The Hillman Part 24

"Warn him?" Louise repeated, with upraised eyebrows. "Dear master, aren't we just a little--do you--melodramatic? The age of duels is past, also the age of hired bravos and a.s.sa.s.sins."

"Agreed," Graillot interrupted, "but the weapons of to-day are more dangerous. It is the souls of their enemies that men attack. If I were a friend of that young man's I would say to him: 'Beware, not of the enmity of Eugene of Seyre, but of his friendship!' And now, dear lady, I have finished. I lingered behind because the world holds no more sincere admirer of yourself and your genius than I. Don't ring. May I not let myself out?"

"Stop!" Louise begged.

Graillot resumed his seat. He watched with an almost painful curiosity the changes in Louise's face, which was convulsed by a storm of pa.s.sionate apprehension. Yet behind it all he could see the truth. There was something softer in her face than he had ever perceived before, a tenderer light than he had ever seen in her eyes. He sighed and looked down at the carpet.

Louise rose presently and walked abruptly to the window. Then she came back and reseated herself by his side.

"You are the one friend I have in life who understands, dear master,"

she said. "Do I weary you if I speak?"

He looked steadfastly into her eyes. His plain, bearded face was heavy-browed, lined, tired a little with the coming of age.

"Louise," he declared, "it is only because I dare not lift my thoughts and eyes any higher that I count myself the greatest friend you ever could have in life!"

She caught at his hand, her head drooped a little.

"Don't overpower me," she faltered. "I can't--no, I can't!"

He watched in silence the twitching of her lips, the filling of her eyes. A momentary remorse struck him. Why should he afflict her at this moment with his own secret? He closed his eyes, and deliberately shut out the vision which had lured his tongue into the byways of unwonted sentiment. He spoke firmly and without emotion.

"Louise," he begged, "let me be your confidant! No man knows more of the game of life as it is played out between men and women. There is no one in whom you can place a greater trust."

Her fingers clutched his, her nails dug into his palm, but he did not flinch.

"I do not know," she murmured, her voice trembling with agitation. "That is the truth of it all. I do not know where to go for guidance or inspiration. Life has suddenly become mysterious. Men seem always so strong and sure. It is only we poor women who lose our bearings."

Graillot patted her hands tenderly. Then he rose to his feet.

"You are not going?" she asked him.

"Dear Louise," he said, "I am going, because the time when I can help is not yet. Listen! More harm has been done in this world by advice than in any other way. I have no advice to give you. You have one sure and certain guide, and that is your own heart, your own instincts, your own sweet consciousness of what is best. I leave you to that. If trouble comes, I am always ready!"

XV

During the remainder of that afternoon and evening John was oppressed by a vague sense of the splendor of his surroundings and his companion's mysterious capacity for achieving impossibilities. Their visits to the tailors, the shirt-makers, the hosiers, and the boot-makers almost resembled a royal progress. All difficulties were waved aside. That night he dined, clothed like other men from head to foot, in the lofty dining room of one of the most exclusive clubs in London. The prince proved an agreeable if somewhat reticent companion. He introduced John to many well-known people, always with that little note of personal interest in his few words of presentation which gave a certain significance to the ceremony.

From the club, where the question of John's proposed membership, the prince acting as his sponsor, was favorably discussed with several members of the committee, they drove to Covent Garden, and for the first time in his life John entered the famous opera-house. The prince, preceded by an attendant, led the way to a box upon the second tier. A woman turned her head as they entered and stretched out her hand, which the prince raised to his lips.

"You see, I have taken you at your word, Eugene," she remarked. "So many evenings I have looked longingly from my stall at your empty box.

To-night I summoned up all my courage, and here I am!"

"You give me a double pleasure, dear lady," the prince declared. "Not only is it a joy to be your host, but you give me also the opportunity of presenting to you my friend, John Strangewey. Strangewey, this is my very distant relative and very dear friend, Lady Hilda Mulloch."

Lady Hilda smiled graciously at John. She was apparently of a little less than middle age, with dark bands of chestnut hair surmounted by a tiara. Her face was the face of a clever and still beautiful woman; her figure slender and dignified; her voice low and delightful.

"Are you paying your nightly homage to Calavera, Mr. Strangewey, or are you only an occasional visitor?" she asked.

"This is my first visit of any sort to Covent Garden," John told her.

She looked at him with as much surprise as good breeding permitted.

John, who had not as yet sat down, seemed almost preternaturally tall in that small box, with its low ceiling. He was looking around the house with the enthusiasm of a boy. Lady Hilda glanced away from him toward the prince, and smiled; then she looked back at John. There was something like admiration in her face.

"Do you live abroad?" she asked.

John shook his head.

"I live in c.u.mberland," he said. "Many people here seem to think that that is the same thing. My brother and I have a farm there."

"But you visit London occasionally, surely?"

"I have not been in London," John told her, "since I pa.s.sed through it on my way home from Oxford, eight years ago."

"But why not?" she persisted.

John laughed a little.

"Well, really," he admitted, "when I come to think of it seriously, I scarcely know. I have lived alone with an elder brother, who hates London and would be very unhappy if I got into the way of coming up regularly. I fancy that I have rather grown into his way of thinking. I am quite satisfied--or rather I have been quite satisfied--to live down there all the year round."

"I have never heard anything so extraordinary in my life!" the woman declared frankly. "Is it the prince who has induced you to break out of your seclusion?"

"Our young friend," the prince explained, "finds himself suddenly in altered circ.u.mstances. He has been left a large fortune, and has come to spend it. Incidentally, I hope, he has come to see something more of your s.e.x than is possible among his mountain wilds. He has come, in short, to look a little way into life."

Lady Hilda leaned back in her chair.

"How romantic!"

"The prince amuses himself," John a.s.sured her. "I don't suppose I shall stay very long in London. I want just to try it for a time."

She looked at him almost wistfully. She was a woman with brains; a woman notorious for the freedom of her life, for her intellectual gifts, for her almost brutal disregard of the conventions of her cla.s.s. The psychological interest of John Strangewey's situation appealed to her powerfully. Besides, she had a weakness for handsome men.

"Of course, it all sounds like a fairy tale," she declared. "Tell me exactly, please, how long you have been in London."

"About forty-eight hours," he answered.

"And what did you do last night?"

"I dined with two friends, we went to the Palace, and one of them took me to a supper club."

She made a little grimace.

"You began in somewhat obvious fashion," she remarked.