Juggernaut Part 28

"I know--I've thought that, too. They don't seem to go with the rest of her, although she takes such perfect care of them."

"A psychologist chap once told me," he remarked after a thoughtful pause, "that hands like that--you mustn't misunderstand me, he was only speaking of the type--were the hands of the successful _cocotte_."

CHAPTER XVII

She was so silent he began to wonder if he had shocked her, though that didn't seem likely, she was such a sensible girl.

"Of course she can't help having that sort of hand," he hastened to add apologetically. "It's just a peculiarity."

Esther was repeating to herself that phrase, "the hands of the successful _cocotte_," which somehow seemed oddly illuminating. Lady Clifford's hands had a meaning for her now. The soft cus.h.i.+oned palms spelled love of luxury, the stumpy, curving fingers and talon-like nails indicated acquisitive greed. She could see them grasping, grasping...

"Ah, here are the c.o.c.ktails."

She came to herself with a smile, and took the frosty gla.s.s which he held out to her.

"May we both get what we want!"

She touched her gla.s.s to his gaily and drank. Then with a flash of reminiscence she glanced across at Holliday, recalling the fact that a few weeks ago he had uttered exactly the same toast. What was it Holliday wanted? She had thought at the time it was something quite definite....

The meal proceeded happily, they laughed and chatted with a sense of exhilaration derived only in part from the champagne. Although they told each other many things, as on a former occasion, it was not what they said that mattered. Each was intensely absorbed in the other's personality; what counted was mutual attraction, which invested every commonplace with vibrant inner meanings. They forgot the life about them; it was as though they were marooned upon a tiny island in the midst of uncharted seas.

"Do you feel like dancing?"

The coffee, sending up a fragrant steam, was too hot to drink; the saxophones sounded an insinuating invitation.

"Do let's--I'm dying to!"

As they mingled with the circling couples on the gla.s.sy floor, Roger gave her hand a faint pressure.

"I said you were," he told her.

"Said I was what?"

"A wonderful dancer. The first time I saw you."

"No--did you?" she replied delightedly and returned the pressure spontaneously. "I'm glad. I'd far rather you praised my dancing than my character."

"I don't know anything about your character," he disclaimed, laughing.

He was enjoying himself immensely. Of all the girls he knew, it struck him that not one would have fitted in so perfectly with his mood as did this little Canadian girl who worked hard for her living. Why was it?

He had nothing to say against his own friends, jolly girls for the most part, excellent at games and only a little spoilt by having always had money--yet certainly they lacked the freshness which was so large a part of this particular girl's attraction for him. She was capable and intelligent, too, without sacrificing one whit of her femininity--he was a simple enough male to remark on this; for that matter, he reflected with pride, there was not a woman in the room who was smarter. She had a poise and grace of movement that were a delight to the eye, and she was _soignee_ to the finger-tips. A thoroughbred, he summed her up, and felt pleased with his judgment.

When presently they were joined by his friends, Graham and Marjory Kent, he was not particularly elated.

"I hope you don't curse us for barging in like this," Miss Kent apologised, "but my brother is fed to the teeth with me and is going to try and cadge a dance or two off you, Miss Rowe, if you'll be good to him."

She was about twenty-six, tall and gypsy-like, her black hair in a bang and her thin brown arms jingling with bangles. Esther liked her, she was straightforward and jolly. The brother was younger and very shy, yet plainly one of those timid souls whose tenacity of purpose will carry them through agonies of embarra.s.sment to a desired end. The end in this case was evidently Esther. His black eyes shone with frank admiration, even while he blushed a dusky red to the roots of his immaculate hair.

"May I have this dance?" he murmured almost at once.

She smiled and rose to join him. At the same moment she caught a certain glint in the eye of Roger which told her plainly how her value had risen by reason of compet.i.tion. In so many ways was he a mere male--but she did not like him the less for that.

Roger, dancing with Marjory, whom he had known all his life, watched the slender figure in fluttering pink whenever it crossed his line of vision. The curly head had an upward tilt at times, for Graham was over six feet tall, and she had to look up to speak to him.

"You know, Roger, Graham's fearfully taken with that girl of yours,"

Marjory told him calmly. "He gave me no peace until I brought him over. Who is she? You don't mean it? A nurse! Well, who'd have thought anyone so useful could look like that? I call it genius."

"Nurses needn't be frights," he objected.

"But most of them are.... By the way, I saw Lady Clifford here last night, marvellous as usual. She was with a rather nice-looking Englishman I've seen about Cannes a good deal--no one I know."

"Yes, he is here this evening, or was. I saw him having dinner."

"So did I, with a comic-looking foreign woman, simply lousy with jewels. She's always about here. I used to wonder who in the world had money enough to buy those enormous diamonds and ropes of pearls you see in the shops in the Rue de la Paix. Now I know."

The dance went on and on; for the first time he noticed how frequently the orchestra responded to an encore.

"Do look at Graham," whispered his partner delightedly. "Isn't it amazing when you think how timid he is?"

The tall youth was not losing any time. In a brief interval Roger overheard him saying something very earnest to his partner on the subject of Sat.u.r.day afternoon, evidently making a desperate bid for Esther's free hour. She in turn was shaking her head doubtfully, but, thought Roger, she did not look displeased. The idea came to Roger that young Kent, who was sole heir to one of the biggest mill-owners in Lancas.h.i.+re, would be counted a fine prize.... He looked at his watch.

"That little girl has to get up early," he murmured to Marjory. "I promised faithfully not to keep her out late. If this goes on much longer..."

It was a little after one o'clock when he tucked Esther into the Citroen. He drove slowly towards La Californie, reluctant to put an end to the evening, and intensely conscious of the girl beside him, wrapped in her velvet coat, warm and glowing in the darkness.

"I'm sure we ought to have left sooner," she said, a little conscience-stricken, "only it was so heavenly! I had the bad luck to oversleep this morning; it would be dreadful to repeat the offence."

"Why should you care?"

"How like a man! Don't you grasp the fact that my living depends on what doctors think of me?"

"In that case, you'll never be out of work."

She laughed.

"No, seriously, I was in the doctor's bad graces this morning. Not only was I late, but I dropped a basin of water on the floor. Wasn't it stupid? He looked at me as if he thought I was weak-minded."

"Pooh! I shouldn't let that worry me."

"I don't, only ... do you know, that man has a curious effect on me, something sort of paralysing.... I can't explain it, quite."

"Does he? How do you mean?"

She told him, on an impulse, about her dream and her subsequent recognition of the python as a symbol of the doctor's personality.