MAIDA’S NUPTIALS.
For some time after Lenox had gone there was much excitement at
the Capucines. But gradually the excitement wore itself out, as
excitement always does. Baccarat for that night, at least, had lost its
allurement. The habitués dispersed, some to other clubs, some to their
homes, and soon the great rooms were deserted by all, save one deaf
man, who, undisturbed by the commotion, had given himself up to the
task of memorizing Sarcey’s feuilleton.
Among the earliest to leave was Mr. Incoul. “Come,” he said to
Blydenburg, “you have seen enough for one evening,” and Blydenburg got
into his coat and followed his companion to the street. They walked
some distance before either of them spoke, but when they reached the
hotel at which Blydenburg was stopping, that gentleman halted at an
adjacent lamp-post.
“I must say, Incoul,” he began, “and I hope you will take it very
kindly--I must say that I think you might have left that matter for
some one else to discover. Why, hang it all! Leigh is a friend of your
wife’s; you know all his people; to you the money was nothing. Really,
Incoul, damn me if I don’t think it hard-hearted. I don’t care that for
what those frog-eaters say; the cards you said were marked, don’t weigh
with me in the least; no, not an atom; it is my opinion that the young
man was just as innocent as a child unborn. No, sir, you can’t make me
believe that he--that he--I hate to say the word--that he cheated. Why,
man alive! I had my eyes on him the whole time. A better-looking fellow
never breathed, and he just chucked out the cards one after another
without so much as looking at them; it seemed to me that he didn’t care
a rap whether he won or lost. I put down a louis or two myself, and he
never noticed it; he left the whole thing to the croupier, and now that
I come to think of it--”
“Yes, I know,” Mr. Incoul interrupted. “I am sorry myself.”
“Well then I’ll be shot if you look so. Good night to you,” and with
that Blydenburg stamped up to the hotel, rang the bell, and slammed the
door behind him.
Mr. Incoul walked on. The annoyance of his friend affected him like
a tonic; he continued his way refreshed. Presently he reached a cab
stand. The clock marked 11.50. He had other duties, and he let himself
into an Urbaine and told the man to drive to the Parc Monceau. On
arriving he tossed a coin to the cabby and entered the house.
In the vestibule a footman started from a nap. Mr. Incoul went up
to the floor above and waited, the door ajar. For a little space he
heard the man moving about, whispering to a fellow footman. But soon
the whispering ceased. Evidently the men had gone. Assured of this,
he opened a drawer and took from it a steel instrument, one that in
certain respects resembled a key; the haft, however, was unusually
large, the end was not blunt but hollow, yet fashioned like a pincer,
and the projecting tongue which, in the case of an ordinary key serves
to lock and unlock, was absent. This he put in his pocket. He went out
in the hall and listened again. The house was very quiet. He made sure
that the footmen had really gone, and walking on tip-toe to his wife’s
door, rapped ever so noiselessly.
“Is it you, Harmon?” he heard her ask. Had he wished he had no time to
answer. A key turned in the lock, the door was opened, and before him
Maida stood, smiling a silent welcome to his first visit to her room.
As he entered and closed the door her lips parted; she would have
spoken, but something in his face repelled her; the smile fell from her
face and the words remained unuttered.
He stood a moment rubbing his hands frigidly, as were he cold, yet
the room was not chilly. There was no fire in the grate, but two gas
fixtures gave out sufficient heat to warm it unassisted. Then presently
he looked at her. She had thrown herself on a lounge near the hearth,
and was certainly most fair to see. Her white gown had been replaced by
one of looser cut; her neck and arms were no longer bare, but one foot
shod in fur that the folds of the skirt left visible was stockingless
and the wonder of her hair was unconfined.
He found a chair and seated himself before her. “Madam,” he said at
last, “I am here at your request.”
The girl started as were she stung.
“You were obliging enough this evening to inform me that we had come
into our own. What is it?” His eyebrows were raised and about his thin
lips was just the faintest expression of contempt. “What is it into
which we have come?”
Maida grew whiter than the whitest ermine; she moved her hand as would
she answer, but he motioned her to be silent.
“I will tell you,” he continued in his measured way, “and you will
pardon me if the telling is long. Before it was my privilege to make
your acquaintance I was not, as you know, a bachelor; my wife”--and
he accentuated the possessive pronoun as had he had but one--“was to
me very dear. When I lost her, I thought at first there was nothing
left me, but with time I grew to believe that life might still be
livable. It is easy for you to understand that in my misfortune I
was not dogmatic. I knew that no one is perfect, and I felt that if
my wife had seemed perfection to me it was because we understood and
loved one another. Then, too, as years passed I found my solitude very
tedious. I was, it is true, no longer young, but I was not what the
world has agreed to call old; and I thought that among the gracious
women whom I knew it might be possible for me to find one who would
consent to dispel the solitude, and who might perhaps be able to
bring me some semblance of my former happiness. It was under these
conditions that I met you. You remember what followed. I saw that you
were beautiful, more so, indeed, than my wife, and I imagined that you
were honest and self-respecting--in fact, a girl destined to become a
noble woman. It was then that I ventured to address you. You told me
of your poverty; I begged you to share the money which was mine; you
told me that you did not love me. I answered that I would wait. I was
glad to share the money with you. I was willing to wait. I knew that
you would adorn riches; I believed that I could win your love, and I
felt that the winning would be pleasant. I even admired you for the
agreement which you suggested. I thought it could not come from any
one not wholly refined and mistress of herself. In short, believing in
your frankness, I offered you what I had to give. In return what did I
ask? The opportunity to be with you, the opportunity of winning your
affection and therewith a little trust, a little confidence and the
proper keeping of my name. Surely I was not extravagant in my demands.
And you, for all your frankness, omitted to tell me the one thing
essential: you omitted to tell me--”
“Do not say it,” the girl wailed; “do not say it.” The tears were
falling, her form was rocked with sobs. She was piteous before him who
knew not what pity was.
He had risen and she crouched as though she feared he had risen to
strike her.
“Of your lover whom I caught to-night cheating at cards.”
He had struck her indeed. She looked up through her tears astonished at
the novelty of the blow, and yet still she did not seem to understand.
She stared at him vacantly as though uncertain of the import of his
words.
“Of your lover,” he repeated; “the blackleg.”
She rose from her seat. She was trembling from head to foot. To
support herself she stretched a hand to the mantel and clutching it,
she steadied herself. Then, still looking him in the face, she said
huskily, “You tell me Lenox Leigh cheated at cards? It is not true!”
“He _is_ your lover, then!” hissed Incoul, and into his green, dilated
eyes there came a look of such hideous hate that the girl shrank back.
In her fear she held out her arms as though to shield herself from him,
and screamed aloud. “You are going to kill me!” she cried.
“Be quiet,” he answered, “you will wake the house.”
But the order was needless. The girl fell backwards on the lounge. He
stood and looked at her without moving. Presently she moaned; her eyes
opened and her sobs broke out afresh. And still he gazed as though in
the enjoyment of a hope fulfilled.
“Now get to your bed,” he said, at last.
His eyes searched the room. On a table was a pink box labeled bromide
of potassium, and filled with powders wrapped in tin foil. He opened
and smelled of one and then opened another and poured the contents of
both into a glass which he half filled with water.
“Drink it,” he said.
She obeyed dumbly. The tears fell into the glass as she drank. But in a
little while her sobs came only intermittently. “I will sleep now,” she
murmured, helplessly. “I think I will sleep now.” Yet still he waited.
Her head had fallen far back on the sofa, her hair drooped about her
shoulders, her lips were gray.
He took her in his arms and carried her to the bed. One of her furred
slippers dropped on the way, the other he took from her. The foot it
held hardly filled his palm. He loosened her gown. He would have taken
it off but he feared to awake her. Was she really asleep, he wondered.
He peered down at her eyelids but they did not move. Surely she slept.
A door that led to a dressing-room was open. He closed it. The chair in
which he had sat he restored to its original position. Then he turned
out the gas. On each of the fixtures his fingers rested the fraction of
a minute longer than was necessary. He groped to the door, opened it
noiselessly and listened. There was no sound. The house was still as a
tomb. He closed the door behind him and drawing the nameless instrument
from his pocket he inserted it carefully in the keyhole, gave it a
quick turn and went to his room.