The Moonlit Way Part 9

He pa.s.sed her at her very elbow--aware of her nearness, as though suddenly close to a young orchard in April. The girl, too, resumed her way, unconscious of him, of his youthful face set hard with controlled emotion.

The one-eyed man followed them both.

A few steps further and she turned into the entrance to one of those sprawling, pretentious restaurants, the sham magnificence of which becomes grimy overnight. He halted, swung around, retraced his steps and followed her. And at his heels two shapes followed them very silently--her shadow and his own--so close together now, against the stucco wall that they seemed like Destiny and Fate linked arm in arm.

The one-eyed man halted at the door for a few moments. Then he, too, went in, dogged by his sinister shadow.

The red sunset's rays penetrated to the rotunda and were quenched there in a flood of artificial light; and there their sun-born shadows vanished, and three strange new shadows, twisted and grotesque, took their places.

She continued on into the almost empty restaurant, looming dimly beyond. He followed; the one-eyed man followed both.

The place into which they stepped was circular, centred by a waterfall splas.h.i.+ng over concrete rocks. In the ruffled pool goldfish glimmered, nearly motionless, and mandarin ducks floated, preening exotic plumage.

A wilderness of tables surrounded the pool, set for the expected patronage of the coming evening. The girl seated herself at one of these.

At the next table he found a place for himself, entirely unnoticed by her. The one-eyed man took the table behind them. A waiter presented himself to take her order; another waiter came up leisurely to attend to him. A third served the one-eyed man. There were only a few inches between the three tables. Yet the girl, deeply preoccupied, paid no attention to either man, although both kept their eyes on her.

But already, under the younger man's spellbound eyes, an odd and unforeseen thing was occurring: he gradually became aware that, almost imperceptibly, the girl and the table where she sat, and the sleepy waiter who was taking her orders, were slowly moving nearer to him on a floor which was moving, too.

He had never before been in that particular restaurant, and it took him a moment or two to realise that the floor was one of those trick floors, the central part of which slowly revolves.

Her table stood on the revolving part of the floor, his upon fixed terrain; and he now beheld her moving toward him, as the circle of tables rotated on its axis, which was the waterfall and pool in the middle of the restaurant.

A few people began to arrive--theatrical people, who are obliged to dine early. Some took seats at tables placed upon the revolving section of the floor, others preferred the outer circles, where he sat in a fixed position.

Her table was already abreast of his, with only the circular crack in the floor between them; he could easily have touched her.

As the distance began to widen between them, the girl, her gloved hands clasped in her lap, and studying the table-cloth with unseeing gaze, lifted her dark eyes--looked at him without seeing, and once more gazed through him at something invisible upon which her thoughts remained fixed--something absorbing, vital, perhaps tragic--for her face had become as colourless, now, as one of those translucent marbles, vaguely warmed by some buried vein of rose beneath the snowy surface.

Slowly she was being swept away from him--his gaze following--hers lost in concentrated abstraction.

He saw her slipping away, disappearing behind the noisy waterfall.

Around him the restaurant continued to fill, slowly at first, then more rapidly after the orchestra had entered its marble gallery.

The music began with something Russian, plaintive at first, then beguiling, then noisy, savage in its brutal precision--something sinister--a trampling melody that was turning into thunder with the throb of doom all through it. And out of the vicious, Asiatic clangour, from behind the dash of too obvious waterfalls, glided the girl he had followed, now on her way toward him again, still seated at her table, still gazing at nothing out of dark, unseeing eyes.

It seemed to him an hour before her table approached his own again.

Already she had been served by a waiter--was eating.

He became aware, then, that somebody had also served him. But he could not even pretend to eat, so preoccupied was he by her approach.

Scarcely seeming to move at all, the revolving floor was steadily drawing her table closer and closer to his. She was not looking at the strawberries which she was leisurely eating--did not lift her eyes as her table swept smoothly abreast of his.

Scarcely aware that he spoke aloud, he said:

"Nihla--Nihla Quellen!..."

Like a flash the girl wheeled in her chair to face him. She had lost all her colour. Her fork had dropped and a blood-red berry rolled over the table-cloth toward him.

"I'm sorry," he said, flus.h.i.+ng. "I did not mean to startle you----"

The girl did not utter a word, nor did she move; but in her dark eyes he seemed to see her every sense concentrated upon him to identify his features, made shadowy by the lighted candles behind his head.

By degrees, smoothly, silently, her table swept nearer, nearer, bringing with it her chair, her slender person, her dark, intelligent eyes, so unsmilingly and steadily intent on him.

He began to stammer:

"--Two years ago--at--the Villa Tresse d'Or--on the Seine.... And we promised to see each other--in the morning----"

She said coolly:

"My name is Thessalie Dunois. You mistake me for another."

"No," he said, in a low voice, "I am not mistaken."

Her brown eyes seemed to plunge their clear regard into the depths of his very soul--not in recognition, but in watchful, dangerous defiance.

He began again, still stammering a trifle:

"--In the morning, we were to--to meet--at eleven--near the fountain of Marie de Medicis--unless you do not care to remember----"

At that her gaze altered swiftly, melted into the exquisite relief of recognition. Suspended breath, released, parted her blanched lips; her little guardian heart, relieved of fear, beat more freely.

"Are you Garry?"

"Yes."

"I know you now," she murmured. "You are Garret Barres, of the rue d'Eryx.... You _are_ Garry!" A smile already haunted her dark young eyes; colour was returning to lip and cheek. She drew a deep, noiseless breath.

The table where she sat continued to slip past him; the distance between them was widening. She had to turn her head a little to face him.

"You do remember me then, Nihla?"

The girl inclined her head a trifle. A smile curved her lips--lips now vivid but still a little tremulous from the shock of the encounter.

"May I join you at your table?"

She smiled, drew a deeper breath, looked down at the strawberry on the cloth, looked over her shoulder at him.

"You owe me an explanation," he insisted, leaning forward to span the increasing distance between them.

"Do I?"

"Ask yourself."

After a moment, still studying him, she nodded as though the nod answered some silent question of her own:

"Yes, I owe you one."