The King in Yellow - Robert W. Chambers (latest books to read .txt) 📗

the street.

The maid didn’t know, so he bestowed upon her a fascinating smile and lounged back to the studio.

Hastings was not far away. The Luxembourg is within five minutes’ walk of the rue Notre Dame des Champs, and there he sat under the shadow of a winged god, and there he had sat for an hour, poking holes in the dust and watching the steps which lead from the northern terrace to the fountain. The sun hung, a purple globe, above the misty hills of Meudon. Long streamers of clouds touched with rose swept low on the western sky, and the dome of the distant Invalides burned like an opal through the haze. Behind the Palace the smoke from a high chimney mounted straight into the air, purple until it crossed the sun, where it changed to a bar of smouldering fire. High above the darkening foliage of the chestnuts the twin towers of St. Sulpice rose, an ever-deepening silhouette.

A sleepy blackbird was carolling in some near thicket, and pigeons passed and repassed with the whisper of soft winds in their wings. The light on the Palace windows had died away, and the dome of the Pantheon swam aglow above the northern terrace, a fiery Valhalla in the sky; while below in grim array, along the terrace ranged, the marble ranks of queens looked out into the west.

From the end of the long walk by the northern façade of the Palace came the noise of omnibuses and the cries of the street. Hastings looked at the Palace clock. Six, and as his own watch agreed with it, he fell to poking holes in the gravel again. A constant stream of people passed between the Odéon and the fountain. Priests in black, with silver-buckled shoes; line soldiers, slouchy and rakish; neat girls without hats bearing milliners’ boxes, students with black portfolios and high hats, students with bérets and big canes, nervous, quick-stepping officers, symphonies in turquoise and silver; ponderous jangling cavalrymen all over dust, pastry cooks’ boys skipping along with utter disregard for the safety of the basket balanced on the impish head, and then the lean outcast, the shambling Paris tramp, slouching with shoulders bent and little eye furtively scanning the ground for smokers’ refuse;—all these moved in a steady stream across the fountain circle and out into the city by the Odeon, whose long arcades were now beginning to flicker with gas-jets. The melancholy bells of St Sulpice struck the hour and the clock-tower of the Palace lighted up. Then hurried steps sounded across the gravel and Hastings raised his head.

“How late you are,” he said, but his voice was hoarse and only his flushed face told how long had seemed the waiting.

She said, “I was kept—indeed, I was so much annoyed—and—and I may only stay a moment.”

She sat down beside him, casting a furtive glance over her shoulder at the god upon his pedestal.

“What a nuisance, that intruding cupid still there?”

“Wings and arrows too,” said Hastings, unheeding her motion to be seated.

“Wings,” she murmured, “oh, yes—to fly away with when he’s tired of his play. Of course it was a man who conceived the idea of wings, otherwise Cupid would have been insupportable.”

“Do you think so?”

“Ma foi, it’s what men think.”

“And women?”

“Oh,” she said, with a toss of her small head, “I really forget what we were speaking of.”

“We were speaking of love,” said Hastings.

“I was not,” said the girl. Then looking up at the marble god, “I don’t care for this one at all. I don’t believe he knows how to shoot his arrows—no, indeed, he is a coward;—he creeps up like an assassin in the twilight. I don’t approve of cowardice,” she announced, and turned her back on the statue.

“I think,” said Hastings quietly, “that he does shoot fairly—yes, and even gives one warning.”

“Is it your experience, Monsieur Hastings?”

He looked straight into her eyes and said, “He is warning me.”

“Heed the warning then,” she cried, with a nervous laugh. As she spoke she stripped off her gloves, and then carefully proceeded to draw them on again. When this was accomplished she glanced at the Palace clock, saying, “Oh dear, how late it is!” furled her umbrella, then unfurled it, and finally looked at him.

“No,” he said, “I shall not heed his warning.”

“Oh dear,” she sighed again, “still talking about that tiresome statue!” Then stealing a glance at his face, “I suppose—I suppose you are in love.”

“I don’t know,” he muttered, “I suppose I am.”

She raised her head with a quick gesture. “You seem delighted at the idea,” she said, but bit her lip and trembled as his eyes met hers. Then sudden fear came over her and she sprang up, staring into the gathering shadows.

“Are you cold?” he said.

But she only answered, “Oh dear, oh dear, it is late—so late! I must go—goodnight.”

She gave him her gloved hand a moment and then withdrew it with a start.

“What is it?” he insisted. “Are you frightened?”

She looked at him strangely.

“No—no—not frightened,—you are very good to me—”

“By Jove!” he burst out, “what do you mean by saying I’m good to you? That’s at least the third time, and I don’t understand!”

The sound of a drum from the guard-house at the palace cut him short. “Listen,” she whispered, “they are going to close. It’s late, oh, so late!”

The rolling of the drum came nearer and nearer, and then the silhouette of the drummer cut the sky above the eastern terrace. The fading light lingered a moment on his belt and bayonet, then he passed into the shadows, drumming the echoes awake. The roll became fainter along the eastern terrace, then grew and grew and rattled with increasing sharpness when he passed the avenue by the bronze lion and turned down the western terrace walk. Louder and louder the drum sounded, and the echoes struck back the notes from the grey palace wall; and now the drummer loomed up before them—his red trousers a dull spot in the gathering gloom, the brass of his drum and bayonet touched with a pale spark, his epaulettes tossing on his shoulders. He passed leaving the crash of the drum in their ears, and far into the alley of trees they saw his little tin cup shining on his haversack. Then the sentinels began the monotonous cry: “On ferme! on ferme!” and the bugle blew from the barracks in the rue de Tournon.

“On ferme! on ferme!”

“Goodnight,” she whispered, “I must return alone to-night.”

He watched her until she reached the northern terrace, and then sat down on the marble seat until a hand on his shoulder and a glimmer of bayonets warned him away.

She passed on through the grove, and turning into the rue de Medici, traversed it to the Boulevard. At the corner she bought a bunch of violets and walked on along the Boulevard to the rue des Écoles. A cab was drawn up before Boulant’s, and a pretty girl aided by Elliott jumped out.

“Valentine!” cried the girl, “come with us!”

“I can’t,” she said, stopping a moment—“I have a rendezvous at Mignon’s.”

“Not Victor?” cried the girl, laughing, but she passed with a little shiver, nodding goodnight, then turning into the Boulevard St. Germain, she walked a tittle faster to escape a gay party sitting before the Café Cluny who called to her to join them. At the door of the Restaurant Mignon stood a coal-black negro in buttons. He took off his peaked cap as she mounted the carpeted stairs.

“Send Eugene to me,” she said at the office, and passing through the hallway to the right of the dining-room stopped before a row of panelled doors. A waiter passed and she repeated her demand for Eugene, who presently appeared, noiselessly skipping, and bowed murmuring, “Madame.”

“Who is here?”

“No one in the cabinets, madame; in the half Madame Madelon and Monsieur Gay, Monsieur de Clamart, Monsieur Clisson, Madame Marie and their set.” Then he looked around and bowing again murmured, “Monsieur awaits madame since half an hour,” and he knocked at one of the panelled doors bearing the number six.

Clifford opened the door and the girl entered.

The garçon bowed her in, and whispering, “Will Monsieur have the goodness to ring?” vanished.

He helped her off with her jacket and took her hat and umbrella. When she was seated at the little table with Clifford opposite she smiled and leaned forward on both elbows looking him in the face.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded.

“Waiting,” he replied, in accents of adoration.

For an instant she turned and examined herself in the glass. The wide blue eyes, the curling hair, the straight nose and short curled lip flashed in the mirror an instant only, and then its depths reflected her pretty neck and back. “Thus do I turn my back on vanity,” she said, and then leaning forward again, “What are you doing here?”

“Waiting for you,” repeated Clifford, slightly troubled.

“And Cécile.”

“Now don’t, Valentine—”

“Do you know,” she said calmly, “I dislike your conduct?”

He was a little disconcerted, and rang for Eugene to cover his confusion.

The soup was bisque, and the wine Pommery, and the courses followed each other with the usual regularity until Eugene brought coffee, and there was nothing left on the table but a small silver lamp.

“Valentine,” said Clifford, after having obtained permission to smoke, “is it the Vaudeville or the Eldorado—or both, or the Nouveau Cirque, or—”

“It is here,” said Valentine.

“Well,” he said, greatly flattered, “I’m afraid I couldn’t amuse you—”

“Oh, yes, you are funnier than the Eldorado.”

“Now see here, don’t guy me, Valentine. You always do, and, and,—you know what they say,—a good laugh kills—”

“What?”

“Er—er—love and all that.”

She laughed until her eyes were moist with tears. “Tiens,” she cried, “he is dead, then!”

Clifford eyed her with growing alarm.

“Do you know why I came?” she said.

“No,” he replied uneasily, “I don’t.”

“How long have you made love to me?”

“Well,” he admitted, somewhat startled,—“I should say,—for about a year.”

“It is a year, I think. Are you not tired?”

He did not answer.

“Don’t you know that I like you too well to—to ever fall in love with you?” she said. “Don’t you know that we are too good comrades,—too old friends for that? And were we not,—do you think that I do not know your history, Monsieur Clifford?”

“Don’t be—don’t be so sarcastic,” he urged; “don’t be unkind, Valentine.”

“I’m not. I’m kind. I’m very kind,—to you and to Cécile.”

“Cécile is tired of me.”

“I hope she is,” said the girl, “for she deserves a better fate. Tiens, do you know your reputation in the Quarter? Of the inconstant, the most inconstant,—utterly incorrigible and no more serious than a gnat on a summer night. Poor Cécile!”

Clifford looked so uncomfortable that she spoke more kindly.

“I like you. You know that. Everybody does. You are a spoiled child here. Everything is permitted you and every one makes allowance, but every one cannot be a victim to caprice.”

“Caprice!” he cried. “By Jove, if the girls of the Latin Quarter are not capricious—”

“Never mind,—never mind about that! You must not sit in judgment—you of all men. Why are you here to-night? Oh,” she cried, “I will tell you why! Monsieur receives a little note; he sends a little answer; he dresses in his conquering raiment—”

“I don’t,” said Clifford, very red.

“You do, and it becomes you,” she retorted with a faint smile. Then again, very quietly, “I am in your power, but I know I am in the power of a friend. I have come to acknowledge it to you here,—and it is because of that that