“Lydia,” Domiloff said sternly, “the laws of the Principality are at the present moment under revision, but I must warn you that divorce is going to be made exceedingly easy for the wronged husband. We can all lunch here, if you like, and send for Lord Henry and the De Hochepierres.”
“Am I invited?” Joan asked.
“Of course you are,” Lydia declared. “All the same, I am very jealous of you, Miss Haskell. I am not sure which I ought to hate the more—you or the Diva.”
“Life is getting too complicated,” Joan sighed. “I had no idea that you were seriously in the running.”
“I was not until this morning,” Lydia acknowledged. “It was seeing him so pale and realizing how near we have been to losing him that did it with me. It may pass off. I hope so. I am playing backgammon with Léon at five o’clock for high stakes.”
“Play with me and we will play for the highest of all,” Sagastrada suggested. “I am bound to win. I am the luckiest player in the world.”
“All this talk does not get us anywhere,” Domiloff remarked a little irritably. “I am always more hungry for luncheon after a late night and I am on the point of starvation.”
Lydia lifted a lazy arm and pressed a bell. The butler arrived almost immediately.
“Search in the restaurant for Monsieur Daroni,” she directed. “Tell him to send up lunch for eight or nine. We must leave it to him to see that there is melon, caviar and a dish of chicken curry. Serve it in the salon in twenty minutes.”
“And in the meantime . . . ,” Domiloff suggested, looking at the empty glasses which the man was already collecting.
“Quite so, sir,” the butler interrupted quietly. “Henri will see about the cocktails. I will hurry in and see Monsieur Daroni myself. We shall serve luncheon at the hour Madame demands.”
“All very pleasant,” Joan declared. “Would you like me to go and fetch the Prince and Princess? I am going to collect the various things I left in the bar.”
“Sweet of you, if you would,” Lydia begged. “I could not desert my charge.”
“The only class of human being to whom you could remain faithful for twenty-four hours,” Domiloff grunted.
“Bring Foxley Brent, too, if he is there,” Lydia called out. “He hates being left out of anything.”
“In fact you have carte blanche, my dear Miss Haskell,” Domiloff put in. “You know what a little family party we are by this time. Outside we only look over the fence if duty demands it.”
One of Domiloff’s official secretaries hurried in. He drew the Baron on one side.
“It is Monsieur Regnier who has just returned from Nice,” he announced. “He desires a few words with you, sir. I left him in your anteroom.”
“I will be there in a moment,” Domiloff promised. He turned round as the secretary left the room. “You must excuse me,” he begged. “Five minutes—no longer. Perhaps I may bring Regnier in to lunch. He should interest all of you.”
“Who is he?” Sagastrada asked.
“He is my fellow conspirator in this great world upheaval,” Domiloff announced with a grin. “My fellow empire-maker.”
“I cannot remember ever having seen the fellow in my life,” Lydia reflected.
“Absurd,” her husband scoffed. “Be prepared for an imposing sight, all of you—that is, if he accepts my invitation. He is tall, he has a beard,—the blackest I ever saw,—he wears the red ribbon of the Légion d’Honneur, he is a Deputy, and—well, what do you suppose all this firing of guns and fluttering of flags has been for? For us. For Monsieur Pierre Regnier—ex-Senator, ex-Deputy, ex-Everything but my fellow Dictator. Everybody got that clear? Very well. Au revoir.”
The Baron left the room.
CHAPTER XXIV
Table of Contents
THE little party—the Prince and Princess, Lord Henry and Foxley Brent—were still occupying the corner table in the bar when Joan entered. She paused on her way towards them, stopped at the counter, mounted a stool and leaned over towards where Louis was making some memoranda in a small book. She dropped her voice.
“Louis,” she said, “you were in the bar when the trouble came this morning?”
He looked at her gravely.
“I was here, Mademoiselle,” he admitted. “I cannot say that I saw much of it. I was taken by surprise and it was all over so soon.”
“You saw the two men who ran out of the bar?”
“Yes, I saw them,” he acknowledged. “I saw them run over, too, by the automobile.”
“One of them, at any rate, was shot before he was run over,” Joan said quietly. “Who shot him, Louis?”
“Mademoiselle,” he answered, shaking his head, “it was all too sudden. I saw nothing. I looked at one place. I looked at another. It seemed to me that I was always missing the things which happened. The gendarmes have been here but I could tell them nothing.”
“You don’t know who the man was who crouched behind the round table in the corner there where the Prince and Princess are and fired through the open window?”
“No, it was difficult,” Louis confided. “I saw nothing of that. I make Mademoiselle a cocktail the same as the others?”
They called to her from the round table. She slipped off the stool and abandoned her questioning. She went over to the chair where she had been seated and collected her racquets and coat.
“The Domiloffs invite you all to lunch,” she announced. “It is to be served in the apartments they have lent to Rudolph Sagastrada.”
“Gee, that’s nice of them,” Foxley Brent said. “Can’t say I have ever been up in those parts.”
“What about Sagastrada—is he all right?” Lord Henry asked.
“He seems remarkably well,” she replied.
“Curious sort of life we are living here,” Lord Henry remarked. “I have been coming to Monte Carlo for a great many years but I have never run up against anything like this. They are all saying now that the fellow who ran out—one of the two who were always hanging round here—was shot in the back before the car touched him. I thought he took a queer little spin in the road before he went over.”
“No one seems to be sure about that,” Joan replied. “What is the use of my going swimming and playing tennis,” she lamented, “if I drink three cocktails before lunch?”
“We are all doing it,” the Princess sighed. “Somehow or other they go with the place. They don’t seem so strong here as anywhere else. I have had four and in Paris or at home I never take more than one. How is that divine young man, Joan, really? Is he in good spirits?”
“The best,” she declared. “Lydia has now assumed complete possession.”
“And the Diva?” Lord Henry asked.
“Fortunately she never comes into the bar.”
Foxley Brent rose to his feet. Joan nodded and followed suit.
“I think we had better be getting along,” she suggested. “Very likely the Baron has more wonderful disclosures to make. He was trying to make us believe that all this flag-flying and these salutes this morning were in his honour.”
They trooped across the hall towards the corridor leading to the Sporting Club. In the restaurant Madame Céline and her two companions were just taking their places for luncheon. The Diva was standing up before her chair looking eagerly around the room, her fingers resting lightly upon the shoulder of one of the men. Apparently her brief promenade had done little to bring back the colour to her cheeks.
“Looking for Sagastrada,” Lord Henry whispered in Joan’s ear. “We shall have to get rid of that young man. I thought last night was a farewell party.”
“It was meant to be,” Joan agreed. “I fancy he changed his mind at the last moment.”
“I think he is a very attractive young man,” Lucille sighed. “Myself I am very hurt. I am the only woman here upon whom he has not smiled.”
“That comes of having a celebrated duellist for a husband,” the Prince observed. “I have forgotten all my subtle passes,” he ad
ded, with a little turn of the wrist. “I must find old Monsieur Gautard and practise for an hour one morning. I can see by Lucille’s expression that the necessity will soon arise.”
“It ought to have arisen long ago,” Lucille said. “I am much too kind to you. I have the reputation of being a constant wife. That is why no man pays me any attention.”
“You should cultivate the gifts, Princess, of Lydia Domiloff,” Lord Henry observed.
“Has she any special gifts?” Lucille asked, falling a little back with the speaker as they reached the last corridor. “Tell me.”
“Lydia Domiloff,” Lord Henry declared portentously, “is one of the most interesting women in the world. She ought to be plain but she is beautiful whenever she chooses. She is a mixture of the kitten and the tigress. She can talk to a man for half an hour and he will leave her believing that he has been engaged in a desperate flirtation. Next time he meets her he will have to go over all the same ground again and he will get no further. The few to whom she troubles to unbend worship her, but she never unbends sufficiently. She is,” he added with a little sigh, “the only woman in Monte Carlo living her life who I would take my oath is faithful to her husband.”
“There is just one thing to be said about that,” Lucille remarked, as they passed the saluting guard who stood before the door of Sagastrada’s apartments. “The Baron himself is the most attractive man in the world—except my own husband,” she added, gripping him by the arm. “Here we all are, Lydia my dear,” she went on, as they trooped into the room. “What a party, what a life and what a happy-looking prisoner!”
“More cocktails!” Lord Henry groaned.
“More cocktails!” the Prince exclaimed with a smile.
“And the best in the world,” Foxley Brent declared.
There was a general flurry of greetings. Joan remained a little in the background. Lydia had suddenly assumed an air of proprietorship.
“My charge must not be too greatly disturbed,” she insisted. “The sight of Lucille and Miss Haskell is quite sufficient to send his temperature up. I shall not allow him to sit down to lunch until I have tested it.”
“What a wonderful woman!” Lucille exclaimed. “A great artist—yes, I do love your water colours, Lydia—a brilliant pianist, a linguist, a woman who seems to find time to read every important book in every language—and now a quasi-serious hospital nurse!”
“Do you hear, Paul?” Lydia called out. “The Princess is explaining what a wonderful woman I am.”
“My dear,” he answered with a little bow, “your husband is the last man who needs reminding of it.”
“Say, aren’t you all very bright for the morning after the party?” Joan asked, as she shook her head resolutely at the cocktail tray.
“It is the sunshine,” Lord Henry declared. “Guaranteed to thaw the foggiest of brains. Sagastrada, how much longer are you going to stay here and turn all these women’s heads?”
“I am nothing but a nuisance already,” was the apologetic rejoinder. “I may have been a little difficult about that tourist steamer. It is not my idea of a departure from paradise. For the rest, the Baron is busy making plans for me. I warn you all, though, that I shall come back again.”
“I cannot think how it is that you have avoided us so long,” Lydia complained.
“I am distracted when I think of it,” he assured her. “Four years ago I was at Cannes. We played polo every day, I had friends, there was a little golf and at the Casino the gambling was very attractive. I meant to come over to finish up with, and then I had rather unexpectedly to go to South America.”
“You will never treat us again like that, I hope,” Lucille sighed.
“Never,” he declared vigorously. “When I leave here, if I do leave, thanks to you all, my dear friends, the place will remain in my memory as the one possible playground of life. I shall be back again before you have had time to miss me.”
The Baron, who had been called out of the room a few minutes before, returned. He brought with him a tall man of bulky figure, dressed with great care, with a short glossy black beard and thick hair. He possessed keen black eyes, a massive forehead and he carried himself with a certain dignity. He wore the coveted ribbon in his buttonhole and though his features lacked distinction, his appearance was by no means insignificant.
“I beg leave to present to you, my friends,” he said, “my confrère in the Administration—Monsieur Pierre Regnier—ex-Deputy, now co-President with me of the Monégasque Assembly.”
There was a little murmur of welcome. Everyone was very pleasant indeed to Monsieur Regnier.
“Between us we are going to try and make Monte Carlo what it was before the war,” Domiloff continued a few minutes later. “The family who have presided over its destinies for so long are retiring and a new constitution had been formed. Monsieur Regnier will take a cocktail, Henri.”
“I am a convert to this agreeable habit,” Monsieur Regnier remarked as he sipped his Martini. “Still, at the back of it all it is wine that I prefer. Spirits have too much the taste and the effect of drugs. The Burgundies, the clarets, the champagnes of France are the wines that set the blood dancing and open the hearts of men. Madame la Baronne, Princesse—I drink to you all,” he added, raising his glass.
Conversation flowed easily along. In a few minutes Henri made his little bow.
“Madame la Baronne est servie,” he announced.
Lydia Domiloff rose to her feet.
“Monsieur Regnier,” she said, “must sit upon my right—this is almost an occasion—but my charge must sit upon my left. Lucille the other side of Monsieur Regnier and Paul next. The rest arranges itself.”
They took their places and Monsieur Regnier with delight essayed the flavour of a fine Château Yquem with his melon.
“You are a man after my own heart, Baron,” he declared. “You are not one who will drink only the dry wines. The finest wines of France must be sweet, but mark you it is the sweetness of the grape. Monsieur Sagastrada,” he said, with a little bow to Rudolph, “I drink to the representative of a famous house. My father’s favourite book in life was a history of the great bankers of the world. Your house ranked next to the Rothschilds in importance and stability. It must have given the whole of the civilized world a shock when they read of the harsh treatment from which your people have been suffering at the hands of your own country.”
“You are very kind,” Sagastrada murmured.
“I am only just,” Regnier insisted. “You should repay our common enemy in this way. You should bring your millions to Monte Carlo and double them.”
Sagastrada smiled.
“I am afraid my millions might soon shrink.”
Regnier’s little gesture was extremely Gallic.
“But, my young friend,” he declared, “I do not mean that you should be as one of these others. I mean that you should join the Administration. The person who regards the conduct of this place from the right aspect, looks upon us as bankers. That is what we are. The bankers must always win at gambling whether it is in les affaires or at the tables. The science of figures is ill understood but practically every great financial venture in the world has its leaven of gambling.”
“You have not lived all your life in Monaco, Monsieur Regnier,” the Princess observed.
“But no, Madame,” he answered. “I passed some of my youth at the Military Academy of St. Cyr. I was at Harvard in the United States two years, at Oxford for one, at the Bank of France for five. My father was chief of the Bank of Monaco. When he died I came to take his place. I became a member of the House of Assembly, I interested myself a little in the politics of France and behold, now I devote all my energies to assisting Baron Domiloff. It is our aim to make Monte Carlo once more the paradise of the world.”
“‘The happy hunting ground,’” Lord Henry quoted, “‘in which men who have finished with the toil and burden of life grow younger and women remain always beautiful.’”
“I rec
ognize the quotation,” Monsieur Regnier acknowledged. “It was one of your talented Englishmen who wrote that.”
“It sounds like an exaggeration but why should it not be true?” the Baroness murmured. “Someone else said that it is only sorrow which ages and grief which kills. There are lots of things about living we do not know. Perhaps eternal life, after all, is a possibility.”
The service of luncheon drew towards an end. Lucille had an appointment with her dressmaker at Cannes and left before coffee was served. The Baroness led the way into her smaller salon and the men drew closer together over their cigars.
“Almost the first question,” the Baron said as soon as the brandy had been served, and the servants had left the room, “which must present itself to you and to me, my friend Regnier, is what are we going to do with our young friend here—Rudolph Sagastrada?”
“It is a difficulty,” Regnier admitted, hugging his huge glass with both hands and gently revolving it.
“This is an entirely informal discussion,” the Baron went on, motioning to Lord Henry and the Prince to remain in their places. “Monsieur Regnier has seen the Mayor of Nice, who is a very important person in French politics, only this morning. He thinks there will be no difficulty in getting the new constitution recognized and the independence of the State legalized but on the other hand, as he points out, unless we are under the protection of one of the Powers, we have no means of defence against an outside aggressor.”
“I ought to have gone on the steamer,” Sagastrada said bitterly. “I meant to go, too. I do not know even now what possessed me. I make a burden of myself upon your hospitality.”
Monsieur Regnier took a long and audible sip of his brandy. He rose slowly to his feet.
“I suggest, my friend and host,” he said, “that you leave this matter in my hands for forty-eight hours. I am overdue at my bureau. I depart there now. I apologize that owing to the stress of weighty affairs I have up till now not been able to give this matter the attention it demands. In forty-eight hours I will come to you, Baron, with any suggestion which occurs to me. You are content, Monsieur Sagastrada?”
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