As she got up the next morning Lily began to shrink inexpressibly from
the thought of going to poor Mr. Ponting’s funeral. She longed to summon
up courage and tell Aunt Cosy that she really felt too ill. As so often
happens after a shock, she felt far worse to-day than she had done even
immediately after her fearful discovery.
She went downstairs with laggard steps, to be met in the corridor below
by the Countess.
“There is a quarter of an hour before you and Uncle Angelo must start,”
she exclaimed, “and I have told Cristina to boil you an egg. Coffee is
not sufficiently substantial.”
She shepherded the unresisting girl into the kitchen. Cristina’s eyes
were swollen; she looked as if she had been crying all night.
“Now sit down,” commanded the Countess, “and eat what you call in
England a good breakfast. It is right to show sorrow when something sad
has happened, but do not look as if you yourself were dying! I do not
want people to think that you, Lily, were in love with Mr. Ponting.”
Lily felt a shock of disgust. What a vulgar, heartless thing to say! She
grew very red, and Aunt Cosy laughed harshly.
And yet the Countess Polda was feeling far better disposed to the girl
than was usual with her. As she watched Lily daintily eating her egg,
she was telling herself that her guest was certainly a very pretty girl.
The type, too, that Beppo admired—that fair, rather delicate, English
type dowered with an exquisitely clear complexion and what the French
call _blond cendré_ hair.
The pleasant thought that her beloved son would certainly approve of
Lily cheered up the Countess mightily, and when Lily stood up she patted
the girl’s hand. “You look very nice,” she said. “That black coat and
skirt and the little toque compose just the right costume to wear on
such a sad occasion as this.”
The Count’s voice was heard in the passage. “Cosy! Cosy!” he called out
impatiently.
The Countess hurried out of the kitchen. And then Cristina seized Lily
by the arm; “You will say a prayer for me,” she said in a trembling
voice, “will you not, Mademoiselle?”
Lily was touched. “Yes,” she said, a little shyly, “I will certainly do
so, Cristina.”
“I shall never forget yesterday—never—never—never!” Cristina uttered the
words in a low voice, but with a terrible intensity.
“But you must try and forget yesterday,” said Lily firmly. “I mean to
force myself to put out of my mind what happened yesterday morning.
That, honestly, was much worse than anything that can have happened to
you afterwards.”
“Yes, indeed! Had I been you I should have fainted!”
At that moment, “Lily! Lily!” came from the passage. “Come, my child,
come! Your Uncle Angelo is quite ready.”
Lily ran into the corridor, and then, had it not been such a sad
occasion, she would have burst out laughing! For the Count was dressed
in an extraordinary costume. He wore a seedy old black dress suit, and
on his head was a dirty white Panama hat with a deep black crape band.
But Uncle Angelo was obviously quite unaware of the ludicrous effect he
produced in the English girl’s eyes.
“Come, come,” he said impatiently. “I want to be in good time at the
cemetery, for I shall have to leave at once after the funeral. There are
several things I have to do in the town.”
“Do not forget to order the carriage for Beppo to-morrow,” called out
the Countess.
“Is it likely that I should forget that?” There was a touch of scornful
ill-temper in the Count’s usually placid tone.
The two curiously unlike companions walked down the hill in almost
absolute silence. Lily often felt consciously glad that Uncle Angelo was
such a very quiet, reserved person. Aunt Cosy’s constant torrent of talk
tired and bewildered the girl.
“The cemetery is on the Nice road,” said Count Polda at last; “this is
the shortest way to it.” They were now going down a rough stairway cut
in the hillside.
It was still so early that there were only a few country folk laden with
country produce trudging towards Monte Carlo. A delicious breeze blew up
from the sea on to the broad, exquisitely-kept carriage-road which links
Monaco with Beaulieu.
They had been walking along that road for only a few minutes when they
were joined by M. Popeau. Lily was secretly very glad to see him, yet
she was also surprised—not so surprised however, as he was to see her.
He turned courteously to Count Polda. “I have been wondering if you and
Mademoiselle would care to go with me to the Prince of Monaco’s
beautiful aquarium—I mean, of course, after the sad ceremony is over?”
“I fear I cannot have the pleasure you so amiably propose,” muttered the
Count. “But I do not see why my niece should not avail herself of your
kind thought. It would, as you say, distract her mind.” He spoke in a
weary, preoccupied tone, as if hardly thinking of what he was saying.
They turned into the gate of the cemetery, and made their way to that
portion of it where those English folk who die at Monte Carlo are
reverently laid to rest. They soon came to the place they were looking
for, and found a tiny gathering round the open grave. Lily was the only
woman there, and her eyes filled with tears as she listened to the
beautiful, solemn words of the English Burial Service being read over
poor Mr. Ponting’s coffin.
Short as was the ceremony, it was scarcely over before Count Polda
detached himself unobtrusively from the group of mourners, and
disappeared in the direction of the gate.
As, slowly, Lily and M. Popeau walked away together, she suddenly heard
herself addressed in a voice unknown to her.
“Are you Miss Fairfield? If so, may I have a word with you, madam?”
She looked round, startled. A tall man, obviously an Englishman, stood
before her.
“Yes,” she said falteringly, “I am Miss Fairfield.”
“My name is Sharrow. I was Mr. Ponting’s friend and partner. I
understand that you found the body?”
Then M. Popeau intervened. “Perhaps you will pardon me, sir, for saying
that the police have all the particulars of that painful occurrence.”
“I have heard all they have to say; but I hope Miss Fairfield will not
mind my asking her a few questions?”
M. Popeau looked very much annoyed and disturbed, perhaps unreasonably
so, and Lily was thankful indeed that Count Polda was no longer there.
After all, it was natural that this Mr.—what was his name?—Sharrow
should wish to speak to her. She nerved herself for what must be, at
best, a rather painful little conversation.
Mr. Sharrow’s next words took her by surprise.
“I think you will agree with me,” he said, slowly and impressively,
“that Mr. Ponting was the very last man in the world to take his own
life.”
Lily hesitated. She really did not know what to answer. And then M.
Popeau again intervened.
“You forget, sir, that this young lady hardly knew your unfortunate
friend.”
“Nonsense!” said Mr. Sharrow rudely. “She knew him quite well. He had
been, to my knowledge, at least six or seven times to La Solitude. More
than once I wanted him to take me up there, but no—he seemed to think
that it would be indiscreet—that the Poldas were quiet people who would
prefer to entertain one rather than two.”
“But I had only arrived at Monte Carlo on the day he came to dinner
there for the last time,” exclaimed Lily. “I did have a few minutes’
talk with him alone, just before we went into the dining-room—but that
was all.”
“I beg your pardon,” said Mr. Sharrow. “I did not know what you have
just told me.”
“He seemed very happy,” she said slowly, “and yes, I must say that he
did not seem to me in the least the sort of man to kill himself.”
Her evident sincerity touched the stranger, as did, too, her young,
girlish charm of manner.
“I wish you would tell me exactly what _did_ happen on that fatal
evening,” he said earnestly. “The whole thing is so mysterious to me!
Ponting had promised some friends of ours to dine with them and then to
spend the evening at the Club. Unluckily I had an engagement at Nice, or
I should have been there too. As it was, they waited on and on for him,
but he neither came nor sent a message.”
“That’s very strange,” said Lily, “for I know that his cabman was told
to take them a message.”
“That doesn’t surprise me,” said M. Popeau drily. “Cabmen are the most
untrustworthy of messengers!”
“Oh, so he gave a message to the cabman?” said Mr. Sharrow slowly. “Of
course, I didn’t know that. But what made him change his mind, Miss
Fairfield? Surely he went up to La Solitude in order to tell the Count
and Countess Polda that he couldn’t have the pleasure of dining with
them?”
“I expect,” said Lily reluctantly, “that he saw how annoyed they were at
his change of plan. They’re old-fashioned people, the sort of people who
make rather a fuss about having anyone to a meal, even to tea”—a slight
smile quivered over her face, and M. Popeau nodded—“and the Countess was
rather disagreeable in her manner, when Mr. Ponting said he could not
stay. I think they were really hurt,” she added. “They had got fond of
him, and they had set their hearts on his spending his last evening with
them; so, suddenly, he made up his mind that he would do so.”
“You’ve relieved my mind very much,” Mr. Sharrow was speaking quite
politely now. “There seemed such an extraordinary mystery about the
whole thing! But what you tell me clears it up. I should like to ask you
one other question. About what time did Ponting leave La Solitude?”
“I had a very long, tiring journey,” said Lily frankly, “and I went up
to bed quite early, before he left. Still, I heard the Countess Polda
say good-bye to him—I should think a little before ten.”
“That fits in with my theory.” Mr. Sharrow nodded. “I think he left La
Solitude with the idea of catching the ten-thirty train, and that then,
on his way down to the station, he was waylaid and murdered.”
“Perhaps that was what did happen.”
But Mr. Sharrow was going on, as if speaking to himself, though
addressing her.
“In this cursed place,” he said, “the police are so used to coming
across suicides that they won’t admit the probability of murder—that
must be very convenient for the kind of bandits who infest Monte Carlo!
Why, they’ve had the most awful gang of thieves here during this last
fortnight. The Commissioner of Police told me himself that they were
desperate men who stuck at nothing. One of them when caught yesterday
made a slash at his captor with a razor, and hurt him most awfully.”
“But is it likely that any of that gang would have been in that lonely
place? It’s a sort of deserted garden, with boards up, warning people
that it’s private property.”
“I know—I know! Of course I’ve been there——” He spoke with a touch of
impatience.
“And then,” said Lily, “surely a thief would have taken away that
curious kind of gold bangle poor Mr. Ponting wore? It was by that
bangle,” she went on in a low voice, “that I identified him—I didn’t see
his face.”
The words she uttered brought back very vividly her terrible experience,
and her lips quivered.
Mr. Sharrow looked at her with concern.
“Forgive me,” he said impulsively, “for asking you all these questions;
but Ponting has a mother out there, and you know she’ll want to hear
everything.”
“There isn’t much to tell,” said Lily. “I was going down to church
yesterday morning, and I rather foolishly tried to find a short cut,
and—and—quite suddenly I saw an arm stretched across my path”—she
stopped, overwhelmed with the recollection. “I saw something gleaming—it
was Mr. Ponting’s bangle!”
“Yes,” interjected M. Popeau. “If your theory is correct, sir, why did
the thieves leave this bracelet?”
“They took everything else,” said Mr. Sharrow shortly. “Luckily, he
hadn’t much on him—perhaps thirty or forty pounds. But he had certain
identification papers—a passport, and so on. They also disappeared. All
that was left was the bangle, and his watch and chain. I don’t suppose
altogether they were worth five pounds. The watch was only a plain
silver watch, but he had worn it through all his fighting, and he was
fond of it. He told me once he wouldn’t exchange it for the finest gold
chronometer that was ever made.”
Mr. Sharrow’s voice became charged with emotion. “I dare say you
gathered that he was a rough diamond, Miss Fairfield? But he was a
thoroughly good chap, a splendid man, straight as a die, and
generous—one of the most generous chaps I ever met!”
“Yes,” said Lily slowly, “I know that. He tried to make me accept a
beautiful little gold snuff-box he had bought, out of kindness, from a
poor old lady who had lost her money at the tables.”
“You never told me that,” said M. Popeau, surprised. “Have you got the
box?”
Lily shook her head. “Oh, no. I couldn’t take such a valuable present
from a stranger.”
“Then that was also included in the haul the thieves made?” exclaimed
Mr. Sharrow. “But I’m very glad I’ve heard about that box, for it might
help to catch Ponting’s murderers. It’s just a chance, to tell you the
truth, that they didn’t make a much bigger haul. Ponting was an
eccentric chap in some ways—the sort of man who doesn’t trust banks. As
a rule he carried about with him a very big sum. But on that very
day—the day, I mean, that he was killed—I got him to deposit the kind of
satchel thing in which he kept his money in the safe of the hotel where
he and I were staying at Nice. The manager there has hit on the rather
clever idea of having a number of little safes, which he lets out at
five francs a day. I persuaded Ponting that it would be very much safer
to leave his securities—for part of the money was in what they call
‘bonds to bearer’—there. It was insane to come every day, as he used to
do, to a place like Monte Carlo with all that money on him.”
“What you tell me,” observed M. Popeau musingly, “alters everything, Mr.
Sharrow. Of course, the fact that he might have had what was practically
a fortune on him would give a very strong motive for his murder!”
“And yet,” exclaimed Mr. Sharrow impatiently, “I told all that to the
Commissioner of Police, and it made no impression on him at all.”
“The truth is”—the Frenchman spoke with some heat—“the authorities here
at Monaco don’t want to believe that a murder is ever committed. In such
a garden of paradise”—there came a note of deep sarcasm in his vibrant
voice—“they never look for the snake!”
“The police are convinced that during the eight days that the body lay
in that orange grove some passer-by, probably a peasant, came across the
body, took everything from it, and naturally said nothing of his
discovery,” observed Mr. Sharrow.
“I confess that that has been my own theory up to now,” said M. Popeau.
“And it would take even more than your curious revelations as to poor
Mr. Ponting’s peculiar habit of carrying about his money to destroy that
theory entirely. I think another thing. I can’t help suspecting that a
professional thief, or gang of thieves, would have left the little gold
snuff-box as well as the watch and the bracelet. They would naturally
not care to take away something that could be identified positively as
having belonged to their victim.”
“On the other hand,” said Mr. Sharrow thoughtfully, “one would never
have thought they would have left anything made of gold.”
“You’re wrong there!” cried M. Popeau quickly. “Such folk are sometimes
very superstitious. They probably thought that bracelet was the dead
man’s mascot, and might bring _them_ ill-luck! Besides, even a peasant
would know that a thin gold band was not really valuable. Forty
francs—fifty francs—even thirty francs might have bought it from what I
hear.”
And then something which seemed to the Frenchman very dramatic occurred.
Mr. Sharrow suddenly put his hand in his pocket and held out a thin gold
hoop. “Here it is!” he exclaimed.
Lily gave a little cry and gasp.
“I beg your pardon,” he said remorsefully. “I didn’t mean to startle
you, Miss Fairfield. I am keeping it for the poor chap’s mother. This
queer little bangle and the silver watch are the only two things I shall
have to take back to her. It’s so pitiful! She was expecting him home
after four years.”
“Yes, indeed,” said Lily, and she turned away. The tears had welled up
into her eyes.
“Well,” said Mr. Sharrow, “there’s nothing more to say, I suppose. Thank
you very much for having answered my questions so clearly. I wanted to
go up and see the Count and Countess Polda, but I shan’t do so now. The
Commissioner of Police begged me not to do it. He said they’d been
terribly upset about the whole thing. After all, they were very kind to
poor Ponting. It’s rather too bad they should have had all this worry
through him, even if they did lead indirectly to his death.”
“Oh, don’t say that!” said Lily, distressed.
Deep in her heart she could not help knowing that it was because of
_her_ presence at La Solitude that the unfortunate man had stayed on,
and this secret knowledge was a bitter trouble to her—one, too, which
she felt she could never confide to anybody as long as she lived.
“Well, but it’s true!” persisted Mr. Sharrow. “If he hadn’t stayed on
there that evening he would be alive to-day. He and I would be on our
way home by now.” He sighed and held out his hand. “Good-bye, and
forgive me for the trouble I’ve put you to.”
“Good-bye,” said Lily mechanically.
M. Popeau led the now weeping girl into a side path where there was a
bench.
“You must not take this sad affair too much to heart,” he said
soothingly. “You must try and forget it.”
“I can’t forget it! I shall never forget it!” sobbed Lily. “I’ve had
such a terrible time since I last saw you, M. Popeau. The Countess was
terribly angry that I had gone to the police!”
“I told you she would be,” interjected the Frenchman.
“Yes, I know you told me so. But that didn’t seem to make it any
better!” Lily smiled, and tried to regain her composure. “Luckily, her
son comes to-morrow, and I hope that will make her forget this dreadful,
dreadful thing! But _I_ shall never forget it.”
“Indeed you will, and must,” said M. Popeau, and there came a very
authoritative tone into his kind voice. “It is your duty to do so, Miss
Fairfield. English people have a great sense of duty—I appeal to that
sense now! You must put this poor man out of your mind”—he
hesitated—“for ever. Now promise me? You know I am your friend—I hope I
shall always be your friend, Miss Fairfield.”
“I hope so too,” said Lily gratefully; “you’ve been wonderfully good to
me! I don’t know how I should have got through the last fortnight if it
hadn’t been for you——”
“If you are really grateful to me,” said M. Popeau gravely, “then there
is one mark of your gratitude which I should very much appreciate.”
Lily looked round at him rather surprised. “Yes?” she said.
“That mark of gratitude,” he said deliberately, “is to trust me,
Mademoiselle—always come to me when you are in any trouble. I do not
only mean now at Monte Carlo. I mean afterwards. When in trouble, real
trouble, come to Papa Popeau! Although I do not often talk of it—for,
though you may be surprised to hear it, I am what you in England call a
modest fellow, Miss Fairfield—Papa Popeau has a great deal of power.
Papa Popeau can do all sorts of strange and wonderful things to help his
friends.”
“I know he can,” said Lily gratefully. “I think that only Papa Popeau
could have secured me such a comfortable journey.”
“That is true,” he said gravely.
He got up from the bench, and they began walking slowly down a cypress
alley. “I think Captain Stuart is waiting for us in the road,” he
observed.
And then Lily—she could not have told you why—blushed very deeply.
“You like Captain Stuart, eh?” said M. Popeau.
He was looking straight before him and he spoke quite lightly, yet Lily
felt a little confused. She knew that he had seen her blush.
“Yes,” she said at last, “I do like him. He seems to me so—so——”
“I know,” said M. Popeau, “‘straight.’ That’s a fine English word. You
are right, Miss Fairfield. Captain Stuart is a ‘white’ man—another of
your English expressions that I like, that I have adopted for my own.
But, Mademoiselle, he is also a jealous man. I would not like to make
Captain Stuart jealous.”
And then all at once Lily remembered something the young Scotsman had
said to her, something of which he had had the grace to be ashamed a
moment later. “Foreign fellows are so infernally familiar!”—that was
what Captain Stuart had said to Lily Fairfield after there had come a
laughing interchange of words between herself and M. Popeau. It was
impossible that the Frenchman could have heard those words. And yet—and
yet—Lily felt a little uncomfortable.
“It is lucky that I am an old man,” went on her companion quietly. “Were
I not an old man, I feel that our friend might possibly become jealous
even of me. That would be most cruel, most unfair, and very hard on poor
Papa Popeau! _Hein?_”
He pirouetted round on his heel for a moment, and then bowed.
“Mademoiselle,” he said, “of all your servants I am the humblest and the
most devoted, and I regret very much now that I did not compel you to
allow me to go into the villa with you yesterday afternoon!”
“I am sorry too,” said Lily in a low voice. “But I don’t know—I think
Aunt Cosy would have had it out with me just the same after you had
gone. She didn’t say much till the Count and the man from the police had
left the house, and then—oh, then, M. Popeau, I’ve never seen anybody so
angry!”
As they came through the gate to the cemetery they saw Captain Stuart’s
lithe figure striding impatiently up and down the road. He took Lily’s
hand—she had taken off her glove—and held it tightly for a moment, then
he dropped it.
“I had no idea the funeral would take so long. Where are the other
people?” he asked.
“There is another gate, they all went out by that, but I expected that
you would be waiting here, my friend,” said M. Popeau smoothly. “And now
we are going off to a little restaurant in the Condamine to have a good
lunch.”
“I thought we were going to the Prince of Monaco’s aquarium,” said Lily
smiling.
“All in good time.” M. Popeau looked as happy as a boy. “We must make
the best of to-day,” he said, “even if it has begun badly, for from
to-morrow, Mademoiselle will probably be much occupied.”
Captain Stuart looked quickly round at Lily. “Why that?” he asked
shortly.
And even Lily felt surprised. What could M. Popeau mean?
“I think you will find that the arrival of the Countess Polda’s son will
mean that you will be very much occupied,” said the Frenchman quietly.
Captain Stuart looked disturbed. “But you don’t even know this fellow?”
he said, turning to Lily. “You’ve never seen him, have you?”
“No, that’s quite true. But all the same, I’m afraid M. Popeau is right.
Only this morning the Countess told me that she hoped——” She waited a
moment.
“Yes?” said Stuart impatiently. “She hoped what, Miss Fairfield?”
“She hoped that Beppo and I would be great friends.”
Lily felt a little ashamed of having said that. But, after all, it was
quite true, and she did so want to know if Captain Stuart would—mind.
Rather to her disappointment he remained silent.