CHAPTER II

THERE IS A WOMAN?

Anger, curiosity, interest; these sensations blanketed one another

quickly, leaving only interest, which was Courtlandt's normal state of

mind when he saw a pretty woman. It did not require very keen scrutiny on

his part to arrive swiftly at the conclusion that this one was not quite

in the picture. Her cheeks were not red with that redness which has a

permanency of tone, neither waxing nor waning, abashed in daylight. Nor

had her lips found their scarlet moisture from out the depths of certain

little porcelain boxes. Decidedly she was out of place here, yet she

evinced no embarrassment; she was cool, at ease. Courtlandt's interest

strengthened.

"Why do you think I am lonely, Mademoiselle?" he asked, without smiling.

"Oh, when one talks to one's self, strikes the table, wastes good wine,

the inference is but natural. So, Monsieur is lonely."

Her lips and eyes, as grave and smileless as his own, puzzled him. An

adventure? He looked at some of the other women. Those he could

understand, but this one, no. At all times he was willing to smile, yet to

draw her out he realized that he must preserve his gravity unbroken. The

situation was not usual. His gaze came back to her.

"Is the comparison favorable to me?" she asked.

"It is. What is loneliness?" he demanded cynically.

"Ah, I could tell you," she answered. "It is the longing to be with the

one we love; it is the hate of the wicked things we have done; it is

remorse."

"That echoes of the Ambigu-Comique." He leaned upon his arms. "What are

you doing here?"

"I?"

"Yes. You do not talk like the other girls who come here."

"Monsieur comes here frequently, then?"

"This is the first time in five years. I came here to-night because I

wanted to be alone, because I did not wish to meet any one I knew. I have

scowled at every girl in the room, and they have wisely left me alone. I

haven't scowled at you because I do not know what to make of you. That's

frankness. Now, you answer my question."

"Would you spare me a glass of wine? I am thirsty."

He struck his hands together, a bit of orientalism he had brought back

with him. The observant waiter instantly came forward with a glass.

The young woman sipped the wine, gazing into the glass as she did so.

"Perhaps a whim brought me here. But I repeat, Monsieur is lonely."

"So lonely that I am almost tempted to put you into a taxicab and run away

with you."

She set down the glass.

"But I sha'n't," he added.

The spark of eagerness in her eyes was instantly curtained. "There is a

woman?" tentatively.

"Is there not always a woman?"

"And she has disappointed Monsieur?" There was no marked sympathy in the

tone.

"Since Eve, has that not been woman's part in the human comedy?" He was

almost certain that her lips became firmer. "Smile, if you wish. It is not

prohibitory here."

It was evident that the smile had been struggling for existence, for it

endured to the fulness of half a minute. She had fine teeth. He

scrutinized her more closely, and she bore it well. The forehead did not

make for beauty; it was too broad and high, intellectual. Her eyes were

splendid. There was nothing at all ordinary about her. His sense of

puzzlement renewed itself and deepened. What did she want of him? There

were other men, other vacant chairs.

"Monsieur is certain about the taxicab?"

"Absolutely."

"Ah, it is to emulate Saint Anthony!"

"There are several saints of that name. To which do you refer?"

"Positively not to him of Padua."

Courtlandt laughed. "No, I can not fancy myself being particularly

concerned about bambini. No, my model is Noah."

"Noah?" dubiously.

"Yes. At the time of the flood there was only one woman in the world."

"I am afraid that your knowledge of that event is somewhat obscured.

Still, I understand."

She lifted the wine-glass again, and then he noticed her hand. It was

large, white and strong; it was not the hand of a woman who dallied, who

idled in primrose paths.

"Tell me, what is it you wish? You interest me, at a moment, too, when I

do not want to be interested. Are you really in trouble? Is there anything

I can do ... barring the taxicab?"

She twirled the glass, uneasily. "I am not in actual need of assistance."

"But you spoke peculiarly regarding loneliness."

"Perhaps I like the melodrama. You spoke of the Ambigu-Comique."

"You are on the stage?"

"Perhaps."

"The Opera?"

"Again perhaps."

He laughed once more, and drew his chair closer to the table.

"Monsieur in other moods must have a pleasant laughter."

"I haven't laughed from the heart in a very long time," he said, returning

to his former gravity, this time unassumed.

"And I have accomplished this amazing thing?"

"No. You followed me here. But from where?"

"Followed you?" The effort to give a mocking accent to her voice was a

failure.

"Yes. The idea just occurred to me. There were other vacant chairs, and

there was nothing inviting in my facial expression. Come, let me have the

truth."

"I have a friend who knows Flora Desimone."

"Ah!" As if this information was a direct visitation of kindness from the

gods. "Then you know where the Calabrian lives? Give me her address."

There was a minute wrinkle above the unknown's nose; the shadow of a

frown. "She is very beautiful."

"Bah! Did she send you after me? Give me her address. I have come all the

way from Burma to see Flora Desimone."

"To see her?" She unguardedly clothed the question with contempt, but she

instantly forced a smile to neutralize the effect. Concerned with her own

defined conclusions, she lost the fine ironic bitterness that was in the

man's voice.

"Aye, indeed, to see her! Beautiful as Venus, as alluring as Phryne, I

want nothing so much as to see her, to look into her eyes, to hear her

voice!"

"Is it jealousy? I hear the tragic note." The certainty of her ground

became as morass again. In his turn he was puzzling her.

"Tragedy? I am an American. We do not kill opera singers. We turn them

over to the critics. I wish to see the beautiful Flora, to ask her a few

questions. If she has sent you after me, her address, my dear young lady,

her address." His eyes burned.

"I am afraid." And she was so. This wasn't the tone of a man madly in

love. It was wild anger.

"Afraid of what?"

"You."

"I will give you a hundred francs." He watched her closely and shrewdly.

Came the little wrinkle again, but this time urged in perplexity. "A

hundred francs, for something I was sent to tell you?"

"And now refuse."

"It is very generous. She has a heart of flint, Monsieur."

"Well I know it. Perhaps now I have one of steel."

"Many sparks do not make a fire. Do you know that your French is very

good?"

"I spent my boyhood in Paris; some of it. Her address, if you please." He

produced a crisp note for a hundred francs. "Do you want it?"

She did not answer at once. Presently she opened her purse, found a stubby

pencil and a slip of paper, and wrote. "There it is, Monsieur." She held

out her hand for the bank-note which, with a sense of bafflement, he gave

her. She folded the note and stowed it away with the pencil.

"Thank you," said Courtlandt. "Odd paper, though." He turned it over. "Ah,

I understand. You copy music."

"Yes, Monsieur."

This time the nervous flicker of her eyes did not escape him. "You are

studying for the opera, perhaps?"

"Yes, that is it."

The eagerness of the admission convinced him that she was not. Who she was

or whence she had come no longer excited his interest. He had the

Calabrian's address and he was impatient to be off.

"Good night." He rose.

"Monsieur is not gallant."

"I was in my youth," he replied, putting on his hat.

The bald rudeness of his departure did not disturb her. She laughed softly

and relievedly. Indeed, there was in the laughter an essence of mischief.

However, if he carried away a mystery, he left one behind.

As he was hunting for a taxicab, the waiter ran out and told him that he

had forgotten to settle for the wine. The lady had refused to do so.

Courtlandt chuckled and gave him a ten-franc piece. In other days, in

other circumstances, he would have liked to know more about the unknown

who scribbled notes on composition paper. She was not an idler in the Rue

Royale, and it did not require that indefinable intuition which comes of

worldly-wiseness to discover this fact. She might be a friend of the

Desimone woman, but she had stepped out of another sphere to become so. He

recognized the quality that could adjust itself to any environment and

come out scatheless. This was undeniably an American accomplishment; and

yet she was distinctly a Frenchwoman. He dismissed the problem from his

mind and bade the driver go as fast as the police would permit.

Meanwhile the young woman waited five or ten minutes, and, making sure

that Courtlandt had been driven off, left the restaurant. Round the corner

she engaged a carriage. So that was Edward Courtlandt? She liked his face;

there was not a weak line in it, unless stubbornness could be called such.

But to stay away for two years! To hide himself in jungles, to be heard of

only by his harebrained exploits! "Follow him; see where he goes," had

been the command. For a moment she had rebelled, but her curiosity was not

to be denied. Besides, of what use was friendship if not to be tried? She

knew nothing of the riddle, she had never asked a question openly. She had

accidentally seen a photograph one day, in a trunk tray, with this man's

name scrawled across it, and upon this flimsy base she had builded a dozen

romances, each of which she had ruthlessly torn down to make room for

another; but still the riddle lay unsolved. She had thrown the name into

the conversation many a time, as one might throw a bomb into a crowd which

had no chance to escape. Fizzles! The man had been calmly discussed and

calmly dismissed. At odd times an article in the newspapers gave her an

opportunity; still the frank discussion, still the calm dismissal. She had

learned that the man was rich, irresponsible, vacillating, a picturesque

sort of fool. But two years? What had kept him away that long? A weak man,

in love, would not have made so tame a surrender. Perhaps he had not

surrendered; perhaps neither of them had.

And yet, he sought the Calabrian. Here was another blind alley out of

which she had to retrace her steps. Bother! That Puck of Shakespeare was

right: What fools these mortals be! She was very glad that she possessed a

true sense of humor, spiced with harmless audacity. What a dreary world it

must be to those who did not know how and when to laugh! They talked of

the daring of the American woman: who but a Frenchwoman would have dared

what she had this night? The taxicab! She laughed. And this man was wax in

the hands of any pretty woman who came along! So rumor had it. But she

knew that rumor was only the attenuated ghost of Ananias, doomed forever

to remain on earth for the propagation of inaccurate whispers. Wax! Why,

she would have trusted herself in any situation with a man with those eyes

and that angle of jaw. It was all very mystifying. "Follow him; see where

he goes." The frank discussion, then, and the calm dismissal were but a

woman's dissimulation. And he had gone to Flora Desimone's.

The carriage stopped before a handsome apartment-house in the Avenue de

Wagram. The unknown got out, gave the driver his fare, and rang the

concierge's bell. The sleepy guardian opened the door, touched his

gold-braided cap in recognition, and led the way to the small electric

lift. The young woman entered and familiarly pushed the button. The

apartment in which she lived was on the second floor; and there was luxury

everywhere, but luxury subdued and charmed by taste. There were fine old

Persian rugs on the floors, exquisite oils and water-colors on the walls;

and rare Japanese silk tapestries hung between the doors. In one corner of

the living-room was a bronze jar filled with artificial cherry blossoms;

in another corner near the door, hung a flat bell-shaped piece of brass--a

Burmese gong. There were many photographs ranged along the mantel-top;

celebrities, musical, artistic and literary, each accompanied by a liberal

expanse of autographic ink.

She threw aside her hat and wraps with that manner of inconsequence which

distinguishes the artistic temperament from the thrifty one, and passed on

into the cozy dining-room. The maid had arranged some sandwiches and a

bottle of light wine. She ate and drank, while intermittent smiles played

across her merry face. Having satisfied her hunger, she opened her purse

and extracted the bank-note. She smoothed it out and laughed aloud.

"Oh, if only he had taken me for a ride in the taxicab!" She bubbled again

with merriment.

Suddenly she sprang up, as if inspired, and dashed into another room, a

study. She came back with pen and ink, and with a celerity that came of

long practise, drew five straight lines across the faint violet face of

the bank-note. Within these lines she made little dots at the top and

bottom of stubby perpendicular strokes, and strange interlineal

hieroglyphics, and sweeping curves, all of which would have puzzled an

Egyptologist if he were unused to the ways of musicians. Carefully she

dried the composition, and then put the note away. Some day she would

confound him by returning it.

A little later her fingers were moving softly over the piano keys;

melodies in minor, sad and haunting and elusive, melodies that had never

been put on paper and would always be her own: in them she might leap from

comedy to tragedy, from laughter to tears, and only she would know. The

midnight adventure was forgotten, and the hero of it, too. With her eyes

closed and her lithe body swaying gently, she let the old weary pain in

her heart take hold again.