"They saw all that the tourist sees, and the chaperon was still ill. The girl thought that she would like to see something of the Parisians themselves; she was tired of Cook's English people and Americans. So she gave the guide money to buy himself clothes, and bade him take her to the restaurants and places where the world of Paris a.s.sembled. It was known at the hotel, perhaps through the servants, that the girl was rich. The guide heard it and told some one else. Between them they concocted a plot. The girl was to be the victim. She was only eighteen.

"One day they were lunching at the Cafe de Paris--the guide and the girl--when a young man entered. He was exceedingly handsome, and very wonderfully turned out after the fashion of the French dandy. The guide, as the young man pa.s.sed, rose up and bowed respectfully. The young man nodded carelessly. Then he saw the girl, and he looked at her as no man had ever looked before. And the girl ought to have been angry, but wasn't.

"She asked the guide who the young man was. He told her that it was the Duke of Languerois, head of one of the oldest families in France. His father and grandfather, and for a time he himself, had been in their service! The girl looked across at the young man with interest, and the young man returned her gaze. That was what he was there for.

"As they left the restaurant her guide fell behind for a moment, and when she looked round she saw him talking to the young man. Of course she wanted to know what they had been saying, and with much apparent reluctance the guide told her. The young man had been inquiring about mademoiselle, where they spent their time, how he could meet them. Of course he had told nothing. But the young man was very persistent and very much in earnest! She encouraged the guide to talk about him, and she believed what she was told. He was rich, n.o.ble, adored in French society, and he was in love with mademoiselle. She was very soon given to understand this.

"For several days the young man was always in evidence. He was perfectly respectful, he never attempted to address her. It was all most cunningly planned. Then one evening, when she was driving with her guide through a narrow street, a man sprang suddenly upon the step of her carriage and s.n.a.t.c.hed at her jewels. Another on the other side had pa.s.sed his arm round the guide's neck and almost throttled him, and a third was struggling with the coachman. It was one of those lightning-like attacks by Apaches, which were common enough then--at least it seemed like one.

The girl screamed, and, of course, the young man, who had been following in another voiture, appeared. One of the thieves he threw on to the pavement, the others fled. And the young man was a hero! It was well arranged!"

Her voice broke for a moment, and Macheson moved uneasily upon the sofa.

If he could he would have stopped her. He could guess as much of the miserable story as it was necessary for him to know! But she ignored his threatened interruption. She was determined, having kept her secret for so long, that he should know now the whole truth.

"After that, things moved rapidly. The girl was as near her own mistress as a child of her age could be. She was lonely and the young man proved a delightful companion. He had many attractive gifts, and he knew how to make use of them. All the time he made love to her. For a time she resisted, but she had very little chance. She was just at the age when all girls are more or less fools. In the end she consented to a secret marriage. Afterwards he was to take her to his family. But that time never came.

"They were married at eleven o'clock one morning, and went afterwards to a cafe for dejeuner. The young man that day was ill at ease and nervous.

He kept looking about him as though he was afraid of being followed. He spoke vaguely of danger from the anger of his n.o.ble relations. They were scarcely seated at luncheon before a man came quietly into the place and whispered a few words in his ear. Whatever those few words were, the young man went suddenly pale and called for his hat and stick. He wrote an address on a piece of paper and gave it to the girl. He begged her to follow him in an hour--he would introduce her then to his friends. And he left her alone. The girl was troubled and uneasy. He had gone off without even paying for the luncheon. He had the air of a desperate man.

She began to realize what she had done.

"She was preparing to depart when an Englishman, who had been lunching at the other end of the room, came over, and, with a word of apology, sat down by her side. He saw that she was young, and a fellow-countryman, and he told her very gravely that he was sure she could not be aware of the character of the man with whom she had been lunching. Her eyes grew wide open with horror. The man, he said, was the illegitimate son of a French n.o.bleman, and his mother had been married to a guide--her guide! He had perhaps the worst character of any man in Paris. He had been tried for murder, imprisoned for forgery, and he was now suspected of being the leader of a band of desperate criminals who were dreaded all over Paris. This and other things he told her of the man whom she had just married. The girl listened as though turned to stone, with the piece of paper which he had given her crumpled up in her hands. Then the police came. They asked her questions. She pretended at first to know nothing. At last she addressed the commissionary. If she gave him the address where this young man could be found, he and all his friends, might she depart without mention being made of her, or her name appearing in any way? The commissionary agreed, and she gave him the piece of paper. The Englishman--it was Gilbert Deyes--took her back to her hotel, and the police captured Jean le Roi and the whole band of his a.s.sociates. The girl returned to England that night. Jean le Roi was sentenced to six years' penal servitude. His time was up last week."

"What a diabolical plot!" Macheson exclaimed. "But the marriage! It could have been annulled, surely?"

"Perhaps," she answered, "but I did not dare to face the publicity. I felt that I should never be able to look any one in the face again. I had given my name to the guide Johnson as Clara Hurd. I hoped that they might never find me."

"They cannot do you any harm," Macheson declared. "Let me go with you to the lawyers. They will see that you are not molested."

She shook her head.

"It is not so easy," she said. "The marriage was quite legal. To have it annulled I should have to enter a suit. The whole story would come out.

I could never live in England afterwards."

"But you don't mean," he protested, "to remain bound to this blackguard all your life!"

"How can I free myself," she asked, "except by making myself the laughing-stock of the country?"

"Why did you send for me?" he asked bluntly.

"To ask for your advice--and to protect me," she added, with a shiver.

"It is not only money that Jean le Roi wants! It is vengeance because I betrayed him."

"As for that, I won't leave you except when you send me away," he declared. "And my advice! If you want that, the right thing to me seems simple enough. Go at once to your lawyers. They will tell you the proper course. At the worst, the man could be bought off for the present."

She raised her head.

"I will not give him one penny," she declared. "I have always sworn that."

"But I'm afraid if you won't try to divorce him that he can claim some,"

Macheson said.

"Then he must come and take it by force," she declared.

There was silence between them. Then she rose to her feet and came and stood before him.

"I ought to have told you all this long ago," she said simply. "To-day I felt that I must tell you without another hour's delay. Now that you know, I am not so terrified. But you must promise to come and see me every day while that brute remains in London."

"Yes! I promise that," he answered, also rising to his feet.

They heard her maid moving about in the bedroom.

"Hortense is reminding me that I must dress for dinner," she remarked with a faint smile. "One must dine, you know, even in the midst of tragedies."

Macheson prepared to take his departure.

"I shall come to-morrow," he said, "if you do not send for me before."

CHAPTER XIV

BEHIND THE PALM TREES

Lady Peggy was fussing round the drawing-room, talking to all her guests at once.

"I haven't the least idea who takes anybody in," she declared. "James said he'd see to that, so you might just as well put your hand in a lucky-bag. And I'm not at all sure that you'll get any dinner. I've got a new _chef_--drives up in a high dogcart with such a sweet little groom. He may be all right. Jules, the maitre d'hotel at Claridge's, got him for me, and, Wilhelmina, sooner than come out like a ghost, I'd really take lessons in the use of the rouge-pot. My new maid's a perfect treasure at it. No one can ever tell whether my colour's natural or not.

I don't mind telling you people it generally isn't. But anyhow, it isn't daubed on like Lady Sydney's--makes her look for all the world like one of 'ces dames,' doesn't it? I'm sure I'd be afraid to be seen speaking to her if I were a man. Gilbert," she broke off, addressing Deyes, who was just being ushered in, "how dare you come to dinner without being asked? I'm sure I have not asked you. Don't say I did, now. You refused me eight times running, and I crossed you off my list."

Deyes held out a card as he bowed over his hostess's fingers.

"My dear lady," he said, "here is the proof that I am not an intruder. I am down to take in our hostess of Thorpe!"

"You have bribed James," she declared. "I hope it cost you a great deal of money. I will not believe that I asked you. However, since you are here, go and tell Wilhelmina some of your stories. I hate pale cheeks, and Wilhelmina blushes easily. No use looking at the clock, Duke. Dinner will be at least half an hour late, I'm sure. These foreign _chefs_ have no idea of punctuality. What's that? Dinner served! Two minutes before time. Well, we're all here, aren't we? I knew it would be either too early or too late. Duke, you will have to take me in. By the time we get there the soup will probably be cold. You'd better pray that we're starting with caviare and oysters! Such a slow crowd, aren't they--and such chatterboxes! I wish they'd move on a little faster and talk a little less. No! Only thirty. Nice sociable number, I call it, for a round table. I asked Victor Macheson, the man who's so rude to us all every Thursday afternoon for a guinea a time--I don't know why we pay it to be abused,--but he wouldn't come. I met him before he developed, and I don't think he liked me."

"You got my telegram?" Deyes asked, as he unfolded his napkin.

Wilhelmina nodded.

"Yes!" she answered. "It was very good of you to warn me. I have had--a letter already. The campaign has begun."

Deyes nodded.

"Chosen your weapons yet?" he asked.

"I haven't much choice, have I?" she answered, a little bitterly. "I fight, of course."

Deyes was carefully scanning the menu through his horn-rimmed eyegla.s.s.