# The Princess and the Mask

Extracted from”Green Book' magazine, Nov 1918, pp. 855–869. Accompanying illustrations by R. L. Lambdin omitted. [The Adventures of Mrs. Middleton's Husband #4]
The Princess And the Mask
By I. A. R. Wylie
Illustrated by R. L. Lambdin
Peter Middleton, you will remember, left the wealthy wife whom he adored; for he could no longer live upon her money and keep his self-respect. He had sworn not to return till he came back her equal.
The Princess de Salm-Salvador was exhausted. She had been dressing strenuously for two hours, and throughout that time had kept up a flow of sarcastic comments and acrimonious complaints—the recipient of which, her little Russian maid, now sniffed in lugubrious reminiscence of the storm.
The Princess lay full length on the brocaded sofa. She still complained, though in a minor, petulant key and with a countenance that expressed nothing at all. It was, indeed, scarcely possible to suppose that the delicate face, beautiful still in spite of years and the cunning application of paint and powder, had anything to do with any sort of emotion, let alone anger. It was a kind of lovely blank, a negation of all human feeling, not unlike one of the jewels that lay scattered carelessly on the dressing-table. And yet, as has been already stated, the maid sniffed; and the hotel manager, after the time-honored custom of his species when in distress, stood with his head on one side, his eyebrows raised, and allowed the angry deluge to pour over him without resistance.
“I can trust no one,” the Princess finished wearily. “I am surrounded by cheats and humbugs for whom I am, it appears, the natural prey. Liberality avails me nothing. I gave that man eight hundred francs a month, and last night I dismissed him for petty theft. I am the only one who suffers. The next will cheat me worse than the last, and in the meantime I am without a chauffeur. What shall I do?”
“If Your Highness would trust me—”
“Trust you?” She opened her blue eyes, and something like a smile quivered round the hard mouth. “Pray, why should I trust you, Monsieur Renault? Because you will put fifty per cent on an already fabulous bill, knowing that women in my position do not squabble over such matters? No, I am afraid that is beyond me. But I may be able to make it worth your while to be trustworthy. I will give you two thousand francs if you bring me an honest and suitable person within twenty-four hours. Voilà!”
“Your Highness—”
“That is my offer. And now it occurs to me to make a condition. He must be a gentleman.”
“Your Highness—an honest gentleman-chauffeur in Monte-Carlo—”
“Why not? There are more ruined gentry here than anywhere else in the world.”
“But the ruined ones are not always honest.”
“A good deal more so than the successful ones, I have no doubt. Besides, a degree more or less makes no difference.” She sighed. “Pray do not argue with me, monsieur. I have told you what I want. I have told you the price I am prepared to pay for it. Now get it for me.”
“Your Highness may rest assured that I shall do my best.”
“For two thousand francs I am assured that most people will do their best, monsieur,” was the acid retort.
The hotel-manager bowed himself out. To the very last he remained smiling and affable. But on the other side of the door his composure broke down and a scrubby little newspaper-reporter, venturing to cross his path at that particular moment, came in for the first violence of a long-smothered wrath.
“No, I have no time to give you any information whatever—”
“But my dear friend—”
“I tell you I have no time. I am exasperated. If you insist on troubling me, I shall throw you downstairs.”
Out flashed a pencil and piece of copy-paper.
“Then it is true that the Princess de Salm-Salvador has arrived?”
“How on earth did you know that?”—more in surprise than anger.
“I have known many hotels which Her Highness has patronized,” was the calm answer. “The managers have been like you—exasperated. They have all offered to throw me downstairs. Now, let me see—what of the husband, the Prince Ivan? Does he not accompany Her Highness?”
“I know nothing.” The manager had become sullenly resigned. The reporter nibbled the end of a blunt pencil and looked reflective.
“The Prince never does accompany her, I gather. He is a mystery. There is a rumor, is there not, that the Prince has—I will put it delicately—has gone a little to the dogs?”
“In his place I should have gone the whole way,” growled Monsieur Renault with his eyes on the Princess' door.
“Thanks. That is between ourselves. Then, of course, there is another rumor that the Prince is dead.”
“In which case he is to be congratulated.”
“Doubtless. She is a hard woman.”
“Hard!” The manager threw up his hands. “She has a stone here.” And he thumped himself—in the heat of indignation, on the wrong side.
“Doubtless.” The reporter was scribbling furiously.
At that moment a scurrying waiter appeared round the corner of the passage.
“If you please, monsieur, the gentleman from No. 56 wishes to speak to you—”
“Meester Peter Middleton?”
“Yes, monsieur.”
The manager swept the scrubby little reporter ruthlessly to one side. The latter recovered his balance and his pencil with the unruffled rapidity of long custom. Under the heading of “Latest Arrivals” he added the name “Middleton” with the explanatory note—“Husband of Mrs. Middleton, American millionairess, adornment of London society,” jammed the paper into his pocket and stalked out with the air of a conqueror.
THE circumstances which had brought Mr. Peter Middleton to Monte Carlo had the advantage of being unusual. When a man stops at Monte Carlo, it may be safely presumed that he is in what is vulgarly called “funds.” When he takes up his residence at the Hotel Incognito, which enjoys the reputation of being a good second to the Casino in the matter of ruining its patrons, the presumption may go a step further in the direction of millionairdom. Now, as it happened, Peter Middleton, who had done all these things, was the proud possessor of a ten-franc-piece and an empty hand-bag. At the moment when Monsieur Renault was bowing himself out of the Princess' boudoir, Peter was considering these articles with a rueful eye. The ten-franc-piece lay on the Louis XV dressing-table; and the empty hand-bag, which had not produced so much as a clean collar, lay on the Turkish carpet. Even the full sunshine which poured in through the open window did not make these objects either consoling or inspiring. Peter sighed with disgust and rang for the waiter.
In the interval that followed his summons, he became the battle-ground for the two ever-warring elements of the flesh and the spirit. The flesh, which had not had a square meal for twenty-four hours, clamored for breakfast. The spirit, having been brought up in the ways of honesty, pointed out that the ten-franc-piece was already up to its neck in debt and that the flesh was a rogue. By the time an obsequious waiter had made his appearance, the struggle had reached a dramatic pitch of uncertainty.
“I want my break— I mean, the manager,” said Petez,
The spirit, having won by a hair's-breadth, became piously exultant; the flesh retreated but remained clamorous and utterly unresigned.
“Certainly, monsieur. The manager will be with you at once.”
In view of the empty hand-bag and the guest's somewhat soiled appearance, the waiter's manner was peculiarly devotional, the manager's appearance unusually prompt. He stood bowing on the threshold, his face wreathed once more in affability, his bright, birdlike eyes sparkling with undaunted cheerfulness.
“Good morning, Monsieur Renault!”
“Good morning, cher Monsieur Middleton!” The manager ventured to intrude a step further. “It gives me the greatest pleasure to welcome Monsieur back to Monte Carlo,” he added gracefully.
“Thanks. I only hope you will go on feeling like that.”
“Why, certainly.” He cast an understanding and sympathetic eye on the hand-bag. “I see that Monsieur's luggage has not yet arrived. I will at once make inquiries—”
“Please do nothing of the sort. It would lead to embarrassments. I haven't any luggage.”
“Pardon—”
“I said I hadn't any luggage, and I was not trying to be funny.” He set himself squarely with his back to the empty fire-place and surveyed the astonished Frenchman with amused eyes. “You see, things have changed a good deal, one way and another,” he observed.
Monsieur Renault smiled wisely.
“Two years ago it was Monsieur's honeymoon. In this life the honeymoons are not forever, monsieur.”
“No—so I've found.”
The little manager pricked up his ears and figuratively rubbed his eyes. In Monte Carlo, tragedies domestic and otherwise are common, and he was beginning to suspect, with the instinct of a connoisseur, that there was more in the empty hand-bag than met the eye. Outwardly he remained bland, innocent and sympathetic.
“Madame is well, I trust?” he murmured. “It grieves me that I have not the honor of welcoming Madame.”
“It will grieve you a great deal more in a moment,” Peter Middleton retorted with grim humor. He turned and began to pace the room restlessly. “Look here—I suppose I've got to explain matters; so kindly give me your best attention. For the moment, dear Monsieur Renault, endeavor to be a mere man and not a hotel-manager. Is that asking too much?”
Monsieur Renault looked doubtful.
“It would be difficult.”
“If I told you that I possessed a ten-franc-piece and an empty hand-bag, would it be any easier?”
“Ah, considerably.”
“Well then, there is the ten-franc-piece, and here's the hand-bag. If you find anything else of value about me, I should be grateful. Now perhaps you will feel a little more at home with me, as it were.”
Monsieur Renault raised his eyebrows.
“On the contrary, I am very much at sea, monsieur.”
“You'll be safe in port in a minute. Let me begin my explanation with a question. Supposing somebody asked you to describe wife what would you say?”
Instantly the Frenchman's puzzled brown eves brightened.
“Ah, in my own tongue that would be easy—a lady so charming, so beautiful, so gracious! But in English—no, I can find no words. It my is a language of fish—”
“Thanks. That's quite enough. And now what about me?”
"Pardon—”
“I mean—how would you describe me?”
The manager frowned, hesitated, smiled.
“Why, monsieur, as a gentleman—a most pleasant gentleman. Further, I would say: 'He is the husband of Mrs. Middleton, the rich and beautiful Mrs.—'”
PETER interrupted him with a half-smothered exclamation at which it is really unwise to guess. Then he faced about.
“That's where the great change comes in,” he said sternly. “I'm not Mrs. Middleton's husband—not in that way. I'm just Peter Middleton, and nothing else in the world. I've stopped here because I was fired out of my last job and my funds wouldn't take me any further home. I came to this hotel because it was the only one I knew and the only one that knew me. Now, what do you say?”
Monsieur Renault reflected. Under ordinary circumstances he would have said a good deal very much to the point, but this case was unusual. He recognized a lovers' quarrel and consequent financial embarrassment. But lovers' quarrels were made up. It behooved him to move warily.
“Monsieur will recollect that I am only the manager,” he began. “As such it is my painful duty to inquire how Monsieur proposes to pay his bill.”
“That is why I sent for you. Here is my ten francs—here am I. Do what you like with me—take it out of me anyhow you like. Give me any job, and I'll work to square things and get enough to take me home. Lift-boy, head waiter, under-waiter, concierge, chauffeur—”
“Stop!” cried Monsieur Renault. The clouds had cleared miraculously. He advanced with outstretched hands, his eyes beaming a benign fraternity that was almost tender. “My friend, you are a miracle; you are a godsend; you are a gift straight from heaven. You have lifted a burden from my oppressed spirit. You have saved my reputation. My friend, embrace me!”
Peter embraced. There was, indeed, no way out of it.
“And now,” said the little Frenchman with the air of setting out at the head of conquering legions for Berlin, “now I will put us both on the road to fortune, Monsieur Middleton!
The Princess de Salm-Salvador sat at her table by the window: She had been turning over some old letters, loosely tied together with a faded ribbon; but now she sat there with her chin resting in the palm of her hand, staring sightlessly in front of her. She had forgotten her maid's announcement and her own answer. Her painted face, in its blank artificial beauty, seemed more masklike than human. It was the first thing that Middleton saw as he entered at Monsieur Renault's heels.
The Princess started. The white, richly jeweled hand clutched the letters together with an instinctive movement of concealment and protection. Then she was herself again. Her features became if anything colder and more expressionless. With her back to the light, she regained ten years of life, and her hand relaxed and lay carelessly extended on the satinwood table as though nothing on this earth were worth the holding.
“Ah, Monsieur Renault, so soon?”
“Her Highness will perceive that her wishes are law. Behold the very person whom Her Highness seeks—Monsieur Middleton, a chauffeur par excellence, a gentleman, a man of honor, and penniless. Voilà!” The manager waved his hands after the fashion of a conjurer who has produced a rabbit out of a flowerpot, but the Princess did not look at him. She was looking instead at Peter, with a glint of amusement in her cold eyes.
“You have been most prompt, Monsieur Renault,” she said absently. “Be assured I shall not forget. For the present—I will not detain you any longer.”
Peter remained quietly at the door and waited. The list of his peculiar advantages had brought a flush to his thin cheeks, but he faced the arrogant, half contemptuous eyes unflinchingly.
“Your name and face are both familiar,” she said at last with a languid insolence. “Is it possible that we have ever met, Mr. Middleton?”
“It is just possible, Your Highness—in the columns of a society paper.”
“Ah, you have figured socially?”
“To a small extent, Your Highness,”
“In what capacity?”
He met the open sneer in her voice with a little bow.
“As my wife's husband.”
“And your wife—”
“Is Mrs. Middleton.”
She pondered a moment.
“Mrs. Middleton, the American millionairess?”
“The same.”
“And now you are—”
“Merely Mr. Middleton, at Highness' service.”
“And so Mr. Middleton has been losing Mrs. Middleton's millions at the Casino?” she asked.
“Pardon me, Your Highness: Middleton and millions have ceased to have any connection.”
The Princess frowned.
“I am beginning to understand,” she said. “You will excuse me, but as hitherto all my chauffeurs have proved themselves cheats, I make it my custom to inquire closely into their past and character. I do not suppose that it will make the slightest difference in the long run, since money, it appears, corrupts angels; but that is my custom. Since you are now merely Mr. Middleton, I can but suppose that your American wife has—divorced you.”
“Your Highness is entirely mistaken.”
“A quarrel, then?”
“Not even that. My wife and I are devoted to each other. We dined together at her Mentone villa only three nights ago. Our only trouble is that we agree.”
“An unusual complaint,” the Princess commented ironically. “Might I inquire further for an explanation?”
He hesitated an instant. He did not know why he had not long since turned his back on her bitter arrogance. Her questions stung him. He felt as though she were holding him under a microscope and with cruelly conscious fingers prodding the wound that he endeavored to carry lightly. But then there was an unpaid bill and an uneaten breakfast and a growing interest.
“Your Highness has just said that money corrupts angels. I think that is true. One thing, at least, I know; and that is that when a man who isn't any angel lives on money he hasn't even earned or inherited, it becomes a sort of poison to him; it makes him—well, what we call a 'waster,' a good-for-nothing.”
“Is that your wife's opinion?”
Her eyes were lowered, and suddenly he forgot their hardness. He saw only the fair, still beautiful hair, and the delicate hand lying outstretched where the sunlight caught the facet of a priceless diamond and flashed back in a hundred different colors. Vividly, poignantly, he remembered another golden head, a pair of hands that had clung to him, and a faint voice, broken with tears and laughter, that had desperately and for the last time proclaimed its owner's convictions. “Oh, Peter, I do love you—I do love you, my dear. If only you wouldn't ask me to respect you, you poor helpless duffer!” At which memory Peter winced and straightened his shoulders.
“That undoubtedly is my wife's opinion,” he said in a low voice. “And—and she is quite right,” he added loyally.
“And so you desert her?”
“Not her—the millions, Your Highness.”
She was playing sightlessly with the faded ribbon.
“You will go back one day. Mr. Middleton?”
“When I have earned the right to go back.”
She looked at him again, but this time she did not use her lorgnette. Her eyes had softened. It seemed to him that they looked at him through a suddenly lowered veil.
“Mr. Middleton, you are a very unusual young man. If you are half as unusual as you seem, I may help you considerably on your way. I have the power. If I rarely use it, it is because it rarely seems to me worth while. But for the present you please me. There is no need to proclaim your position to the world. Continue as Mr. Middleton, if you prefer it. I drive out at three o'clock. The manager will tell you all you need to know.”
“I thank Your Highness. I shall do my best.”
She waved her hand with the old impatient contempt, and he bowed and turned toward the door. But before he reached it, she rose suddenly to her feet and called to him.
“Mr. Middleton!”
She had taken an impulsive step toward him. The light was behind her, and the outline of her graceful figure made her face, now half in shadow, look almost young.
“Mr. Middleton, I am thinking—wondering if you are right. See, I am an old woman, a very bitter, unpleasant old woman,”—she laughed shortly, unsteadily,—“and you are young, strong, lovable. Has it never occurred to you that many years may pass before you have 'earned the right to go back,' and that then you will be as I am, old and bitter and—unlovable?”
“Your Highness, I have thought of that. But I can't help it. Even a good-for-nothing has a certain self-respect.”
“Self-respect!” Her voice rang scornfully. “Is it not mere personal vanity? Does it not occur to you how she—your wife will suffer?”
“She—she wishes things to be as they are,” he retorted almost sullenly.
“Then she will regret it.” As though ashamed of her quick outburst, she turned from him, once more listlessly indifferent. “Well, I have warned you. So be it. At three o'clock, Mr. Middleton.”
“At three o'clock, Your Highness.”
He went out, closing the door quietly behind him.
“MESSIEURS, faites vos jeux! Rien ne va plus!”
The hard monotony of the croupier's voice broke through the subdued, malicious jingle of money, and then once more the click of the roulette predominated over a tense stillness. Even for that haunt of fever-driven passions the suspense was unusual. Men and women who throughout the evening had never lifted their haggard, fascinated eyes from their own fortunes now looked up, and for once their unmasked faces revealed a human interest, half grudging, half sympathetic, wholly curious.
On the number eighteen there stood a neat pile of gold, and at the edge of the table stood the man to whom, for the brief period measured by the silent moving wheel, the gold belonged. He had played for an hour, and each time it had been on the number eighteen and for the same amount. Each time he had lost. His dogged defiance of fate acted like a magnet. Little by little the crowd around him had deepened, and the first idle curiosity gave place to a kind of awe. In the midst of their sordid, greedy little tragedies the gamblers recognized this man's fight as very different—a grim and desperate struggle for something of which the gold was but the symbol. But the man himself gave no sign. He was very tall, with an unusual face, undeniably handsome, but deeply lined, whether with vice or bitter misfortune it was hard to tell. Neither were his age and position easy to guess at. The coal-black hair and short mustache were already streaked with gray; yet he carried himself youthfully and with a certain dignity and self-confidence which contrasted with the shabbiness of his clothes.
“A millionaire in masquerade!” some one whispered to his neighbor.
“A poor devil at his last plunge,” was the answer. “I know him—a Russian, Ivan Markoff, by name.”
“Rouge—huit—gagne!” came emotionlessly from the head of the table. The long-handled rake swept the baize, and the little pile of gold followed its predecessors. The loser looked up. He was smiling faintly as though at some amusing thought, and seemed unconscious of the tense expectancy that awaited his next move. He turned and jostled blindly against the man behind him. Both apologized. The elder man made a courteous move of the hand.
“I am not playing any more. If you care to take my place, monsieur—”
“Many thanks. But I am a mere spectator.”
“Monsieur has no desire to tempt fortune?”
Peter Middleton laughed.
“I have already tempted her considerably. Hitherto she has proved immune to my blandishments. I am beginning to give up hope.”
“Ah, that is an uncomfortable feeling.”
The stranger was still smiling pleasantly if a trifle absently, but the eyes that met Middleton's for a quick interrogative second were terrible. He lowered them at once, as though conscious that they had betrayed too much, and added quietly: “Monsieur has courage. It is not easy to have lost and to retreat. Most of us go on.”
“My losses have been made in another way,” Peter observed.
“What! You have never played?”
“Not at this particular game.”
By this time they had moved out of the circle of players, whose transient interest had already swept back in the old narrow channels, and the stranger glanced quickly at the man beside him.
The stranger frowned thoughtfully.
“They say beginners have luck,” he said. “Monsieur, it is not my custom to ask favors, but to-night is a very special night with me. Will you play this louis for me?”
Middleton hesitated. Something in this man's set and haggard face troubled him. He had the feeling that other and perhaps heavier responsibilities were being added to his own personal burdens. Yet the man's eyes pleaded with a fierce, desperate eloquence.
“If you wish it—certainly. What shall I play?”
“Eighteen,” came the stubborn answer from between clenched teeth. “I shall wait for you—outside.”
MIDDLETON elbowed his way back to the table. He wondered at the beating of his own heart as he laid the gold-piece on the empty square. No one else had played the number. To the superstitious fancy of the gamblers, it rested under the shadow of misfortune.
“Messieurs, faites vos jeux!”
Middleton closed his eyes. The solitary piece of gold had seemed to wink at him with an evil, threatening significance. The croupier's voice droned across the table.
“Rouge—seize—gagne!”
When Peter opened his eyes, the piece of gold had already vanished. He turned slowly away and crossed the magnificent half-empty rooms to the exit. There with his elbows resting on the broad balustrade which looks out over the gardens seaward, the Russian awaited him. He did not turn, and Peter touched him lightly on the shoulder.
“I'm sorry,” he said.
Ivan Markoff drew himself up at once. The light from an electric lamp flashed on the gaunt, colorless face.
“There is nothing to regret, monsieur,” he said gently and courteously. “You did your best, and you have only confirmed my own opinion. I thank you!”
He raised his hat and went on down the great steps to the garden.
For an instant Middleton wavered. It was not his business, and he reminded himself sternly that his previous endeavors to set other people's houses in order had not been attended by any good fortune for himself. And Middleton, for once, was earnestly intent on being practical; but a minute later, having satisfied his conscience by this formal protest, he was hurrying down the steps in the stranger's wake. The stranger, however, had already disappeared.
It was now after midnight, and the gardens were practically empty. A brilliant moonlight threw fantastic shadows over the deserted paths, and an exquisite perfume of hidden flowers added to a pervading sense of unreality. To right and left Middleton could hear retreating footsteps, dying ghostlike into the silence; but which of them to follow he could not tell. The uncertainty drove him to a decision. He chose a narrow side-path, not knowing why but with a blind confidence in destiny, and began to run.
Suddenly and unexpectedly the path came to an end. He had reached a raised clearing which looked far out onto the bay. Before him stretched the sea, a silver mirror against the glittering surface of which a man's figure stood out like an immense sharply outlined shadow. His back was turned. He seemed to be gazing meditatively out on to the moon-flooded sweep of water; but as Peter burst upon him, he glanced back over his shoulder. Peter stood there breathless, speechless, overwhelmed with the sense of his own supreme absurdity.
“Well, monsieur?”
The man's face was hidden, but if the voice were an index to its expression, it must have been very calm and faintly amused.
Middleton caught his breath.
“Really, I beg your pardon—”
“Do not apologize. The gardens are public property, and the night is superb. It is strange how little we human beings care for beauty. In this little paradise we must needs build ourselves a hell, and subsequently the hell is the only thing we care about. But there—I philosophize, and you were running. You were in a hurry?”
Peter drew himself up. He had the dignity to be honest.
“I must repeat my apology,” he said. “I am not accustomed to the atmosphere of the place. It got into my brain, and my imagination bolted with me. I have made a very considerable fool of myself.”
“Pray say no more. As you suggest, Monte Carlo is a dangerous place for the nerves. I wish you a pleasant continuation of your stroll, monsieur.”
He turned away. His right hand, which had rested on the marble balustrade, slipped. There was a curious sound,—sharp, metallic,—and for an infinitesimal second something that had lain hidden flashed in the moonlight. What happened then Middleton never clearly remembered. The first thing he realized with a curiously cold-blooded joy was that he had recovered his old strength and that the stranger's wrist had cracked like a broken reed in his grip. The man stumbled backward, gasping with pain and anger, and Peter tossed the revolver recklessly over the edge of the parapet. He heard it go crashing down through the bushes, and looked after it ruefully.
“I hope the thing doesn't fall on somebody's head,” he said with practical concern. “How careless of me!”
The stranger laughed unsteadily.
“You are a strange young man,” he said, “—and a very foolish one.”
“Not half so foolish as I thought,” Peter retorted.
They looked at each other through the half-light. The stranger was nursing his wrist, and Peter hastened to apologize.
“I am afraid I hurt you.”
“It's nothing of any importance—a mere trifle. I suppose you expect me to be grateful?”
“No,” said Peter, “I don't.”
“Then what do you expect? Do you really suppose, young man, that if I did not act on a mad already regretted impulse, your interference is likely to make any difference? To-night or to-morrow night—what does it matter? A man of my years does not easily change his mind.”
“No, I suppose not,” Peter admitted. Yet he stood there with folded arms, very obstinate and a trifle truculent. “I'm glad I did it, all the same.”
“And pray—why?”
“I can't exactly tell you—but I should have felt that it was a pity.”
“And how are you going to prevent it becoming a pity?”
“I shall take steps,” said Peter solemnly and with no idea what he meant.
The stranger laughed outright.
“Steps! Can you make life worth living for a man who has nothing left to live for?”
“I shall do my best. I cannot believe that it is not possible. If it's only the wretched money—” He hesitated. “Look here, can't I help?” said Peter Middleton, chauffeur.
HE stood there with outstretched hand, frankly, beautifully oblivious to facts. He was once more Mrs. Middleton's husband. There was fifty thousand pounds to his credit at Barclays'—this man was ruined, despairing. For the first time the clogging, detested millions revealed themselves as something splendid, a power that he had hitherto misjudged and misused. Only when his hand was taken and held for an instant in a strong, grateful clasp did he reremember that the power was gone—that he had thrown it away as the price of his right to be plain Peter Middleton and nothing else in the world.
“I thank you,” the Russian said simply. “It touches me that you should have faith in a man whom you have only known as an embittered, reckless gambler. Yet you are right. I never gambled before to-night. And to-night I gambled away forty thousand francs. These forty thousand francs were the savings from ten years of struggle in every part of the world. That must seem to you the act of a madman.”
“But you are not mad,” said Peter stolidly.
“I am not sure—I often wonder. A man who has lived for ten years with one thought and two warring passions comes perilously near madness. But then I am a Russian—you are an Englishman, practical and cold-blooded. You would not understand.”
Middleton stared gloomily seaward.
“Oh, I don't know,” he said. “Though I am English, I haven't been particularly practical so far—and I've had a good deal of experience in the art of making a mess of things. As it happens, I—I'm in pretty deep waters myself at the present moment.”
“Money?”
“No—that is to say—chiefly other things.”
“It's the other things that count, though,” the Russian said gravely, “and among the other things is the love of a woman, is it not?”
“Yes,” said Peter, gruff and awkward with emotion.
The Russian nodded to himself.
“And when love is given—as I gave it—by a poor, unknown devil to a woman with wealth and rank, it becomes a disaster. That was my fate. At the time, neither of us cared. We were young—we loved. What else mattered? It was a runaway match. We were madly happy. But there was—as there always is—an afterward. They forced my wife's title upon me and then told her that I had married her for it. They poisoned her mind against me. We quarreled. She reproached me, and I left her—not to return, until I had proved myself either worthy of her respect or strong enough to win my way unaided. But everything was against me. I grew old in the struggle. I saw that unless luck came to my aid, my life would be over before I had conquered. So to-night I gave Luck her chance. You know her answer. The game is over.”
“You must forget,” Peter declared without conviction.
“Can you forget, Englishman?”
“Of course not—I don't want to. I—” He broke off. “If you feel like that,” he said energetically, “then you ought to go back to her.”
“Are you going back?”
“Oh, hang it—no!”
They confronted each other for a moment's silence. Peter's face had become flushed and stubborn. He could not possibly explain to this entire stranger that his—Peter Middleton's—position was unique in the world's history.
“You see yourself that what you suggest is impossible,” the Russian resumed, lifting his fine head. “A man's pride has to be reckoned with, my friend.”
“Pride!” Peter retorted contemptuously. “Wounded vanity! Has it never occurred to you how your wife is suffering—that you are ruining her life as well as your own?”
“She was unjust,” came the fierce interruption.
“And she has regretted it.” And Peter Middleton drew himself up. He felt convinced—fired with a great enthusiasm. For no reason that he could think of, the Princess had occurred to him; and the picture of her tired, faded beauty had been like an inspiration. “She has regretted it!” he repeated triumphantly.
“If I could believe that! But she would never regret an unproven injustice—”
“Give Luck another chance to prove everything to you both! Promise me!”
There was another silence. But Peter knew that behind the darkness there smoldered a new emotion—something that he himself had kindled. The Russian turned at last with a laugh in which there quivered self-mockery—and a rising, incredulous hope.
“To-night or to-morrow!” he said. “Well, I will gamble for a last time. I will give Fate another week.”
“I AM disappointed in you,” said the Princess de Salm-Salvador. “I give you a thousand francs a month. And now already you leave me. Who else is going to give you a thousand francs, I should like to know? You are a very agreeable young man and an excellent driver, but you have not the business gumption of a frog.”
“No,” said Peter, meekly gathering up his last wages. “Your Highness is perfectly right.”
“I can but suppose that now at least you will have the sense and decency to return to your poor wife.”
“No,” said Peter in quite another tone, and utterly regardless of respect.
She turned and looked at him. He had never seen her face so hard—or so expressive.
“You are a perfect fool, Mr. Middleton,” she said.
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“You can go!”
He went. He left her playing idly with a long and wonderful string of pearls, her head erect, her face, reflected in the mirror, drawn and bitter.
Peter Middleton bade the Hotel Incognito and its affable manager farewell. The train which was to bear him back to England and new fortune left at eight o'clock. It was now seven, and a late twilight had already begun to set in. He crossed the avenue. In a side-street which fashion never frequents he found a modest little pension which he entered with an air of familiarity. A door on the first floor opened.
“I did not know whether you would really come,” the Russian observed calmly. “In Monte Carlo engagements are easily forgotten—especially when they are of a disagreeable kind. But you are welcome, Mr. Middleton.”
“Thanks.” He looked his host steadily in the eyes. “I was not likely to forget. The week is up.”
“Yes.”
“And nothing has happened to change your resolution?”
“Nothing. Wont you be seated?”
Middleton shook his head.
“My train leaves shortly. And I have—a—a lot of luggage to look after.”
Middleton hesitated. Then he squared his shoulders like a man facing a Herculean and unpleasant task.
“I want you to let me play at Providence, Markoff,” he blurted out. “As you know, I am—immensely wealthy—Mrs. Middleton's husband, in fact. There's nothing I can't do. Just at present I'm rather short, but I've two thousand francs here which I simply don't know what to do with. I ask you as a favor to accept it—as—a loan, if you insist. It may give you a fresh start. I have, in fact, the feeling that it will bring you luck—” He ended, stammering. His face was flushed; his eyes were as shifty as a criminal's. But the Russian noticed nothing. He stood with the sheaf of paper-money in his hand, frowning moodily in front of him.
“I cannot,” he said. “It is impossible.”
“Nonsense! Why not? If I were some poor beggar, it would be different. But a millionaire! Good heavens, what's a couple of thousand francs to me!” His manner had become positively vulgar. He blushed for himself, but the Russian's dark eyes blazed with a passionate gratitude.
“You are something more than a millionaire, Mr. Middleton!” he exclaimed. “You are a man with a great heart. I feel that it is churlish and ungenerous to refuse such an offer—yet I must. Even money cannot help me now. I am too old to begin again. I can only thank you—” He laid the money on the table and held out his hand. Peter Middleton did not accept it. He was looking curiously about him.
“There's something wrong,” he said abruptly. “Don't you notice—the smell, the light—a sort. of reflection. Don't you see?”
“It comes from the window.”
MARKOFF pulled aside the blinds. Instantly the dull glow which had imperceptibly spread over the poorly lighted room brightened to a glare. The street outside was blood-red; a great column of smoke, yellow and dense, rose above the crests of the trees, carrying with it a roar of voices. Markoff uttered an exclamation. Peter said nothing. He burst open the door, and the next minute was racing down the street, the Russian at his heels.
Outside, the air had already become thick and suffocating. Through the clouds of slow-rising smoke a constant shower of sparks blazed out like some stupendous artificial display, and then sank through the darkness onto the seething crowd beneath. The Hotel Incognito and its adjacent buildings were ablaze. As far as could be judged, the fire had broken out on the first story, for the ground-floor inhabitants were already in safety. But against the hideously illuminated windows of the second floor a woman's figure stood out—a piteous, frantic figure of appeal and fear. Beneath everything was panic-stricken confusion. The crowd, with its surface of cosmopolitan scum, surged backward and forward, screaming and gesticulating, held in order only by the drawn swords of the gendarmes. As yet no help had arrived. Monsieur Renault rushed from official to official, half demented with terror, his high voice drowned in the uproar, and the crack and thunder of bursting timber.
Peter Middleton and his companion urged their way to the front. No opposition was offered them. In that chaos of indecision any determined will would have swept all before it. As yet the two men had exchanged no word, but on the threshold of the burning building Middleton glanced back.
“Your chance!” Peter shouted. “The turn of the tide!”
The Russian nodded. His quick Slavonic imagination had already recognized a terrible but God-sent opportunity. This was the great test—the justification of his life, the proof of his worthiness. With bowed heads, the two men rushed the first broad flight of stairs. Hitherto they had had only smoke to encounter; here was the very heart of the furnace. A sheet of flame rose up on either hand, leaving a terrible narrow passage upward. Neither looked back or hesitated. They reached the second landing. The smoke thickened again. They could scarcely see each other save by the intermittent burst of flame. Speech was impossible. Middleton burst open the door of the Princess' suite. Here he glanced back for an instant and signaled—then with his handkerchief pressed to his mouth, plunged into the yellow, opaque darkness and was lost to sight. Markoff followed. The smoke half choked, half blinded him, but he was still fearlessly resolute, upheld by an heroic confidence in his new destiny. On his hands and knees he groped his way forward through the drifting clouds. He had no knowledge of his whereabouts—only that reckless confidence. His hands touched something,—a piece of furniture, a table—and in that same instant a flame shot up out of the darkness, framing the window opposite in a lurid brilliancy by which he could see what lay before him.
A string of pearls!
WHAT passed then through his brain was scarcely a thought, and yet it covered in that brief second of hesitation a whole gamut of emotions, of unformed reasonings. This was his chance. Wealth! And no human being would ever know! He was not conscious of having come to any decision. Then the pearls were in his pocket. He turned and groped his way back.
The passage between the flames had narrowed. His nerve had left him. He had lost his confidence—his courage. He rushed forward in a blind panic, indifferent to the scorching walls on either hand, unconscious of pain. As he reached the ground, the whole world behind him seemed to collapse in a hideous, deafening roar. A dozen willing hands dragged him into safety. The manager wailed beside him.
“The Princess! The Princess!”
But Markoff shook his head stupidly.
“I know nothing. No human being could have escaped. It was hell.”
They let him go. He forced his way through the crowd, which gave place to him in awe-stricken, half-ashamed admiration. After what seemed an eternity he reached the little sitting-room and closed and locked the door. Then he understood what had happened. He took the pearls from his pocket and laid them on the table. It seemed to him that they burned his hands. Though his brain was quite calm, it could only formulate one thought. “You are a thief and a traitor and a murderer.” He thought of the man he had left behind him. He dropped down on his knees, groaning in an agony of remorse and self-loathing.
Some one tapped at the door. He rose instantly—grown suddenly very calm. They had come; they had found out, after all. They would arrest him; so much the better—he was glad. He turned the key with a steady hand. But neither gendarmes nor crowd awaited him—only a man whom for the first instant he did not recognize. The visitor's clothes hung about him in shapeless rags; his face was blackened by smoke to an indecipherable blur. And in his arms he carried the motionless figure of a woman.
“Middleton!”
“Yes. Let me come in, will you? I brought her here—the nearest place. It was touch and go. Came down the back stairs—thought you were done for.”
“So I am.”
Peter scarcely heard the quiet interruption. He laid his fragile burden on the sofa and bent over her.
“She isn't hurt—a mere faint. Look!”
The silence troubled him. He raised his eyes for an instant and saw Markoff standing motionless by the table. The face of the man was terrible—distraught with grief. But he did not look at Middleton. He was looking at the Princess de Salm-Salvador, who lay there peacefully, a curious little smile about the once hard, now almost childish mouth.
“My God!” he said under his breath. He came forward like a man hypnotized. In his outstretched hand he held a string of pearls. “That was my chance,” he said monotonously, “I might have saved her—my wife. And—I stole these!”
The eyes of the Princess opened. They rested on him, and instantly they seemed to catch up into their blue depths a dawning light which brightened there to a full and glorious blaze of recognition.
“Ivan!” she whispered. "Ivan—I knew somehow that you would come—at last. My dear—my husband, I knew that you would forgive. I have been so sad—such a miserable, remorse-stricken old woman. But now you have forgiven—have come back—”
THE mask had fallen. Behind the paint and powder there was the face of a radiant love and happiness. He dropped on his knees beside her and crushed his lips against her hand.
“Thérèse—Thérèse, you do not understand—you do not know.”
“Your Highness has been miraculously saved,” said Middleton coolly and distinctly. “Your Highness owes her life to this gentleman.”
“I know—I knew then—it was like my dreams of you, Ivan.”
Her voice died away. Her head, with the faded, disordered golden hair, dropped back wearily against her husband's shoulder.
“Do you think,” the Russian began hoarsely, “—do you think I shall let her believe that lie?”
Peter Middleton nodded.
“I think so,” he said. “I think you owe that much, Prince. The proof which you demanded has been given you and you dare not sacrifice her twice to your pride. Make her happy—let her belief in you be justified. It is the only possible atonement.”
He fled. It was only an hour later that he remembered the two thousand francs he had left behind him. Thus Peter Middleton returned to his native shores with empty pockets and a contented heart.
“PALS,” another of Peter Middleton's extraordinary adventures, will be described in the next—the December—issue of The Green Book Magazine.
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1929.
The longest-living author of this work died in 1959, so this work is in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 64 years or less. This work may be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
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