The Place of Honeymoons Part 14

"Oh, Barone!" she called. "Am I making you miss this dance?"

"It does not matter, Signorina." The Barone stared keenly at the erect and tense figure at the prima donna's side.

"You will excuse me, Herr Rosen," said Nora, as she laid her hand upon the Barone's arm.

Herr Rosen bowed stiffly; and the two left him standing uncovered in the moonlight.

"What is he doing here? What has he been saying to you?" the Barone demanded. Nora withdrew her hand from his arm. "Pardon me," said he contritely. "I have no right to ask you such questions."

It was not long after midnight when the motor-boat returned to its abiding place. On the way over conversation lagged, and finally died altogether.

Mrs. Harrigan fell asleep against Celeste's shoulder, and the musician never deviated her gaze from the silver ripples which flowed out diagonally and magically from the prow of the boat. Nora watched the stars slowly ascend over the eastern range of mountains; and across the fire of his innumerable cigarettes the Barone watched her.

As the boat was made fast to the landing in front of the Grand Hotel, Celeste observed a man in evening dress, lounging against the rail of the quay. The search-light from the customs-boat, hunting for tobacco smugglers, flashed over his face. She could not repress the little gasp, and her hand tightened upon Nora's arm.

"What is it?" asked Nora.

"Nothing. I thought I was slipping."

CHAPTER IX

COLONEL CAXLEY-WEBSTER

Abbott's studio was under the roof of one of the little hotels that stand timorously and humbly, yet expectantly, between the imposing cream-stucco of the Grand Hotel at one end and the elaborate pink-stucco of the Grande Bretegne at the other. The hobnailed shoes of the Teuton (who wears his mountain kit all the way from Hamburg to Palermo) wore up and down the stairs all day; and the racket from the hucksters' carts and hotel omnibuses, arriving and departing from the steamboat landing, the shouts of the begging boatmen, the quarreling of the children and the barking of unpedigreed dogs,--these noises were incessant from dawn until sunset.

The artist glared down from his square window at the ruffled waters, or scowled at the fleeting snows on the mountains over the way. He pa.s.sed some ten or twelve minutes in this useless occupation, but he could not get away from the bald fact that he had acted like a petulant child. To have shown his hand so openly, simply because the Barone had beaten him in the race for the motor-boat! And Nora would understand that he was weak and without backbone. Harrigan himself must have reasoned out the cause for such asinine plays as he had executed in the game of checkers. How many times had the old man called out to him to wake up and move? In spirit he had been across the lake, a spirit in Hades. He was not only a fool, but a coward likewise. He had not dared to

"... put it to the touch To gain or lose it all."

He saw it coming: before long he and that Italian would be at each other's throats.

"Come in!" he called, in response to a sudden thunder on the door.

The door opened and a short, energetic old man, purple-visaged and hawk-eyed, came in. "Why the devil don't you join the Trappist monks, Abbott? If I wasn't tough I should have died of apoplexy on the second landing."

"Good morning, Colonel!" Abbott laughed and rolled out the patent rocker for his guest. "What's on your mind this morning? I can give you one without ice."

"I'll take it neat, my boy. I'm not thirsty, I'm faint. These Italian architects; they call three ladders flights of stairs! ... Ha! That's Irish whisky, and jolly fine. Want you to come over and take tea this afternoon. I'm going up presently to see the Harrigans. Thought I'd go around and do the thing informally. Taken a fancy to the old chap. He's a little bit of all right. I'm no older than he is, but look at the difference! Whisky and soda, that's the racket. Not by the tubful; just an ordinary half dozen a day, and a dem climate thrown in."

"Difference in training."

"Rot! It's the sized hat a man wears. I'd give fifty guineas to see the old fellow in action. But, I say; recall the argument we had before you went to Paris?"

"Yes."

"Well, I win. Saw him bang across the street this morning."

Abbott muttered something.

"What was that?"

"Nothing."

"Sounded like 'dem it' to me."

"Maybe it did."

"Heard about him in Paris?"

"No."

"The old boy had transferred his regiment to a lonesome post in the North to cool his blood. The youngster took the next train to Paris. He was there incognito for two weeks before they found him and bundled him back.

Of course, every one knows that he is but a crazy lad who's had too much freedom." The colonel emptied his gla.s.s. "I feel dem sorry for Nora. She's the right sort. But a woman can't take a man by the scruff of his neck and chuck him."

"But I can," declared Abbott savagely.

"Tut, tut! He'd eat you alive. Besides, you will find him too clever to give you an opening. But he'll bear watching. He's capable of putting her on a train and running away with her. Between you and me, I don't blame him. What's the matter with sicking the Barone on him? He's the best man in Southern Italy with foils and broadswords. Sic 'em, Towser; sic 'em!"

The old fire-eater chuckled.

The subject was extremely distasteful to the artist. The colonel, a rough soldier, whose diplomacy had never risen above the heights of clubbing a recalcitrant Hill man into submission, baldly inferred that he understood the artist's interest in the rose of the Harrigan family. He would have liked to talk more in regard to the interloper, but it would have been sheer folly. The colonel, in his blundering way, would have brought up the subject again at tea-time and put everybody on edge. He had, unfortunately for his friends, a reputation other than that of a soldier: he posed as a peacemaker. He saw trouble where none existed, and the way he patched up imaginary quarrels would have strained the patience of Job. Still, every one loved him, though they lived in mortal fear of him. So Abbott came about quickly and sailed against the wind.

"By the way," he said, "I wish you would let me sketch that servant of yours. He's got a profile like a medallion. Where did you pick him up?"

"In the Hills. He's a Sikh, and a first-cla.s.s fighting man. Didn't know that you went for faces."

"Not as a usual thing. Just want it for my own use. How does he keep his beard combed that way?"

"I've never bothered myself about the curl of his whiskers. Are my clothes laid out? Luggage attended to? Guns s.h.i.+pshape? That's enough for me. Some day you have got to go out there with me."

"Never shot a gun in all my life. I don't know which end to hold at my shoulder."

"Teach you quick enough. Every man's a born hunter. Rao will have tigers eating out of your hand. He's a marvel; saved my hide more than once.

Funny thing; you can't show 'em that you're grateful. Lose caste if you do. I rather miss it. Get the East in your blood and you'll never get it out. Fascinating! But my liver turned over once too many times. Ha! Some one coming up to buy a picture."

The step outside was firm and unwearied by the climb. The door opened unceremoniously, and Courtlandt came in. He stared at the colonel and the colonel returned the stare.

"Caxley-Webster! Well, I say, this globe goes on shrinking every day!"

cried Courtlandt.

The two pumped hands energetically, sizing each other up critically. Then they sat down and shot questions, while Abbott looked on bewildered.

Elephants and tigers and chittahs and wild boar and quail-running and strange guttural names; weltering nights in the jungles, freezing mornings in the Hills; stupendous card games; and what had become of so-and-so, who always drank his whisky neat; and what's-his-name, who invented cures for snake bites!

Abbott deliberately pushed over an oak bench. "Am I host here or not?"

"Abby, old man, how are you?" said Courtlandt, smiling warmly and holding out his hand. "My apologies; but the colonel and I never expected to see each other again. And I find him talking with you up here under this roof.

It's marvelous."