The Princess Passes Part 43

The windows of the Casino were open, protected by awnings; birds were taking their last flight, before going to bed in some orange or lemon tree. The place was more charming than in the high season; but the face I looked for was not to be seen, and I deserted the Terrace for the Rooms.

I had not been to "Monte" since the Boer war; and when I had gone through the formalities at the Bureau, and entered the first _salle_, it struck me strangely to find everything exactly as I had left it years ago.

The same heavy stillness, emphasised by the continuous c.h.i.n.k, c.h.i.n.k of gold and silver, and broken only by the announcement of events at different tables: "_Onze, noir, impair et manque";--"Rien ne va plus";--"Zero!_"

The same _onze_; the same _rien n'va plus_; the same _zero_ heralded in the same secretly joyous, outwardly apologetic tone, by the croupiers fortunate enough to produce it. The same croupiers too;--(or do croupiers develop a family likeness of face, of voice, of coat, as the years go c.h.i.n.king zeroly on?). The same players, or their _doppelgangers_; the same pictured nymphs smiling on the ornate walls. But there was no Boy, no Boy's sister; and suddenly it occurred to me that I was foolish to expect him. He was too childlike in appearance to have obtained a ticket of admission to the gambling rooms.

Since it was useless to look for him here, and no other place seemed promising at this hour, there was nothing to do but pa.s.s the moments until time to change for dinner. Accordingly I watched the tables.

Once, like most men of my age, I had been bitten by the roulette fever and had wrestled with "systems" in their thousands, not so much for the mere "gamble," as for the joy of striving to beat the wily Pascal at his own invention.

In those old days the wheel had been like a populous town for me, inhabited by quaint little people, each living in his own snug house; the Little People of Roulette. Not a number on the board but his face was familiar to me; I would have known him if I had met him in the street. There was sly, thin, dark little Dix, always sneaking up on tiptoe when you did not want him, and popping out behind your back.

Business-like, successful, bustling Onze; tactless but honest Douze; treacherous yet fascinating Treize; blundering Seize; graceful, brunette Dix-Sept; and the faithful, friendly Vingtneuf; feminine Rouge; brusque, virile Noir; mean little, underbred Manque, and senile Pa.s.se; priggish Pair with his skittish young wife; the Dozens, _nouveaux-riches_, thinking themselves a cut above the humbler Simple Chances in Roulette Society; the upright, unbending Columns; the raffish Chevaux; the excitable Transversales, and the brilliant Carres; charming on first acquaintance, but fickle as friends; the twin, blind dwarfs, the Coups des Deux; these and many more, down to the wretched, worried Intermittances, ever in a violent hurry to catch a train but never catching it. I could see them all, still; but I saw them pa.s.s with calmness now, for I wanted to find the Boy.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER x.x.xI

The Boy's Sister

"A little thing would make me tell ... how much I lack of a man."

--SHAKESPEARE.

The palace clock over in Monaco was striking eight as I reached the steps of the Hotel de Paris. Eight had been the hour appointed. Now, here were both the Hour and the Man: but where was the Boy?

I walked into the gay restaurant, with its window-wall, and the long rank of candle-lit tables ready for dinner. Twenty people, perhaps, were dining; but there was no slim figure in short black jacket, Eton collar, and loose silk tie; no curly chestnut head; no blue-star eyes.

Cordially disliking everybody present, I marched down the length of the room, and took a corner table, which was laid for four. On the sparkling snow of the damask cloth burned a bonfire of scarlet geraniums, and two red-shaded wax candles, of the kind which the Boy used to call "candles with nostrils," made wavering rose-lights on the white expanse.

I sat down, and an attentive waiter appeared at my elbow, having apparently shot up from the floor like a pantomime demon.

"Monsieur desires dinner for one?" he deferentially enquired.

"I am expecting one or perhaps two friends," I replied. "I will wait for them half an hour. If they do not come by the end of that time, I will dine alone."

"Will Monsieur please to regard the menu?"

"Yes, thanks."

He put it in my hand with an appetizing bow, which would have been almost as good as an _hors d'oeuvre_ had my mood been appreciative of delicacies. But it was not; neither could I fix my mind upon the ordering of a dinner. My eyes would keep jumping to the gla.s.s door at the far end of the room. "I want the best dinner the house can serve,"

I said, meanly s.h.i.+fting responsibility. "Not too long a dinner, but--oh well, you may tell the chef I depend upon his choice."

"I quite understand, Monsieur. A dinner to please a lady, is it not?"

"Yes. Something to please a lady." Was there not the Boy's sister to be catered for in case she should come? In thinking of him I must not forget her. But then, how improbable it was that my poor dinner would be tasted by either!

"And for wine, Monsieur?"

I ordered at random the brand of champagne which had seemed like nectar to the Boy and me that evening in far away Aosta, when the compact of our friends.h.i.+p was first made. But yes, certainly, it was to be had. And it should in an all little moment be on the ice.

The waiter glided away to make that little moment less, and I was left to measure it and its brothers. One after another they pa.s.sed. What a pity the moment family is such a large one! I stared at the gla.s.s door. Other men's friends came in by it, but not mine. I glared at the window close to which I sat. The peculiarly theatrical effect of daylight melting into night, as seen at Monte Carlo and nowhere else, added to the sensation of suspense I felt, as when the curtain is about to rise on the crowning act of an exciting play.

The scene out there in the Place was exactly like a setting for the stage. The great white Casino, with the constant _va et vient_ to and from the open doorway; the bubbly domes of the fantastically Moorish cafe across the way; the velvet gra.s.s, unnaturally green in the electric light; the flower beds in the garden a mosaic floor of coloured jewels; the air blue as a gauze veil, with diamonds s.h.i.+ning through its meshes; and over all a serene arch of hyacinth sky, pulsing with smouldering ashes-of-rose just above the purple line of mountain-tops.

A carriage drove quickly past the window, and stopped, far on at the main door of the hotel. More people for dinner; but not the Boy. I indistinctly saw a tall man and two ladies in long evening cloaks step out; then I turned my eyes elsewhere.

Over on the brightly lighted balcony of the Cafe de Paris opposite, the "out-of-season" musicians were playing "Sole Mio," and the yearning strains of that simple, hackneyed Italian love song stirred my veins oddly.

The gla.s.s door down at the other end of the room opened, and the movement there caught my eyes. A girl came in, alone, and stood still as if looking for someone--her slender white figure, in its long flowing cloak, clearly outlined against a darker background. She was alone, and there was n.o.body to introduce us, no one to tell me who she was, but the beautiful face as so marvellously like one I knew, that I jumped up instantly. The Boy's sister! She must have come, with friends, and be looking for him. Then, he was here, or would be!

I have a vague remembrance of treading on several trains as I went to meet her, intending to introduce myself, as her brother had not arrived. The restaurant seemed suddenly to have become a mile long, and she was at the other end of it. So was I, at last, holding out my hand to the white girl with a large black hat, and diamond pins winking in the curly chestnut hair which they held in place.

She was so astonis.h.i.+ngly like him! Now that I had come closer, the resemblance was incredible. The hair; the soft oval of the little face; the eyes--the great, star-eyes!

I forgot everything but that one figure, lily-white, and swaying like a lily, as it stood. Luckily, there was no one near to see, or think of us. The diners dined, as if this were an ordinary night, as if there might be other such nights again.

"Who are you?" I said as if in a dream.

A wave of colour swept up from the small, firm chin, to the rings of chestnut hair. "I--why, I'm the Boy's sister," a low voice stammered.

"He--sent me. I've a letter from him. My friends are outside. They will be here soon, but I--I came. You are--I suppose you are Man----"

"And I know you are Boy, Boy himself. I mean, he never was--for heaven's sake tell me--but no, I don't need to ask. I've got my Little Pal back again, that's all."

"Oh, if I'd been sure you would guess--if I had known you would talk to me like this, I should not have dared to come."

"Yes, you would. For you are brave; and you owed me this."

"I'm ashamed to look you in the face. What must you think of me?"

"Think? I'm past thinking. I'm thanking the G.o.ds. If I could think at all it would be of myself, that I was a fool not to--and yet, _was_ I a fool? You _were_ a boy then. Even the Contessa----"

"Oh, don't! Where can we sit? I must tell you everything--explain everything. I can't wait. In a few minutes Molly and Jack will come."

"Good heavens!"

"Yes. Didn't you guess? I'm the Perpetual Mushroom,--Mercedes--Roy--Laurence. Oh, Man, Man, how have I dared everything--and most of all this meeting? To fight that duel would have been easier. I think I would never have ventured after all, I would have stayed a Mushroom always, and let the Boy be buried and forgotten; but Molly wouldn't let me."

"G.o.d bless Molly."

I suppose I must have led her to my table, for at this juncture we found ourselves there.

"Will Monsieur have dinner served?" breathed a voice out of the hazy unrealities that shut us two in alone together.

"Dinner by-and-bye," I heard myself murmuring, as one brushes away a buzzing insect. "Yes,--dinner by-and-bye--for four."

"Man," the Girl began; and then was silent.