If Sinners Entice Thee Part 34

Liane said nothing. She had not failed to notice his anxiety when Mademoiselle Bertholet had explained how Mariette had watched him, and she wondered whether, after all, he feared this remarkable woman who had played such a prominent part in their past lives; this notorious gambler who was her bitterest foe.

She was already tired of Nice, and recognised that to remain longer was only to endanger herself. The Nemesis she had so long dreaded seemed to be closing upon her.

In the Boulevard Carabacel they took an open cab to drive home, but while crossing the Place opposite the Post Office they encountered George Stratfield walking. As he pa.s.sed he raised his hat to Liane, and she greeted him with a smile of sadness.

Zertho noticed the young Englishman, and his bearded face grew dark.

"What! So your lover is also here!" he exclaimed in surprise, turning to catch another glance of the well set-up figure in light grey tweed.

She had carefully concealed from him and from her father the fact that George had come to Nice.

"Yes," she answered simply, looking straight before her.

"Why did you hide the truth from me?" he demanded angrily.

"Because the knowledge that he was here could not have benefited you,"

she answered.

"You have met him, of course, clandestinely," he said, regarding her with knit brows.

"I do not deny it."

"And you have told him, I hope, that you are to be my wife?"

"I have," she sighed.

"Then you must not meet again. You understand," he exclaimed fiercely.

"Send the fellow back to London."

She bit her lip, but made no answer. Her eyes were filled with tears.

Without any further words they drove rapidly along the Promenade, at that hour chill after the fading of the sun, until the cab with its jingling bells pulled up before the Pension, and Liane alighted. For an instant she turned to him, bowing, then entered the villa.

Her father was out, and on going into her own room she locked the door, cast down her sunshade, tossed her hat carelessly aside, and pus.h.i.+ng her hair from her fevered brow with both hands, stood at the open window gazing aimlessly out upon the sea. A sense of utter loneliness crept over her forlorn heart. She was, she told herself, entirely friendless, now that her father desired her to marry Zertho. Hers had been at best a cheerless, melancholy life, yet it was now without either hope, happiness, or love. The sea stretching before her was like her own future, impenetrable, a great grey expanse, dismal and limitless, without a single gleam of brightness, growing every instant darker, more obscure, more mysterious.

Thoughts of the man she loved so fondly surged through her troubled mind. She remembered how sad and melancholy he had looked when she had pa.s.sed him by; how bitterly he had smiled when she bowed to him. The memory of his dear face brought back to her all the terrible past, all the hopelessness of the future, all the hideousness of the truth.

She sank beside her bed, and burying her face in the white coverlet gave way to her emotion, shedding a torrent of tears.

The dusk deepened, the twilight faded and darkness fell, still she sobbed on, murmuring constantly the name of the one man on earth she loved.

A low tapping at the door aroused her, and thinking it was her father she hastily dried her eyes and stumbled blindly across the dark room to admit him. It was, however, the Provencal _femme de chambre_, who handed her a note, saying in her quaint patois--

"A letter for Mademoiselle. It was brought a minute or two ago by a man who gave it to me, with strict injunctions to give it only into Mademoiselle's own hands."

"Thank you, Justine," she answered, in a low hoa.r.s.e voice, then, closing the door again, she lit a candle, and mechanically tearing open the note found that it was dated from the Villa Fortunee, Monaco, and signed by Mariette. In it the woman who was her enemy made a strange request.

She first asked that she should say no word to her father or to Zertho regarding the receipt of the note or inform them of her address, and then, continuing, she wrote: "To-morrow, at two o'clock, call upon George Stratfield, who is, as you know, staying at the Grand Hotel, and he will bring you over here to my house. It is imperative that I should see you. Fear nothing, but come. George is my friend, and he will be awaiting you."

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

SINNED AGAINST.

Liane's first inclination was not to comply with the request, for knowing the crafty nature of this woman, she feared that the words had been written merely to place her off her guard. Yet immediately after luncheon at the Villa Chevrier on the following day she declared her intention of going down to the English library to get some books, and leaving her father and the Prince smoking over their liqueurs, went out upon the Promenade. As soon, however, as she was out of sight of the windows of the villa, she hailed a pa.s.sing cab and drove to the Grand Hotel, where she found George sitting in a wicker-chair in the doorway, consoling himself by smoking a cigarette and awaiting her.

"You have come at last," he cried, approaching the carriage. "Don't get out. We will drive straight to the station," and stepping in, he gave the man directions.

"What does this mean?" inquired Liane, eagerly.

"I cannot tell its meaning, dearest," he answered. "I merely received a note, saying that you would call for me on your way to Monaco."

"Have you no idea why she desires to see both of us?"

"None whatever," he replied.

"You have found her," she observed in a deep, earnest tone. "In my letter she says that you are her friend. You don't know her true character, I suppose," his well-beloved added, looking earnestly into his eyes. "If you did you would not visit her."

"She lives in an air of the most severe respectability," he said. "I dined at the Villa Fortunee the night before last, and found her an extremely pleasant hostess."

She smiled. Then, while driving along the Avenue de la Gare to the station she told him of Mariette's past in similar words to those used by Madame Bertholet. He sat listening eagerly, but a dark shadow crossed his features when, in conclusion, she added, "Such, unfortunately, is the woman who is to be bribed to marry you."

They alighted, obtained their tickets, crossed the platform, and entered the _rapide_. It was crowded with people going to Monte Carlo, and the tunnels rendered the journey hot, dusty and unpleasant. Nevertheless the distance was not far, and when half-an-hour later they were ascending the steep winding way which led up to the rock of Monaco, Liane's heart sank within her, for she feared that she was acting unwisely.

"It is very remarkable that Mariette should have written to us both in this manner," George was saying as he strolled on beside the pale-faced graceful girl. "Evidently she desires to consult us upon some matter of urgency. Perhaps it concerns us both. Who knows?"

"It may," she answered mechanically. "She is not, however, a person to trust. Women of her character have, alas! neither feeling nor honour."

"Is she, then, so notoriously bad?" he asked in surprise.

"You know who and what I am," she answered, turning to him, her grave grey eyes fixed upon his. "I have been forced against my inclination to frequent the gambling-rooms through months, nay years, and I knew Mariette Lepage long ago as the most vicious of all the women who hovered about the tables in search of dupes."

By her manner he saw that she was annoyed, and jealous that he should have visited and dined with this woman so strangely referred to in his father's will, and he hastened to re-a.s.sure her that there was but one woman in the world for him.

"Then you will not marry her?" she cried eagerly. "Do not, for my sake.

If you knew all you would rather cast the money into yonder sea than become her husband."

"Well," he said, "it is imperative that she should be offered the bribe to become my wife. If she refuses I shall gain fifty thousand pounds.

I have thought of buying her refusal by offering to divide equally with her the sum I shall obtain."

"Excellent!" she cried, enthusiastically. "I never thought of that. If she will do so the cruel punishment your father intended will be turned to pleasure, and you will be twenty-five thousand pounds the richer."

"I will approach her," he said, after brief hesitation. "You know, darling, that I love you far too well to contemplate marriage with any other woman."

"But remember, I can never become your wife," she observed huskily, her eyes behind her veil filled to overflowing with tears. "I am debarred from that."

"Ah! no," he cried, "don't say that. Let us hope on."

"All hope within me is dead," she answered gloomily. "I care nothing now for the future. In a few brief days we are leaving here, and I shall say farewell, George, never again to meet you."

"You always speak so strangely and so dismally," he said. "You will never tell me anything of the reason you are so irrevocably bound to Zertho. In the old days at Stratfield you always took me into your confidence."

"Yes, yes," she answered, quickly. "I would tell you everything if I could--but I dare not. You would hate me."