Roland Hamerton did not find any trace of her. He had pledged himself
easily, in utter ignorance of all ways and means, to find her, knowing
nothing, neither how to set about such a search, or where he was likely
to meet with success in it. It is easy for a young man, in his fervor,
to declare that he is able to do anything for the girl he loves, and to
feel that in that inspiration he is sure to carry all before him. But
love will not trace the lost even when it is the agony of love for the
lost, and that passion of awful longing, anxiety, and fear which is,
perhaps, the most profound of all human emotions. The fact that he loved
Rosalind did not convert him into that sublimated and heroic version of
a detective officer which is to be found more often in fiction than
reality. He, too, went to all the hotels, as John Trevanion had done; he
walked about incessantly, looking at everybody he met, and trying hard,
in his bad French, to push cunning inquiries everywhere--inquiries which
he thought cunning, but which were in reality only very innocently
anxious, betraying his object in the plainest way. “A tall lady,
English, with remains of great beauty.” “Oui, monsieur, nous la
connaissons;” a dozen such lively responses were made to him, and he was
sent in consequence to wander about as many villas, to prowl in the
gardens of various hotels, rewarded by the sight of some fine
Englishwomen and some scarecrows, but never with the most distant
glimpse of the woman he sought. He did, however, meet and recognize
almost at every turn the young fellow whose appearances at Bonport had
been few since Rosalind’s repulse, but whom he had seen several times
in attendance upon Mrs. Lennox, and of whom he knew that he was
understood to have been seen in the village at Highcourt, presumably on
account of Rosalind, and was therefore a suitor too, and a rival.
Something indefinable in his air, though Roland did not know him
sufficiently to be a just judge, had increased at first the natural
sensation of angry scorn with which a young lover looks upon another man
who has presumed to lift his eyes to the same _objet adoré_; but
presently there arose in his mind something of that same sensation of
fellowship which had drawn him, on the first night of his arrival,
towards Rivers. They were in “the same box.” No doubt she was too good
for any of them, and Everard had not the sign and seal of the English
gentleman about him--the one thing indispensable; but yet there was a
certain brotherhood even in the rivalry. Roland addressed him at last
when he met him coming round one of the corners, where he himself was
posted, gazing blankly at an English lady pointed out to him by an
officious boatman from the lake. His gaze over a wall, his furtive
aspect when discovered, all required, he felt, explanation. “I think we
almost know each other,” he said, in a not unfriendly tone. Everard took
off his hat with the instinct of a man who has acquired such breeding as
he has in foreign countries, an action for which, as was natural, the
Englishman mildly despised him. “I have seen you, at least, often,” he
replied. And then Roland plunged into his subject.
“Look here! You know the Trevanions, don’t you? Oh yes, I heard all
about it--the children and all that. I am a very old friend;” Roland
dwelt upon these words by way of showing that a stranger was altogether
out of competition with him in this respect at least. “There is a lady
in whom they are all--very much interested, to say the least, living
somewhere about here; but I don’t know where, and nobody seems to know.
You seem to be very well up to all the ways of the place; perhaps you
could help me. Ros-- I mean,” said Roland, with a cough to obliterate the
syllable--“they would all be very grateful to any one who would find--”
“What,” said Everard, slowly, looking in Roland’s face, “is the lady’s
name?”
It was the most natural question; and yet the one man put it with a
depth of significance which to a keener observer than Roland would have
proved his previous knowledge; while the other stood entirely
disconcerted, and not knowing how to reply. It was perfectly natural;
but somehow he had not thought of it as a probable question. And he was
not prepared with an answer.
“Oh--ah--her name. Well, she is a kind of a relation, you know--and her
name would be--Trevanion.”
“Oh, her name would be Trevanion? Is there supposed to be any chance
that she would change her name?”
“Why do you ask such a question?”
“I thought, by the way you spoke, as if there might be a doubt.”
“No,” said Roland, after a moment, “I never thought-- I don’t think it’s
likely. Why should she change her name?”
Everard answered with great softness, “I don’t know anything about it.
Something in your tone suggested the idea, but no doubt I am wrong. No,
I cannot say, all in a moment, that I am acquainted--” Here his want of
experience told like Roland’s. He was very willing, nay anxious, to
deceive, but did not know how. He colored, and made a momentary pause.
“But I will inquire,” he said, “if it is a thing that the--Trevanions
want to find out.”
Roland looked at him with instinctive suspicion, but he did not know
what he suspected. He had no desire, however, to put this quest out of
his own hands into those of a man who might make capital of it as he
himself intended to do. He said hastily, “Oh, I don’t want to put you to
trouble. I think I am on the scent. If you hear anything, however, and
would come in and see me at the hotel--to-night.”
The other looked at him with something in his face which Roland did not
understand. Was it a kind of sardonic smile? Was it offence? He ended
by repeating, “I will inquire,” and took off his hat again in that
Frenchified way.
And Roland went on, unaided, somewhat discouraged, indeed, with his
inquiries. Sometimes he saw in the distance a figure in the crowd which
he thought he recognized, and hurried after it, but never with any
success. For either it was gone when he reached the spot, or turned out
to be one of the ordinary people about; for of course there were many
tall ladies wearing black to be seen about the streets of Aix, and most
of them English. He trudged about all that day and the next with a heavy
heart, his high hopes abandoning him, and the search seeming hopeless.
He became aware when night fell that he was not alone in his quest.
There drifted past him at intervals, hurried, flushed, and breathless,
with her cloak hanging from her shoulders, her bonnet blown back from
her head, her eyes always far in front of her, investigating every
corner, a woman so instinct with keen suspicion and what looked like a
thirst for blood that she attracted the looks even of the careless
passers-by, and was followed, till she outstripped him, by more than one
languid gendarme. Her purpose was so much more individual than she was
that, for a time, in the features of this human sleuth-hound he failed
to recognize Russell. But it was Russell, as he soon saw, with a mixture
of alarm and horror. It seemed to him that some tragic force of harm was
in this woman’s hand, and that while he wandered vaguely round and round
discovering nothing, she, grim with hatred and revenge, was on the
track.