Читать книгу The Wrath to Come - Edward Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 10

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Gertrude was more than content with her luncheon companion on the following morning. In some subtle but unmistakable way Grant's attitude seemed to have changed. He looked at her with undisguised admiration and the table which he had selected was in the most secluded corner of the famous restaurant at the end of the Arcade. She gave a little cry of delight as she leaned over the great bowl of pink roses which were awaiting her.

"How wonderful!" she exclaimed.

"How wonderful to have you here," he murmured gallantly.

She looked at him with a faint air of surprise. Yesterday he had seemed all reserve, sometimes even a little cold. To-day his deportment was almost that of a lover.

"Why are you so much nicer than yesterday?" she asked, as she took her place.

"My resistance is weakening," he confessed.

She gave a little sigh of content.

"I think," she confided, "that I am going to enjoy my luncheon. But before we say another word—tell me some more about this horrible tragedy. What was it? Heart disease?"

Grant nodded.

"The doctor thought so. I believe that he is making a further examination."

"Why did Naga motor all the way from the other side of Nice to see Lord Yeovil so late last night?" she enquired.

"Something to do with the meeting at Nice," he replied indifferently. "Let's talk about ourselves, Gertrude."

She allowed her hand to rest for a moment on his. Again she looked at him, half curiously, half with gratification.

"You are really much nicer than the Lymane boy," she declared, "and I thought that I should have to rely upon him for a flirtation."

"You'll do nothing of the sort," he announced brusquely.

"Mayn't I dine with him?"

"No," was the firm reply. "He has his work to attend to and you have me to look after."

She gave her undivided attention for a few moments to the hors d'œuvres and made a selection.

"Well," she decided, "we will postpone the discussion."

"If a flirtation is necessary to your peace of mind and contentment of spirit," he continued, "I must dig into the memories of my own sombre past."

"Dear me," she sighed, "I am afraid poor Otto is going to be very jealous."

"I was very jealous of him once," Grant reminded her. "It's my turn now."

"How much are you in earnest?" she asked curiously.

"I shall endeavour to show you."

"The life of an attractive woman," she murmured, "is full of complications."

"So are the lives of her victims," he commented. "Besides, there happens to be a little owing to this particular victim."

"Owing?" she repeated.

"I mean it. If you have any thoughts to spare from your husband, any kindness to give, any affection to bestow, these gifts belong to me."

Again she looked at him searchingly.

"Why are you so changed since yesterday?"

"Yesterday the old soreness had come back," he explained. "I loved you and hated you. To-day things seem to have fallen into a clearer perspective. I don't hate you any more."

"And do you—love me a little?"

He looked into her eyes which, before his earnest gaze, became faintly troubled.

"Grant," she whispered, "I don't know whether I want you to talk to me like this. I have a horrible feeling somehow that you're not serious. And besides—supposing I were to lose my head."

"Even then," he said, "you might look upon it as atonement."

She became silent for a time, obviously disturbed. The subjects which had filled her mind had been forcibly ejected.

"I can't think—really I can't think, Grant, what possessed me in those days," she murmured reminiscently. "Otto was so furiously in love with me, and he was so violent. I hesitated and then he seemed to have it all his own way. And I rather wanted to be a Princess."

"Don't let's talk about the past," he begged, his mouth hardening a little. "The only correct philosophy is to live from day to day. Let us talk about to-day, and then to-morrow."

She was almost embarrassed.

"Grant dear," she expostulated, "you mustn't make love to me like this before everybody. Prince Lutrecht always comes here to lunch and Cornelius Blunn arrived early this morning."

"Cornelius Blunn," Grant repeated. "One of the most interesting men in Europe, I should think."

"He is an intimate friend of my husband's," she remarked drily, "and for a widower, he's rather great on the domestic virtues. If we meet him I'll present you."

"How much of the rest of your day am I permitted to claim?" he enquired. "I should think we could dodge this virtue-loving millionaire somehow or other."

"But what about poor Mr. Lymane?" she demanded. "He has sent me a roomful of roses already this morning."

"Life," Grant declared, "is going to be full of disappointments for that young man."

"Meanwhile," she suggested, smiling, "supposing we leave off talking nonsense for a little time. I should like to hear some more about Baron Naga. Have you been up to the Villa this morning?"

"Yes, I went up to see if there was anything I could do. They are terribly upset, of course."

"Why did he come all the way from Nice at that time of night?" she asked for the second time.

"There was no particular reason that I know of, except that things are not going quite so smoothly as they should at the Conference," he confided. "Baron Naga, I think, wanted to explain his position."

"In Berlin they say that the Pact is breaking up," she told him, dropping her voice a little. "I never thought that it would last so long. America did well to keep out of it."

He nodded with assumed self-satisfaction.

"Yes, I think we did the right thing," he agreed. "America doesn't need allies, and she certainly doesn't want to be dragged in to pull the chestnuts out of any one else's fire. She is great enough to stand alone. No one can hurt her. Thank God no one wants to."

"I wonder," Gertrude reflected. "America has enemies, you know."

"Pooh! None that really count," he assured her. "Japan, of course—furious because we won't let her little yellow men come in and become citizens. And I suppose a portion of Germany's historic hatred descends upon us, too. Apart from that, we are all right."

"Supposing America were asked to join the Pact to-day; do you think she would consent?"

"I'm sure she wouldn't," he replied confidently. "Not the ghost of a chance of it. She's been out for all these years, making her own commercial treaties, and to-day is easily the richest country in the world. Why should she change?"

"Why, indeed," Gertrude murmured. "I was just interested to know how you felt about it."

"I feel as our President feels," he continued, "and most of our thinking men. We are satisfied. We shouldn't get into a state of nerves even if Japan got leave to start building a couple more cruisers a year. By the way, I wonder whom they will send to take Naga's place at the Pact?"

"Katina is coming from Berlin," she told him. "I believe he is on his way already. I don't suppose I should have told you that," she added, with a little laugh, "but you see I'm beginning to have confidence in you—or rather in your indifference to these things."

"Why did you ever doubt me?" he asked. "I told you yesterday that I had finished with politics."

"Well," she explained, "you know how careful Germans are. You used to be in the Diplomatic Service, and I've heard you spoken of once or twice as a person who ought to be watched. I think I can clear your character now, though."

"I'm afraid I'm too lazy," he answered, "to be seriously interested in anything. The Van Roorden millions wrecked my ambitions. You'd have been a very rich woman if you'd waited, Gertrude."

"If I'd waited," she sighed, looking at him for a moment, and then dropping her eyes.

The restaurant, which had been almost empty at their first coming, had now filled up. Gertrude looked about her in surprise.

"Why, I never saw these people come in," she declared. "There's Prince Lutrecht over there. And a whole party of your friends. I don't think Lady Susan likes me."

Susan nodded and smiled across the room. Her eyes, however, had a shade of reproach in them as they met Grant's.

"Like you? Of course she likes you," he protested. "If there's an unpopular one in the party, it isn't you. Look how Lymane is glaring at me. Gertrude, you won't dine with him, will you?"

"My dear Grant, how on earth am I going to get out of it?" she asked.

"I'll get you out of it all right," he promised. "Tell me, who is the corpulent gentleman of pleasant appearance, with the hat too small for his head, who is standing upon the threshold, beaming at you?"

"That is Cornelius Blunn," she whispered. "He's a dear thing. Do be civil to him for my sake. He could make mischief with Otto if he wanted to, and I'm afraid he's coming to speak to me."

The newcomer—stout, genial and jovial—was crossing the room, smiling as though the whole of Monte Carlo was some tremendous joke and the fact of meeting the Princess its supreme consummation. He lumbered up like a great elephant, moving clumsily on his rather short legs. But the air with which he raised Gertrude's fingers to his lips was the air of a courtier.

"Why, Princess," he exclaimed. "How delightful to find you, and how good for one's national self-respect to discover that no one in this wonderful place can even hold a candle to a compatriot."

"Always a flatterer," she smiled. "Let me introduce Mr. Grant Slattery. Mr. Cornelius Blunn."

Mr. Blunn shook hands pleasantly, but without enthusiasm. His manner suggested that Grant's presence as Gertrude's sole companion needed some further explanation.

"Mr. Slattery is one of my oldest friends," she continued. "We were children together in Washington."

Mr. Blunn beamed. A great smile seemed to rise from the depths of his nature. He was a man of sentiment and he recognised the claim of old friendships. He took the affair under his protection.

"Delightful!" he exclaimed. "Mr. Slattery, you must not doubt my sincerity when I say that it is always a pleasure to meet an American. I am no stranger in New York. I was one of the first who dared show himself there after the terrible days of the War. I was a youngster then—but it hurt. Still, I said to myself, I will go there. It is the home of many of my race. If there is still bad feeling between us, it must perish. And it has perished. Of that I am assured. It has indeed."

"Do you travel in England, too?" Grant asked.

Mr. Blunn was no longer a completely happy man. He sighed.

"In England—no," he answered. "That is another matter. Princess, I kiss your fingers. My luncheon will be a happier meal for the pleasure you have brought into the room. Mr. Slattery, I envy you, sir. So does every man, but I bear you no grudge."

He departed, ponderous yet light-footed, elephantine yet dignified. Grant gazed after him with genuine curiosity.

"If I were up against that man in a business deal or a political imbroglio," he murmured, "I should feel that I needed all my wits about me. A person of that type is more dangerous than all the Lutrechts in the world."

"Dangerous? But how, dangerous?" she queried. "Mr. Blunn is a great philanthropist and an enthusiastic patron of the arts. In what respect could he be dangerous?"

"Only if he chose to be," Grant answered carelessly.

"Could I be dangerous, if I chose to be?" she demanded.

"You are dangerous," he assured her. "You are the most dangerous woman in the world, to my peace of mind. And the terrible part of it all is that you are a German. You belong to a race with whom the domestic virtues are a positive fetish."

"Just because I married Otto?"

"Just because you married Otto," he acknowledged. "Germans have the knack of making Germans of their wives."

"Absurd!" she laughed. "What is there Teutonic about me? German women haven't my figure, and they certainly couldn't wear my clothes."

"Externally you have advantages," he admitted. "All the same you have married a German and you are a governed woman."

"How you hate my adopted country," she exclaimed.

"I do not," he objected. "I hate neither the country nor the people. My feeling is entirely different. I don't mind admitting that if I were a seriously minded politician I should be afraid of them."

"But why?" she asked. "What is there to fear? Industrially the world is open to every one since war was done away with."

"Perhaps so."

"But hasn't it, Grant, really? The Pact includes every European nation, as well as Japan. Then there's the Limitation of Armaments as well. Every nation is more or less on an equal footing, and they are all pledged not to fight one another. You must admit that Germany has kept the conditions of the Pact faithfully. Where can fear lie?"

"Where, indeed? You mustn't take me too seriously, Gertrude. I only meant that, so far as I can see, Germany is well on the way to becoming the second most powerful nation in the world. But honestly, I don't know why we're talking politics. I lost all interest in them years ago. Do you know what I did yesterday?"

"Tell me," she begged.

"I wired to Cannes for my yacht. It should be here to-morrow."

She looked at him for a moment steadily. Then a tinge of colour stole into her cheek. She seemed suddenly a little nervous.

"I wish I knew which was the real Grant," she murmured.

"What do you mean?"

"The Grant of yesterday—or the Grant of to-day."