*CHAPTER XVI*
*THE BLACK CAT*
That providential stone or tree-root, or whatever it may have been,proved a genuine blessing in disguise to Ste. Marie. It gave him asplitting headache for a few hours, but it saved him a good deal ofdiscomfort the while his bullet wound was being more or less probed, andvery skilfully cleansed and dressed by O'Hara. For he did not regainconsciousness until this surgical work was almost at its end, and thenhe wanted to fight the Irishman for tying the bandages too tight.
But when O'Hara had gone away and left him alone he lay still--or asstill as the smarting burning pain in his leg and the ache in his headwould let him--and stared at the wall beyond his bed, and, bit by bit,the events of the past hour came back to him and he knew where he was.He cursed himself very bitterly, as he well might do, for a bunglingidiot. The whole thing had been in his hands, he said with perfecttruth--Arthur Benham's whereabouts proved, Stewart's responsibility, orat the very least complicity, and the sordid motive therefor. Remained,had Ste. Marie been a sane being instead of an impulsive fool, remainedbut to face Stewart down in the presence of witnesses, threaten him withexposure, and so, with perfect ease, bring back the lost boy in triumphto his family.
It should all have been so simple, so easy, so effortless! Yet now itwas ruined by a moment's rash folly, and Heaven alone knew what wouldcome of it. He remembered that he had left behind him no indicationwhatever of where he meant to spend the afternoon. Hartley would comehurrying across town that evening to the Rue d'Assas and would find noone there to receive him. He would wait and wait and at last go home.He would come again on the next morning, and then he would begin to bealarmed and would start a second search--but with what to reckon by?Nobody knew about the house on the road to Clamart but Mlle. OlgaNilssen, and she was far away.
He thought of Captain Stewart, and he wondered if that gentleman was byany chance here in the house, or if he was still in bed in the Rue duFaubourg St. Honore, recovering from his epileptic fit.
After that he fell once more to cursing himself and his incrediblestupidity, and he could have wept for sheer bitterness of chagrin.
He was still engaged in this unpleasant occupation when the door of theroom opened and the Irishman O'Hara entered, having finished hisinterview with Captain Stewart below. He came up beside the bed andlooked down not unkindly upon the man who lay there, but Ste. Mariescowled back at him, for he was in a good deal of pain and a vilehumour.
"How's the leg--_and_ the head?" asked the amateur surgeon--to do himjustice he was very skilful indeed through much experience.
"They hurt," said Ste. Marie shortly. "My head aches like the devil,and my leg burns."
O'Hara made a sound which was rather like a gruff laugh, and nodded.
"Yes, and they'll go on doing it too," said he. "At least the leg will.Your head will be all right again in a day or so. Do you want anythingto eat? It's near dinner-time. I suppose we can't let youstarve--though you deserve it."
"Thanks, I want nothing!" said Ste. Marie. "Pray don't trouble aboutme!" The other man nodded again indifferently, and turned to go out ofthe room, but in the doorway he halted and looked back.
"As we're to have the pleasure of your company for some time to come,"said he, "you might suggest a name to call you by. Of course I don'texpect you to tell your own name, though I can learn that easilyenough."
"Easily enough, to be sure," said the man on the bed. "Ask Stewart. Heknows only too well."
The Irishman scowled. And after a moment he said--
"I don't know any Stewart." But at that Ste. Marie gave a laugh, and atinge of red came over the Irishman's cheeks.
"And so to save Captain Stewart the trouble," continued the wounded man,"I'll tell you my name with pleasure. I don't know why I shouldn't.It's Ste. Marie."
"What?" cried O'Hara hoarsely. "What? Say that again!" He came forwarda swift step or two into the room, and he stared at the man on the bedas if he were staring at a ghost.
"Ste. Marie?" he cried in a whisper. "It's impossible!
"What are you," he demanded, "to Gilles, Comte de Ste. Marie deMont-Perdu? What are you to him?"
"He was my father," said the younger man, "but he is dead. He has beendead for ten years." He turned his head with a little grimace of painto look curiously after the Irishman, who had all at once turned awayacross the room, and stood still beside a window, with bent head.
"Why?" he questioned. "What about my father? Why did you ask that?"
O'Hara did not answer at once, and he did not stir from his place by thewindow, but after awhile he said--
"I knew him ... That's all." And after another space he came backbeside the bed, and once more looked down upon the young man who laythere. His face was veiled, inscrutable. It betrayed nothing.
"You have a look of your father," said he. "That was what puzzled me alittle. I was just saying to----I was just thinking that there wassomething familiar about you.... Ah well! we've all come down in theworld since then. The Ste. Marie blood though! Who'd have thought it!"The man shook his head a little sorrowfully, but Ste. Marie stared up athim in frowning incomprehension. The pain had dulled him somewhat.
And presently O'Hara again moved towards the door. On the way he said--
"I'll bring or send you something to eat--not too much. And later onI'll give you a sleeping powder. With that head of yours you may havetrouble in getting to sleep. Understand, I'm doing this for yourfather's son, and not because you've any right yourself toconsideration."
Ste. Marie raised himself with difficulty, on one elbow.
"Wait!" said he. "Wait a moment!" and the other halted just inside thedoor.
"You seem to have known my father," said Ste. Marie, "and to haverespected him. For my father's sake will you listen to me for fiveminutes?"
"No, I won't!" said the Irishman sharply, "so you may as well hold yourtongue. Nothing you can say to me or to any one in this house will havethe slightest effect. We know what you came spying here for. We knowall about it."
"Yes," said Ste. Marie with a little sigh, and he fell back upon thepillows. "Yes, I suppose you do. I was rather a fool to speak. Youwouldn't all be doing what you're doing if words could affect you. Iwas a fool to speak." The Irishman stared at him for another moment andwent out of the room, closing the door behind him.
So he was left once more alone to his pain and his bitterself-reproaches, and his wild and futile plans for escape. But O'Harareturned in an hour or thereabouts with food for him--a cup of broth anda slice of bread; and when Ste. Marie had eaten these, the Irishmanlooked once more to his wounded leg, and gave him a sleeping powderdissolved in water.
He lay restless and wide-eyed for an hour, and then drifted away throughintermediate mists into a sleep full of horrible dreams, but it was atleast relief from bodily suffering; and when he awoke in the morning hisheadache was almost gone.
He awoke to sunshine and fresh sweet odours, and the twittering ofbirds. By good chance O'Hara had been the last to enter the room on theevening before, and so no one had come to close the shutters or draw theblinds. The windows were open wide, and the morning breeze, very softand aromatic, blew in and out and filled the place with sweetness. Theroom was a corner room with windows that looked south and east, and theearly sun slanted in and lay in golden squares across the floor.
Ste. Marie opened his eyes with none of the dazed bewilderment that hemight have expected. The events of the preceding day came back to himinstantly and without shock. He put up an experimental hand and foundthat his head was still very sore where he had struck it in falling, butthe ache was almost gone. He tried to stir his leg, and a protestingpain shot through it. It burned dully even when it was quiet, but thepain was not at all severe. He realised that he was to get off ratherwell, considering what might have happened, and he was so grateful forthis that he almost forgot to be angry with himself o
ver his monumentalfolly.
A small bird chased by another wheeled in through the southern windowand back again into free air. Finally the two settled down upon theparapet of the little shallow balcony, which was there, to have theirdisagreement out, and they talked it over with a great deal of noise andmany threatening gestures and a complete loss of temper on both sides.Ste. Marie, from his bed, cheered them on, but there came a commotion inthe ivy which draped the wall below, and the two birds fled inignominious haste, and just in the nick of time, for when the cause ofthe commotion shot into view, it was a large black cat of great bodilyactivity and an ardent single-heartedness of aim.
The black cat gazed for a moment resentfully after its vanished prey,and then composed its sleek body upon the iron rail, tail and pawstucked neatly under. Ste. Marie chirruped, and the cat turned yelloweyes upon him in mild astonishment as one who should say--
"Who the deuce are you, and what the deuce are you doing here?" Hechirruped again, and the cat, after an ostentatious yawn and stretch,came to him--beating up to windward, as it were, and making the bed inthree tacks. When O'Hara entered the room some time later he found hispatient in a very cheerful frame of mind, and the black cat sitting onhis chest, purring like a dynamo and kneading like an industrious baker.
"Ho!" said the Irishman, "you seem to have found a friend."
"Well, I need one friend here," argued Ste. Marie. "I'm in the enemy'sstronghold. You needn't be alarmed: the cat can't tell me anything, andit can't help me to escape. It can only sit on me and purr. That'sharmless enough."
O'Hara began one of his gruff laughs, but he seemed to remember himselfin the middle of it, and assumed an intimidating scowl instead.
"How's the leg?" he demanded shortly. "Let me see it!" He took off thebandages and cleansed and sprayed the wound with some antiseptic liquidthat he had brought in a bottle.
"There's a little fever," said he, "but that can't be avoided. You'regoing on very well--a good deal better than you'd any right to expect."He had to inflict not a little pain in his examination and redressing ofthe wound. He knew that, and once or twice he glanced up at Ste.Marie's face with a sort of reluctant admiration for the man who couldbear so much without any sign whatever. In the end he put together histhings and nodded with professional satisfaction.
"You'll do well enough now for the rest of the day," he said. "I'llsend up old Michel to valet you. He's the gardener who shot youyesterday, and he may take it into his head to finish the job thismorning. If he does I shan't try to stop him."
"Nor I," said Ste. Marie. "Thanks very much for your trouble. Anexcellent surgeon was lost in you."
O'Hara left the room, and presently the old caretaker, one-eyed,gnome-like, shambling like a bear, sidled into the room and proceeded toset things to rights. He looked, Ste. Marie said to himself, likesomething in an old German drawing, or in those imitations of olddrawings that one sometimes sees nowadays in Fliegende Blatter. Hetried to make the strange creature talk, but Michel went about his taskwith an air half frightened, half stolid, and refused to speak more thanan occasional "_oui_" or a "_bien, monsieur_," in answer to orders. Ste.Marie asked if he might have some coffee and bread, and the old Michelnodded and slipped from the room as silently as he had entered it.
Thereafter Ste. Marie trifled with the cat and got one hand wellscratched for his trouble, but in five minutes there came a knocking atthe door. He laughed a little. "Michel grows ceremonious when it's aquestion of food," he said. "_Entrez, mon vieux!_" The door opened,and Ste. Marie caught his breath.
"Michel is busy," said Coira O'Hara, "so I have brought your coffee."
"'Michel is busy,' said Coira O'Hara, 'so I have broughtyour coffee.'"]
She came into the sunlit room, holding the steaming bowl of _cafe aulait_ before her in her two hands. Over it her eyes went out to the manwho lay in his bed, a long and steady and very grave look. "A goddessthat lady, a queen among goddesses,"--thus the little Jew of theBoulevard de la Madeleine. Ste. Marie gazed back at her, and his heartwas sick within him to think of the contemptible role Fate had laid uponthis girl to play: the candle to the moth, the bait to the eagerunskilled fish, the lure to charm a foolish boy.
The girl's splendid beauty seemed to fill all that bright room with, asit were, a richer subtler light. There could be no doubt of her potency.Older and wiser heads than young Arthur Benham's might well forget theworld for her. Ste. Marie watched, and the heartsickness within him waslike a physical pain keen and bitter. He thought of that first and onlyprevious meeting--the single minute in the Champs Elysees when her eyeshad held him, had seemed to beseech him out of some deep agony. Hethought of how they had haunted him afterwards both by day and bynight--calling eyes--and he gave a little groan of sheer bitterness, forhe realised that all this while she was laying her snares about the feetof an inexperienced boy, decoying him to his ruin. There was a name forsuch women, an ugly name. They were called adventuresses.
The girl set the bowl which she carried down upon a table not far fromthe bed.
"You will need a tray or something," said she. "I suppose you can sit upagainst your pillows? I'll bring a tray, and you can hold it on yourknees and eat from it." She spoke in a tone of very deliberateindifference and detachment. There seemed even to be an edge of scornin it, but nothing could make that deep and golden voice harsh orunlovely. As the girl's extraordinary beauty had filled all the roomwith its light, so the sound of her voice seemed to fill it with asumptuous and hushed resonance like a temple bell muffled in velvet.
"I must bring something to eat too," she said. "Would you prefer_croissants_ or _brioches_ or plain bread and butter? You might as wellhave what you like."
"Thank you!" said Ste. Marie. "It doesn't matter. Anything. You aremost kind. You are Hebe, mademoiselle, server of feasts." The girlturned her head for a moment, and looked at him with some surprise.
"If I am not mistaken," she said, "Hebe served to gods." Then she wentout of the room, and Ste. Marie broke into a sudden delighted laughbehind her. She would seem to be a young woman with a tongue in herhead. She had seized the rash opening without an instant's hesitation.
The black cat, which had been cruising, after the inquisitive fashion ofits kind, in far corners of the room, strolled back and looked up to thetable where the bowl of coffee steamed and waited.
"Get out!" cried Ste. Marie. "_Va t'en, sale petit animal_! Go and eatbirds! that's my coffee. _Va_! _Sauve toi_! _He voleur que tu es_!"He sought for something by way of missile, but there was nothing withinreach. The black cat turned its calm and yellow eyes towards him,looked back to the aromatic feast, and leapt expertly to the top of thetable. Ste. Marie shouted and made horrible threats. He waved animpotent pillow, not daring to hurl it for fear of smashing the table'sentire contents, but the black cat did not even glance towards him. Itsmelt the coffee, sneezed over it because it was hot, and finallyproceeded to lap very daintily, pausing often to take breath or to shakeits head, for cats disapprove of hot dishes, though they will partake ofthem at a pinch.
There came a step outside the door, and the thief leapt down with somehaste, yet not quite in time to escape observation. Mlle. O'Hara camein breathing terrible threats.
"Has that wretched animal touched your coffee?" she cried. "I hopenot." But Ste Marie laughed weakly from his bed, and the guilty beaststood in mid-floor, brown drops beading its black chin and hanging uponits whiskers.
"I did what I could, mademoiselle," said Ste. Marie; "but there wasnothing to throw. I am sorry to be the cause of so much trouble."
"It is nothing," said she. "I will bring some more coffee, only it willtake ten minutes, because I shall have to make some fresh." She made asif she would smile a little in answer to him, but her face turned graveonce more, and she went out of the room with averted eyes.
Thereafter Ste. Marie occupied himself with watching idly the movementsof the black cat, and as he watched something icy cold began
to growwithin him, a sensation more terrible than he had ever known before. Hefound himself shivering as if that summer day had all at once turned toJanuary, and he found that his face was wet with a chill perspiration.
When the girl at length returned she found him lying still, his face tothe wall. The black cat was in her path as she crossed the room, sothat she had to thrust it out of the way with her foot, and she calledit names for moving with such lethargy.
"Here is the coffee at last," she said. "I made it fresh. And I havebrought some _brioches_. Will you sit up and have the tray on yourknees?"
"Thank you!" said Ste. Marie. "I do not wish anything."
"You do not----" she repeated after him. "But I have made the coffeeespecially for you!" she protested. "I thought you wanted it. I don'tunderstand."
With a sudden movement the man turned towards her a white and drawnface.
"Mademoiselle!" he cried, "it would have been more merciful to let yourgardener shoot again yesterday. Much more merciful, mademoiselle." Shestared at him under her straight black brows.
"What do you mean?" she demanded. "More merciful? What do you mean bythat?" Ste. Marie stretched out a pointing finger and the girl followedit. She gave, after a tense instant, a single sharp scream. And uponthat--
"No! no! It's not true. It's not possible." Moving stiffly she setdown the bowl she carried, and the hot liquid splashed up round herwrists. For a moment she hung there, drooping, holding herself up by thestrength of her hands upon the table. It was as if she had been seizedwith faintness. Then she sprang to where the cat crouched beside achair. She dropped upon her knees and tried to raise it in her arms,but the beast bit and scratched at her feebly, and crept away to alittle distance, where it lay struggling and very unpleasant to see.
"Poison!" she said in a choked gasping whisper. "Poison!" She lookedonce towards the man upon the bed, and she was white and shivering.
"It's not true!" she cried again. "I--won't believe it. It's becausethe cat--was not used to coffee. Because it was hot. I won't believeit. I won't believe it." She began to sob, holding her hands over herwhite face.
Ste. Marie watched her with puzzled eyes. If this was acting, it wasvery very good acting. A little glimmer of hope began to burn inhim--hope that in this last shameful thing, at least, the girl had hadno part.
"It's impossible!" she insisted piteously. "I tell you it's impossible.I brought the coffee myself from the kitchen. I took it from the potthere--the same pot we had all had ours from. It was never out of mysight--or, that is--I mean----"
She halted there and Ste. Marie saw her eyes turn slowly towards thedoor, and he saw a crimson flush come up over her cheeks and die away,leaving her white again. He drew a little breath of relief andgladness, for he was sure of her now. She had had no part in it.
"It is nothing, mademoiselle," said he cheerfully. "Think no more of it.It is nothing."
"Nothing?" she cried in a loud voice. "Do you call poison nothing?"She began to shiver again very violently.
"You would have drunk it!" she said, staring at him in a white agony."But for a miracle you would have drunk it--and died!" Abruptly shecame beside the bed and threw herself upon her knees there. In herexcitement and horror she seemed to have forgotten what they two were toeach other. She caught him by the shoulders with her two hands and thegirl's violent trembling shook them both.
"Will you believe," she cried, "that I had nothing to do with this?Will you believe me? You must believe me!"
There was no acting in that moment. She was wrung with a frank anguishand utter horror, and between her words there were hard and terriblesobs.
"I believe you, mademoiselle," said the man gently. "I believe you.Pray think no more about it!" He smiled up into the girl's beautifulface, though within him he was still cold and ashiver, as even thebravest men might well be at such an escape, and after a moment sheturned away again. With unsteady hands she put the new-made bowl ofcoffee and the _brioches_ and other things together upon the tray, andstarted to carry it across the room to the bed, but halfway she turnedback again and set the tray down. She looked about and found an emptyglass, and she poured a little of the coffee into it. Ste. Marie, whowas watching her, gave a sudden cry--
"No! no! mademoiselle, I beg you. You must not!" But the girl shookher head at him gravely over the glass.
"There is no danger," she said, "but I must be sure." She drank whatwas in the glass, and afterwards went across to one of the windows andstood there with her back to the room for a little time.
In the end she returned and once more brought the breakfast tray to thebed. Ste. Marie raised himself to a sitting posture, and took the thingupon his knees, but his hands were shaking.
"If I were not as helpless as a dead man, mademoiselle," said he, "youshould not have done that. If I could have stopped you, you should nothave done it, mademoiselle." A wave of colour spread up under the brownskin of the girl's face, but she did not speak. She stood by for amoment to see if he was supplied with everything he needed, and whenSte. Marie expressed his gratitude for her pains she only bowed herhead. Then presently she turned away and left the room.
Outside the door she met some one who was approaching. Ste. Marie heardher break into rapid and excited speech, and he heard O'Hara's voice inanswer. The voice expressed astonishment and indignation and a sort ofgruff horror, but the man who listened could hear only the tones not thewords that were spoken.
The Irishman came quickly into the room. He glanced once towards thebed where Ste. Marie sat eating his breakfast with apparent unconcern(there may have been a little bravado in this), and then bent over thething which lay moving feebly beside a chair. When he rose again hisface was hard and tense, and his blue eyes glittered in a fashion thatboded trouble for somebody.
"This looks very bad for us," he said gruffly. "I should--I should liketo have you believe that neither my daughter nor I had any part in it.When I fight I fight openly, I don't use poison. Not even with spies."
"Oh, that's all right!" said Ste. Marie, taking an ostentatious sip ofcoffee. "That's understood. I know well enough who tried to poison me.If you'll just keep your friend Stewart out of the kitchen, I shan'tworry about my food."
The Irishman's cheeks reddened with a quick flush, and he dropped hiseyes. But in an instant he raised them again, and looked full into theeyes of the man who sat in bed.
"You seem," said he, "to be labouring under a curious misapprehension.There is no Stewart here, and I don't know any man of that name."
Ste. Marie laughed.
"Oh, don't you?" he said. "That's my mistake then. Well, if you don'tknow him, you ought to. You have interests in common."
O'Hara favoured his patient with a long and frowning stare. But at theend he turned without a word and went out of the room.
The Quest: A Romance Page 16
