The Vultures Part 23

"I shall," said Miss Mangles, "write a paper on the Jewish question in this country."

And Joseph changed the position of his cigar from the left-hand to the right-hand corner of his mouth, very dexterously from within, with his tongue. He saw no reason why Jooly should not write a paper on the Semitic question in Russia, and read it to a greedy mult.i.tude in a town-hall, provided that the town-hall was sufficiently far West.

"Seen the Senatorska, Netty?" he inquired. But Netty had not seen the Senatorska, and did not know how to find it.

"Go out into the Faubourg," her uncle explained, "and just turn to the left and follow all the other women. It is the street where the shops are."

Two days later, when Miss Julie Mangles was writing her paper, Netty set out to find the Senatorska. Miss Mangles was just putting down--as the paper itself recorded--the hot impressions of the moment, gathered after a walk down the Street of the Accursed. For they like their impressions served hot out West, and this is a generation that prefers vividness to accuracy.

Netty found the street quite easily. It was a sunny morning, and many shoppers were abroad. In a degree she followed her uncle's instructions, and instinct did the rest. For the Senatorska is not an easy street to find. The entrance to it is narrow and unpromising, like either end of Bond Street.

The Senatorska does not approach Bond Street or the Rue de la Paix, and Netty, who knew those thoroughfares, seemed to find little to interest her in the street where Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski--that weak dreamer--built his great opera-house and cultivated the ballet. The shops are, indeed, not worthy of a close attention, and Netty was pa.s.sing them indifferently enough when suddenly she became absorbed in the wares of a silver-worker. Then she turned, with a little cry of surprise, to find a gentleman standing hatless beside her. It was the Prince Martin Bukaty.

"I was afraid you did not remember me," said Martin. "You looked straight at me, and did not seem to recognize me."

"Did I? I am so short-sighted, you know. I had not forgotten you. Why should I?"

And Netty glanced at Martin in her little, gentle, appealing way, and then looked elsewhere rather hastily.

"Oh, you travellers must see so many people you cannot be expected to remember every one who is introduced to you at a race-meeting."

"Of course," said Netty, looking into the silversmith's shop. "One meets a great number of people, but not many that one likes. Do you not find it so?"

"I am glad," answered Martin, "that you do not meet many people that you like."

"Oh, but you must not think that I dislike people," urged Netty, in some concern; "I should be very ungrateful if I did. Everybody is so kind.

Do you not find it so? I hate people to be cynical. There is much more kindness in the world than anybody suspects. Do you not think so?"

"I do not know. It has not come my way, perhaps. It naturally would come in yours."

And Martin looked down at her beneath the pink shade of her parasol with that kindness in his eyes of which Netty had had so large a share.

"Oh no!" she protested, with a little movement of the shoulders descriptive of a shrinking humility. "Why should I? I have done nothing to deserve it. And yet, perhaps you are right. Everybody is so kind--my uncle and aunt--everybody. I am very fortunate, I am sure. I wonder why it is?"

And she looked up inquiringly into Martin's face as if he could tell her, and, indeed, he looked remarkably as if he could--if he dared. He had never met anybody quite like Netty--so spontaneous and innocent and easy to get on with. Conversation with her was so interesting and yet so little trouble. She asked a hundred questions which were quite easy to answer; and were not stupid little questions about the weather, but had a human interest in them, especially when she looked up like that from under her parasol, and there was a pink glow on her face, and her eyes were dark, almost as violets.

"Ought I to be here?" she asked. "Going about the streets alone, I mean?"

"You are not alone," answered Martin, with a laugh.

"No, but--perhaps I ought to be."

And Martin, looking down, saw nothing but the top of the pink parasol.

"In America, you know," said the voice from under the parasol, "girls are allowed to do so much more than in Europe. And it is always best to be careful, is it not?--to follow the customs of the country, I mean. In France and Germany people are so particular. I wanted to ask you what is the custom in Warsaw."

Martin stepped to one side in order to avoid the parasol.

"In Warsaw you can do as you like. We are not French, and Heaven forbid that we should resemble the Germans in anything. Here every one goes about the streets as they do in England or America."

As if to confirm this, he walked on slowly, and she walked by his side.

"I can show you the best shops," he said, "such as they are. This is Ulrich's, the flower shop. Those violets are Russian. The only good thing I ever heard of that came from Russia. Do you like violets?"

"I love them," answered Netty, and she walked on rather hurriedly to the next shop.

"You would naturally."

"Why?" asked Netty, looking with a curious interest at the packets of tea in the Russian shop next to Ulrich's.

"Is it not the correct thing to select the flower that matches the eyes?"

"It is very kind of you to say that," said Netty, in a voice half-afraid, half-reproachful.

"It is very kind of Heaven to give you such eyes," answered Martin, gayly. He was more and more surprised to find how easy it was to get on with Netty, whom he seemed to have known all his life. Like many lively persons, he rather liked a companion to possess a vein of gravity, and this Netty seemed to have. He was sure that she was religious and very good.

"You know," said Netty, hastily, and ignoring his remark, "I am much interested in Poland. It is such a romantic country. People have done such great things, have they not, in Poland? I mean the n.o.bles--and the poor peasants, too in their small way, I suppose?"

"The n.o.bles have come to great grief in Poland--that is all," replied Martin, with a short laugh.

"And it is so sad," said Netty, with a shake of the head; "but I am sure it will all come right some day. Do you think so? I am sure you are interested in Poland--you and your sister and your father."

"We are supposed to be," admitted Martin. "But no one cares for Poland now, I am afraid. The rest of the world has other things to think of, and, in England and America, Poland is forgotten now--and her history, which is the saddest history of any nation in the world."

"But I am sure you are wrong there," said Netty, earnestly. "I know a great number of people who are sorry for the Poles and interested in them."

"Are you?" asked Martin, looking down at her.

"Yes," she replied, with downcast eyes. "Come," she said, after a pause, with a sort of effort, "we must not stand in front of this shop any longer."

"Especially," he said, with a laugh, as he followed her, "as it is a Russian shop. Wherever you see tea and articles of religion mixed up in a window, that is a Russian shop, and if you sympathize with Poland you will not go into it. There are, on the other hand, plenty of shops in Warsaw where they will not serve Russians. It is to those shops that you must go."

Netty looked at him doubtfully.

"I am quite serious," he said. "We must fight with what weapons we have."

"Yes," she answered, indicating the shops, "these people, but not you.

You are a prince, and they cannot touch you. They would not dare to take anything from you."

"Because there is nothing to take," laughed Martin, gayly; "we were ruined long ago. They took everything there was to take in 1830, when my father was a boy. He could not work for his living, and I may not either; so I am a prince without a halfpenny to call his own."

"I am so sorry!" she said, in a soft voice, and, indeed, she looked it.

Then she caught sight of Paul Deulin a long way off, despite her short sight, which was perhaps spasmodic, as short sight often is. She stopped, and half turned, as if to dismiss Martin. When Deulin perceived them he was standing in the middle of the pavement, as if they had just met. He came up with a bow to Netty and his hand stretched out to Martin--his left hand, which conveyed the fact that he was an old and familiar friend.

"I suppose you are on your way back to the Europe to lunch?" he said to Netty. "I am in luck. I have come just in time to walk back with you, if you will permit it."

And he did not wait for permission, but walked on beside Netty, while Martin took off his hat and went in the opposite direction. It was not the way he wanted to go but something had made him think that Netty desired him to go, and he departed with a pleasant sensation as of a secret possessed in common with her. He walked back quickly to the flower-shop kept by Ulrich, in the Senatorska.