Читать книгу The Poisoned Paradise - Robert William Service - Страница 29

The scenery was as lovely as a painted panel. Between umbrella pines he saw the majestic sway of the sea. Snowy villas peeped from sombre cyprus groves. The palms were pale gold in the wistful sunshine. Magic names glorified the common-place looking stations.—San Raphael, Agay, Nice. In the setting sun the way seemed to be growing more and more wonderful, as if working up to a climax of beauty. Every moment moved him to fresh rapture. And to think that this loveliness had been here all the time and he had not known! How could people continue to exist in that grim grey London? Was there such a place as this, or was he dreaming it? Would he ever go back again to fog and grime? No, never, never....

Villefranche, Beaulieu, Eze ... the light had faded, yet still he stared at the shadows through the darkened pane. He was aware suddenly that the glass was reflecting mirror-like the compartment behind him. At first he thought it was empty, then he heard a sigh and saw it was occupied by a slim slip of a girl. She was sitting in the corner, very quiet, very anxious. She was dressed in deep black, and her white, rather haggard face had a kind of pathetic appeal. He noted all this without any particular interest. Then suddenly she took off her hat and he saw that she had the most wonderful hair in the world.

She rose to arrange it before the small mirror above her seat. With a brusque movement she withdrew two combs and let it ripple down in a rain of gold. It reached below her waist. It covered her like a cape, it shimmered in the lamp light, it seemed as luminous as a flame. At the sight of such glory Hugh turned and stared.

Then the girl noticed him and flushed with shame. She clutched her bright tresses to her head and swiftly rearranged them. She turned her back....

Monte Carlo.

They were getting in now. The train seemed to plunge into a dazzle of light; then the darkness of another tunnel; then a long green station. On the lamps so meanly printed, he could see the magic name that opens wide the portals of romance. Surely it should be blazoned in fiery capitals on the heights of heaven! This then was the spot of which people talk and dream, that masterpiece of nature and art which never disenchants, which is adorable even in its cruelty. Fatal, fascinating name,—Monte Carlo.

It was the climax of the beautiful journey. The train disgorged nearly all its passengers as if this place like a magnet was drawing them out. He saw Bob Bender, and Jarvie Tope. He watched old Professor Durand looking curiously about him, and a white-haired porter taking the baggage of Mrs. Belmire. He felt alone, abandoned.

As the train lingered, loth to leave this charmed spot, Hugh felt a sudden desire to get off. He saw the fair-haired girl struggling with a basket valise. With a sudden impulse he gathered together his own luggage and prepared to descend, but the train was already in motion.

"Just as well. Now for Menton."

Then behold! the train halted again and backed to the station.

"Fate!" said Hugh and jumped off. He passed through a long baggage room into a courtyard where there were a line of luxurious hotel omnibuses and porters in livery. The court was backed by a wall of rock that rose to the heights of a glorious garden. Palms speared the silvery arc-lights. Masses of geraniums stained the face of the rock. On the winding steps that led to the garden a nude statue of a woman was set in a niche amid ferns and water lilies, and a diamond spray of water.

On the long hill to the right was a line of fiacres. He saw the fair haired girl hand her bag to one of the drivers.

"Pension Paoli," she said.

Hugh watched her drive away; then he, too, hailed a fiacre. The dark driver bent to him with smiling politeness.

"Where to, monsieur?"

Hugh thought for a moment. As he stood there he had a strange thrill of wonder and of joy. He seemed to breathe an enchanted air; the silver lights amid the trees were those of fairyland; he felt as if he were hesitating on the very threshold of romance.

"Pension Paoli," he answered.