Celibates Part 24

When the first strength of the blast seemed ebbing, the girls looked round for shelter. They felt if they remained where they were, holding on to roots and gra.s.ses, that they would be carried away.

'Those rocks,' cried Cissy.

'We shan't get there in time, the trees will fall,' cried Elsie.

'Not a minute to lose,' said Mildred. 'Come!'

And the girls ran through the swaying trees at the peril of their lives. And, as they ran, the earth gave forth a rumbling sound and was lifted beneath their feet. It seemed as if subterranean had joined with aerial forces, for the crumbling sound they had heard as they ran through the scattered pines increased; it was the roots giving way; and the pines bent, wavered, and fell this way and that. But about the rocks, where the girls crouched the trees grew so thickly that the wind could not destroy them singly; so it had taken the wood in violent and pa.s.sionate grasp, and was striving to beat it down. But under the rocks all was quiet, the storm was above in the branches, and, hearing almost human cries, the girls looked up and saw great branches interlocked like serpents in the writhe of battle.

In half an hour the storm had blown itself out. But a loud wind shook through the stripped and broken forest; lament was in all the branches, the wind forced them upwards and they gesticulated their despair. The leaves rose and sank like cries of woe adown the raw air, and the roadway was littered with ruin. The whirl of the wind still continued and the frightened girls dreaded lest the storm should return, overtaking them as they pa.s.sed through the avenue.

The avenue was nearly impa.s.sable with fallen trees, and Elsie said:

'You'll not be able to go to Fontainebleau to-day.'

'Then I shall go to Melun.'

As they entered the village they met the carriage, and Mildred bade her friends good-bye.

XVIII.

In the long autumn and winter evenings Harold often thought of his sister. His eyes often wandered to the writing table, and he asked himself if he should write to her again. There seemed little use. She either ignored his questions altogether, or alluded to them in a few words and pa.s.sed from them into various descriptive writing, the aspects of the towns she had visited, and the general vegetation of the landscapes she had seen; or she dilated on the discovery of a piece of china, a bronze, or an old engraving in some forgotten corner. Her intention to say nothing about herself was obvious.

In a general way he gathered that she had been to Nice and Monte Carlo, and he wondered why she had gone to the Pyrenees, and with whom she was living in the Boulevard Poissonier. That was her last address.

The letter was dated the fifteenth of December, she had not written since, and it was now March. But sc.r.a.ps of news of her had reached him. One day he learnt from a paragraph in a newspaper that Miss Mildred Lawson had been received into the Church of Rome, he wrote to inquire if this was true, and a few days after a lady told him that she had heard that Mildred had entered a Carmelite convent and taken the veil. The lady's information did not seem very trustworthy, but Harold was nevertheless seriously alarmed, and, without waiting for an answer to the letter he had written the day before, he telegraphed to Mildred.

'I have not entered a convent and have no present intention of doing so.'

'Could anything be more unsatisfactory,' Harold thought. 'She does not say whether she has gone over to Rome. Perhaps that is untrue too.

Shall I telegraph again?' He hesitated and then decided that he would not. She did not wish to be questioned, and would find an evasive answer that would leave him only more bewildered than before.

He hoped for an answer to his letter, but Mildred did not write, no doubt, being of opinion that her telegram met the necessity of the case, and he heard no more until some news of her came to him through Elsie Laurence, whom Harold met one afternoon as he was coming home from the city. From Elsie he learnt that Mildred was a great social success in Paris. She was living with the Delacours, she had met them at Fontainebleau. Morton Mitch.e.l.l, that was the man she had thrown over, had introduced her to them. Harold had never heard of the Delacours, and he hastened to acquaint himself with them; Morton Mitch.e.l.l he reserved for some future time; one flirtation more or less mattered little; but that his sister should be living with the Delacours, a radical and socialist deputy, a questionable financier, a company promoter, a journalist, was very shocking. Delacour was all these things and many more, according to Elsie, and she rattled on until Harold's brain whirled. He learnt, too, that it was with the Delacours that Mildred had been in the South.

'She wrote to me from some place in the Pyrenees.'

'From Lourdes? she was there.'

A cloud gathered on Harold's face.

'She didn't write to me from Lourdes,' he said. 'But Lourdes is, I suppose, the reason of her perversion to Rome?'

'No; Mildred told me that Lourdes had nothing to do with it.'

'You say that she now lives with these people, the Delacours.'

'Yes; she's just like one of the family. She invites her friends to dinner. She invited me to dinner. The Delacours are very rich, and Mildred is now all the rage in Paris.'

'And Madame Delacour, what kind of a woman is she?'

'Madame Delacour has very poor health, they say she was once a great beauty, but there's very little of her beauty left. ... She's very fond of Mildred. They are great friends.'

The next time that Harold heard of Mildred was through his solicitors.

In the course of conversation regarding some investments, Messrs.

Blunt and Hume mentioned that Miss Lawson had taken 5000 pounds out of mortgage. They did not know if she had re-invested it, she had merely requested them to pay the money into her banking account.

'Why did you not mention this to me before?'

'Miss Lawson has complete control over her private fortune. On a former occasion, you remember, when she required five hundred pounds to hire and furnish a studio, she wrote very sharply because we had written to you on the subject. She spoke of a breach of professional etiquette.'

'Then why do you tell me now about this 5000 pounds?'

'Strictly speaking we ought not to have done so, but we thought that we might venture on a confidential statement.'

Harold thought that Messrs. Blunt and Hume had acted very stupidly, and he asked himself what Mildred proposed to do with the money. Did she intend to re-invest it in French securities? Or had the Roman Catholics persuaded her to leave it to a convent or to spend it in building a church? Or perhaps, Delacour and the Socialists have got hold of the money. But Mildred was never very generous with her money.

... He stepped into a telegraph office and stepped out again without having sent a message. He wrote a long letter when he arrived home, and tore it up when he had finished it. It was not a case for a letter or telegram, but for an immediate journey. He could send a telegram to the office, saying he would not be there to-morrow; he remembered a business appointment for Friday, which could not be broken. But he could return on Thursday morning. ... Arrive on Wednesday night, return on Thursday morning or Thursday night, if he did not succeed in seeing Mildred on Wednesday night. ... Yes, that would do it, but it would mean a tedious journey on the coldest month of the year. But 5000 English pounds was a large sum of money, he must do what he could to save it. Save it! Yes, for he hadn't a doubt that it was in danger.

... He would take the train at Charing Cross to-morrow morning. ... He would arrive in Paris about eight.... He would then go to his hotel, change his clothes, dine, and get to Mildred's about nine or half- past.

This was the course he adopted, and on Wednesday night at half-past nine, he crossed the Rue Richlieu, and inquired the way to Boulevard Poissonier.... If Mildred were going to a ball he would be able to get half an hour's conversation were her before she went upstairs to dress. If she were dining out, he could wait until she came in. She would not be later than eleven, he thought as he entered a courtyard.

There were a number of staircases, and he at last found himself in the corridors and the salons of _La voix du Peuple_, which was printed and published on the first floor. He addressed questions to various men who pa.s.sed him with proofs in their hands, and, when a door was opened on the left, he saw a glare of gas and the compositors bending over the cases.

Then he found his way to the floor above, and there doors were open on both sides of the landing; footmen hurried to and fro. He asked for Mademoiselle Lawson, and was led through rooms decorated with flowers.

'They are giving a ball here to-night,' he thought, and the footmen drew aside a curtain; and in a small end room, a boudoir dimly lighted and hung with tapestry and small pictures in gold frames, he found Mildred sitting on a couch with an elderly man, about fifty.

They seemed to be engaged in intimate conversation; and they rose abruptly, as if disconcerted by his sudden intrusion.

'Oh, Harold,' said Mildred.... 'Why didn't you write to say that you were coming _vous tombez comme une tuile.... Permettez-moi, Monsieur Delacour, de vous presenter a won frere_.' Harold bowed and shook hands with the tall thin man with the high-bridged nose and the close- cut black hair, fitting close to his head. In the keen grey eyes, which shone out of a studiously formal face, there was a look which pa.s.sed from disdain to swift interrogation, and then to an expression of courteous and polite welcome. M. Delacour professed himself delighted to make Harold's acquaintance, and he hoped that Harold was staying some time in Paris. Harold regretted that he was obliged to return on the following morning, and M. Delacour's face a.s.sumed an expression of disappointment. He said that it would have been his pleasure to make Harold's stay as agreeable as possible. However, on the occasion of Harold's next visit, M. Delacour hoped that he could stay with them. He went so far as to say that he hoped that Harold would consider this house as his own. Harold thanked him, and again expressed regret that he was obliged to leave the following morning.

He noticed a slight change of expression on the diplomatist's face when he mentioned that he had come over in a hurry to discuss some business matters with his sister. A moment later M. Delacour was smiling perfect approval and comprehension and moving towards the door. At the door he lingered to express a hope that Harold would stay for the ball. He said that Mildred must do her best to persuade her brother to remain.

The musicians had just come, she could hear them tuning their instruments. Guests would soon arrive, so she hoped that the interview would not be prolonged. The way to shorten it was to say nothing. She could see that Harold was embarra.s.sed, silence would increase his embarra.s.sment. She knew that he had come to speak about the 4000 pounds which she had taken out of mortgage. She knew that he hoped to induce her to re-invest it in some good security at five per cent. But she did not intend to take his advice, or to inform him regarding her relations with the Delacours. She knew, too, that he disapproved of her dress: it was certainly cut a little lower than she had intended, and then she saw that his eyes had wandered to the newspaper, which lay open on the table. In a moment he would see her name at the bottom of the first article. If he were to read the article, he would be more shocked than he was by her dress. It was even more _decolletee_ than her dress, both had come out a little more _decolletee_ than she had intended.

'I see,' he said, 'that you write in this paper.'

'A little, I'm doing a series of articles under the t.i.tle of _Bal Blanc_. My articles are a success. I like that one as well as any, you shall take the number of the paper away with you.'

'But how do you manage about writing in French?'

'I write very easily in French now, as easily as in English. M.

Delacour looks over my proof, but he hardly finds anything to correct.'

Mildred suppressed a smile, she had taken in the entire situation, and was determined to act up to it. It offered an excellent opportunity for acting, and Mildred was only happy when she could get outside herself. She crossed her hands and composed her most demure air; and, for the sake of the audience which it pleased her to imagine; and when Harold was not looking she allowed her malicious eyes to say what she was really thinking. And he, unconscious of the amus.e.m.e.nt he afforded, made delightful comedy. He tried to come to the point, but feared to speak too suddenly of the money she had drawn out of the mortgage, and, in his embarra.s.sment, he took a book from the table. The character of the ill.u.s.trations caused his face to flush, and an expression of shame to appear. Mildred s.n.a.t.c.hed the book out of his hand, saying:

'That is one of M. Delacour's books.'

'You know the book, then?'