With the unerring instinct of the man of the world, Verplank, on
entering the crowded salon, divined immediately, among all the women
present, the hostess whom he had never seen.
As he bent over her hand, the duchess, who had not an idea how he came
there, said in her fluted voice:
“This is really so nice of you. I did not know you were in Paris.”
“Nor did I--until this moment,” answered Verplank, looking as he spoke
into the eyes of his hostess who, after the one imperceptible glance
with which the mondaine judges and classifies, was wondering in what
manner, this man, with his virile face and impeccable presence, had
forced Leilah Barouffska to leave him.
“But,” he added, “Monsieur de Joyeuse whom I saw this afternoon told
me that you would be at home, and assured me that I might venture to
present my homages.”
The duchess displayed her tireless smile. “I am only sorry not to have
had them sooner.” She paused. Between her smile, the edges of her
teeth showed, false but beautiful. “There is Lady Silverstairs trying
to get you to look at her, and very well worth looking at she is.”
Camille de Joyeuse turned for a moment to the reticent young prince who
in his diffident way still lingered at her side.
Beyond, at the farther end of the room, notes rippled. Standing near
a grand piano, the Roumanian with the flowing hair was preluding a
fantasy of his own.
In the hush that succeeded, Verplank moved to where Violet sat.
Smilingly, without speaking, she gave him her hand and indicated a seat
beside her. Then, raising a fan, she whispered:
“Demon! What have you done? Where do you spring from? How long have you
been in Paris?”
Verplank, seating himself, answered:
“I got here this morning. Why am I a demon?”
From behind the fan, Violet asked:
“What did you do to Leilah? Why did she leave you?”
Verplank folded his gloved hands. “That is what I am here to find out.”
“Do you mean to tell me that you don’t know!”
“I have not an idea--unless it was because of this Count Thingumagig.”
Violet Silverstairs furled her fan, looked at him, looked away, looked
about the room. At one end her husband, accompanied by de Joyeuse,
Tempest, de Fresnoy, and the others, had entered. At the further end
the Roumanian dominated. Supported en sourdine by an accompanist, he
massed sounds and dispersed them, concentrating fulgurations of notes
from which echoing showers fell. Presently, resuming an abandoned
measure, he caressed a largo, infinitely sweet, that swooned in the
languors of the finale. At once to a murmur of bravos, the applause of
gloved hands and a cry of “Bis!” raising violin and bow above his head,
he bent double to the duchess, his flowing hair falling like a veil
before him.
“He may play again,” said Violet. “I want to talk to you. Let us go
into the next room.”
As Verplank rose at her bidding, others who had been seated, rose also.
Interrupted conversations were more animatedly resumed. A servant
announced additional names. The first salon now was thronged. The
second was filled. Verplank and Violet passed on.
Beyond was a gallery. At the entrance stood a woman, her face averted,
talking to a man. As the others approached, she turned.
At sight of her and of the man, Violet would have turned also. It was
too late.
“Leilah!” Verplank exclaimed.
For a second, in tragic silence, two beings whom love had joined and
fate had separated, stood, staring into each other’s eyes.
For a second only. At once the man interposed himself between them.
“Monsieur!” he insolently threw out. “My name is Barouffski.”
With superior tact Lady Silverstairs intervened. “Good evening, Count.
It never occurred to us that we were interrupting a tête-à-tête.”
She paused. Hostilely the two men were measuring each other. In
Verplank’s face there was a threat, in Barouffski’s there was a jeer,
in Leilah’s there was an expression of absolute terror. Of the little
group Violet alone appeared at ease.
“Leilah,” she added, “don’t forget that you are to have luncheon with
me to-morrow. Good night, my dear. Silverstairs and I will be going
soon. Good night, Barouffski.”
She smiled, nodded, took Verplank’s arm, took him away. But the arm
beneath her hand was shaking and she realised that it shook with rage.
Sympathetically she looked up at him. “I thought they were in the other
room and it was just to avoid a thing of this sort that I got you out
of it. You won’t do anything, will you?”
Verplank now had got control of himself, his arm no longer shook,
and it was the smile of a man of the world, the smile of one to whom
nothing is important and much absurd, that he answered:
“Why, yes; it was very civil of this chap to introduce himself. I shall
leave a card on him. Hello! Here’s Silverstairs! I wonder if he will
introduce himself, too.”
The young earl was advancing, his hand outstretched. “I say! I saw a
man marching off with the missis, but I had no idea it was you. Where
are you stopping? Will you dine with us Tuesday?”
“Yes, do.” Violet threw in. “Rue François Premier at eight.”
“I shall be very glad to,” Verplank answered. He turned to Silverstairs.
“I am at the Ritz. Stop by there to-morrow noon, won’t you, and let me
take you somewhere for luncheon?”
Lady Silverstairs laughed and employing a darkyism, said: “You don’t
say turkey to me. There!” she exclaimed as Verplank was about to
protest. “I could not anyway.”
From the salon beyond came a woman’s voice, clear and rich, rendering,
in a lascive contralto, a song of love and passion.
The Silverstairs and Verplank approached. Meanwhile, from the diva’s
mouth, notes darted like serpents on fire. In mounting fervour the aria
developed, trailing, as it climbed, words such as _amore_, _speranza_,
_morir_. A breath of brutality passed. The atmosphere became charged
with emanations in which the perfume of women mingled with the desires
of men. Still the aria mounted, it coloured the air, projecting, like a
magic lantern, visions of delight, imperial and archaic, that ascended
in glittering scales.
Verplank, detaching himself from the Silverstairs, felt his dumb rage
renewed. At the moment he conceived an insane idea of going below,
waiting without until Barouffski and Leilah appeared and he saw
himself, confronting the man, tearing the woman from him, carrying her
off and making her his own.
The impulse fell from him. The rage that he felt at the man deflected
into rage at this woman who had made his life a vacant house and for
what, good God! And why?
In a cascade of flowers and flames the song was ending. There was new
applause, the discreet approbation of worldly people, easily pleased,
as easily bored and with but one sure creed: Not too much of anything.
Verplank must also have had enough. When presently the Silverstairs
looked about for him he had gone.
Already Violet had summarised the situation to her lord. Now, perplexed
at Verplank’s abrupt disappearance, she said:
“You don’t suppose that anything will happen, do you?”
Silverstairs, bored by the entertainment, anxious only to get away
where he could have a quiet drink, tugged at his moustache and with
unconscious reminiscence answered:
“I don’t know and I don’t care. I don’t care what happens as long as it
doesn’t happen to me.”
V
“There are too many of us,” Verplank, the day following, found himself
saying to Silverstairs.
The two men were lunching at Voisin’s.
The charming resort which, since the passing of Véry, of Véfour and the
Maison Dorée, has become the ultimate refuge of the high gastronomic
muse of Savarin and of Brisse was, on this forenoon, filled with its
usual clientèle:--old men with pink cheeks, young women with ravishing
hats, cosmopolitan sportsmen, ladies of both worlds, assortments of
what Paris calls High Life and pronounces Hig Leaf.
Without, a fog draped the windows, blurred the movement of the street,
transforming it into a cinematograph of misty silhouettes. But within,
the brilliant damask, the glittering service, the studied excellence of
everything, produced an atmosphere of wealth and ease.
Silverstairs, after swallowing a glass of Chablis, meditatively lit a
cigar. But meditation was not his forte. The twentieth of his name, he
was tall and robust. He had straw-coloured hair, blue eyes, a skin
of brick, and an appearance of simple placidity. At the moment he was
mentally fondling certain reminiscences of the Isis and certain bouts
with bargees there.
“You know,” he said at last, “if I were you I would just march up to
him and knock him down.”
Verplank nodded. “I dare say. But not if he had taken your wife.”
The suggestion, penetrating the earl’s placidity, punctured it. He
threw back his head. “By George! If he had, I’d kill him.”
“There, you see!”
Silverstairs puffed at his cigar. His placidity now was reforming
itself.
“Yes,” he answered. “But then in taking yours, he did it after she was
divorced. You can’t have him out for that.”
“All the same there are one too many of us.”
Silverstairs filled his mouth with smoke. Longly, with an air of
considering the situation he expelled it. Then he said:
“It is what I call damned awkward. But what the deuce can you do?”
“What can I do?” Verplank with an uplift of the chin repeated. “Why, if
only for the manner in which he acted last night--”
“I know,” Silverstairs interrupted. “The missis told me. He behaved
like a fidgety Frenchman. I grant you that. But there were no words,
nothing that you could put a finger on.”
Through an adjacent door a man strolled in. He had his hat on and in
one gloved hand he held a thin umbrella of which the handle was studded
with gold nails. With the other hand he smoothed a black moustache.
Through a monocle he was surveying the room. He looked careless and
cynical.
Deferentially a maître d’hôtel addressed him. Ignoring the man he waved
his umbrella at Silverstairs.
Silverstairs waved his hand. He turned to Verplank. “Here’s de Fresnoy.
He can put us straight. Let’s ask him to join us.”
Rising, he greeted the Parisian, invited him to the table, introduced
Verplank, speaking as he did so in French, with an accent frankly
barbarous which de Fresnoy seemed to enjoy.
The latter raised his hat to Verplank, confided it to the maître
d’hôtel, gave him the umbrella also, while another waiter drew up for
him a chair.
“Thanks,” he said in an interval of these operations. “I see you have
breakfasted. If you don’t mind my eating while you smoke--”
Seating himself he turned to the waiter, a man short and stout,
completely bald, with large dyed whiskers and an air of repressed
satisfaction.
“Listen, Léopold, and note well what I say. To begin with do not
attempt to tell me what you wish me to eat. You have heard? Good!
Listen again. A dozen Ostendes, an omelette, a pear. Nothing else. Not
a crumb. Yes, some Eau de Vals. Allez!”
Léopold bowed. “Perfectly, monsieur le baron. I shall have the honour
of serving monsieur le baron with what he has been good enough to be
willing to desire.”
Again the waiter bowed. But behind the oleaginousness of his speech
a severity had entered, one which intimated that in this preserve of
gastronomics such an order was unworthy.
“These gentlemen?” he added, his eyes moving from Verplank to
Silverstairs. “Some coffee? A liqueur?”
But now, in fluent French, Verplank was addressing de Fresnoy.
“Silverstairs and I have been having an argument. In your quality of
Parisian, will you tell us whether a man can have another out for
looking impertinently at him?”
De Fresnoy adjusted his collar, patted his neck-cloth. “But certainly,
most assuredly. To look impertinently at a man constitutes an attack
on his self esteem, which in itself is an integral part of his moral
wealth. To omit to return a man’s bow, to neglect to take his proffered
hand, to regard him in an offensive manner, are one and all so many
assaults on his dignity.”
Verplank, pleased with this view of things, smiled. “Thanks. Mine has
been assailed and I was in doubt how to rebuke the aggressor.”
“It is simple as Good day. You have only to select two representatives
and get them to put themselves in communication with him. If then he
refuses to have friends of his meet yours, or if, afterward, he will
neither apologise or fight, he is outlawed.”
De Fresnoy, as he spoke, made a gesture, a wide movement of the arm
which indicated, or was intended to indicate, the uttermost limits of
the world.
“It is Barouffski,” Silverstairs, with some idea that de Fresnoy might
be aware of the anterior complication, threw out.
“Barouffski!” de Fresnoy repeated, his head held appreciatively a
little to one side. “In a bout he is very clever. Barring d’Arcy,
Helley-Quetgen”--and myself he was about to add, but throwing the
veil he desisted--“I don’t know his equal. How he is on the field,
personally I cannot say. But there, the absence of buttons, the
absence of masks, the inevitable emotion, the sight of the other
man, the consciousness of an injury to be maintained or avenged, the
consciousness too of the definite character of any thrust you may give
and particularly of any thrust you may receive, these things have such
an effect that often the cleverest acts like a fool. On the boards,
fencing is an exercise, it is an amusement. On the field, it is another
man’s blood--or yours. Though, after all, one is rarely killed except
by one’s seconds.”
He turned to Verplank. “You fence? Or is it that you shoot?”
Verplank leaned back in his chair. “Oh, I suppose I can fire a gun.”
Silverstairs laughed. “I say now! You are too modest by half.” He
looked at de Fresnoy. “Verplank is one of the crack shots of America.”
De Fresnoy turned again to Verplank. “You should demand pistols then.
Barouffski draws well, but at twenty paces he is less sure of himself.
Have you selected your seconds?”
“I suppose I may count on Silverstairs for one----”
The young earl nodded. “That’s of course, and perhaps you, de Fresnoy,
will act with me.”
The Parisian smoothed his moustache. “I shall be much honoured. In that
case, however, as necessary preliminary, I shall have to ask to be made
acquainted with all the circumstances.”
But now Léopold, bearing a dish on which were oysters green as stagnant
scum, approached and with an air of infinite tenderness, much as though
it were a baby, placed it before de Fresnoy.
Leisurely he began to eat.
Verplank, who had been looking out of the window, leaned forward. “The
circumstances are evangelical in their simplicity. Last evening I was
about to speak to Madame Barouffska when he put himself between us and
eyed me in the manner which I have described.”
De Fresnoy, considering him over an oyster, said:
“You were at the Joyeuses then?”
Verplank nodded.
“And there Barouffski objected to your speaking to his wife?”
“Yes.”
De Fresnoy swallowed the oyster. “In that case he was guilty not only
of a grave offense to you, but to Madame de Joyeuse as well. The duke
would be the first to resent it.”
With an idea of making it all very clear, Silverstairs put an oar in:
“Madame Barouffska, you know, was formerly Madame Verplank.”
De Fresnoy bent a little. It may be that because of Silverstairs’ ultra
English accent he had not understood. “Pardon?”
But here Verplank intervened. “This lady had been divorced from me
before she married Barouffski.”
De Fresnoy, over another oyster, turned to him again. Yet any surprise
he may have experienced he was too civil to display.
“Ah, indeed!” he replied. He looked as though he were about to add
something, but refraining, he paused.
Verplank helped him out. “You are thinking perhaps that there may
have been circumstances that rendered further acquaintance between us
inadmissible. I may assure you that there are none and, without wishing
to intrude my private affairs, I may assure you also that to this hour
I am unaware why the divorce was obtained. This lady had no grievance
of any kind against me and I had none whatever against her.”
Pontifically, in his deepest note, Silverstairs threw out: “In the
States they give you a divorce for a Yes or a No.”
“For married people,” de Fresnoy remarked, yet so pleasantly that the
sarcasm was lost, “America is the coming country.”
As he spoke, the fat waiter, after supervising the removal of the
first dish, produced, with the air of a conjurer, another. It was an
omelette, golden without, frothy within.
De Fresnoy glanced up. “Countermand the pear. Instead, bring me paper
and ink.”
“Perfectly, monsieur le baron.”
Slowly de Fresnoy attacked the food. After a mouthful he said to
Silverstairs:
“When the writing materials come we can get off a note to Barouffski.
If he has any explanation he can advance it. Otherwise--on guard!”
After another mouthful he said to Verplank:
“You have fought before?”
“I have not had the occasion.”
“Nor I,” interjected Silverstairs. “It is against the law in England.”
Gravely, as though he were receiving valuable information de Fresnoy
bowed. “So it is here. But with us it is custom that rules, not law.
No jury would convict an honourable man for fighting a fair fight.
Besides, dueling is in our blood. It will not disappear as chivalry
has. It will last as long as there are French men--and French women.
And yet, in saying that chivalry has disappeared, I am in error. Not
later than the week before last a cousin of mine, a young man truly
charming, married a monster.”
He pushed aside his plate. “Well, then, Léopold, am I to sit here the
entire day?”
Serviceably, a buvard in his hand, the waiter approached. “I have
subventioned a new pen for the use of monsieur le baron.”
“There, Léopold, your sins are remitted. See at once if the chasseur is
free.”
De Fresnoy looked at Silverstairs. “With your permission, in our joint
names, I write.”
He looked at Verplank. “Will you pardon me if I ask how your name is
spelled?”
Verplank, getting at his case, extracted a card.
De Fresnoy glanced at it. Then, taking that new pen, he read, as he
wrote, aloud.
_M. le Comte Barouffski._
_Monsieur: M. Verplank has requested the Earl of Silverstairs
and myself to arrive at an understanding with two of your
friends concerning an incident which occurred last evening in
the Avenue Cours la Reine._
_Lord Silverstairs and I will be obliged if, as soon as
possible, you will ask one of your friends to appoint a meeting
at which we may deliberate._
_Receive, Monsieur, the expression of my distinguished
sentiments._
_Baron de Fresnoy_
He looked over at Silverstairs. “Is that to your liking? Good! We will
send it to the Little Club where the answer is to be left and we will
have a reply to-day. En attendant, there are matters that claim me.”
With a movement of the chin he summoned the waiter.
A little byplay followed; the presentation of the bill, the click of
gold on porcelain, the carelessly gathered change, the meagre tip, the
reappearance of the hat, the bowing waiters, the craning necks, and the
departure of de Fresnoy, an umbrella under his arm, a cigar between his
teeth.
Verplank, emptying a glass of Chablis, looked out of the window. A
panorama was forming. He saw the room at Coronado, Leilah as she told
him of her love, his brief absence, his harrowing return, the hunt for
her that had extended over half the globe, a hunt that divorce had not
terminated, which her re-marriage had not stopped and which, had he
not at last discovered her, nothing could have stayed save his death
or hers or the reason of the implacable Why. An obstacle to the Why
or, it might be, the incarnation of it, was Barouffski, and Verplank
saw himself standing somewhere with Barouffski before him. There was a
command, the call of numbers, a detonation and the sight of Barouffski
turning, swaying, falling down.
The panorama faded. A picture had appeared. Before the window, arrested
by a congestion of traffic, a motor was stopping. In it and the mist
was Leilah.
Verplank sprang to his feet. With the idea of going out to her there
and forcing an explanation, he looked about for his hat.
Silverstairs also got up. He had not seen. He too was looking for his
hat. Placidly he remarked:
“I have an appointment with a chap named Tempest. Will you come with
me?”
But now, the congestion relieved, the motor shot on. Verplank had the
spectacle of a face fading instantly in the fog and the future.
“Will you?” Silverstairs repeated.
“Will I what?”
“I have to see a man about a horse. He lives just off the Bois de
Boulogne, in the rue de la Pompe. Will you come up there with me?”
“Yes, if you will go on foot. In that case I’ll leave you there and
walk back. I need the exercise. I feel like what you described as a
fidgety Frenchman.”
Silverstairs pulled at his moustache. “It’s no end of a walk. But no
matter, I’ll go with you.”