"I must ask you, Monsieur," she said, stiffly, "to depose the fee on the
table. It is the custom."
Vanderlyn's thin nervous hand shot up to his mouth to hide a smile; the
eerie feeling which had so curiously possessed him dropped away, leaving
him slightly ashamed.
"Poor woman," he said to himself, "she cannot even divine that I am an
honest man!"
He bent his head gravely, and took the roll of notes with which he had
come provided out of his pocket. He placed a thousand-franc note on the
table. "What a fool she must think me!" he mentally exclaimed; then came
the consoling reflection, "But she won't think me a fool for long."
Madame d'Elphis scarcely glanced at the thousand-franc note; she left it
lying where Vanderlyn had put it. "Will you please sit down, Monsieur?"
she said.
Vanderlyn rather reluctantly obeyed her. As she seated herself opposite
to him, he was struck by the sad intensity of her face; he told himself
that she had once been--nay, that she was still--beautiful, but it was
the tortured beauty of a woman who lives by and through her emotions.
He also realised that his task would not be quite as easy as he had
hoped it would be; the manner of La d'Elphis was cold, correct, and
ladylike--no other word would serve--to the point of severity. He saw
that he would have to word his offer of a bribe in as least offensive a
fashion as was possible. But while he was trying to find a sentence with
which to embark on the delicate negotiation, he suddenly felt his left
hand grasped and turned over, with a firm and yet impersonal touch.
The centre of the soothsayer's cool palm rested itself on the ring--his
mother's wedding ring--loosely encircling his little finger, and then
Madame d'Elphis began speaking in a low, quiet, and yet hesitating,
voice,--a voice which suddenly recalled to her listener her Southern
birth and breeding; it was strangely unlike the accents in which she had
asked him to produce the promised fee.
Surprise, a growing, ever-deepening surprise, kept Vanderlyn silent. He
soon forgot completely, for the time being, the business which had
brought him there.
"For you the crystal," she whispered, "for others the Grand Jeu. You
have not come, as others do, to learn the future; you do not care what
happens to you--now."
She waited a moment, then, "the ring brings with it two visions," she
said, fixing her eyes on the polished depths before her. "Visions of
love and death--of pain and parting; one, if clear, yet recedes far into
the past...."
She raised her voice, and began speaking in a monotonous recitative:
"I see you with a woman standing in a garden; behind you both is a great
expanse of water. She is so like you that I think she must be your
mother. She wears her grey hair in Madonna bands; she puts her arms
round your neck; as she does so, I see on her left hand one ring--the
ring which you are now wearing, and which I am now touching. She, your
mother, is bidding you good-bye, she knows that she will never see you
again, but you do not know it, so she smiles, for she is a brave
woman----"
Madame d'Elphis stopped speaking. Vanderlyn stared at her with a sense
of growing excitement and amazement; he was telling himself that this
woman undoubtedly possessed the power of reading not only the minds, but
even the emotional memories, of those who came to consult her.... Yes,
it was true; his last parting with his mother had been out of doors, in
the garden of their own family house on the shores of Lake Champlain.
As he looked fixedly at the crystal-gazer's downcast eyes, his own
emotions seemed to become reflected in her countenance. She grasped his
hand with a firmer, a more convulsive pressure.
"I see you again," she exclaimed, "and again with a woman! This vision
is very clear; it evokes the immediate past--almost the present. The
woman is young; her hair is fair, and in a cloud about her head. You are
together on a journey. It is night----"
Madame d'Elphis stopped speaking abruptly; she looked up at Vanderlyn,
and he saw that her dark eyes were brimming with tears, her mouth
quivering.
"Do you wish me to describe what I see?" she asked, in an almost
inaudible voice.
"No," said Vanderlyn, hoarsely,--he seemed to feel Peggy's arms about
his neck, her soft lips brushing his cheek.
The soothsayer bent down till her face was within a few inches of the
polished surface into which she was gazing.
"Now she is lying down," she whispered. "Her face is turned away. Is she
asleep? No, she is dead!--dead!"
"Can you see her now?" asked Vanderlyn. "For God's sake tell me where
she is! Can I hope to see her again--once more?"
Madame d'Elphis withdrew her hand from that of Vanderlyn.
"You will only see her face," she answered, slowly, "through the
coffin-lid. That you will see. As to where she is now--I see her
clearly, and yet,"--she went on, as if to herself, "nay, but that's
impossible! I see her," she went on, raising her voice, "laid out for
burial under a shed in a beautiful garden. The garden is that of Dr.
Fortoul's house at Orange. At the head of the pallet on which she lies
there are two blessed candles; a nun kneels on the ground. Stay,--who is
that coming in from the garden? It is the wife of the doctor, it is
Madame Fortoul,"--again there came a note of wavering doubt into the
voice of the crystal-gazer. "She is whispering to the nun, and I hear
her words; she says, 'Poor child, she is young, too young to have died
like this, alone. I am having a mass said for her soul to-morrow
morning.'"
Madame d'Elphis looked up. Her large eyes, of which the lids were
slightly reddened, rested on Vanderlyn's pale, drawn face.
"Monsieur," she said, in a low, reluctant voice, "to be honest with you,
I fear I have been leading you astray. During the last few moments it is
my own past life that has been rising before me, not the present of this
poor dead woman. When I am tired--and I am very tired to-night--some
such trick is sometimes played me. I was born at Orange; as a child I
spent many hours in the beautiful garden which just now rose up before
me; I once saw a dead body in that shed--Madame Fortoul, who is devout,
often has masses said for those who meet with sudden deaths and whose
bodies are brought to her husband."
The soothsayer rose from her chair.
"If you will come to me to-morrow," she said, "bringing with you
something which belonged to this lady, I am sure I shall be able to tell
you all you wish to know. For that second séance," she added hurriedly,
"I shall of course ask no further fee."
Vanderlyn, waking as from a dream, heard sounds in the other room, the
coming and going of a man's footsteps. He also got up.
"Madame," he said, quietly, "I thank you from my heart. I recognise the
truth of all you have told me, _with one paramount exception_. It is
true that the woman whom you saw lying dead is now in the house of Dr.
Fortoul at Orange; the fact that you once knew the place is an
accident--and nothing but an accident. You have, however, Madame, made
one strange mistake."
He took out of his pocket and held in his hand the large open envelope
containing, in addition to the remainder of the notes he had brought,
the slip he had cut from the newspaper. "Here is the proof that all you
have seen is true," he repeated, "with one exception--_This lady was
alone in the train_. It is important that this should be thoroughly
understood by you, for to-morrow you will be called upon to testify to
the fact."
Madame d'Elphis stiffened into deep attention.
"To-morrow morning," continued Vanderlyn, very deliberately, "one of
your regular clients is coming to ask you to assist him to solve a
terrible mystery. I will tell you his name--it is Mr. Pargeter, the
well-known sportsman. He is coming to ask you to help him to find
Mrs. Pargeter, who some days ago mysteriously disappeared. This
lady's death, but he does not yet know it, took place while she was
travelling--travelling alone. I repeat, Madame, that she was
_alone--quite alone--on her fatal journey_."
Vanderlyn stopped speaking a moment; then his voice lowered, became
troubled and beseeching.
"Once you have revealed the truth to Mr. Pargeter,--and he will believe
implicitly all you say,--then, Madame, you will not only have
accomplished a good action, but a sum, bringing the fee for the séance
which is just concluded up to ten thousand francs, will be placed at
your disposal by me."
Madame d'Elphis looked long and searchingly at the man standing before
her.
"Monsieur," she said, "will you give me your word that the death of Mrs.
Pargeter was as this paper declares it to have been--that is to say, a
natural death?"
"Yes," answered Vanderlyn, "she knew that she would die in this
way--suddenly."
"Then," said the fortune-teller, coldly, "I will do as you desire."
Vanderlyn, following a sudden impulse, put the envelope he held in his
hand on the table. "Here is the fee," he said, briefly. "I know that I
can trust in your discretion, your loyalty,--may I add, Madame, in your
kindness?"
"I am ashamed," she whispered, "ashamed to take this money." She clasped
her hands together in an unconscious gesture of supplication, and then
asked, with a curious childish directness, "It is a great deal--can you
afford it, Monsieur?"
"Yes," he said, hastily; the suffering, shamed expression on her face
moved him strangely.
"When you next see Mr. Pargeter," she murmured, "you shall have written
proof that I have carried out your wish."
She tapped the table twice, sharply,--then led the way into the larger
room. It was empty, but Vanderlyn, even as he entered, saw a door
closing quietly.
Madame d'Elphis walked across to an un-curtained window; she opened it
and stepped through on to a broad terrace balcony.
"Walk down the iron stairway," she said, in a low voice, "there are not
many steps. A little door leads from the garden below straight into the
street; the door has been left unlocked to-night."
Vanderlyn held out his hand; she took it and held it for a moment. "Ah!"
she said, softly, "would that _I_ had died when I was still young, still
beautiful, still loved!--"