"See?" she screamed.

"--see no reason why you should refuse my aid, my plight is worse still. What are you doing now?"

"My hair," she announced.

"Surely it would not be improper for me to view a head of hair?"

"Perhaps not, monsieur; but my head is on my shoulders--which makes a difference."

"Mademoiselle," sighed Tricotrin, "never have I known a young lady whose head was on her shoulders more tightly. May I crave one indulgence? My imprisonment would be less painful for a cigarette, and I cannot reach the matches--will you consent to pa.s.s them round the screen?"

"It is against the rules. But I will consent to throw them over the top. Catch! Why don't you say 'thank you'?"

"Because your unjust suspicion killed me; I now need nothing but immortelles, and at dinner I will compose my epitaph. If I am not mistaken, I already smell the soup on the stairs."

And the soup had scarcely entered when his guest presented herself.

Paquin and the Fairy G.o.dmother would have approved her gown; as to her coiffure, if her employer could have seen it, he would have wanted to put her in his window. Tricotrin gave her his arm with stupefaction.

"Upon my word," he faltered, "you awe me. I am now overwhelmed with embarra.s.sment that I had the temerity to tease you while you dressed.

And what shall I say of the host who is churl enough to welcome you in such a shabby coat?"

The cork went pop, their tongues went nineteen to the dozen, and the time went so rapidly that a little clock on the chest of drawers became a positive killjoy.

"By all the laws of dramatic effect," remarked the poet, as they trifled with the almonds and raisins, "you will now divulge that the fashionable lady before me is no 'Rosalie Durand,' of a hairdresser's shop, but madame la comtesse de Thrilling Mystery. Every novel reader would be aware that at this stage you will demand some dangerous service of me, and that I shall forthwith risk my life and win your love."

"Bien sur! That is how it ought to be," she agreed.

"Is it impossible?"

"That I can be a countess?"

"Well, we will waive the 'countess'; and for that matter I will not insist on risking my life; but what about the love?"

"Without the rest," she demurred, "the situation would be too commonplace. When I can tell you that I am a countess I will say also that I love you; to-night I am Rosalie Durand, a friend. By the way, now I come to think of it, I shall be all that you have seen in London!"

"Why, I declare, so you will!" exclaimed Tricotrin. "Really this is a nice thing! I come to England for the benefit of my education--and when it is almost time for me to return, I find that I have spent the whole of the day in a room."

"But you have, at least, had a unique experience in it?" she queried with a whimsical smile.

"Well, yes; my journey has certainly yielded an adventure that none of my acquaintances would credit! Do you laugh at me?"

"Far from it; by-and-by I may even spare a tear for you--if you do not spoil the day by being clumsy at the end."

"Ah, Rosalie," cried the susceptible poet, "how can I bear the parting?

What is France without you? I am no longer a Frenchman--my true home is now England! My heart will hunger for it, my thoughts will stretch themselves to it across the sea; banished to Montmartre, I shall mourn daily for the white cliffs of Albion, for Soho, and for you!"

"I, too, shall remember," she murmured. "But perhaps one of these days you will come to England again?"

"If the fare could be paid with devotion, I would come every Sunday, but how can I hope to ama.s.s enough money? Such things do not happen twice. No, I will not deceive myself--this is our farewell. See!" He rose, and turned the little clock with its face to the wall. "When that clock strikes, I must go to catch my train--in the meantime we will ignore the march of time. Farewells, tears, regrets, let us forget that they exist--let us drink the last gla.s.s together gaily, mignonne!"

They pledged each other with brave smiles, hand in hand. And now their chatter became fast and furious, to drown the clock's impatient tick.

The clockwork wheezed and whirred.

"'Tis going to part us," shouted Tricotrin; "laugh, laugh, Beloved, so that we may not hear!"

"Kiss me," she cried; "while the hour sounds, you shall hold me in your arms!"

"Heaven," gasped the young man, as the too brief embrace concluded, "how I wish it had been striking midnight!"

The next moment came the separation. He descended the stairs; at the window she waved her hand to him. And in the darkness of an "English hansom" the poet covered his face and wept.

"From our hearts we rejoice to have thee safely back!" they chorused in Montmartre. "And what didst thou see in London?"

"Oh, mon Dieu, what n.o.ble sights!" exclaimed Tricotrin. "The Lor' Maire blazes with jewels like the Shah of Persia; and compared with Peeccadeelly, the Champs Elysees are no wider than a hatband. Vive l'Entente! Positively my brain whirls with all the splendours of London I have seen!"

THE INFIDELITY OF MONSIEUR NOULENS

Whenever they talk of him, whom I will call "Noulens"--of his novels, his method, the eccentricities of his talent--someone is sure to say, "But what comrades, he and his wife!"--you are certain to hear it. And as often as I hear it myself, I think of what he told me that evening --I remember the shock I had.

At the beginning, I had expected little. When I went in, his wife said, "I fear he will be poor company; he has to write a short story for _La Voix,_ and cannot find a theme--he has been beating his brains all day." So far, from antic.i.p.ating emotions, I had proposed dining there another night instead, but she would not allow me to leave.

"Something you say may suggest a theme to him," she declared, "and he can write or dictate the story in an hour, when you have gone."

So I stayed, and after dinner he lay on the sofa, bewailing the fate that had made him an author. The salon communicated with his study, and through the open door he had the invitation of his writing-table--the little sheaf of paper that she had put in readiness for him, the lighted lamp, the pile of cigarettes. I knew that she hoped the view would stimulate him, but it was soon apparent that he had ceased to think of a story altogether. He spoke of one of the latest murders in Paris, one sensational enough for the Paris Press to report a murder prominently--of a conference at the Universite des Annales, of the artistry of Esther Lekain, of everything except his work. Then, in the hall, the telephone bell rang, and madame Noulens rose to receive the message. "Allo! Allo!"

She did not come back. There was a pause, and presently he murmured:

"I wonder if a stranger has been moved to telephone a plot to me?"

"What?" I said.

"It sounds mad, hein? But it once happened--on just such a night as this, when my mind was just as blank. Really! Out of the silence a woman told me a beautiful story. Of course, I never used it, nor do I know if she made use of it herself; but I have never forgotten. For years I could not hear a telephone bell without trembling. Even now, when I am working late, I find myself hoping for her voice."

"The story was so wonderful as that?"

He threw a glance into the study, as if to a.s.sure himself that his wife had not entered it from the hall.

"Can you believe that a man may learn to love--tenderly and truly love --a woman he has never met?" he asked me.

"I don't think I understand you."

"There has been only one woman in my life who was all in all to me," he said--"and I never saw her."

How was I to answer? I looked at him.

"After all, what is there incredible in it?" he demanded. "Do we give our love to a face, or to a temperament? I swear to you that I could not have known that woman's temperament more intimately if we had made our confidences in each other's arms. I knew everything of her, except the trifles which a stranger learns in the moment of being presented-- her height, her complexion, her name, whether she was married or single. No, those things I never knew. But her tastes, her sympathies, her soul, these, the secret truths of the woman, were as familiar to me as to herself."