“I am glad,” he said, “I have got that settled.”
Madame de Viard’s grim face relaxed a little. She took his words to herself. This little wisp of unimportance at her side had been trying to place her in her category all the evening. He had been paying her his due tribute, and tributes even from little wisps of unimportance are pleasing.
“Yes. I am a Tabateau,” she said, expecting congratulations. She was disappointed.
“Ah, yes! So you said!” Mr. Ricardo adjusted his pince-nez and nodded. “A Tabateau!”
“A Tabateau,” she repeated impressively.
“From the Rue de la Paix.”
“The great jeweller.”
“I once bought from him a little trinket for a Christmas present,” Mr. Ricardo continued. “A miniature gold fish with the tiniest of ruby eyes. Quite charming, Madame de Viard.”
It seemed to Ricardo that the moustache bristled upon her lips. With a glance she basilisked him. But before she could say a word, outside the open windows there was a loud hiss as though a play had failed; and a rocket shot up into the air, burst and descended like a flaming parasol.
Everyone in the room jumped — even Madame de Viard née Tabateau, even Mr. Ricardo. But Mr. Ricardo, whilst he jumped, kept his eyes open and so witnessed one of the intriguing little incidents of everyday life which to him were the salt of the earth.
A bottle of champagne, still three-quarters full, was standing upon the table where Lucrece Bouchette, Lydia Flight, Oliver Ransom and now Mr. Horne, the artist, were taking their supper. As the rocket hissed and ascended, two arms were suddenly stretched out towards the bottle, the shapely white arm of Lucrece and the arm of Oliver Ransom sleeved in his dark blue pilot coat. Oliver Ransom won — and very clearly to Lucrece Bouchette’s annoyance. Annoyance? Mr. Ricardo reflected that annoyance was not the descriptive word. Some emotion much stronger than that shook her frame and contorted her face. The bitterest disappointment, the sudden fury of one who has been the fraction of a second too late and sees herself in consequence utterly defeated. Oliver Ransom held the bottle.
“Madame Lucrece?” he asked, tilting it towards her glass.
“No, thank you,” she cried angrily; and upon that Oliver Ransom dropped the bottle, so that it fell upon its side on the table and rolled gushing out its contents in a foamy stream towards Lydia Flight. Lucrece Bouchette stared at that bottle as though she could not believe her eyes. She sat with her mouth agape, her eyes wide open, and then as the wine slopped over the edge of the table on to Lydia’s fine white satin coat, she suddenly leaned back in her chair and rocked with laughter. She carried her amusement up to the very edge of hysteria.
Mr. Ricardo could not misunderstand the odd little scene. No pantomime could have been more explicit. For some reason to which Ricardo had not the key, Lucrece Bouchette had wanted that bottle of champagne to be upset. She had stretched out her arm to seize it. Oliver Ransom had anticipated her. She had lost her chance. She had been wild with disappointment and fury. And then, to her stupefaction, by an accident the very thing which she wanted to happen had happened. The bottle had slipped from Oliver Ransom’s fingers and had rolled over to drench and stain the skirt of Lydia Flight’s fine gold-embroidered coat.
But Mr. Ricardo had noticed a detail still more intriguing which had altogether eluded Lucrece Bouchette. There had been no accident; Oliver Ransom had dropped that bottle deliberately. With a twist of his fingers, quite obvious to Ricardo, he had even set it rolling towards Lydia. He had wanted her on her feet, as she was now, trying to dry with her napkin her saturated coat.
“Lydia, I am so sorry,” he cried in dismay, and at that moment Madame de Viard at his side cried:
“Mon Dieu!”
Ricardo turned to her. She, too, then had observed with consternation the ruin of as pretty and decorative a garment as could be found in that room. But there was no regret whatever visible on Madame de Viard’s face. For a moment Ricardo fancied that the daughter of the Tabateau was scandalised by the sight of a pair of slim and shapely legs sheathed in silk stockings and satin breeches. But Madame de Viard was staring at Lydia Flight’s hands, which were nimbly readjusting the huge butterfly-winged bow under her chin. When she sprang up, her cravat had been twisted awry and the lace fall had caught on one of the glittering buttons on the breast of her coat.
“Mon Dieu!” Madame de Viard repeated with a gasp.
“She is certainly exquisite,” said Mr. Ricardo.
“I meant nothing of the kind,” Madame de Viard returned tartly. For she was now aware and unappreciative of Lydia Flight’s legs.
Meanwhile Lydia was plying her napkin.
“I’m drenched,” she said. “I shall have to run upstairs and change.”
“I’ll come up with you,” cried Oliver Ransom.
But it was easier to say it than to do it. They tried to make for the door opening into the lounge. But the whole company was on foot now and pressing towards the windows. There was a glare of light over the garden and the quartette from the ballroom was tuning up on the terrace. The entertainment was about to begin. Oliver and Lydia Flight were forced to wait by their table until the stream had passed them by. Lydia noticed that Lucrece had crossed the room, and moving away from the terrace on the side where the press was lightest, had slipped out by the service door. “That’s the way we should have gone,” she realised. By the time, indeed, they were able to cross, there were only Madame de Viard and Mr. Ricardo left in the room and they were following the other guests out by the glass doors.
Chairs had been arranged on the terrace during supper. The glare of light came from two powerful projectors upon the balcony of the gallery on the first floor. They lit up the thick rope stretched tightly between the mast in the garden and the balcony, and turned it into a cable of gold. The moon had sunk, but the night was clear and the sky above spangled with a pattern of innumerable stars.
Mr. Ricardo found a chair for Madame de Viard and another just behind her for himself, and prepared to enjoy himself. There was something charmingly bizarre in the setting of this entertainment, and Mr. Ricardo had a liking for the bizarre so long as it was not dangerous. He also loved to see people doing perilous things, so long as he was not involved in the peril. At a prizefight he felt the punch without the pain. At a football match he was winded, yet breathed equably. So now he was going to slip with the tight-rope dancer, fall like a man in a nightmare, and yet keep his feet firmly on the terrace slabs. He looked at his watch. It was a little after half-past twelve. He lit a cigar.
“Oh!” cried Madame de Viard in front of him, shaking her head as though a swarm of gnats was stinging her. “Do gentlemen smoke cigars now in the neighbourhood of ladies?”
Mr. Ricardo was greatly inclined to say “No” and go on smoking. But he had not time to make any answer at all. For as he took his cigar reluctantly from his lips, the music crashed and out from the balcony Prince Ali Ibrahim, as he styled himself, of the Rouen Circus, slithered out on to the rope, his balancing pole waist-high in his hands.
Mr. Ricardo applauded and Madame de Viard shrugged her shoulders at his naïveté. Prince Ali Ibrahim was dressed in white with a scarlet sash about his waist. He ran, he danced, he brought out a table and a chair, he cooked an omelette and ate it and at last he slipped.
“Oh!” Mr. Ricardo gasped, feeling his heart stop.
“Puerile,” commented Madame de Viard, and that was more than Mr. Ricardo could endure.
The scene was absorbingly picturesque: he was making a speech to her in his mind, a dumb speech but utterly crushing. The odd dresses, the white shoulders of the women, the man on the rope so much more at his ease than many of the guests had been on the floor of the ball-room, the contrast between the fierce glare of the projectors and the calm beauty of the night, the little cries of awe and fear which burst from the spectators — all combined to make up an entertainment, with just enough of the barbaric to give it a pleasantly sharp tang.
/> “That old camel has spoilt my enjoyment altogether,” Mr. Ricardo reflected; and very quietly he slipped out of his chair. He was standing close to the long windows of the supper-room. One step back and he could light his cigar again and be free of her supercilious comments. He took the step back and finding himself in the supper-room remembered that he had noticed neither Lydia Flight nor Oliver Ransom come out on to the terrace. The girl had certainly had time enough to change even from her elaborate costume. He walked out of the supper-room into the lounge. There, too, the glass doors stood wide open; and Ricardo argued that on coming down the stairs they had slipped out by the door nearest to them in order to lose as few of the tight-rope dancer’s feats as they could.
For himself the evening had been spoilt. He would not return to the terrace. Prince Ali Ibrahim might stand on his head on the rope. He probably was standing on it at this moment. “I shan’t see him,” said Ricardo firmly; and he could not avoid a sensation that he was unjustly punishing Prince Ali Ibrahim by not seeing him. Nevertheless that had to be. He turned his back on the terrace and went out through the stone hall into the courtyard; and there he relit his cigar.
CHAPTER XI
MR. RICARDO THINKS IT TIME TO GO
IT WAS VERY quiet in the courtyard, quiet and cool and dark. A lamp shone at each side of the gateway. Inside the garage, but sufficiently at the back to be out of Mr. Ricardo’s sight, another light was burning. It lit up the entrance and the pavement of the yard in front of it. The windows of the living rooms above were in darkness.
The chauffeurs of the different cars stationed in the courtyard were no doubt watching the entertainment. Mr. Ricardo had seen a group clustered about the garden door of the servants’ wing. He heard a prolonged exclamation now from the other side of the house, which greeted some new audacity of Ibrahim Ali. No one would be likely to return to his car until the performance was over.
So he reasoned, and was aware that he was wrong. For someone was moving in the open garage. A car was wheeled out, a small two-seater with a yellow body — Oliver Ransom’s car. Ricardo had seen it too often flashing about the roads round Caudebec to be in any doubt. The man who pushed it out swung it round to face the gateway, and Ricardo saw that he was dressed in a chauffeur’s uniform, a dark pilot coat, breeches and leggings, and a peaked cap.
“Oliver Ransom,” said Ricardo to himself in considerable perplexity. He could not see the man’s face, but he was wearing the dress which Oliver Ransom had worn at the ball; and Oliver Ransom had left the supper-room on the heels of Lydia Flight. What in the world was he doing here alone?
The man went back into the garage, and Ricardo saw that he was of the build of Oliver. He saw no more, for the light inside the garage went out. He looked around him, for he expected now to see Lydia Flight come running from the house to join her friend. But no one came from the house behind him.
He heard a door bang, the whirr of the engine, and suddenly the small yellow car moved forward. The exhaust was open, a foot was on the accelerator, and the car shot out between the high gate-posts with a roar and went throbbing down the slope to the river road. Mr. Ricardo ran to the gates. He watched it turn to the right at the bottom of the slope on the road to Rouen. For a second or two its lights flashed amongst the trees. He could see here and there a few yards of road bathed in a momentary radiance; and then all but the noise of its engine had gone, and a little while after that too ceased. Mr. Ricardo looked at his watch. It was one o’clock in the morning.
Ricardo was uneasy, although he could not have given any reasonable grounds for his uneasiness. He could not say that there had been anything furtive in this departure. It was unexpected, and perhaps — yes, certainly — disappointing, as it would not have been had Lydia Flight slipped out and jumped into the car by the side of the driver. But it was not secret. Mr. Ricardo turned round to go back to the house, and saw standing quietly just behind him the little old man who was posted at the gate.
“Did you see that genelman go, mister?” asked Furlong. Ricardo was not then aware of his name. “Yes, I did.”
“I hope I don’t git into trouble over this. Mr. Ransom, wasn’t it?”
“It looked like Mr. Ransom, and it was Mr. Ransom’s car,” replied Ricardo.
“I ought ter ‘ave been on the spot, sir, to make sure he was all right. That’s my dooty. But I was looking at that Indian on the tight-rope. A ‘uman fly, I calls him.”
“I don’t think Mr. Ransom was in need of any help,” said Ricardo.
Nick Furlong nodded his head gratefully. His little beady eyes looked up and down Mr. Ricardo and gave him an odd sensation of discomfort.
“Well, if I gits into trouble, mister, p’r’aps you’ll speak up for me,” said Furlong. “‘Ow could I expec’ Mr. Ransom would want to go rushin’ off whilst that man was dancin’ between heaven and earth?”
And how could anyone else expect him to go rushing off whilst Lydia Flight was changing her dress? Ricardo wondered. He walked back to the house. Here was a mystery which for once did not amuse him. Something’s wrong, he felt, and for those two young people he wanted everything to go right. He opened the front door and passed into the lounge. As he crossed the lounge a great round of applause told him that the performance was over. Half-way across he stopped. Against the dark staircase he saw a gleam of white, a sparkle of buckles and gold embroidery. Lydia Flight, still dressed as Octavian, from head to foot, stumbled down the stairs and leaned against the wall as if she was on the point of swooning.
“My dear,” he cried, in the greatest concern. “What has happened to you? You are hurt?”
Lydia gazed at him with blind eyes. She heard a kindness in his voice, but the speaker might have been the wild man from Borneo for all she knew.
“No, I am not hurt,” she said, shaking her head. “I am not hurt at all.” She gave him an odd suspicious look. “Are you a friend of mine?”
“Of course.”
“I don’t know,” said Lydia stubbornly. “Lots of people aren’t friendly, lots and lots, you know. Perhaps you haven’t had to fight”; and Mr. Ricardo felt a trifle ashamed. It was true that he had made a fortune in Mincing Lane by his own abilities, but he had inherited a little business to start with. He had not had to jump into the cockpit and fight as this young girl had had to do with no other weapons than God had given her.
Again the applause burst forth on the terrace. The acrobat had slid forward along his rope and with bended knee was bowing his acknowledgements. The applause and the cries and the grating of chairs upon the flags awaked Lydia’s attention. Her lips parted, and her breath came fast, and a light burned in her eyes.
“I have made a success!” she cried. “‘Que schiva?’ It’s no use, old Manotti,” and she began to laugh wildly, clapping her hands. And then she stopped, and tottered and would have fallen, had not Ricardo slipped an arm about her waist and held her up.
“Find Oliver for me,” she said. Her head was bowed forward against his chest, and the words only reached him in a whisper. There was so tender an appeal in her voice that Ricardo dared not give her the only answer which he knew. But Lydia insisted. She threw her head back, and shook him by the arm.
“You can find him for me? Why can’t you? It’s not like you.”
Mr. Ricardo answered miserably:
“He has gone.”
Lydia frowned at him. Gone? Gone was a word, but it didn’t mean anything. Gone? What was he talking about?
“He went in the car. The little yellow car. I saw him go. He went towards Rouen” — and he felt her whole weight upon his arm. A couch stood against the wall at the foot of the stairs. Mr. Ricardo lowered her on to it gently.
“I’ll get you a glass of water. I’ll be back in a minute. Stay there!” he said, but whether she heard him or not, and if she heard, whether she understood him, he had no idea. He ran across into the supper-room, found a glass and a jug of water and a bottle of brandy. He mixed a strong grog, and hurried back
to Lydia. By this time, however, the people from the garden were crowding back into the lounge. Some stood in groups chattering at the tops of their voices. Others were mounting the stairs for their wraps. When Ricardo reached the couch, Guy Stallard was standing in front of Lydia and shielding her. Ricardo gave her the glass, and she drank from it, and gave it back.
“Better?” he asked gently.
“Yes.”
She sat staring at the floor, and then raised her head. She looked at Guy Stallard.
“I’m distracted,” she said with a little break in her voice. “He says that Oliver has gone.”
Guy Stallard wheeled round upon Ricardo.
“Gone?” he asked. “What do you mean?”
There had been an odd violence in his movement, and a peremptory abruptness in his voice. Mr. Ricardo was not to be browbeaten.
“I saw him go.”
“In his car...towards Rouen...” Lydia added, leaning forward.
Stallard’s eyes were still upon Ricardo. They were rather implacable, rather menacing.
“When did you see him?”
“Ten minutes ago.”
“Where were you?”
“In the courtyard.”
“Did anybody else see him?”
Mr. Ricardo remembered the little man’s prayer that he should not reveal to his employer his absence from his post. He contented himself with saying:
“Your man at the gates.”
“Furlong?” said Stallard. A smile suddenly softened his face. “You seem to see a good deal, Mr. Ricardo, one way and another,” he said, and he turned back to Lydia.
“But I don’t believe it,” he continued reassuringly. “It was dark in the courtyard, I expect, wasn’t it?” The question was put to Ricardo.
“Yes,” he admitted. “But there was a light in the garage as he pushed the car out.”
Complete Works of a E W Mason Page 128