Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo Part 57

She looked timidly into his eyes. A new feeling was upon her. She gave him her hand almost shyly. Her voice trembled.

"If I come," she whispered, "you are quite sure that you mean it all?

You are quite sure that you will not change?"

He raised her hand to his lips.

"Not in this world, dear," he answered, with sublime confidence, "nor any other!"

She stole away from him. He was left alone upon the terrace, alone, but with the exquisite conviction of her return, promised in that last half-tremulous, half-smiling look over her shoulder. Then suddenly life seemed to come to him with a rush, a new life, filled with a new splendour. He was almost humbly conscious of bigger things than he had ever realised, a nearness to the clouds, a wonderful, thrilling sense of complete and absolute happiness.... Reluctantly he came back to earth.

His thoughts became practical. He went to the back of his car, drew out a rocket on a stick and thrust it firmly into the lawn. Then he started his engine and almost immediately afterwards she came. She was wearing a white silk motor-coat and a thick veil. Behind her came a bewildered French maid, carrying wraps, and a man-servant with a heavy dressing-case. In silence these things were stowed away. She took her place in the car. Lane struck a match and stepped on to the lawn.

"Don't be frightened," he said. "Here goes!"

A rocket soared up into the sky. Then he seated himself beside her and they glided off.

"That means," he explained, "that they'll let your father and the others off in two hours. Give us plenty of time to get to Nice. Have you--left any word for him?"

"I have left a very short message," she answered, "to say that I was going to marry you. He will never forgive me, and I feel very wicked and very ungrateful."

"Anything else?" he whispered, leaning a little towards her.

She sighed.

"And very happy," she murmured.

CHAPTER x.x.xVIII

HONEYMOONING

Hunterleys saw the Right Honourable Meredith Simpson and Monsieur Douaille off to Paris early that morning. Then he called round at the hospital to find that Sidney Roche was out of danger, and went on to the villa with the good news. On his way back he stayed chatting with the bank manager until rather later than usual, and afterwards strolled on to the Terrace, where he looked with some eagerness towards a certain point in the bay. The _Minnehaha_ had departed. Mr. Grex and his friends, then, had been set free. Hunterleys returned to the hotel thoughtfully. At the entrance he came across two or three trunks being wheeled out, which seemed to him somehow familiar. He stopped to look at the initials. They were his wife's.

"Is Lady Hunterleys leaving to-day?" he asked the luggage-porter.

"By the evening train, sir," the man announced. "She would have caught the _Cote d'Azur_ this morning but there was no place on the train."

Hunterleys was perplexed. Some time after luncheon he enquired for Lady Hunterleys and found that she was not in the hotel. A reception clerk thought that he had seen her go through on her way to the Sporting Club.

Hunterleys, after some moments of indecision, followed her. He was puzzled at her impending departure, unable to account for it. The Draconmeyers, he knew, proposed to stay for another month. He walked thoughtfully along the private way and climbed the stairs into the Club.

He looked for his wife in her usual place. She was not there. He made a little promenade of the rooms and eventually he found her amongst the spectators around the baccarat table. He approached her at once.

"You are not playing?"

She started at the sound of his voice. She was dressed very simply in travelling clothes, and there were lines under her eyes, as though she were fatigued.

"No," she admitted, "I am not playing."

"I understood in the hotel," he continued, "that you were leaving to-day."

"I am going back to England," she announced. "It does not amuse me here any longer."

He realised at once that something had happened. A curious sense of excitement stole into his blood.

"If you are not playing here, will you come and sit down for a few moments?" he invited. "I should like to talk to you."

She followed him without a word. He led the way to one of the divans in the roulette room.

"Your favourite place," he remarked, "is occupied."

She nodded.

"I have given up playing," she told him.

He looked at her in some surprise. She drew a little breath and kept her eyes steadily averted.

"You will probably know sometime or other," she continued, "so I will tell you now. I have lost four thousand pounds to Mr. Draconmeyer. I am going back to England to realise my own money, so as to be able to pay him at once."

"You borrowed four thousand pounds from Mr. Draconmeyer?" he repeated incredulously.

"Yes! It was very foolish, I know, and I have lost every penny of it. I am not the first woman, I suppose, who has lost her head at Monte Carlo," she added, a little defiantly.

"Does Mr. Draconmeyer know that you are leaving?" he asked.

"Not yet," she answered, after a moment's hesitation. "I had an interview with him yesterday and I realised at once that the money must be paid, and without delay. I realised, too, that it was better I should leave Monte Carlo and break off my a.s.sociation with these people for the present."

In a sense it was a sordid story, yet to Hunterleys her words sounded like music.

"I am very pleased indeed," he said quietly, "that you feel like that.

Draconmeyer is not a man to whom I should like my wife to owe money for a moment longer than was absolutely necessary."

"Your estimate of him was correct," she confessed slowly. "I am sorry, Henry."

He rose suddenly to his feet. An inspiration had seized him.

"Come," he declared, "we will pay Draconmeyer back without sending you home to sell your securities. Come and stand with me."

She looked at him in amazement.

"Henry!" she exclaimed. "You are not going to play? Don't! Take my advice and don't!"

He laughed.

"We'll see," he replied confidently. "You wouldn't believe that I was a fatalist, would you? I am, though. Everything that I had hoped for seems to be happening to-day. You have found out Draconmeyer, we have checkmated Mr. Grex, I have drunk the health of Felicia and David Briston--"

"Felicia and David Briston?" she interrupted quickly. "What do you mean?"