With much grinding of brakes and hiss of escaping steam, the express
at last stopped slowly in the little station and the door of Paul's
compartment was swung open by the officious guard with a "Lucerne,
your Lordship," which effectually aroused him from his reverie.
Paul quietly stepped out of the car, and waited with the air of one
among familiar scenes, while his man Baxter collected the luggage and
dexterously convoyed it through the hostile army of customs men to a
_fiacre_. In the midst of the bustle and confusion, as Paul stood
there on the platform, his straight manly form was the cynosure of all
eyes. A fond mamma with a marriageable daughter half unconsciously
sighed aloud at the thought of such a son-in-law. A pair of slender
French dandies outwardly scorned, but inwardly admired his athletic
figure, so visibly powerful, even in repose.
But all oblivious to the attention he was attracting, Paul waited with
passive patience for the survey of his luggage. For was not all this
an old, old story to him, a trifling disturbance on the path of his
pilgrimage? When one travels to travel, each station is an incident;
not so to him who journeys to an end.
But Paul was not destined to remain wholly uninterrupted. As the other
travellers descended from the carriage and formed a little knot upon
the platform, the Comtesse de Boistelle, now occupied with a betufted
poodle frisking at the end of a leash, strolled by him. As she passed
Paul she dropped a jewelled reticule, which he promptly recovered for
her, offering it with a grave face and a murmured "_Permettez moi,
Madame_."
The Comtesse gently breathed a thousand thanks, allowing her carefully
gloved hand to brush Paul's arm.
"Monsieur is wearied with the journey, perhaps?" she said in a low
voice. And her eyes added more than solicitude.
Paul did not deny it. Instead, he raised his green Alpine hat formally
and turned impassively to meet his man, who had by then stowed away
the boxes in the Waiting _fiacre_.
In the group of Paul's late companions stood the American girl who had
sat facing him all the way from Paris. He was no sooner out of earshot
than--
"Did you see, Mamma?" she whispered to the matron beside her.
"See what, Daisy?"
"That French creature--she tried to talk to my big Englishman, but he
snubbed her. What a fine chap he must be! I knew he had a title, and
I'm just dying to meet him. Do you suppose he'll stay at our hotel? If
he does, I'll find somebody who knows all about him. Now I understand
why so many American girls marry titled Englishmen. If they're all as
nice as this one, I don't blame them, do you?"
"Hush, child, hush!" her mother reproved. "How can you run on so about
a total stranger?"
But the girl merely smiled softly to herself in answer, as she watched
Paul's straight back receding down the platform.
Overwhelmed with a rush of memories, Paul climbed into the carriage.
It was a fine afternoon, but he did not see the giant mountains
rearing their heads for him as proudly in the sunshine as ever they
had held them since the world was new.
For Paul just now was lost in the infinite stretches of the past,
those immeasurable fields through which the young wander blithely, all
unconscious of aught but the beautiful flowers so ruthlessly trampled
on, the luscious fruits so wantonly plucked, the limpid streams drunk
from so greedily, and the cool shades in which to sink into untroubled
sleep.
Ah! if there were no awakening! If one were always young!
The _fiacre_ stopped; and soon Paul found himself in the hall of the
hotel, surrounded by officious porters. The _maître d'hôtel_ himself,
a white-haired Swiss, pushed through them and greeted him, for was not
Sir Paul an old and distinguished guest, who never failed to honour
him with his patronage each year? Himself, he showed Paul to the same
suite he always occupied, and with zealous care conferred with milord
over the momentous question of dinner, a matter not to be lightly
discussed.
"And the wine? Ah! the _Tokayi Imperial_, of a certainty. Absolutely,
Monsieur, we refuse to serve it to anyone but yourself. Only last week
it was, when a waiter who would have set it before some rich
Americans--but that is over, he is here no longer."
Paul smiled indulgently at the solicitous little man. It was good to
be here again, talking with Monsieur Jacques as in the old days.
"One moment, more, Monsieur, before I go. Is it that Monsieur desires
the same arrangements to be made again this year--the visit to the
little village on the lake, the climb up the Bürgenstock, the
pilgrimage to the Swiss farmhouse? Yes? Assuredly, Monsieur, it shall
be done, _tout de suite_."
And then with a confident air as of complete and perfect understanding
on the part of an old and trusted friend, the bustling little _maître
d'hôtel_ bowed himself out.
Paul proceeded, with his usual care, to dress for dinner, pausing
first to stand in the window of his dressing-room and gaze wistfully
upon the lake he loved so well, now dimming slowly in the Spring
twilight.
The last time! Ah, well, so be it, then. There must come an end to all
things. And Paul turned away with a sigh, drawing the draperies gently
together, as if to shut out the memories of the past.
How well he succeeded, we shall soon know.
He was the last to enter the restaurant, which was well filled that
evening. On his way to his accustomed place he passed the table at
which sat Miss Daisy Livingstone, his American fellow-traveller,
dining with her mother; and another where the Comtesse, by courtesy,
sat toying with a _pâté_. To Paul's annoyance, he was greeted further
down the room by a member of his club; Graham Barclay was not a
particular favourite of his, at any time, and furthermore Paul had no
desire, just now, to be reminded of London. As civilly as he could,
he declined an invitation to join the party, pleading fatigue from his
long journey, and moved on to the end of the room, where his old
waiter, Henri, stood, with hand on chair-back, ready to help him to a
seat.
"Deuced fine fellow, Verdayne," explained Barclay in parentheses to
his friends. "A bit abstracted sometimes, as you see. But he'll be all
right after tiffin. We'll gather him in for billiards later."
The eyes of more than one guest followed Paul as he walked the length
of the restaurant, for Verdayne possessed that peculiar quality--that
spiritual attraction--magnetism--(call it what you will, a few elect
mortals have it) that stamps a man indelibly. But of all those who
marked him as he moved among the tables, none regarded him more
closely than a lady who sat alone in a small recess, screened from
prying eyes by a bank of greenery.
A marvellous lady she was, with hair as black as the sweep of a
raven's wing, crowning a face as finely chiselled as any Florentine
cameo. And if the diamonds about her smooth white throat had wondrous
sheen they were not more lustrous nor more full of sparkling fire than
her opalescent eyes.
Unseen by the preoccupied Paul, she leaned across the cloth, scarcely
whiter than her pale face, and gazed at him with wonder--was it more
than that? With a slight movement of her tapering hand she dismissed
the liveried servant stationed behind her, and stayed on, with food
and wine untouched. And Paul knew it not.
So near to us can lie the hidden path of our strange destinies until
the appointed hour.