Читать книгу The Four Corners of the World - A. E. W. Mason - Страница 17

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There is no doubt about it. Women are not reasonable beings. Otherwise Olivia would never have come to the President's party in a white lace coat over a clinging gown of white satin. She looked beautiful, but I was dismayed when I saw her. She had come with the Gimenos, and I took her aside, and I am afraid that I scolded her.

"But you told me," she expostulated, "I was to spare no pains. There must be nothing of the traveller about me"; and there was not. From the heels of her satin slippers to the topmost tress of her hair she was dressed as she alone could dress in Santa Paula.

"But of course I meant you to wear black," I whispered.

"Oh, I didn't think of it," Olivia exclaimed wearily. "Please don't lecture"; and she dropped into a chair with such a lassitude upon her face that I thought she was going to faint.

"It doesn't matter," I said hastily. "No doubt the disguise will cover it. At ten o'clock, slip down into the garden. Until then, dance!"

"Dance!" she exclaimed, looking piteously up into my face.

"Yes," I insisted impatiently, and taking her hand, I raised her from her chair.

She had no lack of partners, for the President himself singled her out and danced in a quadrille with her. Others timorously followed his example. But though she did dance, I was grievously disappointed--for a time. It seemed that her soul was flickering out in her. Just when she most needed her courage and her splendid spirit, she failed of them.

There were only two more hours after a long fortnight of endurance. Yet those two last hours, it seemed, she could not face. I know now that I never acted with greater cruelty than on that night when I kept her dancing. But even while she danced, there came to me some fear that I had misjudged her. I watched her from a corner of the ballroom. There was a great change in her. Her face seemed to me smaller, her eyes bigger, darker even, and luminous with some haunting look. But there was more. I could not define the change--at first. Then the word came to me. There was a spirituality in her aspect which was new to her, an unearthliness. Surely, I thought, the fruit of great suffering; and blundering, with the truth under my very nose, I began to ask myself a foolish question. Had Harry Vandeleur played her false?

A movement of the company awakened me. A premonitory sputter of rockets drew the guests to the cloak-room, from the cloak-room to the garden. I saw Olivia fetch her lace coat and slip it over her shoulders like the rest. It was close upon ten. The Fates were favouring us, or perhaps I was favouring the Fates. For I had arranged that the fireworks should begin just a few minutes before the hour struck. In the darkness of the garden Olivia could slip away, and her absence would not afterwards be noticed.

I waited at the garden door. I heard the clock strike. I saw Juan Ballester's profile in fire against a dark blue sky of velvet and stars. I shook hands with myself in that the moon would not rise till one. And then a whiteness gleamed between the bushes, and Olivia was at my side. Her hand sought mine and clung to it. I opened the postern and looked out into a little street. The lamps of a closed carriage shone twenty yards away, and but for the carriage the street was empty.

"Now!" I whispered.

We ran out. I opened the carriage door. I caught a glimpse of horn spectacles, a lantern-jawed, unshaven face, a shovel hat; and I heard a stifled oath. Mr. Crowninshield, too, had noticed Olivia's white gown. She jumped in, I shut the door, and the carriage rolled away. I went back into the garden, where Juan Ballester's profile was growing ragged.

Of the next hour or two I have only confused memories. I counted stages in Olivia's progress as I passed from room to room among the guests. Now she would have reached the station; now the train had stopped on the Quay at Las Cuevas; now, perhaps, the gangway had been withdrawn and the great ship was warping out into the river. At one o'clock I smoked a cigarette in the garden. From the marquee came the clatter of supper. In the sky the moon was rising. And somewhere outside the three-mile limit a rippling path of silver struck across the Ariadne's dark bows. I was conscious of a swift exultation. I heard the throb of the screw and saw the water flashing from the ship's sides.

Then I remembered that I had left the garden door unlocked. I went to it and by chance looked out into the street. I received a shock. For, twenty yards away, the lights of a closed carriage shone quietly beside the kerb. I wondered whether the last few hours had been really the dream of a second. I even looked back into the garden, to make sure that the profile of Juan Ballester was not still sputtering in fire. Then a detail or two brought me relief. The carriage was clearly a private carriage; the driver on the box wore livery--at all events, I saw a flash of bright buttons on his coat. In my relief I walked from the garden towards the carriage. The driver recognised me most likely--recognised, at all events, that I came from the private door of the President's garden. For he made some kind of salute.

I supposed that he had been told to wait at this spot, away from the park of carriages, and I should have turned back but for a circumstance which struck me as singular. It was a very hot night, and yet not only were the windows of the carriage shut, but the blinds were drawn close besides. I could not see into the carriage, but there was light at the edges of the blinds. A lamp was burning inside. I stood on the pavement, and a chill struck into my blood and made me shiver. I listened. There was no sound of any movement within the carriage. It must be empty. I assured myself and again doubted. The little empty street, the closed carriage with the light upon the edges of the blinds, the absolute quiet, daunted me. I stepped forward and gently opened the door. I saw Olivia. There was no trace of the nun's gown, nor the coif. But that her hair was ruffled she might this moment have left Juan Ballester's drawing-room.

She turned her face to me, shook her head, and smiled.

"It was of no use, my friend," she said gently. "They were on the watch at Las Cuevas. An officer brought me back. He has gone in to ask Juan what he shall do with me."

Olivia had given up the struggle--that was clear.

"It was Crowninshield's fault!" I cried.

"No, it was mine," she answered.

And here is what had happened, as I learnt it afterwards. All had gone well until the train reached Las Cuevas. There the police were on the look-out for her. The Padre Antonio, however, excited no suspicion, and very likely Sister Pepita would have passed unnoticed too. But as she stepped down from the carriage on to the step, and from the step to the ground, an officer was startled by the unexpected appearance of a small foot in a white silk stocking and a white satin slipper. Now, the officer had seen nuns before, old and young, but never had he seen one in white satin shoes, to say nothing of the silk stockings. He became more than curious. He pointed her out to his companions. Sister Pepita was deftly separated in the crowd from the Padre Antonio--cut out, to borrow the old nautical phrase--and arrested. She was conducted towards a room in the station, but the steamer's siren hooted its warning to the passengers, and despair seized upon Olivia. She made a rush for the gangway, she was seized, she was carried forcibly into the room and stripped of her nun's disguise and coif. She was kept a prisoner in the room until the Ariadne had left the Quay. Then she was placed in a carriage and driven back, with an officer of the police at her side, to the garden door of the President's house.

Something of this Olivia told me at the time, but she was interrupted by the return of the officer and a couple of Juan Ballester's messengers.

"His Excellency will see you," said the officer to her. He conducted her through the garden and by the private doorway into Ballester's study. I had followed behind the servants and I remained in the room. We waited for a few minutes, and Juan himself came in. He went quickly over to Olivia's side. His voice was all gentleness. But that was his way with her, and I set no hopes on it.

"I am grieved, Señorita, if you have suffered rougher treatment than befits you. But you should not have tried to escape."

Olivia looked at him with a piteous helplessness in her eyes. "What am I to do, then?" she seemed to ask, and, with the question, to lose the last clutch upon her spirit. For her features quivered, she dropped into a chair, laid her arms upon the table, and, burying her face in them, burst into tears.

It was uncomfortable--even for Juan Ballester. There came a look of trouble in his face, a shadow of compunction. For myself, the heaving of her young shoulders hurt my eyes, the sound of her young voice breaking in sobs tortured my ears. But this was not the worst of it, for she suddenly threw herself back in her chair with the tears wet upon her cheeks, and, beating the table piteously with the palms of her hands, she cried:

"I am hungry--oh, so hungry!"

"Good Heavens!" cried Ballester. He started forward, staring into her face.

"But you knew," said Olivia, and he turned away to one of the messengers, and bade him bring some supper into the room.

"And be quick," said I.

"Yes, yes, be quick," said Juan.

At last I had the key to her. She had been starving, in that great, empty house in the Calle Madrid. "A fortnight!" she had cried in dismay. I understood now the reason of her terror. She had known that she would have to starve. And she had held her head high, making no complaint, patiently enduring. It was not her spirit which had failed her. I cursed myself for a fool as once more I enthroned her. Her face had grown smaller, her eyes bigger. There was a look of spirituality which I had not seen before. I had noticed the signs, and I had misread them. Her lassitude this evening, her vain struggle with the police, her apathy under their treatment of her, were all explained. Not her courage, but her body had failed her. She was starving.

A tray was brought in and placed before her. She dried her eyes and with a sigh she drew her chair in to the table and ate, indifferent to the presence of Ballester, of the officer who remained at the door, and of myself. Ballester stood and watched her. "Good Heavens!" he said again softly, and going to her side he filled her glass with champagne.

She nodded her thanks and raised it to her lips almost before he had finished pouring. A little colour came into her cheeks and she turned again to her supper. She was a healthy girl. There never had been anything of the drooping lily about Olivia. She had always taken an interest in her meals, however dainty she might look. The knowledge of that made her starvation doubly cruel--not only to her. Juan sat down opposite to her. There was no doubt now about the remorse in his face. He never took his eyes from her as she ate. Once she looked up and saw him watching her.

"But you knew," she said. "I was alone in the house. How much money did you leave there for me when you took my father away? A few dollars which your men had not discovered."

"But you yourself----" he stammered.

"I was at a ball," said Olivia scornfully. "How much money does a girl take with her to a ball? Where would she put it?"

There was no answer to that question.

"The next day I went to the bank," she continued. "My father's money was impounded. You had seen to that. All the unpaid bills came in in a stream. I couldn't pay them. I could get no credit. You had seen to that. My friends left me alone. Of course I starved; you knew that I should. You meant me to," and, with the air of one who has been wasting time, she turned again to her supper.

"I never thought that you would hold out," stammered Ballester. I had never seen him in an apologetic mood before, and he looked miserable. "I hadn't seen that you were starving."

Olivia looked up at him. It was not so much that her face relented, as that it showed an interest in something beyond her supper.

"Yes," she said, nodding at him. "I think that's true. You hadn't seen with your own eyes that I was starving. So my starving wasn't very real to you."

Ballester changed her plate and filled her glass again.

"Ah!" said Olivia with satisfaction, hitching up her chair still closer. She was really having a good square meal.

"But why didn't you tell me?" I asked.

"I told no one," said Olivia, shaking her head. "I thought that I could manage till to-night. Once or twice I called on the Gimenos at luncheon-time, and I had one or two dollars. No; I would tell no one."

"Yes," said Juan, "I understand that. It's the reason why I wanted you." And at this sign of his comprehension of her, Olivia again looked at him, and again the interest in her eyes was evident.

At last she pushed back her chair. The tray was removed. Ballester offered her a cigarette. She smiled faintly as she took it. Certainly her supper had done her a world of good. She lit her cigarette and leaned her elbows on the table.

"And now," she said, "what do you mean to do with me?"

Ballester went to his bureau, wrote on a sheet of paper and brought the paper to Olivia.

"You can show this at the railway-station to-morrow," he said, and he laid the permit on the table and turned away.

Women are not reasonable people. For the second time that night Olivia forced me to contemplate that trite reflection. For now that she had got what she had suffered hunger and indignities to get, she merely played with it with the tips of her fingers, looking now upon the table, now at Juan Ballester's back, and now upon the table again.

"And you?" she said gently. "What will become of you?"

I suppose Ballester was the only one in the room who did not notice the softness of her voice. To me it was extraordinary. He had tortured her with hunger, exposed her to the gentle methods of his police, yet the fact that he did these things because he wanted her seemed to make him suddenly valuable to her now that she was free of him.

Ballester turned round and leaned against the wall with his hands in his pockets.

"I?" he said. "I shall just stay on alone here until some day someone gets stronger than I am, perhaps, and puts me up against the wall outside----"

"Oh, no!" cried Olivia, interrupting him.

"Well, one never knows," said his Excellency, shrugging his shoulders. He turned to the window and drew aside the curtains. The morning had come. It was broad daylight outside.

"Unless, Olivia," he added, turning again towards her, "you will reconsider your refusal to marry me. Together we could do great things."

It was the most splendid performance of the grand gentleman which Ballester ever gave. And he knew it. You could see him preening himself as he spoke. His gesture was as noble as his words. From head to foot he was the perfect cavalier, and consciousness of the perfection of his chivalry shone out from him like a nimbus. I looked quickly towards Olivia--in some alarm for Harry Vandeleur. She had lowered her head, so that it was impossible to see how she had taken Ballester's honourable amendment. But when she raised her head again a smile of satisfaction was just disappearing from her face; and the smile betrayed her. She had been playing for this revenge from the moment when she had finished her supper.

"I am honoured, Señor Juan," she said sedately, "but I am already promised."

Ballester turned abruptly away. Whether he had seen the smile, whether, if he had seen it, he understood it, I never knew.

"You had better get the Señorita a carriage," he said to the officer at the door. As the man went out, the music from the ballroom floated in. Juan Ballester hesitated, and no shock which Olivia had given to me came near the shock which his next words produced.

"Don Santiago shall have his money. You can draw on it, Señorita, to-morrow, before you go."

"Thank you," she said.

The messenger reappeared. A carriage was waiting. Olivia rose and looked at Juan timidly. He walked ceremoniously to the door and held it open.

"Good night," she said.

He bowed and smiled in a friendly fashion enough, but he did not answer. It seemed that he had spoken his last word to her. She hesitated and went out. At once the President took a quick step towards me.

"Do you know what is said to-night?" he said violently.

I drew back. I could not think what he meant. To tell the truth, I found him rather alarming.

"No," I answered.

"Why, that I have given this party as a farewell; that I am still going to bolt from Maldivia. Do you see? I have spent all this money for nothing."

I drew a breath of relief. His violence was not aimed against me.

"That's a pity," I said. "But the rumour can still be killed. I thought of a way yesterday."

"Will it cost much?" he asked.

"Very little."

"What am I to do?"

"Paint the Presidential House," said I. "It wants it badly, and all Santa Paula will be very sure that you wouldn't spend money in paint if you meant to run away."

"That's a good idea," said he, and he sat down at once and began to figure out the expense. "A couple of hundred dollars will do it."

"Not well," said I.

"We don't want it done well," said Juan. "Two men on a plank will, be enough. A couple of hundred dollars is too much. Half that will be quite sufficient. By the way"--and he sat with his pen poised--"just run after--her--and tell her that Vandeleur is landing to-morrow at Trinidad. I invented some business for him there."

He bent down over the desk. His back was towards the door. As I turned the handle, someone was opening it from the other side. It was Olivia Calavera.

"I came back," she said, with the colour mantling in her face. "You see, I am going away to-morrow--and I hadn't said 'Good-bye.'"

Juan must have heard her voice.

"Please go and give that message," he said sharply. "And shut the door! I don't want to be disturbed."

Olivia drew back quickly. I was amazed to see that she was hurt.

"His message is for you," I said severely. "Harry Vandeleur lands at Trinidad to-morrow."

"Thank you," she said slowly; she turned away and walked as slowly down the passage. "Goodbye," she said, with her back towards me.

"I will see you off to-morrow, Señorita," I said; and she turned back to me.

"No," she said gently. "Don't do that! We will say 'Good-bye' here."

She gave me her hand--she had been on the point of going without even doing that. "Thank you very much," she added, and she walked rather listlessly away. She left me with an uneasy impression that her thanks were not very sincere. I am bound to admit that Olivia puzzled me that night. To extract the proposal of marriage from Ballester was within the rules of the game and good play into the bargain. But to come back again as she had done, was not quite fair. However, as I watched her go, I thought that I would keep my bewilderment to myself. I have never asked Harry Vandeleur, for instance, whether he could explain it. I went back to the study.

"I think fifty dollars will be ample," said Ballester, still figuring on his paper. "Has she gone?"

"She is going," said I. He rose from his chair, broke off a rose from a bowl of flowers which, on this night only, decorated the room. Then he opened the window and leaned out. Olivia, I reckoned, would be just at this moment stepping into the carriage. He tossed the rose down and drew back quickly out of sight.

"Shall it be green paint, your Excellency?" I asked.

His Excellency, I regret to say, swore loudly.

"Never in this world!" said he.

I had left the door open. The music of a languorous and melting waltz filled the room.

"I do loathe music!" cried Juan Ballester violently. It was the nearest approach to a sentimental remark that I had ever heard him make.