The Price of Things Part 36

"I know that Denzil went to see you, my dear little girl. He has told me about it. And I know that you love each other. There is only one chance for us in the future--and that lies with the child. It may be that when it comes to you it may fill your life and satisfy you. This is my prayer--otherwise we must see what can be arranged about things; because I cannot allow you to be unhappy. You were an innocent factor in all this, and it would be unjust that you should be hurt."

How good and generous John had always been.

And his letter to his lawyers! To make things smooth for her--and for Denzil--how marvellously kind!

Her mourning for John was real and deep, as it would have been for a brother. But during the month of intense anxiety about Denzil everything else was numbed, even her interest in her son.

By the end of August he was out of danger, although little hope was entertained that he would ever walk easily. But this was a minor thing--and gradually it began to be some consolation to the two women who loved him to know that he was safely wounded and would probably not be fit for active service again for a very long time.

They wrote letters to one another, but they decided not to meet.

Six months must elapse at least, they both felt--even in spite of John's commands.

Another sh.e.l.l must have fallen not far off, for his body was never found--only his field gla.s.ses, broken and battered. And there would have been no actual information about his death had not Denzil seen him die.

Harietta Boleski and Stanisla.s.s and Ferdinand Ardayre had remained in Paris, with visits to Fontainebleau.

When John had been killed, Harietta had been extremely perturbed.

"Now Stepan will be able to marry that odious bit of bread and b.u.t.ter, and he is sure to do it after the year!" This thought rankled with her and embittered everything. Nothing pleased her. She grew more than ever rebellious at the dullness she had to live in. War was an imposition which ought not to be tolerated and she often told Hans so. At last she grew to take quite an interest in her spying for lack of more agreeable things to do.

And so the months went by and November came, and a madness of jealousy was gradually augmenting in Harietta for Amaryllis Ardayre.

Verisschenzko had gone to Russia in September, and she was convinced that he loved Amaryllis and that the child was his child. She could not conceive of a spiritual devotion, and something had altered all Stepan's ways. From the moment he returned to Paris until he had left she had tried and been unable to invoke any response in him, and she had felt like a foiled tigress when another has eaten her prey.

As the impossibility of moving him forced itself upon her unwilling understanding, so the wildest pa.s.sion for him grew, and when he left in September she was quite ill for a week with chagrin; then she became moody and more than ever capricious, and made Stanisla.s.s' life a h.e.l.l, while Ferdinand Ardayre had little less misery to endure.

An incident late in November caused her jealousy to burst into flame.

She heard that Verisschenzko had returned from Russia and she went to his rooms to see him. The Russian servant who was accustomed to receive her was there waiting for his master who had not yet arrived. Without a word she pa.s.sed the old man when he opened the door, and made her way into the sitting room, and then into the bedroom beyond. She did not believe that Stepan was not there and wanted to make sure. It was empty but a light burned before an Ikon, the doors of which were closed.

Curiosity made Harietta go close and examine it. She knew the room so well and had never seen it there before. The table beneath it was arranged like an altar, and the Ikon was let in to the carved boiserie of the wall. It must have been since he had parted with her that this ridiculous thing had been done! She had not entered his _appartement_ since June. She felt angry that the shrine should be closed and that she could not look upon it, for it must certainly be something which Verisschenzko prized.

She bent nearer and shook the little doors; they resisted her, and her temper rose. Then some force seemed to propel her to commit sacrilege.

She shook and shook and tore at the golden clasp, her irritation giving strength and cunning to her hands; and at last the small bolt came undone and the doors flew open--and an exquisitely painted modern picture of the Virgin disclosed itself, holding the Christ child in her arms. But for all the saintliness in the eyes of Mary, the face was an exact portrait of Amaryllis Ardayre!

A frenzy of rage seized Harietta. Her rival reigned now indeed! This was positive proof to her, not of spiritual meaning--not of the mystic, abstract aloofness of wors.h.i.+p which lay deep in Stepan's nature and had caused him to have Amaryllis transfigured into the symbol of purity, a daily reminder that she must always be for him the lady of his soul--such things had no meaning for Harietta. The Ikon was merely a material proof that Verisschenzko loved Amaryllis--and, of course, as soon as the year of mourning should be over he would make her his wife.

She trembled with pa.s.sionate resentment. Nothing had ever moved her so forcibly. She took out her pearl hatpin and stabbed out the eyes of the Virgin, almost shaking with pa.s.sion, and scratched and obliterated the face of the Christ child. This done, she extinguished the little lamp and slammed to the doors.

She laughed savagely as she went back into the sittingroom.

"The Virgin indeed!--and _his_ child!--well, I've taught him!" and she flung past the Russian servant with a look which was a curse, so that the old man crossed himself and quickly barred the entrance door, when she stamped off down the stairs.

Arrived in her gilded salon at the Universal, she would like to have wrung some one's neck. She had never been so full of rage in her life.

She did find a little satisfaction in a kick at Fou-Chow, who fled whining to his faithful Marie who had come in to carry away her mistress'

sable cloak.

The maid's face became thunderous. A look of sullen hate gleamed in her dark eyes.

"She will kick thee, my angel, just once too often," she murmured to the wee creature when she had carried him from the room. "And then we shall see, thy Marie knows that which may punish her some day soon!"

Harietta, quite indifferent to these matters, telephoned immediately to Ferdinand Ardayre.

He must come to her instantly without a moment's delay! And she stamped her foot.

A plan which might give her some satisfaction to execute had evolved itself in her brain.

He was in his room in another part of the building, and hastened to obey her command. She was livid with anger and seemed to have grown old.

She went over and kissed him voluptuously and then she began:

"Ferdie," and she whispered hoa.r.s.ely, "now you have got to do something for me. You are not going to let the child of Verisschenzko be master of Ardayre! We are going to gain time and perhaps some day be able to do away with it. Now I have got a plan which will lighten your heart."

She knew that she could count upon him, for since the birth of the little Benedict and the death of John, Ferdinand had stormed with threats of vengeance, while knowing his impotency.

His life with Harietta had grown a torment and a h.e.l.l--but with every fresh unkindness and pang of jealousy she caused him, his low pa.s.sion for her increased. He knew that she loved Verisschenzko, whom he hated with all his might--and if she now proposed to hurt both his enemies, he would a.s.sist her joyfully.

"Tell it me," he begged.

So she drew him to the sofa and picked up a block and pencil.

"Do you possess any of the writing of your dead brother, John, or if you don't, can you get some from anywhere?"

Ferdinand's face blazed with excitement. What was she going to suggest?

"I always keep one letter--in which he ordered me never to address him and told me I was not of his blood but was a mongrel Turk."

"That is splendid--where is it? Have you got it here?"

"Yes, in my despatch box. I'll go and fetch it now."

"Very well. I will get rid of Stanisla.s.s for the evening and we can have some hours alone--and you will see if I don't help you to worry them hideously, Ferdie, even if that is all we can do!"

And when he had left her presence, she paced the room excitedly.

"It will prevent Stepan's marrying her at all events for; a long time."

The thought that she had lost Verisschenzko completely unbalanced her.

It was the first time in her life that she had had to relinquish a man.

She hated to have to realise how highly he must hold Amaryllis. He seemed the only thing she wanted now in life, and she knew that he was quite beyond her, and that indeed he had never been hers; the one human being whom she had attracted and yet never been able to intoxicate and draw against his will. She went over all their past meetings. With what supreme insolence he had invariably treated her--even in moments when he permitted himself to feel pa.s.sion! And how she adored him! She would have crawled to him now on the ground. She had not known she could feel so much. Every animal, sensual desire made her throb with rage. She would have torn the flesh from Amaryllis' face had she been there, and thrust her hatpin into her real eyes.

But the spoke should be put in the wheel of Verisschenzko's marrying her!

And perhaps some other revenge would come. Hans?--Hans should be made to carry the scheme through--Hans and Ferdinand. She dug her nails into the palms of her hands. No wild animal in its cage could have felt more rage.

Then when Ferdinand returned with John's letter, she controlled herself and sat down at the table beside him and supervised his attempts at copying the writing, while she unfolded the details of her scheme.

"You know John's body was never found," she informed him presently. "I heard all the details from a man who was there--they only picked up his gla.s.ses and his boot. He could very well have been taken prisoner by the Germans and be in hospital there, too ill to have written for all this time. Now think how he ought to word his first letter to his precious bread and b.u.t.ter wife!"