The Way of Ambition Part 66

"No, don't!"

"Why not?"

"They are a symbol of your reconciliation with Armand Gillier."

"He isn't altogether a fool, I fancy," remarked Henriette, laying Gillier's bouquet down on the seat beside her. "But we shall see."

"Oh, Max! Yes, come in and sit with us!"

The faces of the two women changed as Max Elliot joined them.

CHAPTER XXIV

After their return from Constantine Mrs. s.h.i.+ffney and her party only stayed two nights at Mustapha. Then they descended to the harbor and went on board _The Wanderer_, which weighed anchor and set sail for Monte Carlo. Before leaving they paid a visit to Djenan-el-Maqui to say adieu to Charmian.

The day was unusually hot for the time of year, and both Mrs. s.h.i.+ffney and Madame Sennier were shrouded in white veils with patterns. These, the latest things from Paris, were almost like masks. Little of the faces beneath them could be seen. But no doubt they preserved complexions from the destructive influence of the sun.

Jacques Sennier had told his friends and his wife the story of his days of desertion. A name summed it up, Djenan-el-Maqui. With the utmost vivacity, however, he had described all he had eaten, drunk, smoked, and done in that hospitable house and garden; the impression he had made upon the occupants and had received from them.

"I am beloved by all!" he had cried, with enthusiasm. "They would die for me. As for the good Pierre, each night he led me home as if I were his own child!"

"We must certainly go and thank them," said Mrs. s.h.i.+ffney, laughing.

The visit was not without intensities.

"We've come to say 'Good-bye,'" said Mrs. s.h.i.+ffney, when they came into the "harem," as she persisted in calling the drawing-room. "We are just back from our little run, and now we must be off to Monte Carlo. By the way, we came across your husband in Constantine."

"I know. He wrote to me all about it," said Charmian.

Claude had really written a very short note, ending with the maddening phrase, "all news when we meet." She was burning with curiosity, was tingling almost with suspicion. As she looked at those veils, and saw the s.h.i.+ning of the feminine eyes behind them, it seemed to her that the two women lay in ambush while she stood defenseless in the open.

"Jacques has been telling me about your kindness to him," said Madame Sennier, "and your long talks about opera, America, the audiences over there, the managers, the money-making. I'm afraid he must have bored you with our affairs."

"Oh, no!" said Charmian quickly, and faintly reddening. "We have had a delightful time."

"Adorable!" said Sennier. "And those syrups of fruit, the strawberry, the greengage! And the omelettes of Jeanne, 'Jeanne la Grande,'"--he flung forth his arms to indicate the breadth of the cook. "And the evenings of moonlight, when we wandered between the pa.s.sion-flowers!"

He blew a kiss.

"Shall I forget them? Never!"

Madame Sennier was evidently quite undisturbed.

"You've given him a good time," she observed. "Indeed I'm afraid you've spoilt him. But are there really pa.s.sion-flowers in the garden?"

"I don't believe it!" said Max Elliot, laughing.

The composer seized his arm.

"Come with me, Max, and I will show you. England, that is the land of the sceptics. But you shall learn to have faith. And you, my Susan, come!"

He seized these two, who happened to be nearest to him, and, laughing like a child, but with imperative hands, compelled them to go out with him to the courtyard. Their steps died away on the pavement. The three women were left alone.

"Shall we sit in the court?" said Charmian. "I think it's cooler there.

There's a little breeze from the sea."

"Let us go, then," said Madame Sennier.

When they were sitting not far from the fountain, which made a pleasant murmur as it fell into the pool where the three goldfish moved slowly as if in a vague and perpetual search, Charmian turned the conversation to Constantine.

"It's perfectly marvellous!" said Mrs. s.h.i.+ffney. "Barbaric and extraordinary."

And she talked of the gorge and of the Chemin des Touristes. Madame Sennier spoke of the terrific wall of rock from which, in the days before the French occupation, faithless wives were sometimes hurled to death by their Arab husbands.

"_C'est affreux!_" she exclaimed, lapsing into French. She put up her hand to her veil, and pulled it tightly under her prominent chin with twisting fingers.

"_Les Arabes sont des monstres._"

As she spoke, as with her cold yellow eyes she glanced through the interstices of her veil at Charmian, she thought of Claude's libretto.

"Oh, but they are very attractive!" said Charmian quickly.

She, too, was thinking of the libretto with its Arab characters, its African setting. Not knowing, not suspecting that Madame Sennier had read it, she supposed that Madame Sennier was expressing a real and instinctive disgust.

The Frenchwoman shrugged her shoulders.

"_Ce sont tous des monstres mal propres!_"

"Henriette can't bear them," said Mrs. s.h.i.+ffney, pus.h.i.+ng a dried leaf of eucalyptus idly over the pavement with the point of her black-and-white parasol. "And do you know I really believe that there is a strong antipathy between West and East. I don't think Europeans and Americans really feel attracted by Arabs, except perhaps just at first because they are picturesque."

"Americans!" cried Madame Sennier. "Why, anything to do with what they call color drives them quite mad!"

"Negroes are not Arabs," said Charmian, almost warmly.

"It is all the same. _Ils sont tous des monstres affreux._"

"Tst! Tst! Tst!"

The voice of Jacques came up from the garden.

"What is it?"

"Tst! Tst!"

They were silent, and heard in the distance faintly a sound of drumming and of native music.