Chapter X

During their short walk to the Sporting Club, where the two young men had arranged to spend the rest of the evening, Christopher endeavoured to bring the conversation round to the subject of Myrtile.

“It is time,” he insisted, “that we did something a little more definite about Myrtile.”

“What can we do?” Gerald replied carelessly. “She’ll find a job presently.”

“She won’t unless we help her,” Christopher replied, “and meanwhile this life is horribly bad for her. She is all the time unsettled and uneasy, and I don’t wonder at it. You don’t take her seriously enough, Gerald.”

“In what way?”

“She told me this afternoon that you had promised to take her to one of your supper parties.”

Gerald was not altogether at his ease.

“It was rather a rash promise,” he admitted, “but after all, why not? She’d create quite a sensation.”

“That child’s immediate future is a charge upon our honour,” Christopher said sternly. “You and I know the class of young women you invite to your parties. They’re smart enough--the best of their sort, without a doubt. At the same time, they’re not fit companions for Myrtile. She’s full of hysterical impressions, as it is. She mustn’t come near them. She mustn’t breathe the same atmosphere.”

“Are you in love with Myrtile?” Gerald asked curiously.

Christopher loathed the question but he remained outwardly unperturbed.

“Myrtile is a child,” he said. “It will be time enough to think of such things when she has become a woman. The one deadly and pernicious certainty is that she is in love with you. Be careful, Gerald. You don’t want to walk on the floor of hell.”

They had reached the steps of the Sporting Club. Gerald ran lightly up.

“My dear Chris,” he said, turning around as he prepared to divest himself of his overcoat, “don’t be a melodramatic ass. We’re in the wrong atmosphere for that sort of thing. Jupiter! Here is the family!”

“Well, you might appear a little more pleased to see us,” Mary declared. “Dad and I looked in here on our way back from the dinner party. Dad met an old friend there--Sir William Greatwood--and he insisted upon our coming. It seemed so ridiculously early to go home. They’ve hurried in to make sure of places at the first roulette table.”

“Let’s find a corner in the bar and have some coffee,” Christopher suggested. “Gerald is too electric to-night for a man of my staid temperament.”

“I’m not so sure of your staid temperament as I was,” Mary rejoined. “However, I’d like some coffee. We’ll take those two easy-chairs.”

Gerald soon drifted away and the two were left alone. Mary leaned back in her corner and studied her companion thoughtfully.

“Christopher,” she began, “I am not at all sure that you two young men are behaving nicely in Monte Carlo. Father was saying this afternoon that we scarcely saw you at all except at tennis.”

“Will you play golf and lunch with me to-morrow morning, Lady Mary?” he begged.

“With pleasure,” she replied. “And now that you have made your peace, do tell me about Gerald. He seems to have an extraordinary craze for taking the mysterious young woman next door out motoring every afternoon. Who is she?”

“I haven’t the faintest idea,” Christopher confessed. “Neither has he. That, I think, is part of the attraction.”

“Does any one know her?” Mary asked, a little doubtfully. “She looks all right, but, after all, ours is such a very small world that it seems odd no one knows anything about her.”

Christopher shook his head.

“I believe that Madame Lénore--the woman from whom we bought the things for Myrtile--knows something about them, at any rate.”

Lady Mary played with the pearls which hung from her neck.

“To leave the subject of our mysterious neighbours, then, have you succeeded in finding any employment for your little protégée yet?” she enquired, looking up at her companion.

“Not yet,” Christopher replied. “I have written to a cousin of mine in London, who goes in for that sort of thing, to see if she can find her a post as nursery governess. The housekeeper at the hotel would take her as a chambermaid, but for once I agree with Gerald--I think she is far too good for anything of that sort.”

“I can’t imagine what you two young men think you know about it,” Mary remarked. “The girl has lived all her life as a peasant, and I am still old-fashioned enough to believe that it is exceedingly unwise to pitchfork any one into a position to which he is unaccustomed.”

“The girl is altogether unusual,” Christopher pointed out. “Her father and mother were both school-teachers. Sometimes I feel inclined to regret that we ever discovered her, but so long as we did, and brought her here, we must try and start her properly.”

“In Monte Carlo?” his companion observed, a little drily.

“I shall send her to England, if my cousin agrees to take her,” Christopher declared.

“And, in the meantime, the poor little fool is hopelessly in love with Gerald. Well, you both know what you are doing, I suppose. I should be sorry to have your responsibility.--I think I ought to go and see how dad is getting on with his mille.”

“Wait one moment,” Christopher begged, laying his hand upon her arm. “I want you to watch this.”

She looked up curiously. Gerald had just entered the crowded little room, and, at the same moment, Mademoiselle de Ponière and her aunt appeared on the other threshold. Madame was dressed in black clothes of old-fashioned but distinctive cut. A wonderful black lace shawl drooped from her shoulders. Her ears and fingers blazed with gems. She leaned, as she walked, upon an ivory-topped stick, and her eyes had their usual trick of wandering around the room as though she saw no one. Pauline’s wonderful figure seemed sheathed in a black net gown, which fitted her with almost magical perfection. From the curve of her large hat, which framed her pale face and heavily-fringed eyes, to the tips of her black and white patent shoes, she seemed to represent a perfection unobtrusive but inevitable. Gerald, who had been on his way to join his sister and Christopher, paused at their approach, as though bent on challenging some recognition, however slight, from the girl. In this, however, he was disappointed. Without any appearance of avoiding him, without even turning her eyes away from his direction, she passed by as though in complete unconsciousness of his presence, and followed her companion through the other door. Gerald stood for a moment in silent fury after they had left. The cigarette which he had been holding between his fingers slipped on to the carpet, crushed to pieces. He set his heel upon it and crossed the room. Lady Mary recognised the sense of disturbance in him and welcomed him with the tactful smile of one who has noticed nothing unusual.

“Tell me whether to play _trente et quarante_ or roulette to-night, Gerald?” she said. “Or shall I go and play baccarat? If only the people there weren’t so alarming!”

Gerald looked across at Christopher. He seemed as though he had scarcely heard his sister’s words.

“Did you see that?” he asked, in a low tone.

Christopher nodded.

“Personally,” he admitted, “I should find it intolerable, but then, as you know, I hate all mysteries. I should feel inclined to go up to the young woman and ask her if she were tired after her motoring.”

“I believe I have an average amount of pluck,” Gerald declared, “but I tell you honestly I couldn’t face it. I believe I should get the most colossal snub which has ever been inflicted upon a human being.”

“The girl is extraordinarily attractive,” Mary observed. “Shall I really be brave and call, Gerald? One doesn’t do that sort of thing abroad, but she must be lonely. If they aren’t what they should be, it won’t hurt me.”

“No good, old dear,” Gerald groaned. “I’ve suggested something of the sort already, but she only threw cold water on the idea.”

Lady Mary laughed softly.

“After all,” she decided, “there is something humourous in the situation. I always look upon Gerald as being the most woman-spoilt man I know. Quite a new experience for you, dear, isn’t it? I can’t think how you ever progressed so far as you have done.”

“Sheer British pluck,” Gerald declared. “I can assure you I never shivered so much during my three years in France, as I did when I walked up to the rock where the girl was standing. I don’t remember, even now, how I made the plunge.”

“You probably asked her if her name wasn’t Smith and if you hadn’t met at the Jones’ ball,” Mary remarked. “After all, there have been other people in the world who haven’t wished to make acquaintances. They are both in half-mourning, too.”

“I should cheer up, old fellow,” Christopher advised. “They won’t hold out for ever. You will probably find that to-morrow afternoon the young lady will shyly invite you in to meet her aunt.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Gerald growled. “There! Did you see that?”

Through the open doorway, Madame de Ponière and her younger companion were plainly visible, making their way towards one of the roulette tables. They had come face to face for a moment with a little Frenchman, who stopped and bowed with every mark of respect. Both of the women acknowledged his salutation graciously. Gerald sprang to his feet.

“That’s Henri Dubois, Monsieur Blanc’s representative there!” he exclaimed. “He knows them! Thank heavens, I’ve come across some one at last who does!”

He crossed the room in half a dozen strides, and accosted Monsieur Dubois in the private way leading to the Hôtel de Paris. The usual civilities were exchanged.

“Monsieur Dubois, you can do me a favour,” Gerald confided, as he drew him towards the bar and ordered two liqueur brandies.

“If it is possible, it is done,” Dubois declared. “If it is impossible, it shall be done.”

“I want you to tell me,” Gerald continued, “who the two ladies in black were, to whom you just bowed--Madame and Mademoiselle de Ponière, they call themselves?”

The courteous smile faded from the lips of the little man. He was watching intently the pouring of the brandy into his glass.

“Milord,” he regretted, “I cannot tell you anything about those two ladies.”

Gerald was a little staggered. Monsieur Dubois was a well-known gossip, to whom he had been indebted for the history of many of the visitors to the place.

“You, too!” he exclaimed. “What on earth is the mystery about them?”

The Frenchman looked at him in bland surprise.

“Mystery, milord?” he repeated. “Is there one?”

Gerald avoided a fruitless discussion. He laid his hand on his companion’s shoulder in friendly fashion.

“Look here, old fellow,” he said, “I will ask you one question, and one question only. What are their real names?”

Monsieur Dubois smiled. His difficulties were at an end.

“Milord,” he declared, “you wrong those very respectable ladies in imagining that they would present themselves here under names to which they had no right. Both ladies, who are, as you have doubtless surmised, related, are entitled to the name of De Ponière. The first Christian name of the older lady is Anastasie, of the younger--Pauline. I am happy to be able to satisfy milord. A thousand excuses. They call me from the baccarat room.”

Gerald returned dejectedly to the room where his sister and Christopher were waiting expectantly.

“It appears that there is no mystery at all,” he announced. “Dubois assures me that they are related and that their names are indeed De Ponière.”