Читать книгу The Court of St. Simon - E. Phillips Oppenhein - Страница 9

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EUGENE D'ARGMINAC had certainly succeeded in his quest for some new sensation, although the result did not appear to be altogether satisfactory. Wrapped in a rose-colored dressing-gown, he lay upon a deep sofa in his luxurious bedroom, with a pile of novels and newspapers beside him, a basket of peaches, a bottle of absinthe, and a half-empty box of cigarettes. The room was full of strange odors, burning essences, for which he seemed to have a special fondness, and every aperture through which fresh air could enter was closed. Nevertheless, although his immediate surroundings were exactly those most dear to him, it was very clear that he was far from content. As a matter of fact, he was almost prostrated with fear. At the slightest noise he twitched and started nervously. A footstep alarmed him.

"Gustave!" he exclaimed. "Gustave, how is it that you tread so loudly! Where are your slippers, you dolt, you clumsy idiot!"

There was no reply. D'Argminac turned his head and was suddenly speechless. This was not the pale, smooth-faced Gustave who came so leisurely across the room towards him. The boy clutched at the side of his couch. He could scarcely believe his eyes. It was the wonderful stranger of a few nights ago, Monsieur Simon, the man who had first turned the key in the door which had led into this land of strange terrors and delights!

"Monsieur Simon!" he gasped. "You!"

Valentin laid down his hat and stick. "Yes!" he assented shortly. "I had a visit this morning from our friend Briane. I thought that I had better come and see you."

D'Argminac shrank back upon his couch. His face was livid, his forehead damp, the lines under his eyes were almost purple. "You have seen Monsieur Briane?" he faltered. "He has told you everything?"

"He has told me everything," Valentin repeated. "It seems that you have gone a little further, my young friend, in your quest."

"It was Monsieur Briane," the boy muttered. Valentin frowned. "Briane gave you what you asked for," he reminded him sharply. "It is generally a mistake to give people what they ask for."

The boy's lips were slowly parted. "Monsieur Simon," he said hoarsely, "it was horrible! I saw the black figure come up behind, noiseless, creeping like an animal, holding on to the wall, bent double. And then the spring! I saw the knife flash, I heard that man's cry and the drip, drip, drip upon the pavement!"

He began to sob. Valentin looked at him as one might look upon some deformed object.

"Robert—the man who did it," he went on—"I had spoken to him only a minute before—I had taken a petit verre with him. He wiped his knife upon the tunic of the gendarme and leered at me across the street. Then he turned and ran, and all the others ran, and I—oh, my God, I couldn't!" the boy wound up.

Valentin sighed. "This is what comes of taking a nerveless parcel of insignificant humanity like you and treating it as though it were really flesh and blood," he murmured. "You had a beastly unwholesome craving to see crime. You've seen it and it has been too much for you. They tell me that there is some danger of your betraying those who gave you what you asked for."

"The man may die!" D'Argminac faltered.

"Die!" Valentin repeated contemptuously. "You knew quite well that life and death are phases only among these people. You knew that you were going to see an act of revenge—it may even have been justice. It is not your concern. It was bloodshed itself which you desired to see. You were gratified and now you whine like a sentimental puppy. Remember this. No one has made you the judge of my friend Briane or le beau Robert, or any of these others, any more than you have been made the guardian angel of the man at whom they struck. So far as you are concerned, these men have done no ill."

D'Argminac's fingers twitched as they played with the girdle of his dressing-gown. "I don't care what they've done," he muttered. "It isn't that."

Valentin shrugged his shoulders slightly. Then: "The object of my visit," he said, "is to impress this upon you, Eugène d'Argminac. If you are summoned before the magistrate to-morrow, you know nothing about that happening, about what went before or what came afterwards. There is no one concerned in it whom you can identify or whom you can remember to have seen before." D'Argminac listened intently. "No one I can identify, no one whom I can remember to have seen before," he repeated, after a pause. "I will try. But, Monsieur Simon, I am afraid. I suffer terribly from nerves. I do not like to go into any crowded place. I do not like to go into a court of justice. If I stand there, I shall scream. They bully one so, these lawyers. They will do what they will with me. I am terrified lest they should make me answer just as they please. This morning I am ill, Monsieur Simon, indeed I am ill."

He threw himself back upon the sofa with a groan.

Valentin looked around the room with an air of intense disgust.

"Of course you are ill, or think you are," he replied, "breathing an atmosphere like this! Why don't you send for a doctor to prescribe for you, open all the windows, and let in some fresh air?"

D'Argminac shook his head. "I catch cold so easily," he protested. "I like my rooms always warm. As for the doctor, I have sent for him many times, but he does me no good. I have my draught here and some absinthe. Monsieur Simon," he continued pitifully, "it is not that I wish to bring evil upon Monsieur Briane or the man—the man whom they call Robert, but in the court of justice I am helpless. I cannot breathe in a crowd—I shall faint, and when I recover I shall be so weak that I may say anything."

Valentin rose to his feet. His face was dark and menacing. He gripped the other'a shoulders and shook him. D'Argminac began to sob with terror.

"Listen," Valentin said, "I have done my errand. Before I go, let me assure you of this, though. The magistrate's room may have its fears for you, but there are more terrible things in the world. The friends of Monsieur Briane and le beau Robert number something like five thousand in this city, all bound together for purposes of self-protection. If by any single word you give away your knowledge of the affair that night, or mention our little excursion of the other evening, you will need to have exactly five thousand lives to avoid having your throat cut within a month."

"The police would protect me!" the boy muttered.

Valentin laughed scornfully. "The police! The poor fellow whom you saw killed in the Place Ceinture represented the police. They are none too anxious to have anything to do with Monsieur Briane's friends—let me tell you that. They know all about the house you visited with Mademoiselle and with me, but I don't think you will find them making any raids in that direction."

"I could leave the country!"

Valentin sighed. "Really," he said, "I gave you credit for more intelligence. I shall waste no more time upon you, but look me in the eyes, listen to what I am saying to you. Your cross-examination by the magistrate tomorrow will be only nominal. You saw nothing except a dark form steal up behind the gendarme, and you heard a cry. You were paralyzed with terror and you could not speak or move. You did not see the murderer's face. You were there because beyond the Place Ceinture there is a café which you had heard spoken of as a curiosity and worth a visit. Would you like me to repeat it?"

"I can remember it," the boy faltered. "But the magistrate will ask me more questions."

"I think not," Valentin replied. "Between you and me, I think that they are very well content to know as little as possible. Another arrest would mean more reprisals. I think you will find them willing to let things lie. Look at me. You believe what I say? You will obey?"

D'Argminac gazed up with fascinated eyes at the man who was standing over him. "I will do my best," he promised weakly.

Valentin moved away. He took up his hat and stick. He returned, however, to his former position and stood looking into the boy's face. There was a touch there of something feminine, something which seemed to denote an absence of virility, a superabundance of sensitiveness, which, after all, was perhaps a matter of inheritance. Valentin's expression softened; his tone, when he spoke, was kinder.

"My young friend," he said, "for my part I will say this. I regret exceedingly that a moment's idle curiosity should have induced me to make your acquaintance the other night in the Abbaye. Believe me, you are not suited for this life. Take my advice and chuck it all. Go back to England and try living in the open air for a few months. Here you are, after all, only affecting to be weary of a life over whose threshold you have not yet passed. How old are you?"

"Twenty-two," D'Argminac replied.

"Twenty-two!" Valentin repeated. "Haven't you a sister or a mother or some one who'll look after you?" "I have a sister," D'Argminac replied.

"Then go back to her," said Valentin, taking up his hat. "Make up your mind to try my prescription. Three months in England—in the country, mind—and try and fall in love with some nice girl. If you've any manhood in you, that ought to bring it out. And while you are here, break open your windows and let in the fresh air. Stop burning these beastly perfumes, take a cold bath now and go for a brisk walk in the Bois. Do you hear?"

"Yes, I hear," D'Argminac answered. "I'll—I'll try."

Valentin nodded not unkindly and turned away.

"Above all," he said, as he looked back from the door, "remember those few words of warning of mine."