“Françoise!” rapped out Didier in a muffled voice. The word was uttered in such a tone of reproach that Françoise stopped teasing him. She saw that he was very pale and painfully upset.
“Good gracious, I didn’t know that I should be hurting your feelings like that.”
He took her hand and pressed it gently.
“My dearest,” he said, “I will tell you all about her, but never forget that since the day that I first saw you, there’s never been any other woman in the world for me but you.”
“I believe you, my Didier.”
Nothing more was said while they remained among the fashionably dressed crowd which assembles between eleven o’clock and midday on the Promenade de la Baie des Anges. But as soon as they were alone on the terrace, which was usually deserted at that time, and which, skirting the Château, leads to the harbor, Didier told Françoise what he knew of Giselle and how he came to know her.
The incident occurred on an occasion when he was home on leave. He was “pulling himself together” from the fatigues of the front in a small flat which he had taken on his arrival in Paris. It was in the Luxembourg quarter, facing the gardens, of which he was very fond, and which served to remind him of the happiest days of his boyhood.
One day as he left his flat he was arrested by a most mournful procession which was descending from the attic above. Some poor devil was being taken to his last resting place. A young girl was walking behind the coffin. She was in tears, and was so weak that obviously she had the greatest difficulty to hold herself upright. She was alone or almost alone. Didier offered her his assistance. She clung to his arm in her distress with an ingenuous confidence that deeply touched him. He took her thus to the cemetery, and brought her back home again.
It was not until they were in the house that she seemed to notice the assistance which a stranger had rendered her.
“Oh, monsieur, it’s very good of you,” she said, and as they were now indoors she made her escape and went upstairs to her attic.
Captain d’Haumont questioned the porter’s wife. He learned that Giselle’s father had suffered from an illness — consumption — which was practically incurable. Thus he had not been able to work for two years, and her mother was crippled, so that the young girl could only maintain her unhappy family by the most grinding toil. Scarcely being able to leave them, she was forced to wear herself out with needlework at home, and earned barely enough to keep the wolf from the door.
D’Haumont knew the elder of the Violette sisters, for one of her nephews, a second lieutenant, had served under him; and amid the dangers of the campaign they had struck up a friendship. He called upon this worthy lady and asked her if she could find a situation for an honest girl who would be worthy of her trust. Mlle. Violette, as it happened, had a vacancy for a cashier. And that was how Giselle came to enter one of the principal dressmaking establishments in Paris, and her mother and herself to be extricated from poverty. In the course of a year, assisted by her youth, Giselle won back her health. In a word, she blossomed forth into the beautiful young girl whom Françoise had just seen. Mlle. Violette, realizing how graceful she was, sometimes took her away from the cash desk and dressed her as her most valuable mannequin, for she set off to advantage their most sensational “confections.”
“And now, my dear Françoise, you know as much as I do about Giselle.”
“You always will be the best of men,” returned Françoise, affectionately pressing his arm. “Men are only as good as that in popular novels and plays,” she added with an arch smile.
“You are laughing at me,” said the Nut in a tone of surprise, slightly vexed. But she grew entirely serious again.
“I adore you, my Didier.”
They retraced their steps, for it was now lunch time. As they turned round they almost ran into a singular-looking person, with a copper-colored skin, and eyes devoid of eyebrows but protected from the glare of the sun by large yellow glasses. This peculiar individual was dressed entirely in white linen; and he wore white shoes and a gray bowler hat. Didier could not help giving a start when his eyes fell upon him.
“How very much like Yoyo he is!” he said to himself.
But the idea no sooner flashed upon him than he realized how ridiculous and unpardonable it was to let his thoughts wander back to the men and things of the primeval forest while walking on the Promenade des Anglais.
“Did you notice that man?” asked Françoise, laughing. “There’s an eccentric for you! Do you know who he is? From what I hear, he is a genuine redskin, a celebrated surgeon-dentist from Chicago who has just opened a consulting-room in Nice. How would you like to have a redskin as your dentist? Personally, I should be afraid of his sending me to sleep and then scalping me. Madame d’Erlande told me, the other day, that the women here are crazy about him, and that he has already secured the smartest people in the foreign colony as his patients.”
Captain d’Haumont smiled and turned round to have another look at him. The man was still walking some twenty paces behind them, smoking a cigarette.
A few days later a charitable fête was held in Cimiez, in the beautiful gardens of the Château de Valrose, standing on the hills which tower above Nice. Madame d’Erlande was one of the chief organizers of the fête, and she invited Françoise, whom she had known since she was a little girl, and for whom she had always shown a great affection, to take charge of a stall. Françoise could not well refuse. Didier went with her. He allowed her to sell his choicest tobacco with all the reckless and charming freedom which the holder of a tobacco stall is expected to show in an affair of the sort.
He wandered among the clumps of trees, strolled through the sham Roman ruins, and drew near and entered the Château de Valrose almost at the same time as the redskin, who was surrounded by a regular “court” of smart women. He knew the man’s name now, for it was to be heard on every hand. He called himself Herbert Ross.
They went into the theater at the same time. The surgeon-dentist from Chicago took a seat in front of him, next to a woman whose appearance seemed to be familiar to him. She chattered incessantly to the redskin and did her utmost to arouse his interest. But with his usual unruffled calm he replied to her only in monosyllables. That was his method. Moreover, it was stated that he could only speak a black man’s broken lingo.
At that juncture a celebrated Russian diva sang Gluck’s “Alceste.” She secured a great triumph, and was followed by sundry instrumental pieces on the piano, harp and violin. Finally it was announced that the celebrated Nina Noha would appear in her character dances.
Didier gave a start when he heard her name. He had often seen mention of her in the newspapers since his return to France. He was fully aware that the dancer was still much courted, or at least that the fascination which the great public in Paris found in her who used to be Raoul de Saint Dalmas’s mistress had in no sense diminished. The war had made no difference to her. On the one hand were those who fought, and on the other those who idled away their time.
Nevertheless it struck him that Nina Noha must have changed in the course of fifteen years. If he had been bent on it, he could have seen for himself. It would have been easy for him to have found an opportunity. But he did not seek her out — far from it. In spite of the image which was reflected in his mirror, and showed him a Didier who in no way resembled the old Raoul, he could not help shuddering with a peculiar dread at the thought of finding himself confronted by a countenance which used to be so familiar to him. Suppose she recognized him! Repeat to himself that the thing was impossible as he might, he had none the less procured some tortoiseshell-rimmed dark glasses in order to take refuge behind those glasses should any sudden encounter place him in an embarrassing position.
Nina Noha! She was the origin of all his misery. What follies he had committed for the woman whom he now held in horror!
She came on to the stage. What a marvel she was! She had not changed in the least. She still possessed her fatal beauty. Her eyes, her great
dark, blazing eyes still held their disturbing fire. Her movements were still as lithe, as voluptuous, as before. She was still as young as ever.
Nina Noha danced in a Parisian robe which revealed her figure more completely than if she had worn a Corinthian tunic. What were Didier’s real feelings as he gazed at that apparition? Did they betoken the death of his former passion for her? Was he mourning over himself? Did he see in her the hated cause of all his woes?
He clapped his hands like everybody else, hardly knowing what he was doing. Five minutes later, at the sound of a voice which, likewise had under gone no change, he came to himself from his musings.
“Well, doctor, are you satisfied?”
The woman who had sat in front of him and whose back alone he had seen while she chattered to the “doctor,” was no other than Nina Noha.
Didier instinctively put on his dark glasses. She had come back to her seat. She had danced solely to please the redskin. At least he gathered as much from her talk which he could not but overhear. But the Captain was no longer listening to her voice. He was staring at her.
He was staring at the nape of her neck, the sight of which at one time distracted him. Even now he could not remove his eyes from it, but it was not the living flesh that held him, it was not the perfumed neck which he was wont to cover with kisses that he now gazed upon. His eyes were fixed on the necklace fastened round her neck.
Lord above, he had known a necklace with pearls like that! It was a long time ago... a very long time ago. It was more than fifteen years ago. Yes, he had held in his hand gems which were so like them that they might easily be mistaken for those which were round Nina’s neck. He had held pearls in his hand like them on the day when the banker had passed to him, so that he might judge their brilliance, the necklace which once belonged to the Queen of Carynthia.
Oh, how he longed to count the number of pearls in it! That particular necklace — the fact had been repeated often enough during the trial for the Nut to remember it — contained sixty pearls. Such was the necklace which, if the Public Prosecutor was to be believed, Raoul de Saint Dalmas had stolen, and to obtain which he had not scrupled to murder his employer!
It was enough to strike any man to the very heart suddenly to see before his eyes, after fifteen years, a necklace like it... exactly like it... for after all, suppose it were one and the same?
“I am wandering in my mind,” he thought, Nina Noha! A pearl necklace! Raynaud’s murder!... All these things were whirling in Didier’s poor brain.
“It’s not surprising that I cannot see a necklace without thinking of the other one,” he thought to himself. “But the other one contained a certain pearl, a pearl with a flaw in it, a pearl which had lost its luster. M. Raynaud pointed it out to me. True, I myself remember the particular pearl. It was not perfectly round either. True, I see it in my mind’s eye still.... But here I cannot see it at all!
“Am I going mad? Haven’t I yet done staring at that necklace, trying to count how many pearls there are in it? Why do I not at once cry aloud to the people in this theater: ‘Cannot you recognize me? I am Raoul de Saint Dalmas. I was condemned to death for the murder of the owner of that necklace. I insist on this woman telling me where she got it from.’”
He was afraid of himself. He left the theater. By a curious coincidence Nina Noha came out after him. She was no longer with the redskin but was attended by a showily dressed “gentleman” who, however, left her almost at once, and to whom she said:
“See you this evening, my dear de Saynthine...
At that moment Didier encountered his wife’s friend, Madame d’Erlande, who likewise was leaving the theatre, and she stopped to speak to him.
She was a vivacious and sprightly, and somewhat mature woman, who wore a smile from which youth had fled. She was not devoid of wit, nor of love of mischief, nor, in particular, of malice. She liked to tease the enamored. She had assisted at Françoise’s wedding with immense enjoyment; and she never failed to say, when she caught her giving her husband an adoring look:
“Make the most of it, my dear. Make the most of it. One can never tell how long it will last with those gentlemen.”
She was reputed, moreover, to have had not a little experience in love affairs, and malicious tongues declared that in her time she had rarely allowed to slip from her the opportunity of putting to test the constancy of man.
“Well,” she said to Didier, “what do you think of our little fête? I noticed just now that you were by no means boring yourself. You were taking an enormous pleasure in watching Nina Noha dance.”
“Upon my word,” returned Didier, forcing himself to reply by a resolute effort of will so as to appear natural, for, at the mention of her name, Nina Noha turned her head and was eyeing him with considerable interest, “upon my word, she certainly dances extremely well.”
“She is undoubtedly one of our most beautiful actresses. Ah, you brigand, she was in front of you. I was watching you. You never took your eyes from her. But I shall tell Françoise the whole story. I must put the little innocent on her guard.” Nina Noha passed them with an air of supreme unconcern. Well, Madame d’Erlande could let her tongue rim on as she pleased. Nina Noha had not recognized him.
CHAPTER XVI
CHÉRI-BIBI’S SIMPLE PROGRAMME
THE SAME EVENING, a few minutes before the arrival of the train from Paris, a man in livery was walking up and down the platform of the railway station at Nice. He wore a cap with a glazed leather peak, which hid from sight one eye, while the other was covered with a large black band wound round his head.
Not only could very little be caught of the man’s face, but people might, with good reason, ask themselves whether he was able to distinguish anything himself. Nevertheless his heavy but confident tread bore witness, in spite of the manner in which he was muffled up, to the fact that he retained a clear perception of what was passing round him. He avoided groups of passengers, the porters, the station-master, and even the commissary of police!
When the train entered the station, he posted himself near the way out and imperturbably watched travelers march past him carrying their luggage. Now and again, for he had chosen a somewhat dark corner, he was jostled by the crowd, but he stood stock still as firm as a rock.
Suddenly he stepped forward, thrust out his arm, and laid hold of a remarkably tall, lean man who was wearing an immense, loose overcoat.
The man gave a start and murmured:
“Oh, it’s you, Monsieur le Marq—”
The other gave him a dig in the ribs which checked his flow of words and manifestations of pleasure.
“Did you have a pleasant journey, Monsieur Hilaire?” asked the servant, seizing the bag from the hands of the traveler in the flowing overcoat.
“Very pleasant indeed, Monsieur le—”
“Call me Casimir, you ass!”
“Yes, Monsieur Casimir. But I don’t want you to carry my bag. I am not at all tired. One can travel very comfortably in these first-class carriages. I never want to travel again in anything but a first-class carriage.”
“Dry up!” growled Monsieur Casimir.
Hilaire did not speak again. When they reached the Avenue de la Gare, and were abreast of Notre Dame, the servant said to the new-corner:
“Now you can talk.”
“Well, that’s a good thing,” sighed Hilaire, “because I have several things to tell you, Monsieur le Marq — Casimir! First of all, let me thank you for enabling me to realize the greatest dream of my life: a trip to the blue waters of the Mediterranean.”
“Did your wife offer any objection to your leaving her, Monsieur Hilaire?”
“She did everything that she could think of to prevent me from getting away. But she had to bow to the inevitable when I told her that I was entrusted by the Government with a secret mission to supply the Mediterranean seaboard with macaroni!... But even that didn’t pass without some unpleasant remarks, and she foretold a number of dire disasters, such as the tr
ain running off the lines, an earthquake, and a few epidemics. But I don’t want to think of those disagreeable moments. I am at Nice. I see before me the land of the sun.”
“You will see it to-morrow morning,” corrected Chéri-Bibi. “Meantime, we will go and have a bit of dinner together. I have nothing to do. My master has given me the evening off!”
“Your master! So you have a master now. I imagined that your uniform was only for show. I know, Monsieur le Marquis, that you always had a fancy for assuming a disguise, and even in the time of—”
“Are you sober, Dodger?”
“I beg your pardon. I couldn’t help it. I thought I was back again to those days when you, Monsieur le Marquis, disguised yourself before proceeding on certain expeditions. And then, it’s quite true, this country, this air intoxicates me. I don’t know myself. I am twenty years younger. I beg your pardon....”
“Listen to me. I am employed as hall-porter by Dr. Herbert Ross, 95A, Avenue Victor Hugo. He is a fashionable surgeon-dentist, and has a large number of smart patients. Remember that, I beg of you. And you, do you know what you are?”
“Know what I am! I should think I did. I am M. Hilaire, grocer, spending a holiday on the Riviera, and my one idea is to amuse myself and take things easy.”
They had reached a dingy street which turned into the Place Masséna. Chéri-Bibi came to a stand before an hotel.
“I’ve taken a room here in your name. Off with you! I’ll wait for you.”
Five minutes later Hilaire came out again.
“I’ve only had time to wash my hands and dip my face in a basin of water,” he said. “Where are we going to dine? I’ll stand treat.”
Chéri-Bibi took the Dodger to a restaurant, in the old town, famous for its tripe and light white wines. Hilaire was in the highest spirits. After dinner he lit a cigar which Chéri-Bibi gave him and he puffed away at it with great gusto as he threw himself back in his chair.
Collected Works of Gaston Leroux Page 199