Chapter XV

After they had left Toulon, the two men seemed almost to change places. Gerald, who for the last four days had been in much the same mentally comatose state as he had been since his return from Scotland, sat up and for the first time began to look about him with interest. Christopher, on the other hand, who during the whole of their journey had been continually endeavouring to amuse and entertain his companion, gradually relapsed into a rare fit of thoughtfulness. They had passed through Hyères, however, and were winding their way around the Forêt du Dom, before any direct allusion was made to the subject which in varying degrees was foremost in the minds of both of them.

“About an hour and a half beyond this, wasn’t it?” Gerald asked.

Christopher nodded. It was significant that he made no comment upon the fact that Gerald had caught up with his own train of thought.

“Just about this time of the year, too,” Gerald went on, ruminatingly. “I remember these orchards were just showing a little pink. And you say she’s back again there, Chris. I wonder why? There wasn’t any trouble at home, was there?”

“Not the slightest,” Christopher assured him. “In fact, all the time you were in Russia your father seemed to rely upon her absolutely. It was a great blow to him when she made up her mind to go back.”

“But what made her want to leave?” Gerald persisted.

Christopher did not hesitate for a moment. He meant to take every possible advantage of this, the first sign of any real interest in life which Gerald had shown for months.

“Because she is very finely strung,” he said, “and the situation was becoming impossible for her. She was very much in love with you, and you were crazy about some one else. I was very much in love with her, as I always had been, and I was ass enough to try and persuade her to marry me. Of course,” he went on, “I ought to have realised the unconquerable fidelity of a nature like hers. An ordinary woman,” he went on, leaning back in his corner and discussing the matter very much as he would have done a legal point presented for his opinion, “might select and prefer one man to all others, but if, for some reason or other, he did not return her affection, she would be able, in course of time, to feel practically the same thing for another man. Myrtile could never do that. She has that saint-like fidelity which is the joy and the curse of the best women. You are a very dear fellow, Gerald, and I am very fond of you, but I sometimes get fed up with your nerves, your blindness, your Grand Duchesses and your stark idiocy.”

Gerald sat up in his place and stared at his friend in amazement.

“How long have you been keeping that bottled up, Chris?” he asked.

“Ever since Myrtile turned me down,” was the prompt reply. “She was as kind as she could be about it, but she did her job like a surgeon. She hurt, but I knew it was no use ever thinking about her again that way. I am a dispassionate observer now and I can see the truth.”

“I suppose I have been rather an ass,” Gerald acknowledged, “but you must remember, Chris, I didn’t quite know what I was in for when I took on that visit to Russia, and I don’t think any one could go through what I had to go through without getting bowled over. Fancy being taken care of like a baby by that amazing woman, Elsa Francks!--Having to owe her your life half a dozen times over! Seeing that great coarse creature, with her hank of yellow hair, and her breath smelling of drink and patchouli, standing up one moment and defying death, and lying the next without a tremor to guards who would have set us up against the wall and shot us on sight if they had known the truth!”

“She was an epic figure,” Christopher declared. “I wonder what has become of her.”

“Heaven knows!” Gerald answered. “We may meet her queening it at Monte Carlo, or she may have married a respectable German tradesman and buried the past. She is wealthy enough. She got that fellow Krossneys’ share of the money I took out, as well as her own.--How these pine trees smell, Chris! And what sunshine! One could sleep here.”

Gerald leaned back in his place with half-closed eyes, and Christopher was well content to leave him alone. This was the first time he had spoken naturally of his journey to Russia and the terrible experience through which he had passed. All through the summer months he had lain about the gardens at Hinterleys, accepting life as an inevitable burden, gaining no strength, sleeping little, all the time engaged in a morbid struggle with the tyranny of his nerves. Nothing had moved or interested him. These last few sentences of his were the first evidences of his return to a natural outlook. Physically he had shrunken almost to a shadow. There was very little left of the gay and debonair young man who had passed his arm round Myrtile’s waist and drawn her into the car, mocked at Christopher’s remonstrances, and, with a few careless words, built up in Myrtile’s heart the fairyland at the end of the road. Yet, as they drew near the place where they had found her, he seemed to shake off some of his torpor. He sat up and looked about him with reminiscent eyes. One more bend and they would see the gate!

“Would you like to stop for a moment?” Christopher asked. “Myrtile is almost certain to be here.”

This was most assuredly a changed Gerald. He was almost diffident.

“If you think she would like to see us,” he assented.

He sat upright now, leaning a little forward. They were round the corner, in sight of the little grove of cypresses. And there at the gate--Myrtile!--Gerald gave a little exclamation which sounded almost like a sob. His incredulous stare had something in it alike of pain and fear.

“I wrote her days ago and said that we should be passing,” Christopher hastily explained.

She stepped out into the road to greet them. Even to Christopher, her coming was almost like a vision. The small differences of clothing and circumstance seemed scarcely to exist. It was Myrtile who welcomed them, shyly but joyfully. Her eyes were fixed upon Gerald, and there was a touch of sublime pity in them as she realised the change. But from her face shone the same things.

“You will come in and see my home?” she begged. “The car can turn in here. The road is better than it used to be.”

“I am tired of the car,” Gerald said. “I would rather walk.”

They moved slowly down through the cypress avenue, Gerald leaning a little on Myrtile’s arm, Christopher loitering behind. On one side were the formal lines of the closely pruned vines, protruding from the rich brown earth; on the other a flush of purple from the field of violets. Myrtile answered some half intelligible question from Gerald.

“I am very happy here,” she assured him. “There is so much to do. I have broken up some more of the land for growing violets, and presently I will show you my carnations. The vineyards, too, needed a lot of attention; they had been very much neglected. I hope you like the colour of the house? I had it painted pink because of the background. And you see what a lovely verandah I have had built? By moving a few yards one gets the sun all day.”

“It is the most restful and the most beautiful place I have ever been in,” Gerald murmured. “Tell me, Myrtile,” he added, “do you know all that has happened to me?”

“Everything! Christopher has written, and I had a long letter, too, from your father. Please do not speak of those things which are finished. You are here to forget.”

Involuntarily he looked away towards the road and turned back with a shiver. Whatever his thoughts might have been, he said nothing. A little French maid, in spotless white cap and apron, came out on to the verandah in reply to Myrtile’s call.

“A bottle of our own wine and glasses,” Myrtile ordered, “some fruit, and the sandwiches I told you to have ready, Marie. Come, we have another half-hour of sunshine. Gerald, you must take the sofa chair.”

Gerald sank into a sea of cushions. Myrtile, bending over him, arranged them more comfortably. Her eyes were soft with the shadow of tears. Gerald, more weary than he had confessed, seemed for a moment almost to doze.

“He is very weak,” Myrtile whispered, looking anxiously across towards Christopher.

Christopher nodded.

“It is the journey,” he answered. “I wish that it were over.”

The wine was brought, but Gerald was now in a deep sleep. Christopher and Myrtile sat at the other end of the verandah and talked in an undertone. Presently the sun began to sink behind the forest-crowned hills, westwards. A cool breeze came stealing across the valley. Myrtile rose suddenly to her feet.

“He must not sleep any longer,” she said firmly. “He ought not to be out at all as late as this.”

They tried to rouse him. Three times Christopher laid his hand upon his shoulder and called him by name. There was no response. Gerald was sleeping heavily, his breathing was regular, the lines seemed to have faded from his face.

“It is the first time he has slept like this for weeks,” Christopher declared. “It seems a shame to wake him.”

“Don’t,” she begged eagerly. “You see the chair has castors. Wheel it into the sitting room, and if he doesn’t wake, leave him here. Marie and I can look after him, and Pierre, my head man, is a treasure. He could carry him upstairs if it were necessary.”

“We’ll move him in and see if he wakes, anyhow,” Christopher agreed.

They wheeled him into Myrtile’s sitting room, sweet and flower-scented, without his showing the slightest sign of being disturbed. Myrtile closed the outer doors and lit the fire of pine logs and cones which was already prepared upon the hearth. Then she and Christopher stole from the room.

“This may be his salvation,” Christopher declared hopefully.

There were tears in Myrtile’s eyes. All the time she seemed to be listening.

“Leave him with me, Christopher,” she begged. “He needs rest.”

Christopher nodded.

“I’ll send two of his bags down from the car,” he proposed, “and some of us will come and have a look at him in a few days. His servant can stay here if you like, so that you have help if you want it.”

She smiled through her tears.

“I shall need no help,” she promised. “I will cure Gerald. Tell Lady Mary and Lord Hinterleys that I promise it. Only leave him alone with me. Do not come, any of you, until I send. If he wishes to leave, I can hire a car from San Raphael--he can be with you in a few hours. But I think he will be content. I think he will get better here.”