"Mademoiselle Milan, I wish you good-evening."
The lady bowed. She was reclining on a divan, before a large mirror,
absently turning the rings on her finger; but in her simple négligée she
appeared more beautiful than ever. The long, dark ringlets gave the oval
face a look of earnestness, the fierce Italian blood glowed in her
cheeks, and the flashing brilliancy of her eyes had a restlessness that
was unusual. She was evidently suffering from nervous excitement; but
there was a fascinating grace in every movement, and even in the easy
indolence of her position.
"Take a seat on that sofa, by the side of my little dog. Is he not
pretty?"
"Very," replied Dupleisis; "but I am more interested in his mistress. We
have not met for a week,--not, in fact, since two thieves robbed Mr.
Reed of a fortune."
Dupleisis said this with pointed significance; but the lady preserved
the coolest unconcern.
"The muse of the foot-lights is the most jealous of mistresses."
"True," replied Dupleisis; "but in this case she has had rivals."
"I choose to amuse myself with a crowd, who eat my suppers and make me
laugh."
"And among the jesters you number the Minister of War and Chief of
Police."
"I may need their aid."
"Mademoiselle Milan, you _do_ need their aid; but, with all your
charming courtesies, you have not secured it."
"M. Dupleisis chooses to speak in enigmas. I am obtuse."
"At our last most agreeable _tête-à-tête_, you were pleased to feel
interested in my somewhat sluggish history. Would you pardon a few
inquiries concerning yours?"
"M. Dupleisis, I am at your service."
"Two months since, you resided in the Rue de Luxembourg, Paris."
"This is an assertion. I expected an inquiry."
Dupleisis took from a pocket-book a half-sheet of thin, closely-written
letter-paper, and spread it out on the table before him.
"It was about two months ago that this document was blown from your
window. Am I right, Mademoiselle Milan?"
"It _was_ blown from my writing-desk into the street."
"I knew I was right; for 'twas I that picked it up. It is a letter,
written in Rio de Janeiro, and contains the details of a plot to rob one
of the wealthiest diamond-dealers in this city. You may think my
interest singular, mademoiselle; but the merchant deals with every
large jewelry-house in Paris. Their loss by a felony of this magnitude
would be immense."
Mademoiselle Milan listened with an air of indifference that was
absolutely freezing.
"You may think it singular, also, that when, shortly afterward, you
started for Bordeaux, I went by the same train; and that when you
concluded to prolong your journey to Brazil by the French packet, via
Lisbon, it was _I_ who assisted with your luggage."
"There is nothing low enough to be singular in M. Dupleisis."
"Mademoiselle Milan, one week ago you and Edgar Fay went into the
hall-way of Mr. Reed's house together, and you went _out_ alone. Denial
is useless, for I _saw_ you. If you remember, the door was banged
violently, and it was you who did it. A careless servant locked him in.
He opened the secret vault in that table, and abstracted diamonds worth
a million. You were wise in courting the Minister of War and Chief of
Police, but your passports have been stopped. No power under heaven can
get you out of Rio."
For the first time her countenance changed, and she looked at Dupleisis
with a smile of contemptuous pity.
"So I was not wrong in suspecting you to be an agent of the police. How
strong an alloy of cunning exists in every fool! The man whom you
believe to have stolen a million is my own brother. The letter which
caused this display of sagacity was paid for out of my wretched weekly
earnings. At the sacrifice of every _sou_ I owned, I came here to thwart
the plot it spoke of."
Dupleisis glanced at her with an incredulous sneer.
"He wrote to Paris for a woman to assist him,--what weaklings you men
are!--and, utterly unable to prevent the larceny, I pretended to be his
accomplice. While you were exposing your ill-breeding by coarse
criticisms on a people in every way your superior, I substituted for the
real diamonds the paste gems you were so particular in noticing. What
was stolen is my property. Go back to Mr. Reed, and tell him his
diamonds are bundled into an old hat that hangs on the wall of his
sitting-room; and tell him, furthermore, it was I who put them there. I
did court the favor of the Minister of War, but it was to put that man
in the army. I have watched over him for years, and, by the blessing of
God, I will watch over him to the end. He has never known me, nor will
he----" Suddenly she turned livid, and nervously clasped her hands over
her breast.
"M. Dupleisis, I regret my inability to be present at the Assembly; but,
really, I am engaged."
Dupleisis looked at her in astonishment.
Edgar Fay, pale and trembling, was standing behind them. He must have
heard every word; for he sunk helplessly and faint on the floor, hiding
his face in the depth of his degradation.
Why should we follow them any further? _Can_ I tell how the miserable
man, cringing at the feet of that pure woman, narrated his dreary
history of folly, extravagance, and dishonor? Need it be said that,
through all his dissipation, frivolity, and crime, his gentle sister
clung to him, and, smiling through her tears, bade him go and sin no
more? She stole upon him like a shadow in the night, and, her labor of
love ended, faded away. No entreaty of the generous diamond-dealer
dissuaded her; no apology of the detective turned her from the one fixed
purpose. The star of the _Alcasar_ rose, culminated, and disappeared in
two weeks.
O woman! I have seen you in the brilliant whirl of society, where all
was gayety, gallantry, and splendor. I have seen your eyes flash
triumphant, and daintily gaitered feet move fast and furious to the
music of _les pièces d'or_. I have seen brave men stand fascinated at
your side, and careless youth overflow the bumper of Johannisberger to
health, and youth, and beauty. I have heard the stern cynic jingle his
Napoleons in unison with the frantic strains, and sneer out, "_Vive la
bagatelle!_" Daughters of marble! daughters of marble! Turn your snowy
arms to the glittering gorgeous, scatter the golden heaps, deluge the
world with champagne. Diamonds, _diamonds_ must win hearts. I have
watched you in a deeper, darker, madder whirl, while I have seen fair,
blooming flowers wither in the hot hands of drunken licentiousness. Oh,
Becky Sharp! Oh, _Dame aux Camellias_! you are but single dandelions in
a parterre of heliotropes!
* * * * *
There was hurrying to and fro on the broad decks. Bustling cabin-boys
rushed hither and thither with great baskets of stores; the
jauntily-arrayed stewardess chatted saucily with her friends in the
shore-boats; sailors slipped quietly over the bulwarks with their
secretly-collected menageries of pets; watermen contended stoutly at the
gangway for a landing near the steps; and dusky _cameradas_ cursed, in
broken French and Portuguese, at the weight of the trunks. Here a
naturalist trembled with anxiety for the fate of a coral; there a
bird-fancier worked himself into a small frenzy at the jostling of big
parrots. Bones, fossils, plants, bottled fish, bananas, oranges, and
mangoes, were mingled in one promiscuous heap. Monkeys of all tribes and
shades of complexion, from the golden Mumasitte to the fierce Machaca,
were crowded pell-mell into passages; and forcing them against the
bulkheads were boxes of wine, jellies, and _doces_ in their
infinitesimal variety. Men and women, crouching in retired places,
hurried through their few broken words of parting, and eyes were dried
for the great heart-throb left for the very last. Off in the painted
boats, ship-chandlers smilingly bowed their _bon voyage_, and faces
pallid with grief gazed with swollen eyes at loved ones convulsed with
emotion. The gorgeous custom-house officer has smoked his last cigarette
and taken his last "dispatch;" the belated passenger, whose agonizing
shrieks and spasmodic contortions finally attracted the attention of the
captain, is at length, carpet-bag in hand, on board, and the sharp crash
of the gong severs the lingering groups.
Who ever made an ocean voyage undismayed by the knell! It is the
trumpet-tongue of reality, awakening the mind from the lethargy of its
distress. The woe of separation, the terror of the journey, the vague
apprehension of the future, meeting, burst upon you in the fullness of
their stern reality. The bewildered mortal turns to gaze at the
companions of his danger, casts a lingering look on those he has left
behind; the groaning paddles, with reluctant plunges, begin their weary
labor; the faces of the cheering crowd, one by one, drop out of the
picture, until distance swallows the whole, and those nearer and dearer
than all earth beside become a memory.
Far aft, under the waving tricolor, stood the woman of our story. Her
fingers twined carelessly through the glittering necklace thrust into
her hand as Percy Reed clambered into his boat, and her eyes rested
sadly on an ungainly transport, already freighting with its cargo of
mortality for the sacrifice at Humaita. The golden glow of the harbor
was lost in the chilly mist; the bare mountain-tops loomed bleakly
through the piles of cloudy haze. White waves curled dismally at the
base of the Pao de Assucar, and the weird shrieks of the sea-gulls on
the rocks that jutted around it made the dreariness more desolate. Far
out in the trackless waste the sky lowered gloomily over the weary
waters. Fit emblem of her path through life--dark was the picture,
threatening the surroundings.
Pray for the woman doomed to a calling she cannot but despise! Pray for
the being overflowing with good thoughts toward all mankind, sentenced
to "tread the wine-press alone!" God have mercy upon us miserable
sinners!
THE END.