himself to a glimpse of the young woman with whom he had parted in a fog
off Liverpool. And yet this was not through indifference, or
forgetfulness, for in all his wanderings the image of the fair American,
his "Goddess of Liberty," as he liked to think of her, had gone with him
persistently, in spite of the unpleasant fact that he knew her to be
engaged to, and now on the point of matrimony with, another man. Even
Mariol had not found out how keenly the news of the forthcoming nuptials
of Miss Winstanley and Mr. Glynn had cut into his friend's
sensibilities. Rather than meet her, Clandonald would fain have avoided
the Riviera altogether, to go on direct to London, but for the pleading
image of his dear old aunt, who was counting upon him to come to her.
Nobody suspected that in a long, flat pocket-book of Viennese leather,
presented to him at parting by Lady Campstown--and for a wonder in
woman's gifts, actually available by the male recipient--he carried a
picture of Posey, cut out of an English illustrated paper, found in a
wayside inn in Roumania, among other "Beauties of the Day and Hour." It
was a charming characteristic pose in which the photographer had caught
her, and the gown and coiffure showed the girl's advance in worldly
style and knowledge of how to make the most of her advantages. Here,
indeed, would have been a Lady Clandonald, amply equipped to take her
place in the picture gallery of Beaumanoir among the beauties of their
line! And in her frank young face he could read no trace of the
unwholesome tastes and proclivities that had wrecked him through Ruby
Darien. It was a folly, a childish weakness, to treasure this scrap of
paper in his breast pocket close over his heart, and he had resolved
that he would soon violently dispossess himself of the same by casting
it in the fire. Let him meet her once again, have speech with her in
the ordinary way, realize that she was entirely absorbed in preparations
for her union with another, and it would be easier to be done for good
and all with this strange, obstinate, enduring obsession.
It was not the best atmosphere for a man in his state of mind to find
himself in daily intercourse with his impulsive old aunt, whose life had
been for weeks and months saturated with the influence of Posey's
personality. Although Lady Campstown honestly believed herself to be
doing everything that feminine tact and zeal could inspire to extol to
him the desirability of Helen Carstairs as a wife, she was really
setting forth Posey's charm from morning until night. She told
Clandonald how the girl had first come to her, tall and nymph-like,
through the avenue of palms, with violets, white and blue, clustered
around her footprints. How, immediately, her first distaste of the
dreaded American neighbor had been swept away in the girl's sweet appeal
to her friendship; how she had then only done for her what she would
have had another woman do, in like case, for her own Lucy, had she
lived. And how, little by little, she had grown to wait upon Posey's
daily coming, to laugh with her, to sympathize in her needs and
perplexities, until she counted a day lost when Miss Winstanley did not
appear to irradiate it.
"At the same time, my dear," the dowager said, interrupting herself, "I
am not going to pretend that there are not other girls in the world as
engaging and lovable as she. Miss Carstairs, for example, is--er--_most_
distinguished in her appearance, and has admirable manners. Posey tells
me that her friend Helen is so highly educated she makes her feel as
ignorant as a street Arab. Of course, that's only the child's American
habit of exaggeration. She really reads and studies part of every day,
and her literature teacher, Miss Barton, says Miss Winstanley's memory
for facts and grasp of ideas is something quite out of the common. As I
was saying, Helen Carstairs is just the kind of person I should think
would bear transplanting into English life. She is so simple and
unemotional and self-contained. When you go to Heine des Fees to
call--when did you say you were going to call, Clan dear?"
"I don't think I said, Aunt Lucy," answered her nephew, with a twinkle
in his eye.
"Ah, well, dear, probably it will be to-day, as you have now had time to
draw breath after telling me all about your travels. You must have had
a very pleasant journey from Naples in company with Miss Carstairs."
"Yes, very pleasant, what Mariol would let me have of her. He was very
absorbent, it must be said. You know I told you once, long ago, that I
believed good old Mariol had actually knocked under to a fair Yankee,
and I have now every reason to believe that this lady is the object of
his secret cult."
"I never heard of such a thing!" exclaimed Lady Campstown, for her,
almost sharply. "I can't imagine a more unsuitable idea. These
marriages with Frenchmen rarely turn out well. At least, unless the man
has a title and a chateau, and the foreign wife would have some
interests in the country. A mere brilliant, drifting, scoffing creature
like M. de Mariol--! Think of that book of his I found on your table
and tried to read. Why, there were ideas in it that made my hair stand
on end."
"Moral: Aunt Lucys shouldn't carry off the French books they find on
their nephews' tables," answered he, teasingly. "It is a fact, however,
that Miss Carstairs seemed to find extreme satisfaction in her
long-continued duet with my clever chum. It was as much as I could do
to get a word in edgewise."
"I am surprised, and I must say a little put out, Clan. I shouldn't
think you'd have given her up like that to any man, however friendly he
might be."
"To give up argues to have had. And I cannot truly claim to have
established any monopoly in the young lady's society. Aunt Lucy, dear,
I won't tease you any more. As our American friends say, 'you've been
barking up the wrong tree.' It was never Miss Carstairs that turned my
poor, weak brain. I admire, esteem her cordially, and think Mariol would
get an ideal wife if she would smile on him--but love her--never in this
world."
"But you _said_ I might think what I pleased as to your being spooney
about an American girl, that day you brought her to Beaumanoir and
afterward told me you had decided to go away again. It was virtually
acknowledging that you loved her, and but for the abominable
interference of a person who shall be nameless, would have pressed your
suit."
"They said that in Lord Byron's days, Aunt Lucy, or was it Miss
Edgeworth's? And you have been dwelling on that rash admission of mine,
and building air castles with me and Miss Carstairs looking out of the
windows all these months in consequence? No, best of aunties, you are
horribly out of focus. You've got hold of the wrong person altogether.
I don't in the least mind letting you know that I made all kinds of a
fool of myself on that voyage over last October. I dreamed dreams never
to be realized. And, as the powers of mischief willed it, Ruby seeing
my name announced for that sailing, had taken a second-class passage on
the same ship, with the laudable hope of 'making it hot for me,' she
said. She succeeded but too well. She peppered an innocent young girl
with vile anonymous notes that made her shun the sight of me. After I
got to town, she wrote to me directly, and to buy her off I made certain
sacrifices I could ill afford. As far as I know to the contrary, I did
buy her off. I count any money well spent that would keep shame and
sorrow out of the life of the girl I set out to champion. She never
knew of it, she very likely wouldn't care. She probably went on her
straight, clean path of life, and forgot everything connected with me.
Yes, it _was_ an American girl, Aunt Lucy, but she wasn't Helen
Carstairs."
"My poor boy, my darling Clan," began the dowager, then choked and
remained silent.
"I know you'll never ask me who it was, dear, so I'll make haste and put
you out of your misery. Did it never occur to you that your admiration
for Miss Winstanley might be a family failing?"
"Oh! not _that_, Clan. Never _that_! To think you got so near anything
that would have given me such pure joy----"
"I didn't get near, that was just the trouble. I believe she liked me,
perhaps better than any other man on board, till Ruby's doings came
between us. But she gave me unmistakably to understand there could be
nothing again after we parted then. Of course, when I heard later that
she was engaged to this man Glynn----"
"Who is really a fine, manly fellow, Clan; you couldn't help liking him.
But, oh! why couldn't he have fancied the Carstairs girl and left my
Posey for you? And, my dear, it is just a marvel to me. Posey, who is
as open as a spring morning when there isn't a cloud in the sky; Posey,
who never prevaricates or hesitates about the truth, how could she let
me go on, day after day, hour after hour, talking about you----"
"A fine evidence of her polite endurance, Aunt Lucy. Poor Miss
Winstanley!"
"How could she, I say, without giving me the least little hint that you
had fallen in love with her?"
"I suppose because she considered that my secret."
"Now that I think it over, it seems to me that she almost always managed
to turn the conversation in your direction. She certainly showed the
utmost relish in whatever I had to tell her, good, bad or indifferent."
"There was no occasion for the use of either of the two last adjectives,
when I was your subject," said Clandonald, looking at her with
tenderness, more touched than he chose to show.
"No, my dear, there wasn't, I must say. Oh! Clan, it all comes back to
me with a rush. Why, Posey has been just _living_ on talk of you and
reminiscences of you ever since we have been together. And I thought it
was only I!"
"Take care, Aunt Lucy," the man said, getting up to stride back and
forth across the room. "This is dangerous doctrine you're preaching,
when Miss Winstanley's wedding-day is set."
"God forgive me, so it is," answered Lady Campstown, the tears rushing
into her eyes.
"Let us make a pact, will you?" said Clandonald, stopping presently. "I
have gone over and left my pasteboards in due form at Reine des Fees, at
a time when you told me the ladies were likely to be at the Golf Club."
"Yes, and I was really quite put out about it, but I see now that it was
better so."
"And I shall meet the young lady at dinner here this evening, according
to your plan. There will be several outsiders. I shan't have much
chance to speak with her, and after that----"
"Clan, don't suggest that you will leave me after that. Indeed, I
couldn't stand it; you positively must stay. I should tell you that you
won't run much chance of seeing Posey privately, in any case. She's
tremendously taken up with fitters and people who come down from Paris
to bring things for her to see. Besides, Miss Carstairs isn't in good
spirits, I find, and no wonder--I believe she just broke and ran away
from that dreadful vulgar stepmother. We heard enough of Mrs.
Carstairs' doings the little time she was here to be thankful she took
herself off. There's trouble brewing for the husband, if all one is told
is true. Posey watches over Helen like a mother-bird, and hardly leaves
her. Besides, they are expecting at any day or time the return of Mr.
Glynn. He hasn't cabled, but it was understood he was to get aboard the
first available ship sailing for Cherbourg or the Mediterranean ports
the hour after he finished some critical business he had on hand for his
chief. (The way these Americans fly fairly takes one's breath away!)
So there is no reason for you to go from here, if you think there's to
be any embarrassment resulting from your meeting with her. The days
will glide on fast enough to the wedding!" she ended with a deep and
heartfelt sigh.
"I don't want to run in face of the enemy, indeed," he said, trying for
a more cheerful face. "I think I'll stroll out in the garden and smoke
a pipe, and try and settle my perturbed spirit. And you, dear, what
will you do with yourself this afternoon?"
"The carriage is ordered, soon, for a round of visits I have to make.
How much rather had I spend the time, as I often do at this hour, going
in through the green door to sit with Posey in the orange walk--near the
fountain with the broken-nosed Triton, you remember. It's her favorite
spot, and nothing but rain will prevent her sitting there for an hour
with her book or work."
"Then I'll see you at tea-time, if not before."
"I'll be back, you may trust me. Nothing I dislike more than having my
tea out, at houses where a woman sits behind a little table, talking to
everybody that comes, and mixing the most abominable doses of half-cold
tea, and too much cream and sugar, for her unoffending guests,
forgetting whether the water boils or the tea-pot has stood too long!
Keep to the bamboo walk, my dear, the mistral is blowing hard to-day,
and you're not like me, acclimatized to it. Down there you'll be
sheltered and private, and can smoke your pipe in peace."
Clandonald had hardly left his aunt standing before the fireplace in her
sunny drawing-room, pondering upon the surprising intelligence he had
communicated, when Lady Campstown's parlor-maid came in with a rather
frightened face.
"Well, Parks, what is it? Have you broken a piece of my old Sevres in
putting out the dessert service, or has pussy had a fit?"
"It's only, my lady," said the girl, haltingly, "that the--er--lady you
gave us orders not to admit has driven up to the gate in a cab, and
insists upon seeing you on business of the highest importance, so she
says."
"You mean the person calling herself Mrs. Darien?" asked the dowager, in
icy tones.
"That were the name, your ladyship."
"What can I do?" passed through Lady Campstown's much-perturbed and
angered brain. "Clan's being here complicates matters dreadfully. She
is quite capable of making a scene that will echo through the
neighborhood. I have declared that I will not again hold speech with
her. If she were herself, I believe even she would not push into my
house and presence. The horrible fear is that she is not herself, but
under the influence of drink. In that case I must get old Rosa, who
loves her still, to take her off quietly.
"Say that Lady Campstown will see Mrs. Darien for ten minutes before she
goes out to keep an engagement. And, Parks, tell the cab to wait. Not
outside the front gate, but in the lane at the bottom of the garden.
And, Parks, send Rosa to me at once."
The Provencal servant, called Rosa, with a rather pale and
guilt-stricken face and manner, came hastily into the drawing-room,
stepping back to hold open its door for Mrs. Darien, who followed close
upon her heels.
"Stop where you are, Rosa," said the mistress of the dwelling, now the
great lady in every muscle and fibre of her stately little form. She
spoke in the woman's own tongue, and her low, clear voice was charged
with indignant emphasis. "From this lady's appearance in my house, I
assume that she is in some degree irresponsible for her actions, and
that she needs a caretaker to escort her back whence she came. I desire
you to make yourself ready to go with her, now, directly, without delay,
and not to return under my roof until you can report to me that you have
done so."
"No such great hurry, Aunt Lucy," said Mrs. Darien, with careless
insolence. "I'm really in a very normal and pacific state of mind,
considering the way the mistral is blowing, and that I, last night,
spent my last sou at Monte Carlo, and will be turned out of my room at
Nice if I can't pay for it before a couple of days have passed."
"You can stoop to ask me for money?" said Lady Campstown, in English.
"When one's flat on the ground one hasn't to stoop, you know," answered
the visitor, calmly arranging the folds of her veil drawn over a cheap
plumed hat, under which a chalk-white countenance with gleaming eyes
revealed itself menacingly. "I chanced to see in the local paper that
Clan had arrived to stop with you, and so simply timed my visit when you
would feel most impelled to pay to get rid of me. What, for instance,
if he were to step in at this moment, through that window into the
garden? Wouldn't it be rather cheap at the price to see the last of me
for a couple of hundred francs or so?"
Lady Campstown, with a swelling heart, walked over to her escritoire,
unlocking a compartment thereof to take out two bank-notes of the amount
indicated. She despised herself for the action, but could not trust her
voice to speak.
"Thanks, so very much," said Ruby, superbly putting her gains into a bag
of gilded meshes hanging at her waist. "And as I see you flashing the
lightning of your virtuous eye upon that poor, shuddering numbskull of a
Rosa there, let me at least exonerate her from any complicity in the
arrangement for my visit here to-day."
"I have heard that you have been seen lately in the lane below my
garden," exclaimed the dowager hotly, "and that some one in my household
is under suspicion of having been holding conversation with you in the
bamboo walk. I can only say that if this happens again Rosa goes out of
my service on the minute."
Ruby, who had been covetously looking around the luxurious, familiar
room, shrugged her shoulders indifferently.
"I suppose I must not detain you," she said conventionally, turning to
withdraw. "But since you have suggested it, I would be really quite glad
to have Rosa escort me back to my hotel. The effort of coming
here--perhaps the force of old associations--has proved something of an
ordeal to me. My heart is rather spinning around, and I am not
altogether sure I can answer for the strength necessary to support my
legs on the retreat."
"Go, Rosa, put on your hat and jacket as I bid you, and accompany
Madame," said Lady Campstown, nervously anxious to end the scene at any
cost. A fuller view of Mrs. Darien's face had showed her the awful
extent to which time and an evil life had ravaged it. She would not
look at her a second time, but, shuddering, walked away to the window
and set it wide open, standing with her back to the offender, in
speechless disgust and misery.
To be one minute unobserved was enough for Ruby Darien. She had been
standing near a little cabinet, on a shelf of which was accustomed to
lie Lady Campstown's own especial pass-key through the little green door
into the garden of Reine des Fees. Since the occupation of the place by
tenants this had not been used. But things were not wont to change
their position often at Villa Julia, and the key still lay in its old
corner undisturbed. Ruby's nimble fingers closed upon and transferred
it to the interior of her little gilded bag, while Lady Campstown,
resolved not to speak to her visitor again, kept her position at the
window.
"I suppose, then, I may go?" said Ruby, laughing softly. "In view of
your inhospitable attitude, I have really no excuse for lingering. _Au
revoir_, Aunt Lucy. I will return to you your old Rosa unspotted by the
world. And if it will add to Clan's pleasure to hear I am near him, give
him my compliments."
*CHAPTER XI*
Clandonald, meantime, was walking up and down in the bamboo avenue,
chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancy. Lady Campstown's loving
babble had put him in possession of an idea that haunted him like sweet
music. "Posey has been fairly _living_ on talk of you and reminiscences
of you ever since we met." With all due allowance for the
predisposition of the kind speaker in his favor, there was a suggestion
of conviction in her manner that he could not forget or put away. Was
ever flattery so subtly delicious as this thought? The fine stern
resolution he had made to flee from Posey's vicinity seemed to take to
itself wings and vanish in thin air. What? Go without seeing her once
alone, without thanking her for her kind thought of him, her mission of
ministration to his relative in his absence? It would be a truly
unheard-of thing to do. He even chose to forget the swiftly advancing
marriage--the betrothed lover who was doubtless now upon the ocean,
speeding as fast as steam could bring him to make sweet Posey his.
Nothing weighed, nothing counted, beside Clandonald's strong,
overpowering desire to look upon her face, to touch her hand again, to
have her clear eyes search the recesses of his soul.
In two words, he had come down off his high horse, and was now madly
anxious to get inside the Reine des Fees garden on the chance of finding
Miss Winstanley sitting alone in the spot indicated by his aunt as her
favorite retreat at that hour of the day--the orange walk, near the
fountain with the broken-nosed Triton. It was one of the most secluded
spots about the grounds, he remembered. Anything might happen there and
the inhabitants of the villa be none the wiser for it. What good
fortune if he should have the luck to find her alone and undisturbed in
this sequestered nook! And even if Miss Carstairs should be with Posey,
he would trust to her woman's tact to leave them alone for a little
talk.
With an artful affectation of going toward the town, he proceeded to
stroll down the walled street for a bit, then turning, doubled on his
tracks, and went in at the large gate of the Villa Reine des Fees,
inquiring of the woman who sat in the vine-wreathed doorway of the lodge
playing dominoes with an old, old man, and who admired milord Clandonald
greatly, whether "the ladies" were at home. Upon receiving from her a
smiling assurance that she knew them to be somewhere about the grounds,
since her husband, the gardener, had just then called to Miss Winstanley
where she sat in the orange walk, to receive some orders about a new
flower-bed, he bowed, thanked his informant, and took his way to the
designated spot.
Clandonald had regained his boyish beauty after so many days in the
saddle and nights under the stars. His complexion was well with healthy
blood, the haggard look had fled from his eyes, his magnificent form was
in perfect condition, his heart beat like a schoolboy's beneath his
summer flannels. As he walked on with a rapid, springing step, he
brandished in his hand a Makila stick of tough Pyrenean wood, of which
the handle was formed of a single rounded pebble, and having at the
lower end an iron spike--one of the dangerous canes fabricated by the
Basque peasants, dear to the heart of Northern Spain, brought by him
from Biarritz, long ago, and left hanging by its leathern loop in his
aunt's entry, where, as a relic of her nephew, it was religiously
preserved. His hat, of fine Panama braid, shaded his eyes from the too
glaring ardor of the Provencal sun after the middle of the day.
The gardener's wife, looking after him, smiled appreciatively. She knew
his hard luck story, and, like everybody else, hoped that Clandonald had
at last emerged again from under the shadow of the undeserved cloud of
Ruby Darien. When he had disappeared behind the shrubbery, and was well
out of hearing, the good woman curved her hand around her mouth and
remarked to her ancient sire, in a patois hard for an outsider to
understand, that she hoped at last the _Bon Dieu_ was going to make up
to this poor young milord for the troubles He had sent to him--just, for
all the world, as if he had been a peasant like themselves!
Clandonald did not notice her further, nor other inhabitant of the
enchanted garden than himself, until he arrived through a flowery arch
directly in the presence of Miss Winstanley, seated alone upon a marble
bench in a niche of glossy green, wiping tears out of her eyes, like a
naughty dryad put in a corner for punishment.
[Illustration: Like a naughty dryad put in a corner for punishment.]