The Dark Star by Robert W. Chambers (best fiction novels of all time TXT) 📖

but, although he had no reason to believe the girl who had written him, something within him made him ashamed to notify the steward as to where he was going. He ought to have done it; common prudence born of experience with Ilse Dumont suggested it. And yet he could not bring himself to do it; and exactly why, he did not understand.

One thing, however, he could do; and he did. He wrote a note to Captain West giving the Paris address of the Princess Mistchenka, and asked that the olive-wood box be delivered to her in case any accident befell him. This note he dropped into the mailbox at the end of the main corridor as he went out. A few minutes later he stood in an empty passageway outside a door numbered 623. He had a loaded automatic in his breast pocket, a cigarette between his fingers, and, on his agreeable features, a smile of anticipation—a smile in which amusement, incredulity, reckless humour, and a spice of malice were blended—the smile born of the drop of Irish sparkling like champagne in his singing veins.

And he turned the knob of door No. 623 and went in.

She was reading, curled up on her sofa under the electric bulb, a cigarette in one hand, a box of bonbons beside her.

She looked up leisurely as he entered, gave him a friendly nod, and, when he held out his hand, placed her own in it. With delighted gravity he bent and saluted her finger tips with lips that twitched to control a smile.

“Will you be seated, please?” she said gently.

The softness of her agreeable voice struck him as 230 he looked around for a seat, then directly at her; and saw that she meant him to find a seat on the lounge beside her.

“Now, indeed you are Scheherazade of the Thousand and One Nights,” he said gaily, “with your cigarette and your bonbons, and cross-legged on your divan––”

“Did Scheherazade smoke cigarettes, Mr. Neeland?”

“No,” he admitted; “that is an anachronism, I suppose. Tell me, how are you, dear lady?”

“Thank you, quite well.”

“And—busy?” His lips struggled again to maintain their gravity.

“Yes, I have been busy.”

“Cooking something up?—I mean soup, of course,” he added.

She forced a smile, but reddened as though it were difficult for her to accustom herself to his half jesting sarcasms.

“So you’ve been busy,” he resumed tormentingly, “but not with cooking lessons! Perhaps you’ve been practising with your pretty little pistol. You know you really need a bit of small arms practice, Scheherazade.”

“Because I once missed you?” she inquired serenely.

“Why so you did, didn’t you?” he exclaimed, delighted to goad her into replying.

“Yes,” she said, “I missed you. I needn’t have. I am really a dead shot, Mr. Neeland.”

“Oh, Scheherazade!” he protested.

She shrugged:

“I am not bragging; I could have killed you. I supposed it was necessary only to frighten you. It was my mistake and a bad one.” 231

“My dear child,” he expostulated, “you meant murder and you know it. Do you suppose I believe that you know how to shoot?”

“But I do, Mr. Neeland,” she returned with good-humoured indifference. “My father was head jäger to Count Geier von Sturmspitz, and I was already a dead shot with a rifle when we emigrated to Canada. And when he became an Athabasca trader, and I was only twelve years old, I could set a moose-hide shoe-lace swinging and cut it in two with a revolver at thirty yards. And I can drive a shingle nail at that distance and drive the bullet that drove it, and the next and the next, until my revolver is empty. You don’t believe me, do you?”

“You know that the beautiful Scheherazade––”

“Was famous for her fantastic stories? Yes, I know that, Mr. Neeland. I’m sorry you don’t believe I fired only to frighten you.”

“I’m sorry I don’t,” he admitted, laughing, “but I’ll practise trying, and maybe I shall attain perfect credulity some day. Tell me,” he added, “what have you been doing to amuse yourself?”

“I’ve been amusing myself by wondering whether you would come here to see me tonight.”

“But your note said you were sure I’d come.”

“You have come, haven’t you?”

“Yes, Scheherazade, I’m here at your bidding, spirit and flesh. But I forgot to bring one thing.”

“What?”

“The box which—you have promised yourself.”

“Yes, the captain has it, I believe,” she returned serenely.

“Oh, Lord! Have you even found out that? I don’t know whether I’m much flattered by this surveillance 232 you and your friends maintain over me. I suppose you even know what I had for dinner. Do you?”

“Yes.”

“Come, I’ll call that bluff, dear lady! What did I have?”

When she told him, carelessly, and without humour, mentioning accurately every detail of his dinner, he lost his gaiety of countenance a little.

“Oh, I say, you know,” he protested, “that’s going it a trifle too strong. Now, why the devil should your people keep tabs on me to that extent?”

She looked up directly into his eyes:

“Mr. Neeland, I want to tell you why. I asked you here so that I may tell you. The people associated with me are absolutely pledged that neither the French nor the British Government shall have access to the contents of your box. That is why nothing that you do escapes our scrutiny. We are determined to have the papers in that box, and we shall have them.”

“You have come to that determination too late,” he began; but she stopped him with a slight gesture of protest:

“Please don’t interrupt me, Mr. Neeland.”

“I won’t; go on, dear lady!”

“Then, I’m trying to tell you all I may. I am trying to tell you enough of the truth to make you reflect very seriously.

“This is no ordinary private matter, no vulgar attempt at robbery and crime as you think—or pretend to think—for you are very intelligent, Mr. Neeland, and you know that the contrary is true.

“This affair concerns the secret police, the embassies, the chancelleries, the rulers themselves of nations long 233 since grouped into two formidable alliances radically hostile to one another.

“I don’t think you have understood—perhaps even yet you do not understand why the papers you carry are so important to certain governments—why it is impossible that you be permitted to deliver them to the Princess Mistchenka––”

“Where did you ever hear of her!” he demanded in astonishment.

The girl smiled:

“Dear Mr. Neeland, I know the Princess Mistchenka better, perhaps, than you do.”

“Do you?”

“Indeed I do. What do you know about her? Nothing at all except that she is handsome, attractive, cultivated, amusing, and apparently wealthy.

“You know her as a traveller, a patroness of music and the fine arts—as a devotee of literature, as a graceful hostess, and an amiable friend who gives promising young artists letters of introduction to publishers who are in a position to offer them employment.”

That this girl should know so much about the Princess Mistchenka and about his own relations with her amazed Neeland. He did not pretend to account for it; he did not try; he sat silent, serious, and surprised, looking into the pretty and almost smiling face of a girl who apparently had been responsible for three separate attempts to kill him—perhaps even a fourth attempt; and who now sat beside him talking in a soft and agreeable voice about matters concerning which he had never dreamed she had heard.

For a few moments she sat silent, observing in his changing expression the effects of what she had said to him. Then, with a smile: 234

“Ask me whatever questions you desire to ask, Mr. Neeland. I shall do my best to answer them.”

“Very well,” he said bluntly; “how do you happen to know so much about me?”

“I know something about the friends of the Princess Mistchenka. I have to.”

“Did you know who I was there in the house at Brookhollow?”

“No.”

“When, then?”

“When you yourself told me your name, I recognised it.”

“I surprised you by interrupting you in Brookhollow?”

“Yes.”

“You expected no interruption?”

“None.”

“How did you happen to go there? Where did you ever hear of the olive-wood box?”

“I had advices by cable from abroad—directions to go to Brookhollow and secure the box.”

“Then somebody must be watching the Princess Mistchenka.”

“Of course,” she said simply.

“Why ‘of course’?”

“Mr. Neeland, the Princess Mistchenka and her youthful protégée, Miss Carew––”

“What!!!”

The girl smiled wearily:

“Really,” she said, “you are such a boy to be mixed in with matters of this colour. I think that’s the reason you have defeated us—the trained fencer dreads a left-handed novice more than any classic master of the foils. 235

“And that is what you have done to us—blundered—if you’ll forgive me—into momentary victory.

“But such victories are only momentary, Mr. Neeland. Please believe it. Please try to understand, too, that this is no battle with masks and plastrons and nicely padded buttons. No; it is no comedy, but a grave and serious affair that must inevitably end in tragedy—for somebody.”

“For me?” he asked without smiling.

She turned on him abruptly and laid one hand lightly on his arm with a pretty gesture, at once warning, appealing, and protective.

“I asked you to come here,” she said, “because—because I want you to escape the tragedy.”

“You want me to escape?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I—am sorry for you.”

He said nothing.

“And—I like you, Mr. Neeland.”

The avowal in the soft, prettily modulated voice, lost none of its charm and surprise because the voice was a trifle tremulous, and the girl’s face was tinted with a delicate colour.

“I like to believe what you say, Scheherazade,” he said pleasantly. “Somehow or other I never did think you hated me personally—except once––”

She flushed, and he was silent, remembering her humiliation in the Brookhollow house.

“I don’t know,” she said in a colder tone, “why I should feel at all friendly toward you, Mr. Neeland, except that you are personally courageous, and you have shown yourself generous under a severe temptation to be otherwise. 236

“As for—any personal humiliation—inflicted upon me––” She looked down thoughtfully and pretended to sort out a bonbon to her taste, while the hot colour cooled in her cheeks.

“I know,” he said, “I’ve also jeered at you, jested, nagged you, taunted you, kiss––” He checked himself and he smiled and ostentatiously lighted a cigarette.

“Well,” he said, blowing a cloud of aromatic smoke toward the ceiling, “I believe that this is as strange a week as any man ever lived. It’s like a story book—like one of your wonderful stories, Scheherazade. It doesn’t seem real, now that it is ended––”

“It is not ended,” she interrupted in a low voice.

He smiled.

“You know,” he said, “there’s no use trying to frighten such an idiot as I am.”

She lifted her troubled eyes:

“That is what frightens me,” she said. “I am afraid you don’t know enough to be afraid.”

He laughed.

“But I want you to be afraid. A really brave man knows what fear is. I want you to know.”

“What do you wish me to do, Scheherazade?”

“Keep away from that box.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Yes, you can. You can leave it in charge of the captain of this ship and let him see that an attempt is made to deliver it to the Princess Mistchenka.”

She was in deadly earnest; he saw that. And, in spite of himself, a slight thrill that was almost a chill passed over him, checked instantly by the hot wave of sheer exhilaration at the hint of actual danger.

“Oho!” he said gaily. “Then you and your friends are not yet finished with me?” 237

“Yes, if you will consider your mission accomplished.”

“And leave the rest to the captain of the Volhynia?”

“Yes.”

“Scheherazade,” he said, “did you suppose me to be a coward?”

“No. You have done all that you can. A reserve officer of the British Navy has the box in his charge. Let him, protected by his Government, send it toward its destination.”

In her even voice the implied menace was the more sinister for her calmness.

He looked at her, perplexed, and shook his head.

“I ask you,” she went on, “to keep out of