"He is really a splendid character though," Denzil hastened to a.s.sure him. "Do you know the family history? But no, of course not, we were too busy in the old days enjoying life to trouble to talk of such things!

Well, it is rather strange in the last generation--things very nearly came to an end and John has built it all up again. You are interested in heredity?"

"Naturally--what is the story?"

"Our mutual great-grandfather was a tremendous personage in North Somerset--the place Ardayre is there. My father was the son of the younger son, who had just enough to do him decently at Eton, and enable him to sc.r.a.pe along in the old regiment with a pony or two to play with.

My mother was a Willowbrook, as you know, and a considerable heiress, that is how I come out all right, but until John's father, Sir James, squandered things, the head of the family was always very rich and full of land--and awfully set on the dignity of his race. They had turned the cult of it into regular religion."

"The father of this man made a _gaspillage_, then--well?"

"Yes, he was a rotter--a hark-back to his mother's relations; she was a Cranmote--they ruin any blood they mix with. I am glad that I come from the generation before."

Denzil helped himself to a Russian salad, and went on leisurely. "He fortunately married Lady Mary de la Paule--who was a saint, and so John seems to have righted, and takes after her. She died quite early, she had had enough of Sir James, I expect, he had gambled away everything he could lay hands upon. Poor John was brought up with a tutor at home, for some reason--hard luck on a man. He was only about thirteen when she died and at seventeen went straight into the city. He was determined to make a fortune, it has always been said, and redeem the mortgages on Ardayre--very splendid of him, wasn't it?"

"Yes--well all this is not out of the ordinary line--what comes next?"

Denzil laughed--he was not a good raconteur.

"The poor lady was no sooner dead than the old boy married a Bulgarian snake charmer, whom he had picked up in Constantinople! You may well smile"--for Verisschenzko had raised his eyebrows in a whimsical way--this did sound such a highly coloured incident!

"It was an unusual sort of thing to do, I admit, but the tale grows more lurid still, when I tell you that five months after the wedding she produced a son by the Lord knows who, one of her own tribe probably, and old Sir James was so infatuated with her that he never protested, and presently when he and John quarrelled like h.e.l.l he pretended the little brute was his own child--just to spite John."

Verisschenzko's Calmuck eyes narrowed.

"And does this result of the fusion of snake charmers figure in the family history? I believe I have met him--his name is Ferdinand, is it not, and he is, or was, in some business in Constantinople?"

"That is the creature--he was brought up at Ardayre as though he were the heir, and poor John turned out of things. He came to Eton three years before I left, but even there they could not turn him into the outside semblance of a gentleman. I loathed the little toad, and he loathed me--and the sickening part of the thing is that if John does not have a son, by the English law of entail Ferdinand comes into Ardayre, and will be the head of the family. Old Sir James died about five years ago, always protesting this b.a.s.t.a.r.d was his own child, though every one knew it was a lie. However, by that time John had made enough in the city to redeem Ardayre twice over. He had tremendous luck after the South African War, so he came into possession and lives there now in great state--I do really hope that he will have a son."

"You, too, have the instinct of the family, then--this pride in it--since it cannot benefit you either way."

"I believe it is born in us, and though I have never seen Ardayre, I should hate this mongrel to have it. I was brought up with a tremendous reverence for it, even as a second cousin."

"Well, the new Lady Ardayre looks young enough and of a health to have ten sons!"

"Y-es," Denzil acquiesced in a tentative tone.

"Not so?" Verisschenzko glanced up surprised, and then gave his attention to the waiter who had brought some Burgundy and was pouring it out into his gla.s.s.

"Not so you would say?"

"I don't know, I have never seen her--but in the family it is whispered that John--poor devil--he had an accident hunting two or three years ago. However, it may not any of it be true--here, let us drink to the Ardayre son!"

"To the Ardayre son!" and Verisschenzko filled his friend's gla.s.s with the decanted wine and they both drank together.

"Your cousin is like you," he said presently. "A fatiguing likeness, but the same height and make--and voice--strange things these family reproductions of an exact type. I have no family, as you know--we are of the people, arisen by trade to riches. Could I go beyond my immediate parents, could I know cousins and uncles and brothers, should I find this same peculiar stamp of family among us all? Who knows? I think not."

"I suppose there is something in it. My father has told me that in the picture gallery at Ardayre they are as like as two pins the whole way down."

"The concentration upon the idea causes it. In people risen like my father and myself, we only resemble a group--a nation; if I have children they will resemble me. It is strength in the beginning when an individual rises beyond the group, which produces a type. One says 'English' to look at you, and then, if one knows, one says 'Ardayre' at once; one gets as far as 'Calmuck' with me, that is all, but in years to come it will have developed into 'Verisschenzko.'"

"How you study things, Stepan; you are always putting new ideas into my head whenever I see you. Life would be just a routine, for all the joy of sport, if one did not think. I am going to finish my soldiering this autumn and stand for Parliament. It seems waste of time now, with no wars in prospect, sticking to it; I want a vaster field."

"You think there can be no wars in prospect--no? Well, who can prophesy?

There are clouds in the Southeast, but for the moment we will not speculate about them--and they may affect my country and not yours. And so you will settle down and become a reputable member of Parliament?"

Then, as Denzil would have spoken perhaps upon the subject of war clouds, Verisschenzko hastily continued:

"Will you dine to-morrow night at the Ritz to meet your cousin and his wife? They are honouring me."

"I wish I could, but I am off in the morning. What is she like?"

Verisschenzko paid particular attention to the selection of a quail, and then he answered:

"She is of the same type as the family, Denzil,--that is, a good skeleton--bones in the right place, firm white flesh, colouring as yours--well bred, balanced, unawakened as yet. Was she a relation?"

"Yes, I believe so--a cousin of a generation even before mine. I wish I could have dined, I would awfully like to have met them; I shall have to make a chance in England. It is stupid not to know one's own family, but our fathers quarrelled and we have never had a chance of mending the break."

"They were at the Russian Emba.s.sy last night; the throng admired Lady Ardayre very much."

"And what are you doing in Paris, Stepan? The last I heard of you, you were on your yacht in the Black Sea."

"I was cruising near countries whose internal affairs interest me for the moment. I returned to my _appartement_ in Paris to see a friend of mine, Stanisla.s.s Boleski--he also has a lovely wife. Look, she has just come in with him. She is in the devil of a temper--observe her. If I sit back, the pillar hides me--I do not wish them to see me yet."

Denzil glanced down the room; two people were taking their seats by the wall. The mask was off Harietta Boleski's face for the moment; it looked silly with its raised eyebrows and was full of ill temper and spite. The husband had an air of extreme worry on his clever, intellectual face, but that he was solicitous to gratify his wife's caprices, any casual observer could have perceived.

"You mean the woman with the wonderful _cigrettes_--she is good-looking, isn't she? I wonder who it is she has caught sight of now, though? Look at the eagerness which has come into her eyes--you can see her in the mirror if you want to."

But Verisschenzko had missed nothing, and he bent forward to endeavour to identify the person upon whom Madame Boleski's gaze had turned. There was nothing to distinguish any individual--the company were of several nations--German and Austrian and Balkan and Russian scattered about here and there among the French and American _habitues_. The only plan would be to continue to watch Harietta--but although he did this throughout the dinner, not a flicker of her eyelids gave him any further clue.

Denzil was interested--he felt something beyond what appeared on the surface was taking place, so he waited for his friend to speak.

Verisschenzko was silent for a little, and then he casually gave a resume of the character and place of Madame Boleski and her husband, a good deal more baldly expressed, but in substance much the same as he had given to Amaryllis at the Russian Emba.s.sy the night before.

He spoke lightly, but his yellow green eyes were keen.

"Look at her well--she is capable of mischief. Her extreme stupidity--only the brain of a rodent or a goat--makes her more difficult to manipulate than the cleverest diplomat, because you can never be sure whether the blank want of understanding which she displays is real or simulated. She is a perfect actress, but very often is quite natural. Most women are either posing all the time, or not at all.

Harietta's miming only comes into action for self-preservation, or personal gain, and then it is of such a superb quality that she leaves even me--I, who am no poor diviner--confused as to whether she is telling a lie or the truth."

"What an exceptional character!" Denzil was thrilled.

"An absence of all moral sense is her great power," Verisschenzko continued, while he watched her narrowly, "because she never has any of the p.r.i.c.kings of conscience which even most rogues experience at times, and so draws no demagnetising nervous uncertain currents. If it were not for an insatiable extravagance, and a capricious fancy for different jewels, she would be impossible to deal with. She has information, obtained from what source I do not as yet know, which is of vital importance to me. Were it not for that, one could simply enjoy her as a mistress and take delight in studying her idiosyncrasies."

"She has lovers?"

"Has had many; her role now is that of a great lady and so all is of a respectability! She is so stupid that if that instinct of self-preservation were not so complete as to be like a divine guide, she would commit betises all the time. As it is, when she takes a lover it is hidden with the cunning of a fox."

"Who did you say the first husband was--?"

"A German of the name of Von Wendel--he used to beat her with a stick, it is said--so naturally such a nature adored him. I did not meet her until she had got rid of him and he had disappeared. She would sacrifice any one who stood in her way."

"Your friend, the present husband, looks pretty epuise--one feels sorry for the poor man."