The Princess Passes Part 38

"Do you mean you can't, or won't?"

"I know nothing, Monsieur, except that I have been paid well, and told that I may go home as soon as I like, and by what route I like, having delivered the letter to Monsieur. My young master gave me enough to return with the donkeys to Mentone all the way from Chambery by rail if I chose; but I prefer to walk down, and keep the extra money for my _dot_. It will make me a good one."

I am not sure that, before disentangling a huge bottle-fly from f.a.n.n.y's long lashes, she did not glance under her own at Joseph, when giving this information.

"Look here, Innocentina," I said beguilingly, "tell me which way, and how, your young Monsieur has gone, and I will double that _dot_ of yours."

"Not if you would quadruple it, Monsieur. I promised my master to say nothing."

"Couldn't you get absolution for breaking a promise?"

"No, Monsieur. I am not that kind of Catholic. It is only heretics who break their promises, and take money for it--like Judas Iscariot."

Joseph did not charge at this red rag, but looked so utterly depressed that Innocentina's eyes relented.

"Very well," I said. "You deserve praise for your loyalty. I ought not to have tried to corrupt it. But, you know, I shall find out in the town, or at the railway station."

Innocentina smiled. "I do not think so, Monsieur."

"We shall see," I retorted. "Joseph, where is the railway station?"

Joseph pointed, accompanying his gesture with directions. Then he offered to be my guide, but I refused his services and left him with Innocentina, having bidden him call at my room in the hotel for instructions later.

But the prophecy of Innocentina the Seeress was fulfilled. I could learn nothing of the Boy or his movements, at the _gare_ of Chambery.

Several trains had gone out, bound for several destinations in different directions, during the past three hours, and no one answering the description I gave of the Boy had been seen to leave.

Sadder, but no wiser, I returned to the Hotel de France, and asked if a youth of seventeen, "with large blue eyes, chestnut hair which curled, a complexion tanned brown, a panama hat, and a suit of navy-blue serge knickerbockers," had lunched there.

The answer was no. Such a yoking gentleman had not come to the hotel, nor had he been noticed in the town, either with or without a young woman and a couple of donkeys.

I had no more than finished my questionings and gone up to my room, when Joseph arrived--a wistful, expectant Joseph, with a deep light of excitement burning in his eyes.

"Any news?" I asked.

"No, Monsieur, except that in an hour Innocentina starts to walk on to Les Ech.e.l.les with her _anes_."

"She is energetic."

"The girl knows not what is the fatigue. Besides, each day less on the road means so many more francs added to the _dot_."

"Innocentina seems very keen upon increasing that _dot_. Has she anyone in view to share it with her?"

"She has not confided that to me, Monsieur."

"I suppose he would have to be a good Catholic?"

"Of that I am not so sure. I do not think she would object to a good Protestant, if he would allow the children to be brought up in her faith."

"The lady is brave. She takes time by the forelock."

"It is the wise way, Monsieur."

"Well, whoever he may be, I am sure _you_ do not envy the future _mari_, _dot_ or no _dot_. Your opinion of Innocentina----"

"Ah, it is changed, Monsieur, completely changed, I confess."

"Then, after all, it is Innocentina who has converted you."

Joseph bent his head to hide a flush. "Perhaps, Monsieur, if you put it in that way. Yet it was not of myself nor of Innocentina I came to talk, but of the plans of Monsieur."

"Plans? I've no plans," I answered dejectedly.

"Will Monsieur wish to proceed to-morrow morning as usual?"

"Proceed where?" I gloomily capped his question with another.

"On the way south, towards the Riviera, is it not? If we made an early start, it might be possible to go by the route of la Grande Chartreuse, and reach the monastery late in the afternoon. If Monsieur wished to sleep there, travellers are accommodated at the Sister House, which has been turned into an hotellerie since the expulsion of the Order."

I reflected a moment before replying. On the face of it, it appeared like weakness to change my plans simply because I had been deserted by a comrade whose very existence had been unknown to me when first I made them. Yet, on the other hand, I had grown so used to his companionship now, that the thought of continuing my journey without him was distasteful. With the Little Pal, no day had ever seemed too long, no misadventure but had had its spice. Lacking the Little Pal, the vista of day after day spent in covering the country at the rate of three miles an hour loomed before me monotonous as the treadmill.

My gorge rose against it. I could not go on as I had begun. Why punish myself by a diet of salt when the savour had gone?

"Joseph," I said at last, "the disappearance of the young Monsieur has been a blow to me, I admit. It has destroyed my appet.i.te for sightseeing, for the moment, at all events. I can't rearrange my plans instantly; but this I have determined. I'll end my walking-tour here.

What to do afterwards I will make up my mind in good time, but meanwhile, I won't keep you dancing attendance upon me. You will be anxious to get back home----"

"Monsieur, I have no home." There was despair in Joseph's tone, and suddenly the keen point of truth pierced the armour of my selfishness.

Poor Joseph, facing exile--from Innocentina--and keeping his countenance politely, while I densely discoursed of "blows"! Being a muleteer "farmed out" by a master, he was at the mercy of Fate, and temporarily I represented Fate. He could not journey on southwards, whither his heart was wandering, unless I bade him go. This fine fellow, this old soldier, was as much at my orders as if I had been a king.

"If you aren't in a hurry to get back to Martigny, Joseph," said I, changing my tone, "I'll tell you what you can do for me. You may take some of my luggage down to the Riviera. I'm expecting a portmanteau to arrive here by rail to-night or to-morrow morning, with plenty of clothing in it. But there are those hold-alls which Finois has carried for so long. I can't travel about with them in railway carriages; at that I draw the line; yet if I sent them by _grande vitesse_, their contents would be injured or stolen. Take them down to Monte Carlo for me. I shall go there sooner or later, to meet some friends of mine who are motoring, and I shall stop at the Royal."

Joseph's face would have put radium to shame, with the light it generated.

"Monsieur is not joking? He is in earnest?" the poor fellow stammered.

"Most certainly. And when we meet on the Riviera, we will talk over a scheme for your future of which I've been thinking. If you would like to buy Finois of your patron, and two or three other animals only less admirable than he, setting up in business for yourself, I think I know a man who might advance you the money."

"Oh, Monsieur!"

Had there been a little more of the French, or a little less of the Swiss, in honest Joseph's blood, I think that he would have fallen on his knees and rained kisses on my mild-stained boots. The Swiss upped the balance, luckily for us both, and kept him erect; but there was a suspicious glitter in his deep eyes, and a sudden pinkness of his respectable brown nose, which gave to his "Oh, Monsieur!" more meaning than a volume of protestations.

His hand came out impulsively, then flew back humbly to his side, but I put out mine and grasped it.

"Monsieur, I would die for you," he said.

"I would prefer," I returned, "that you should live--for Innocentina."

[Ill.u.s.tration]