. This
change of tactics her enemies attributed to fear that he "knew all about
her at home." But she told Mary that he had such slept-on looking ears,
he took away her appetite; and one needed all the appetite one could
muster to worry through a meal at the Bella Vista. Besides, she believed
that he had made his fortune by some awful stuff which kept hair from
decaying or teeth from falling off, and it did one no good to be seen in
the Casino with a creature like that. It was almost better to go about
with a woman, though she did hate being reduced to walking with a
female; it made a girl look so unsuccessful.
At length Dodo decided that, even for Mary's sake, she could no longer
"stick it out" at the Bella Vista. She felt, she said, so wretched that
she was "quite off her bonbons." The crisis came at luncheon and
indirectly through the marmoset. Dodo paid well and regularly; therefore
she was tacitly allowed certain privileges, not always approved by her
fellow-guests. Diablette had been a standing cause of friction between
Lady Dauntrey and the dog's mistress; but the marmoset, its successful
rival in Dodo's affections, was grudgingly permitted whenever Lord
Dauntrey had borrowed fifty francs or so, to select its own fruit from
the dessert. Some people were even amused at seeing the tiny animal jump
from Dodo's lap on to the table, and pick out the best grapes in an
old-fashioned centre-piece. On the last fatal day, however, Lady
Dauntrey's nerves had been rasped by the loss of her fifth cook. When
the marmoset was taken suddenly and desperately ill in the bread plate,
Eve flew into a rage, and high words passed like rapier flashes between
her and Miss Wardropp. Dodo attributed her pet's seizure to the fact
that Dauntrey fruit was unfit even for a monkey's consumption, and Eve
informed the whole company that Dodo was a disgusting Australian pig.
This was the last insult. Dodo shrilly "gave notice," while the marmoset
was dying in her napkin. The meal ended in confusion; and Miss Wardropp
went away that afternoon with the living Diablette, the dead monkey,
two teddy bears, an umbrella-mosquito-net, and seven trunks.
"Ask that man for your money back!" she advised Mary on the doorstep. "I
don't say go to _her_, for she'd only tell you some lie. 'Lie and let
lie' is her motto. She's reduced lying to a fine art. But ask him for
your capital, my dear, and watch his face when you do it. Compared to
his wife he's a model, even if it's a model of all the vices."
Mary missed Dodo. Diablette had been an invincible and dangerous enemy
to the blue frog from the Mentone china shop, poor, blasé Hilda, who
spent most of her time choking in flies a size too large for her, or
trying helplessly to push them down her blue throat with a tiny
turquoise hand. Dodo, however, had been a ray of brightness in the
house: meretricious, garish brightness perhaps; still she had given a
tinselline sparkle to the dull rooms when things were at their worst,
and Lady Dauntrey clouded with sullen gloom.
When the newest and humblest guests of the Villa Bella Vista lost money
beyond a certain limit, the bare thought of the Casino gave them mental
indigestion. They then stayed safely at home, and infested the unaired
drawing-room--pale people reading pink papers, and talking "system"; or
flushed people playing bridge for small points, with the windows
hermetically closed and their backs to the sunset. They quarrelled among
themselves in a liverish way over cards and politics, and agreed only on
the subject of such titled acquaintances as they had in common, all of
whom seemed to be perfectly charming. But these heraldic conversations
bored Mary even more intensely than the squabbles. There came a time
when desperation got the upper hand of that prudence so earnestly
recommended by Lord Dauntrey. She could not endure the long evenings in
the villa, and felt that she must again tempt fortune at the Casino.
One night after dinner she broke to her host the news that she need no
longer trouble him to win money for her. She would take back her own
half of the capital he was using, and play the old game once more.
"If I have a few days' luck, I think the wisest thing to do next would
be to go away," she went on, forcing herself to laugh quite gayly, as if
there were nobody at Monte Carlo whom it would hurt her cruelly never to
see again. "I've stayed on and on, when all the time I ought to have
been somewhere else. And I've never had courage to write my--my friends
at home what I've been doing. Just one more 'flutter,' and
then--goodbye!"
Her thoughts flew afar, as she made this little set speech. She saw
Vanno as he had looked that day, and on other days when she had
deliberately cut him in the street, or in the Casino, though she knew he
had been waiting in the hope that she would relent and let him speak.
His eyes haunted her everywhere. It seemed to her that they were very
sad, and had lost that burning, vital light of the spirit which in
contrast had made the personalities of other men dull as smouldering
fires. Occasionally he was near her at the tables, for he played
constantly now, recklessly and often disastrously according to
Hannaford.
The word "goodbye" and its attendant thought of departure brought
Vanno's image as clearly before Mary as if he had walked into the ugly
drawing-room, where people were shuffling cards for bridge or putting on
their wraps for the Casino. It was Vanno alone who was real for her, not
the other figures; and she did not see the grayness that settled like a
shadow on Lord Dauntrey's lined and sallow face.
"I'm awfully sorry, Miss Grant," he said, "but I can't give you back
your money now, for the simple reason that I banked most of your capital
and mine this afternoon. I felt rather seedy, and didn't mean to play
seriously to-night. If only you'd spoken in time, it would have been all
right enough. But now I'm afraid the best I can do for you, until
to-morrow, will be a few hundred francs. My wife and I must see what we
can scrape together."
He jumbled his words, as if in a hurry to get them all out, and laughed
apologetically, staring Mary straight in the face, insistently, with his
melancholy eyes. Something in them caught her attention, distracting it
from the thought that was always forcing itself in front of others. She
readily believed that he "felt seedy," for he looked extremely ill.
There were bags under the gray eyes, and his skin seemed loose on his
face, almost like a glove on a hand for which it is too large. Mary was
sorry for him, and protested that after all she did not care about
playing that night. She would wait till to-morrow, and he must not mind
what she had said. He appeared to be slightly relieved; but though he
smiled, his eyes kept the dull glassiness which gave them an unnatural
effect.
Late that night Eve knocked at Mary's door. She had on a bright green
dressing-gown, with a Chinese embroidery running over it of golden
dragons and serpents. In her hand she carried a cheap silver-backed
brush, and her long dark hair was undone. She looked strikingly
handsome, but the thick black strands hanging down on either side of the
white face recalled to Mary a picture in the library at Lady
MacMillan's. It was a clever painting of the Medusa, level-eyed, with a
red mouth like a wound, and dimly seen, pale glimmering features,
between the lazy writhing of dark snakes. The thing had fascinated Mary
in her impressionable schoolgirl days, but now she tried to huddle the
idea quickly out of her head, for it seemed disloyal and even disgusting
in connection with her hostess.
"I saw your light under the door," Lady Dauntrey said, "and I thought
maybe you wouldn't mind my sitting with you for a bit. I do feel so
beastly down on my luck, and you always cheer me up, you're so different
from any of the others."
Mary had begun, for perhaps the twentieth time, a letter to Reverend
Mother; but she was half glad of an excuse to put it away unfinished.
She too was in a wrapper, with her shining hair over her shoulders, but
she suggested a St. Ursula rather than a Medusa. There was no
comfortable chair in the room, but she drew the only one whose legs
could be depended upon, in front of a dying wood fire for Lady Dauntrey.
Eve sat for a few moments brushing her hair in a lazy, aimless way, and
staring at the red logs. "Perhaps," she said at last, "I shall have to
cheer _you_ up, though, when you've heard what I've come for. Might as
well out with it, I suppose! I know _I_ can't bear having had news
'broken' to me. My husband told you he was seedy, didn't he?--and hadn't
meant to play, so he'd banked all the money. He hadn't the courage, poor
chap, to tell you what really happened. He's simply sick over it, so I
offered to see you. In a way, it was true, what he said. The bank _has_
got the money, only--it's the Casino bank. Dauntrey had an awful débacle
to-day, the first time since he's been playing for you, and lost
everything; not only your capital, of course, but his own too. It's your
money he's so sick about, though. He could stand the loss of his own,
though it's a blow, and I don't quite know what we shall do. But to lose
yours! He's almost off his head. If it weren't for me, and my saying
you'd forgive him, I believe he'd blow his brains out."
"Oh, don't speak of anything so horrible!" Mary cried. "Of course I
forgive him."
"He's afraid you may think he has juggled away your money. When you
asked him for it to-night he was already wondering how you'd take the
loss; but your proposal coming suddenly like that bowled him over, and
he made an excuse to put off the evil hour. What a weird coincidence you
should have wanted your capital back the very day he'd lost the lot!
He's so sorry you didn't think of it yesterday; for then it would have
been safe in your hands now, unless you'd lost it yourself, which I
can't help thinking, my dear, you probably _would_, the way things were
going with you before."
"I daresay I should have lost the money if he hadn't," said Mary kindly.
In her heart, she wished that she had been given the chance, as at least
she would then have had some amusement, before the money was gone. And
certainly it was an odd coincidence that the loss should have happened
just before she had suggested playing for herself again. She could not
help remembering Dodo's parting shot at the Dauntreys. She wished that
the idea had not been put into her head; for though she would not
believe that Lord Dauntrey had robbed her, she saw that it was a mistake
to have lent him the capital--a mistake from his point of view, as well
as her own. The money was gone; and even if there were something wrong
in the way of its going, she could not prove the wrong. Nor did she wish
to try. She wished to believe the story Lady Dauntrey had told, which
might easily be true. Yet there would always remain the little crawling
snake of doubt; and that was not fair to Lord Dauntrey.
"It's too, too bad, and we are both terribly upset," Eve went on
heavily. "But it's the fortune of war, isn't it? And, thank goodness,
you've got plenty left of what the Casino's given you, I hope, in spite
of that awful Christmas night."
"Oh, yes, I've got more, in Smith's Bank," said Mary. "I can draw some
out to-morrow, and begin playing again. Tell Lord Dauntrey he mustn't
mind as far as I'm concerned."
"I did tell him you'd be sporting, and that you were a good plucked one,
but I couldn't console him. The truth is, _our_ part of the loss is
pretty serious. The Casino didn't give us any of our capital, you know,
and we aren't rich. We've lost an awful lot this season. Monte Carlo's
been disastrous to us in every way."
"But I thought Lord Dauntrey had done well with his system?" Mary
ventured.
"Oh, the system!" Eve caught herself up, quickly. "Yes, that was all
right. Only we never made much, as he couldn't afford high stakes. But
he's so good-natured and generous. He lent money to others to gamble
with--I won't say _who_, though perhaps you can guess--and never got a
penny back. And some of the people we've had staying here ran up big
bills and skipped without paying them. We simply had to let them go, and
make the best of it. Oh, dear Miss Grant--Mary--this is a bad time to
ask a favour, I know, when my husband's just come a cropper with your
money, as well as his own; but I was never one to beat about the bush.
And you're a regular brick. You're in luck, and we're out--down and out!
I wonder--_would_ you be inclined to lend us--say, a thousand pounds,
just to tide over the few weeks till our dividends come? We'd give you
good security, of course. We have shares in South African diamond
mines."
"I think I might be able to do that," said Mary, who could not bear to
see Lady Dauntrey humble herself to plead.
"How good you are!" Eve exclaimed. "You're a _real_ friend, the only one
we've got. The rest are sharks, or cats. It--it won't run you down low
to let us have a thousand?" She fixed her eyes sharply on Mary, under
the shadow of her falling hair, which she brushed as if mechanically.
"Oh no, I'm sure I can manage it very well."
"And keep enough to go on playing with?"
"Yes. I don't quite know how much I have in the bank. I've given away a
good deal here and there, I suppose, besides what I lost--and this now.
But there's sure to be plenty."
"Suppose, though, you go on losing? Of course I hope you won't. But
there's that to think of. Still, I presume you needn't worry if the
Casino should get back every penny they've given you? I hope you have
ever and ever so much of your own. I think I heard you telling the
Wardropp girl--wretched little beast!--that you had a big legacy left
you?"
"I believe I did tell her so, in the train," said Mary. "I don't
remember speaking of it since."
"I couldn't help overhearing what you said then. You were both talking
at the top of your voices. Well, I'm glad for you. If you're wise,
you'll put yourself out of temptation's way, and won't keep much beyond
your winnings where you can lay hands on it."
"I came here with very little," Mary confessed. "You see, I'd meant to
go on to Italy."
"And you were so lucky at first, that you've lived on your winnings, and
have never had to write a cheque on your own bank in England or
anywhere?"
"Not one!" laughed Mary. "Since I came into my money, I haven't drawn
half a dozen cheques--except in the cheque-book I got at Smith's, after
Mr. Shuyler and Mr. Carleton advised me to keep my winnings there."
"You fortunate girl! And think of all the lovely jewellery you've
bought, too! Of course I'm glad for our sakes, that your friends advised
you to store the best things in the bank, when you're not wearing them,
for one never knows about one's servants; and there are such creatures
as burglars. Still, I wonder you can bear having those heavenly things
out of your sight. _I_ couldn't!"
"I've felt rather tired of my jewellery lately," said Mary. "I hardly
know why. But I don't seem to take the pleasure in wearing it that I did
at first, when it was new to me."
Lady Dauntrey rose from the creaky chair with a sigh, and a slight
shiver. "You look too much like a saint for jewellery to suit you as
well as it does other people--me for instance!" she said. "And you
_are_ a saint. I don't know how to thank you enough. My poor boy will be
grateful! Well, I must go. You ought to have more wood on your fire. But
I suppose it's gone. Everything always is in this house, if it's
anything one wants. If ever you're in trouble of your own, and need a
couple of friends to stand by you, you've got us. Let's shake on it!"
She put out her hand and drew Mary toward her. If the girl had not
shrunk away almost imperceptibly, she would have bent down and kissed
her.