The Ghost - Arnold Bennett (top 10 books to read .TXT) 📗

bitterly complained of thirst. She wanted, indeed, to stop the carriage and have something to drink at the Café de l'Univers, but I absolutely declined to permit such a proceeding, and in a few minutes we were at her flat. The attack was passing away. She mounted the stairs without much difficulty.

"You must go to bed," I said. We were in the salon. "In a few hours you will be better."

"I will ring for Yvette."

"No," I said, "you will not ring for Yvette. I want Yvette myself. Have you no other servant who can assist you?"

"Yes. But why not Yvette?"

"You can question me to-morrow. Please obey me now. I am your doctor. I will ring the bell. Yvette will come, and you will at once go out of the room, find another servant, and retire to bed. You can do that? You are not faint?"

"No, I can do it; but it is very queer."

I rang the bell.

"You have said that before, and I say, 'It is queer; queerer than you imagine.' One thing I must ask you before you go. When you had the attack in the theatre did you see things double?"

"Yes," she answered. "But how did you know? I felt as though I was intoxicated; but I had taken nothing whatever."

"Excuse me, you had taken egg-and-milk. Here is the glass out of which you drank it." I picked up the glass, which had been left on the table, and which still contained about a spoonful of egg-and-milk.

Yvette entered in response to my summons.

"Mademoiselle has returned soon," the girl began lightly.

"Yes."

The two women looked at each other. I hastened to the door, and held it open for Rosa to pass out. She did so. I closed the door, and put my back against it. The glass I still held in my hand.

"Now, Yvette, I want to ask you a few questions."

She stood before me, pretty even in her plain black frock and black apron, and folded her hands. Her face showed no emotion whatever.

"Yes, monsieur, but mademoiselle will need me."

"Mademoiselle will not need you. She will never need you again."

"Monsieur says?"

"You see this glass. What did you put in it?"

"The cook put egg-and-milk into it."

"I ask what you put in it?"

"I, monsieur? Nothing."

"You are lying, my girl. Your mistress has been poisoned."

"I swear—"

"I should advise you not to swear. You have twice attempted to poison your mistress. Why did you do it?"

"But this is absurd."

"Does your mistress use eyedrops when she sings at the Opéra?"

"Eyedrops?"

"You know what I mean. A lotion which you drop into the eye in order to dilate the pupil."

"My mistress never uses eyedrops."

"Does Madame Carlotta Deschamps use eyedrops?"

It was a courageous move on my part, but it had its effect. She was startled.

"I—I don't know, monsieur."

"I ask because eyedrops contain atropine, and mademoiselle is suffering from a slight, a very slight, attack of atropine poisoning. The dose must have been very nicely gauged; it was just enough to produce a temporary hoarseness and discomfort. I needn't tell such a clever girl as you that atropine acts first on the throat. It has clearly been some one's intention to prevent mademoiselle from singing at rehearsals, and from appearing in Paris in 'Carmen.'"

Yvette drew herself up, her nostrils quivering. She had turned decidedly pale.

"Monsieur insults me by his suspicions. I must go."

"You won't go just immediately. I may tell you further that I have analyzed the contents of this glass, and have found traces of atropine."

I had done no such thing, but that was a detail.

"Also, I have sent for the police."

This, too, was an imaginative statement.

Yvette approached me suddenly, and flung her arms round my neck. I had just time to put the glass on the seat of a chair and seize her hands.

"No," I said, "you will neither spill that glass nor break it."

She dropped at my feet weeping.

"Have pity on me, monsieur!" She looked up at me through her tears, and the pose was distinctly effective. "It was Madame Deschamps who asked me to do it. I used to be with her before I came to mademoiselle. She gave me the bottle, but I didn't know it was poison—I swear I didn't!"

"What did you take it to be, then? Jam? Two grains of atropine will cause death."

For answer she clung to my knees. I released myself, and moved away a few steps. She jumped up, and made a dash for the door, but I happened to have locked it.

"Where is Madame Deschamps?" I asked.

"She returns to Paris to-morrow. Monsieur will let me go. I was only a tool."

"I will consider that matter, Yvette," I said. "In my opinion you are a thoroughly wicked girl, and I wouldn't trust you any further than I could see you. For the present, you will have an opportunity to meditate over your misdoings." I left the room, and locked the door on the outside.

Impossible to disguise the fact that I was enormously pleased with myself—with my sharpness, my smartness, my penetration, my success.

CHAPTER XIII THE PORTRAIT

For the next hour or two I wandered about Rosa's flat like an irresolute and bewildered spirit. I wished to act, yet without Rosa I scarcely liked to do so. That some sort of a plot existed—whether serious or trivial was no matter—there could be little doubt, and there could be little doubt also that Carlotta Deschamps was at the root of it.

Several half-formed schemes flitted through my head, but none of them seemed to be sufficiently clever. I had the idea of going to see Carlotta Deschamps in order to warn her. Then I thought the warning might perhaps be sent through her sister Marie, who was doubtless in Paris, and who would probably be able to control Carlotta. I had not got Carlotta's address, but I might get it by going to the Casino de Paris, and asking Marie for it. Perhaps Marie, suspicious, might refuse the address. Had she not said that she and Carlotta were as thick as thieves? Moreover, assuming that I could see Carlotta, what should I say to her? How should I begin? Then it occurred to me that the shortest way with such an affair was to go directly to the police, as I had already threatened Yvette; but the appearance of the police would mean publicity, scandal, and other things unpleasant for Rosa. So it fell out that I maintained a discreet inactivity.

Towards nightfall I went into the street to breathe the fresh air. A man was patrolling the pavement in a somewhat peculiar manner. I returned indoors, and after half an hour reconnoitred once more. The man was on the opposite side of the road, with his eyes on the windows of the salon. When he caught sight of me he walked slowly away. He might have been signalling to Yvette, who was still under lock and key, but this possibility did not disturb me, as escape was out of the question for her.

I went back to the flat, and a servant met me in the hall with a message that mademoiselle was now quite recovered, and would like to see me in her boudoir. I hurried to her. A fire was burning on the hearth, and before this were two lounge chairs. Rosa occupied one, and she motioned me to the other. Attired in a peignoir of pure white, and still a little languorous after the attack, she looked the enchanting perfection of beauty and grace. But in her eyes, which were unduly bright, there shone an apprehension, the expectancy of the unknown.

"I am better," she said, with a faint smile. "Feel my pulse."

I held her wrist and took out my watch, but I forgot to count, and I forgot to note the seconds. I was gazing at her. It seemed absurd to contemplate the possibility of ever being able to call her my own.

"Am I not better?"

"Yes, yes," I said; "the pulse is—the pulse is—you are much better."

Then I pushed my chair a little further from the fire, and recollected that there were several things to be said and done.

"I expected the attack would pass very quickly," I said.

"Then you know what I have been suffering from," she said, turning her chair rapidly half-round towards me.

"I do," I answered, with emphasis.

"What is it?"

I was silent.

"Well," she said, "tell me what it is." She laughed, but her voice was low and anxious.

"I am just wondering whether I shall tell you."

"Stuff!" she exclaimed proudly. "Am I a child?"

"You are a woman, and should be shielded from the sharp edges of life."

"Ah!" she murmured "Not all men have thought so. And I wish you wouldn't talk like that."

"Nevertheless, I think like that," I said. "And I'm really anxious to save you from unnecessary annoyance."

"Then I insist that you shall tell me," she replied inconsequently. "I will not have you adopt that attitude towards me. Do you understand? I won't have it! I'm not a Dresden shepherdess, and I won't be treated like one—at any rate, by you. So there!"

I was in the seventh heaven of felicity.

"If you will have it, you have been poisoned."

I told her of my suspicions, and how they had been confirmed by Yvette's avowal. She shivered, and then stood up and came towards me.

"Do you mean to say that Carlotta Deschamps and my own maid have conspired together to poison me simply because I am going to sing in a certain piece at a certain theatre? It's impossible!"

"But it is true. Deschamps may not have wished to kill you; she merely wanted to prevent you from singing, but she ran a serious risk of murder, and she must have known it."

Rosa began to sob, and I led her back to her chair.

"I ought not to have told you to-night," I said. "But we should communicate with the police, and I wanted your authority before doing so."

She dried her eyes, but her frame still shook.

"I will sing 'Carmen,'" she said passionately.

"Of course you will. We must get these two arrested, and you shall have proper protection."

"Police? No! We will have no police."

"You object to the scandal? I had thought of that."

"It is not that I object to the scandal. I despise Deschamps and Yvette too much to take the slightest notice of either of them. I could not have believed that women would so treat another woman." She hid her face in her hands.

"But is it not your duty—" I began.

"Mr. Foster, please, please don't argue. I am incapable of prosecuting these creatures. You say Yvette is locked up in the salon. Go to her, and tell her to depart. Tell her that I shall do nothing, that I do not hate her, that I bear her no ill-will, that I simply ignore her. And let her carry the same message to Carlotta Deschamps."

"Suppose there should be a further plot?"

"There can't be. Knowing that this one is discovered, they will never dare.... And even if they tried again in some other way, I would sooner walk in danger all my life than acknowledge the existence of such creatures. Will you go at once?"

"As you wish;" and I went out.

"Mr. Foster."

She called me back. Taking my hand with a gesture half-caressing, she raised her face to mine. Our eyes met, and in hers was a gentle, trustful appeal, a pathetic and entrancing wistfulness, which sent a sudden thrill through me. Her clasp of my fingers tightened ever so little.

"I haven't thanked you in words," she said, "for all you have done for me, and are doing. But you know I'm grateful, don't you?"

I could feel the tears coming into my eyes.

"It is nothing, absolutely nothing," I muttered, and hurried from the room.

At first, in the salon, I could not see Yvette, though the