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

a few. Shall I?”

“You are most amiable. I have been wondering what the other floors in this building are used for.”

“Private apartments,” she replied smiling, looking him straight in the eyes. “Now you don’t know whether I’ve told you the truth or not; do you?”

“Of course I know.”

“Which, then?”

“The truth.”

She laughed and indicated a chair; and he seated himself.

“Who is the dark, nice-looking gentleman accompanying you?” she enquired.

“How could you see him at all through your newspaper?”

“I poked a hole, of course.”

“To look at him or at me?”

“Your mirror ought to reassure you. However, as an afterthought, who is he?”

“Prince Erlik, of Mongolia,” replied Neeland solemnly.

“I supposed so. We of the infernal aristocracy belong together. I am the Contessa Diabletta d’Enfer.”

He inclined gravely:

“I’m afraid I don’t belong here,” he said. “I’m only a Yankee.”

“Hell is full of them,” she said, smiling. “All Yankees belong where Prince Erlik and I are at home.... Do you play?”

“No. Do you?”

“It depends on chance.” 363

“It would give me much pleasure––”

“Thank you, not tonight.” And in the same, level, pleasant voice: “Don’t look immediately, but from where you sit you can see in the mirror opposite two women seated in the next room.”

After a moment he nodded.

“Are they watching us?”

“Yes.”

“Mr. Neeland?”

He reddened with surprise.

“Get Captain Sengoun and leave,” she said, still smiling. “Do it carelessly, convincingly. Neither of you needs courage; both of you lack common sense. Get up, take leave of me nicely but regretfully, as though I had denied you a rendezvous. You will be killed if you remain here.”

For a moment Neeland hesitated, but curiosity won:

“Who is likely to try anything of that sort?” he asked. And a tingling sensation, not wholly unpleasant, passed over him.

“Almost anyone here, if you are recognised,” she said, as gaily as though she were imparting delightful information.

“But you recognise us. And I’m certainly not dead yet.”

“Which ought to tell you more about me than I am likely to tell anybody. Now, when I smile at you and shake my head, make your adieux to me, find Captain Sengoun, and take your departure. Do you understand?”

“Are you really serious?”

“It is you who should be serious. Now, I give you your signal, Monsieur Neeland––”

But the smile stiffened on her pretty face, and at 364 the same moment he was aware that somebody had entered the room and was standing directly behind him.

He turned on his chair and looked up into the face of Ilse Dumont.

There was a second’s hesitation, then he was on his feet, greeting her cordially, apparently entirely at ease and with nothing on his mind except the agreeable surprise of the encounter.

“I had your note,” he said. “It was charming of you to write, but very neglectful of you not to include your address. Tell me, how have you been since I last saw you?”

Ilse Dumont’s red lips seemed to be dry, for she moistened them without speaking. In her eyes he saw peril—knowledge of something terrible—some instant menace.

Then her eyes, charged with lightning, slowly turned from him to the girl on the sofa who had not moved. But in her eyes, too, a little flame began to flicker and play, and the fixed smile relaxed into an expression of cool self-possession.

Neeland’s pleasant, careless voice broke the occult tension:

“This is a pretty club,” he said; “everything here is in such excellent taste. You might have told me about it,” he added to Ilse with smiling reproach; “but you never even mentioned it, and I discovered it quite by accident.”

Ilse Dumont seemed to find her voice with an effort:

“May I have a word with you, Mr. Neeland?” she asked.

“Always,” he assured her promptly. “I am always more than happy to listen to you––”

“Please follow me!” 365

He turned to the girl on the sofa and made his adieux with conventional ceremony and a reckless smile which said:

“You were quite right, mademoiselle; I’m in trouble already.”

Then he followed Ilse Dumont into the adjoining room, which was lined with filled bookcases and where the lounges and deep chairs were covered with leather.

Halting by the library table, Ilse Dumont turned to him—turned on him a look such as he never before had encountered in any living woman’s eyes—a dead gaze, dreadful, glazed, as impersonal as the fixed regard of a corpse.

She said:

“I came.... They sent for me.... I did not believe they had the right man.... I could not believe it, Neeland.”

A trifle shaken, he said in tones which sounded steady enough:

“What frightens you so, Scheherazade?”

“Why did you come? Are you absolutely mad?”

“Mad? No, I don’t think so,” he replied with a forced smile. “What threatens me here, Scheherazade?”—regarding her pallid face attentively.

“Death.... You must have known it when you came.”

“Death? No, I didn’t know it.”

“Did you suppose that if they could get hold of you they’d let you go?—A man who might carry in his memory the plans for which they tried to kill you? I wrote to you—I wrote to you to go back to America! And—this is what you have done instead!”

“Well,” he said in a pleasant but rather serious 366 voice, “if you really believe there is danger for me if I remain here, perhaps I’d better go.”

“You can’t go!”

“You think I’ll be stopped?”

“Yes. Who is your crazy companion? I heard that he is Alak Sengoun—the headlong fool—they call Prince Erlik. Is it true?”

“Where did you hear all these things?” he demanded. “Where were you when you heard them?”

“At the Turkish Embassy. Word came that they had caught you. I did not believe it; others present doubted it.... But as the rumour concerned you, I took no chances; I came instantly. I—I had rather be dead than see you here––” Her voice became unsteady, but she controlled it at once:

“Neeland! Neeland! Why did you come? Why have you undone all I tried to do for you––?”

He looked intently at Ilse Dumont, then his gaze swept the handsome suite of rooms. No one seemed to notice him; in perspective, men moved leisurely about the further salon, where play was going on; and there seemed to be no one else in sight. And, as he stood there, free, in full pride and vigour of youth and strength, he became incredulous that anything could threaten him which he could not take care of.

A smile grew in his eyes, confident, humorous, a little hint of tenderness in it:

“Scheherazade,” he said, “you are a dear. You pulled me out of a dreadful mess on the Volhynia. I offer you gratitude, respect, and the very warm regard for you which I really cherish in my heart.”

He took her hands, kissed them, looked up half laughing, half in earnest. 367

“If you’re worried,” he said, “I’ll find Captain Sengoun and we’ll depart––”

She retained his hands in a convulsive clasp:

“Oh, Neeland! Neeland! There are men below who will never let you pass! And Breslau and Kestner are coming here later. And that devil, Damat Mahmud Bey!”

“Golden Beard and Ali Baba and the whole Arabian Nights!” exclaimed Neeland. “Who is Damat Mahmud Bey, Scheherazade dear?”

“The shadow of Abdul Hamid.”

“Yes, dear child, but Abdul the Damned is shut up tight in a fortress!”

“His shadow dogs the spurred heels of Enver Pasha,” she said, striving to maintain her composure. “Oh, Neeland!—A hundred thousand Armenians are yet to die in that accursed shadow! And do you think Mahmud Damat will hesitate in regard to you!”

“Nonsense! Does a murderous Moslem go about Paris killing people he doesn’t happen to fancy? Those things aren’t done––”

“Have you and Sengoun any weapons at all?” she interrupted desperately, “Anything!—A sword cane––?”

“No. What the devil does all this business mean?” he broke out impatiently. “What’s all this menace of lawlessness—this impudent threat of interference––”

“It is war!”

“War?” he repeated, not quite understanding her.

She caught him by the arm:

“War!” she whispered; “War! Do you understand? They don’t care what they do now! They mean to kill you here in this place. They’ll be out of France before anybody finds you.” 368

“Has war actually been declared?” he asked, astounded.

“Tomorrow! It is known in certain circles!” She dropped his arm and clasped her hands and stood there twisting them, white, desperate, looking about her like a hunted thing.

“Why did you do this?” she repeated in an agonised voice. “What can I do? I’m no traitor!... But I’d give you a pistol if I had one––” She checked herself as the girl who had been reading an evening newspaper on a sofa, and to whom Neeland had been talking when Ilse Dumont entered, came sauntering into the room.

The eyes of both women met; both turned a trifle paler. Then Ilse Dumont walked slowly up to the other:

“I overheard your warning,” she said with a deadly stare.

“Really?”

Ilse stretched out her bare arm, palm upward, and closed the fingers tightly:

“I hold your life in my hand. I have only to speak. Do you understand?”

“No.”

“You are lying. You do understand. You take double wages; but it is not France you betray! Nor Russia!”

“Are you insane?”

“Almost. Where do you carry them?”

“What?”

“Answer quickly. Where? I tell you, I’ll expose you in another moment if you don’t answer me! Speak quickly!”

The other woman had turned a ghastly white; for a second or two she remained dumb, then, dry-lipped: 369

“Above—the knee,” she stammered; but there was scarcely a sound from the blanched lips that formed the words.

“Pistols?”

“Yes.”

“Loaded? Both of them?”

“Yes.”

“Clips?”

“No.”

“Unstrap them!”

The woman turned, bent almost double, twisting her supple body entirely around; but Ilse Dumont was at her side like a flash and caught her wrist as she withdrew her hand from the hem of her fluffy skirt.

“Now—take your life!” said Ilse Dumont between her teeth. “There’s the door! Go out!”—following her with blazing eyes—“Stop! Stand where you are until I come!”

Then she came quickly to where Neeland stood, astonished; and thrust two automatic pistols into his hands.

“Get Sengoun,” she whispered. “Don’t go down-stairs, for God’s sake. Get to the roof, if you can. Try—oh, try, try, Neeland, my friend!” Her voice trembled; she looked into his eyes—gave him, in that swift regard, all that a woman withholds until the right man asks.

Her lips quivered; she turned sharply on her heel, went to the outer hallway, where the other woman stood motionless.

“What am I to do with you?” demanded Ilse Dumont. “Do you think you are going out of here to summon the police? Mount those stairs!” 370

The woman dropped her hand on the banisters, heavily, set foot on the first stair, then slowly mounted as though her little feet in their dainty evening slippers were weighted with ball and chain.

Ilse Dumont followed her, opened a door in the passage, motioned her to enter. It was a bedroom that the electric light revealed. The woman entered and stood by the bed as though stupefied.

“I’ll keep my word to you,” said Ilse Dumont. “When it becomes too late for you to do us any mischief, I’ll return and let you go.”

And she stepped back across the threshold and locked the door on the outside.

As she did so, Neeland and Sengoun came swiftly up the stairs, and she beckoned them to follow, gathered the skirts of her evening gown into one hand, and ran up the stairs ahead of them to the fifth floor.

In the dim light Neeland saw that the top floor was merely a vast attic full of débris from the café on the ground floor—iron tables which required mending or repainting, iron chairs, great jars of artificial stone with dead baytrees standing in them, parts of rusty stoves and kitchen ranges, broken cutlery in boxes, cracked table china and heavier kitchen crockery in tubs which once had held flowers.

The only windows gave on a court. Through their dirty panes already the grey light of that early Sunday morning glimmered, revealing the contents of the shadowy place, and the position of an iron ladder hooked to two rings under the scuttle overhead.

Ilse Dumont