“Ah, Mr. Lafitte, you are a flatterer!”
“‘Pierre’!”
“Well, Pierre, then ... since you are so insistent. But I warn you, sir,
I do not believe a word you say!”
“But I swear I am in earnest, _ma belle_!”
She tapped him chidingly on the shoulder with her fan. From their seat in
the trellised, jasmine-covered arbor could be seen the moving figures of
the dancers in the candle-lighted ballroom, multiplied a thousandfold by
the flashing mirrors on the walls ... an orgy of color, a pandemonium of
merriment.
The strains of a dreamy waltz floated out to them,
haunting—ethereal—unreal. The soaring moon, a glorious disk of silver in
a sky of royal purple—a cupola of basalt—the twinkling stars, friendly
celestial chinks of light, therein ... the balmy, scent-laden air ... all
contributed to make of this Southern desmesne a fairyland—a night for
love—and love—and naught but love. The moonlight lay like snow on the
silver-misted foliage....
Virginia Grymes, clad in an eye-arresting gown of shimmering, filmy,
gauze-like material, the make-up of which no mere man knows, laughed. Her
companion, Pierre Dominique Lafitte, a gallant figure in cambric frills
and claret-colored damask, bent toward her, intoxicated by the glamour of
the night—the challenge of her eyes—the appeal of her feminine charm....
“Oh, Virginia, you are cruel ... heartless! You cannot doubt me! I
insincere? Pierre Lafitte? What—”
She looked at him, her eyes roguish.
“Pierre, do you love me?”
“_Do_ I love you? _Do_ I love you? Why you are my dream—my star—my—”
“Really?” amusedly.
“Ah, mademoiselle, you jest. But I am not like your cold-blooded
Americans. We Frenchmen hold _la grande passion_ above everything! After
all, _ma belle_ Virginia, love is the greatest of all things. We were
born to love. And love really comes but once to us ... and it comes to
stay.... Virginia, that great love has come into my life. And you are the
cause of it—its _raison d’être_!”
“Platitudes, sir, mere platitudes!”
“But it is the truth!”
“Enough of these fine words, Monsieur Lafitte. I believe in deeds, not
words.”
The protecting darkness concealed her flush as her mind reverted back to
a certain day not long past when a man with coal-black eyes stood in the
path of an oncoming carriage, pistol in hand.
“Mademoiselle pleases to jest,” sulkily.
“Jest? No, I do not. But, there, sir, you are but a sulky cavalier. Are
you that way with all of your friends? With Gabrielle—and Céleste—and
Angélique?...” She laughed lightly.
The Frenchman started in surprise.
“Gabrielle—Angélique!” he stammered. “What do you know of Angélique?”
Suddenly light came to him.
“What has François de Moulin been telling you?” he demanded.
“There, there,” she teased, “don’t fly into such a rage. ’Twill spoil
your handsome brow.”
He all but gnashed his teeth in exasperation. If thoughts could kill, a
certain young indigo-planter would have died a horrible death at that
moment. Fortunately for the latter, however, this is both a physical and
psychological impossibility. And it is better so perhaps, for if such
thought-murder were possible, it is doubtful if the world would be as
populous as it is.
Virginia shook her finger at him reprovingly.
“I dare you to mention a word of it to poor François,” she said. “You
yourself have often said ‘all’s fair in love and war.’”
He stared at the frivolous stars, disdaining to answer. If he could
but lay his hands on his friend, it would be a “war” indeed; perhaps
premeditated murder.
To his relief, she turned the subject. This was not altogether an act of
mercy, had he known it, but a seizure of just this opportunity to discuss
the man whom she professed to dislike above all men.
“By the way, Mr. Lafitte—Pierre—I have never really met your brother,
have I? What sort of a man is he?” Casually. Too casually, perhaps.
“Jean? He’s a prince. Why, he—”
“Why doesn’t he mingle with people more than he does? I very seldom see
him.”
He considered this for a moment.
“Society? Why he does, when he’s in town. But of late he’s been away so
often, and for such long periods, that, no doubt, since you are but a
recent arrival, you haven’t seen him about much. Jean is very popular
around town, however. Much more, I am forced to admit, than my humble
self. And very naturally,” he added, loyally.
She ignored this, however.
“I suppose your brother is as much of a heartbreaker as yourself, then,”
she remarked with an assumed lightness.
For a moment he was strangely silent.
“I have never known Jean to look at a woman twice,” he replied, soberly.
“And why, pray?”
“Because his thoughts are of but one.”
Her body became rigid, tense.
“And who is the fortunate lady, if I may ask?”
“She is dead!” he replied, nettled at her apparent lightsomeness.
She was immediately contrite, sensing the resentment in his tone. But a
great curiosity filled her.
“Please forgive my flippancy!” she exclaimed. “Do tell me about it. I
know there is a story attached to it.”
Mollified by her contrition and apparent interest, he told her. Perhaps
another purpose actuated him. Who knows?
Slowly, seriously, almost oblivious of his auditor, he told her the tale
of Jean and Lizette ... the duel ... the tragedy ... Jean’s vengeance.
The Frenchman, his voice low and impassioned, now swelling, his eyes
sparkling, now melting, might have been a troubadour of old Normandy
reciting the age-old story of love and death. In the magic of the
moonlight, he was a glamorous figure.
Entranced, engrossed in his absorbing tale, Virginia felt her emotions
sway her—the hot tears fill her eyes. As she listened she felt a great
envy of this girl who had died for Jean Lafitte—and a great yearning....
Pierre ended his tale, making little mention of Jean’s career in the
Caribbean. His own eyes were wet, for Pierre was a sentimentalist, a
lover of women as a sex; of the beautiful.
For a while there was silence.
Virginia was torn with conflicting emotions.
On one side was this new viewpoint of the Creole smuggler—“the fashion
plate,” as she mentally labeled him; a gallant gentleman, and a constant
lover. All the world loves a lover, but Virginia felt more than an
impersonally worldly affection for this lover in particular, if the truth
be told.
On the other hand, there was that damning story of her chum, Margaret
Claiborne, which pictured him as a cruel pirate, a murderer, and a
lustful villain.
Suddenly an inspiration came.
“Pierre,” she said, haltingly, “is it true that your brother killed a
man—a quadroon—at Grande Terre?”
He answered without hesitation, matter-of-factly!
“Yes, it is. That was a very unfortunate occurrence, however. Jean was
forced to do it. If he hadn’t—”
“Didn’t he—wasn’t it over a girl, a slave girl?” she demanded, strangely
wrought up.
“Why, yes, that was the cause of it, I believe,” he admitted, absently,
unknowing of the havoc his words were creating. It _had_ been over a
slave girl, but each of these two very naturally were putting different
constructions to this simply-worded fact.
Of such incidents are lives molded, empires destroyed, history made,
mayhap.
She sobbed, then fiercely smothered it.
“What’s the matter?” he asked, in surprise.
She sniffed.
“Nothing,” calmly. “I merely coughed. I have a headache, Pierre. Won’t
you bring me a drink of water?”
He left her hurriedly, all solicitude.
When he returned with the drink for which she had asked, however, he
stared around the arbor, in surprise, and swept the black ocean of
shrubbery with his eyes.
She had disappeared.
Utterly. Inexplicably.
Pierre Dominique, musing bitterly on the peculiarities of the sex, turned
misogynist.
The sheen of the river, near by, was like celestial silk. The moonlight
still coquetted with the shadows, and the night-breeze, odorous with
jasmine, was sodden with music. But to little avail; the girl was gone.
Pierre Dominique Lafitte, a gallant figure in cambric frills and
claret-colored damask, raised his head to the opaque gloom of the
nocturnal sky and said words—unrepeatable words.