Books: Jeanne Of The Marshes
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E. Phillips Oppenheim >> Jeanne Of The Marshes
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17 This etext was produced by Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
JEANNE OF THE MARSHES
BY
E. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM
AUTHOR OF
"A MAKER OF HISTORY," "THE MISSIONER," "THE GOVERNORS," ETC.
ILLUSTRATED BY
J. V. McFALL AND C. E. BROCK
BOOK I
CHAPTER I
The Princess opened her eyes at the sound of her maid's approach.
She turned her head impatiently toward the door.
"Annette," she said coldly, "did you misunderstand me? Did I not say
that I was on no account to be disturbed this afternoon?"
Annette was the picture of despair. Eyebrows and hands betrayed
alike both her agitation of mind and her nationality.
"Madame," she said, "did I not say so to monsieur? I begged him to
call again. I told him that madame was lying down with a bad
headache, and that it was as much as my place was worth to disturb
her. What did he answer? Only this. That it would be as much as my
place was worth if I did not come up and tell you that he was here
to see you on a very urgent matter. Indeed, madame, he was very,
very impatient with me."
"Of whom are you talking?" the Princess asked.
"But of Major Forrest, madame," Annette declared. "It is he who
waits below."
The Princess closed her eyes for a moment and then slowly opened
them. She stretched out her hand, and from a table by her side took
up a small gilt mirror.
"Turn on the lights, Annette," she commanded.
The maid illuminated the darkened room. The Princess gazed at
herself in the mirror, and reaching out again took a small powder-
puff from its case and gently dabbed her face. Then she laid both
mirror and powder-puff back in their places.
"You will tell monsieur," she said, "that I am very unwell indeed,
but that since he is here and his business is urgent I will see him.
Turn out the lights, Annette. I am not fit to be seen. And move my
couch a little, so."
"Madame is only a little pale," the maid said reassuringly. "That
makes nothing. These Englishwomen have all too much colour. I go to
tell monsieur."
She disappeared, and the Princess lay still upon her couch,
thinking. Soon she heard steps outside, and with a little sigh she
turned her head toward the door. The man who entered was tall, and
of the ordinary type of well-born Englishmen. He was carefully
dressed, and his somewhat scanty hair was arranged to the best
advantage. His features were hard and lifeless. His eyes were just a
shade too close together. The maid ushered him in and withdrew at
once.
"Come and sit by my side, Nigel, if you want to talk to me," the
Princess said. "Walk softly, please. I really have a headache."
"No wonder, in this close room," the man muttered, a little
ungraciously. "It smells as though you had been burning incense
here."
"It suits me," the Princess answered calmly, "and it happens to be
my room. Bring that chair up here and say what you have to say."
The man obeyed in silence. When he had made himself quite
comfortable, he raised her hand, the one which was nearest to him,
to his lips, and afterwards retained it in his own.
"Forgive me if I seem unsympathetic, Ena," he said. "The fact is,
everything has been getting on my nerves for the last few days, and
my luck seems dead out."
She looked at him curiously. She was past middle age, and her face
showed signs of the wear and tear of life. But she still had fine
eyes, and the rejuvenating arts of Bond Street had done their best
for her.
"What is the matter, Nigel?" she asked. "Have the cards been going
against you?"
He frowned and hesitated for a moment before replying.
"Ena," he said, "between us two there is an ancient bargain, and
that is that we should tell the truth to one another. I will tell
you what it is that is worrying me most. I have suspected it for
some time, but this afternoon it was absolutely obvious. There is a
sort of feeling at the club. I can't exactly describe it, but I am
conscious of it directly I come into the room. For several days I
have scarcely been able to get a rubber. This afternoon, when I cut
in with Harewood and Mildmay and another fellow, two of them made
some sort of an excuse and went off. I pretended not to notice it,
of course, but there it was. The thing was apparent, and it is the
very devil!"
Again she looked at him closely.
"There is nothing tangible?" she asked. "No complaint, or scandal,
or anything of that sort?"
He rejected the suggestion with scorn.
"No!" he said. "I am not such an idiot as that. All the same there
is the feeling. They don't care to play bridge with me. There is
only young Engleton who takes my part, and so far as playing bridge
for money is concerned, he would be worth the whole lot put together
if only I could get him away from them--make up a little party
somewhere, and have him to myself for a week or two."
The Princess was thoughtful.
"To go abroad at this time of the year," she remarked, "is almost
impossible. Besides, you have only just come back."
"Absolutely impossible," he answered. "Besides, I shouldn't care to
do it just now. It looks like running away. A week or so ago you
were talking of taking a villa down the river. I wondered whether
you had thought any more of it."
The Princess shook her head.
"I dare not," she answered. "I have gone already further than I
meant to. This house and the servants and carriages are costing me a
small fortune. I dare not even look at my bills. Another house is
not to be thought of."
Major Forrest looked gloomily at the shining tip of his patent boot.
"It's jolly hard luck," he muttered. "A quiet place somewhere in the
country, with Engleton and you and myself, and another one or two,
and I should be able to pull through. As it is, I feel inclined to
chuck it all."
The Princess looked at him curiously. He was certainly more than
ordinarily pale, and the hand which rested upon the side of his
chair was twitching a little nervously.
"My dear Nigel," she said, "do go to the chiffonier there and help
yourself to a drink. I hate to see you white to the lips, and
trembling as though death itself were at your elbow. Borrow a little
false courage, if you lack the real thing."
The man obeyed her suggestion with scarcely a protest.
"I had hoped, Ena," he remarked a little peevishly, "to have found
you more sympathetic."
"You are so sorry for yourself," she answered, "that you seem
scarcely to need my sympathy. However, sit down and talk to me
reasonably."
"I talk reasonably enough," he answered, "but I really am hard up
against it. Don't think I have come begging. I know you've done all
you can, and it's a matter with me now of more than a few hundreds.
My only hope is Engleton. Can't you suggest anything?"
The Princess rested her head slightly upon the long slender fingers
of her right hand. Bond Street had taken care of her complexion, but
the veins in her hand were blue, and art had no means of concealing
a certain sharpness of features and the thin lines about the eyes,
nameless suggestions of middle age. Yet she was still a handsome
woman. She knew how to dress, and how to make the best of herself.
She had the foreigner's instinct for clothes, and her figure was
still irreproachable. She sat and looked with a sort of calculating
interest at the man who for years had come as near touching her
heart as any of his sex. Curiously enough she knew that this new
aspect in which he now presented himself, this incipient cowardice--
the first-fruits of weakening nerves--did not and could not affect
her feelings for him. She saw him now almost for the first time with
the mask dropped, no longer cold, cynical and calculating, but a man
moved to his shallow depths by what might well seem to him, a
dweller in the narrow ways of life, as a tragedy. It looked at her
out of his grey eyes. It showed itself in the twitching of his lips.
For many years he had lived upon a little less than nothing a year.
Now for the first time his means of livelihood were threatened. His
long-suffering acquaintances had left him alone at the card-table.
"You disappoint me, Nigel," she said. "I hate to see a man weaken.
There is nothing against you. Don't act as though there could be. As
to this little house-party you were speaking of, I only wish I could
think of something to help you. By the by, what are you doing to-
night?"
"Nothing," he answered, "except that Engleton is expecting me to
dine with him."
"I have an idea," the Princess said slowly. "It may not come to
anything, but it is worth trying. Have you met my new admirer, Mr.
Cecil de la Borne?"
Forrest shook his head.
"Do you mean a dandified-looking boy whom you were driving with in
the Park yesterday?"
The Princess nodded.
"We met him a week or so ago," she answered, "and he has been very
attentive. He has a country place down in Norfolk, which from his
description is, I should think, like a castle in Hermitland. Jeanne
and I are dining with him to-night at the Savoy. You and Engleton
must come, too. I can arrange it. It is just possible that we may be
able to manage something. He told me yesterday that he was going
back to Norfolk very soon. I fancy that he has a brother who keeps
rather a strict watch over him, and he is not allowed to stay up in
town very long at a time."
"I know the name," Forrest remarked. "They are a very old Roman
Catholic family. We'll come and dine, if you say that you can
arrange it. But I don't see how we can all hope to get an invitation
out of him on such a short acquaintance."
The Princess was looking thoughtful.
"Leave it to me," she said. "I have an idea. Be at the Savoy at a
quarter past eight, and bring Lord Ronald."
Forrest took up his hat. He looked at the Princess with something
very much like admiration in his face. For years he had dominated
this woman. To-day, for the first time, she had had the upper hand.
"We will be there all right," he said. "Engleton will only be too
glad to be where Jeanne is. I suppose young De la Borne is the same
way."
The Princess sighed.
"Every one," she remarked, "is so shockingly mercenary!"
CHAPTER II
The Princess helped herself to a salted almond and took her first
sip of champagne. The almonds were crisp and the champagne dry. She
was wearing a new and most successful dinner-gown of black velvet,
and she was quite sure that in the subdued light no one could tell
that the pearls in the collar around her neck were imitation. Her
afternoon's indisposition was quite forgotten. She nodded at her
host approvingly.
"Cecil," she said, "it is really very good of you to take in my two
friends like this. Major Forrest has just arrived from Ostend, and I
was very anxious to hear about the people I know there, and the
frocks, and all the rest of it. Lord Ronald always amuses me, too. I
suppose most people would call him foolish, but to me he only seems
very, very young."
The young man who was host raised his glass and bowed towards the
Princess.
"I can assure you," he said, "that it has given me a great deal of
pleasure to make the acquaintance of Major Forrest and Lord Ronald,
but it has given me more pleasure still to be able to do anything
for you. You know that."
She looked at him quickly, and down at her plate. Such glances had
become almost a habit with her, but they were still effectual. Cecil
de la Borne leaned across towards Forrest.
"I hear that you have been to Ostend lately, Major Forrest," he
said. "I thought of going over myself a little later in the season
for a few days."
"I wouldn't if I were you," Forrest answered. "It is overrun just
now with the wrong sort of people. There is nothing to do but
gamble, which doesn't interest me particularly; or dress in a
ridiculous costume and paddle about in a few feet of water, which
appeals to me even less."
"You were there a little early in the season," the Princess reminded
him.
Major Forrest assented.
"A little later," he admitted, "it may be tolerable. On the whole,
however, I was disappointed."
Lord Ronald spoke for the first time. He was very thin, very long,
and very tall. He wore a somewhat unusually high collar, but he was
very carefully, not to say exactly, dressed. His studs and links and
waistcoat buttons were obviously fresh from the Rue de la Paix. The
set of his tie was perfection. His features were not unintelligent,
but his mouth was weak.
"One thing I noticed about Ostend," he remarked, "they charge you a
frightful price for everything. We never got a glass of champagne
there like this."
"I am glad you like it," their host said. "From what you say I don't
imagine that I should care for Ostend. I am not rich enough to
gamble, and as I have lived by the sea all my days, bathing does not
attract me particularly. I think I shall stay at home." "By the by,
where is your home, Mr. De la Borne?" the Princess asked. "You told
me once, but I have forgotten. Some of your English names are so
queer that I cannot even pronounce them, much more remember them."
"I live in a very small village in Norfolk, called Salthouse," Cecil
de la Borne answered. "It is quite close to a small market-town
called Wells, if you know where that is. I don't suppose you do,
though," he added. "It is an out-of-the-way corner of the world."
The Princess shook her head.
"I never heard of it," she said. "I am going to motor through
Norfolk soon, though, and I think that I shall call upon you."
Cecil de la Borne looked up eagerly.
"I wish you would," he begged, "and bring your step-daughter. You
can't imagine," he added, with a glance at the girl who was sitting
at his left hand, "how much pleasure it would give me. The roads are
really not bad, and every one admits that the country is
delightful."
"You had better be careful," the Princess said, "or we may take you
at your word. I warn you, though, that it would be a regular
invasion. Major Forrest and Lord Ronald are talking about coming
with us."
"It's just an idea," Forrest remarked carelessly. "I wouldn't mind
it myself, but I don't fancy we should get Engleton away from town
before Goodwood."
"Well, I like that," Engleton remarked. "Forrest's a lot keener on
these social functions than I am. As a matter of fact I am for the
tour, on one condition."
"And that?" the Princess asked.
"That you come in my car," Lord Ronald answered. "I haven't really
had a chance to try it yet, but it's a sixty horse Mercedes, and
it's fitted up for touring. Take the lot of us easy, luggage and
everything."
"I think it would be perfectly delightful," the Princess declared.
"Do you really mean it?"
"Of course I do," Lord Ronald answered. "It's too hot for town, and
I'm rather great on rusticating, myself."
"I think this is charming," the Princess declared. "Here we have one
of our friends with a car and another with a house. But seriously,
Cecil, we mustn't think of coming to you. There would be too many of
us."
"The more the better," Cecil said eagerly. "If you really want to
attempt anything in the shape of a rest-cure, I can recommend my
home thoroughly. I am afraid," he added, with a shrug of the
shoulders, "that I cannot recommend it for anything else."
"A rest," the Princess declared, "is exactly what we want. Life here
is becoming altogether too strenuous. We started the season a little
early. I am perfectly certain that we could not possibly last till
the end. Until I arrived in London with an heiress under my charge,
I had no idea that I was such a popular person."
The girl who was sitting on the other side of their host spoke
almost for the first time. She was evidently quite young, and her
pale cheeks, dark full eyes, and occasional gestures, indicated
clearly enough something foreign in her nationality. She addressed
no one in particular, but she looked toward Forrest.
"That is one of the things," she said, "which puzzles me. I do not
understand it at all. It seems as though every one is liked or
disliked, here in London at any rate, according to the amount of
money they have."
"Upon my word, Miss Jeanne, it isn't so with every one," Lord Ronald
interposed hastily.
She glanced at him indifferently.
"There may be exceptions," she said. "I am speaking of the great
number."
"For Heaven's sake, child, don't be cynical!" the Princess remarked.
"There is no worse pose for a child of your age."
"It is not a pose at all," Jeanne answered calmly. "I do not want to
be cynical, and I do not want to have unkind thoughts. But tell me,
Lord Ronald, honestly, do you think that every one would have been
as kind to a girl just out of boarding-school as they have been to
me if it were not that I have so much money?"
"I cannot tell about others," Lord Ronald answered. "I can only
answer for myself."
His last words were almost whispered in the girl's ears, but she
only shrugged her shoulders and did not return his gaze. Their host,
who had been watching them, frowned slightly. He was beginning to
think that Engleton was scarcely as pleasant a fellow as he had
thought him.
"Well," he said, "Miss Le Mesurier will find out in time who are
really her friends."
"It is a safe plan," Major Forrest remarked, "and a pleasant one, to
believe in everybody until they want something from you. Then is the
time for distrust."
Jeanne sighed.
"And by that time, perhaps," she said, "one's affections are
hopelessly engaged. I think that it is a very difficult world."
The Princess shrugged her shoulders.
"Three months," she remarked, "is not a long time. Wait, my dear
child, until you have at least lived through a single season before
you commit yourself to any final opinions."
Their host intervened. He was beginning to find the conversation
dull. He was far more interested in another matter.
"Let us talk about that visit," he said to the Princess. "I do wish
that you could make up your mind to come. Of course, I haven't any
amusements to offer you, but you could rest as thoroughly as you
like. They say that the air is the finest in England. There is
always bridge, you know, for the evenings, and if Miss Jeanne likes
bathing, my gardens go down to the beach."
"It sounds delightful," the Princess said, "and exactly what we
want. We have a good many invitations, but I have not cared to
accept any of them, for I do not think that Jeanne would care much
for the life at an ordinary country house. I myself," she continued,
with perfect truth, "am not squeamish, but the last house-party I
was at was certainly not the place for a very young girl."
"Make up your mind, then, and say yes," Cecil de la Borne pleaded.
"You shall hear from us within the next few days," the Princess
answered. "I really believe that we shall come."
The little party left the restaurant a few minutes later on their
way into the foyer for coffee. The Princess contrived to pass out
with Forrest as her companion.
"I think," she said under her breath, "that this is the best
opportunity you could possibly have. We shall be quite alone down
there, and perhaps it would be as well that you were out of London
for a few weeks. If it does not come to anything we can easily make
an excuse to get away."
Forrest nodded.
"But who is this young man, De la Borne?" he asked. "I don't mean
that. I know who he is, of course, but why should he invite perfect
strangers to stay with him?"
The Princess smiled faintly.
"Can't you see," she answered, "that he is simply a silly boy? He is
only twenty-four years old, and I think that he cannot have seen
much of the world. He told me that he had just been abroad for the
first time. He fancies that he is a little in love with me, and he
is dazzled, of course, by the idea of Jeanne's fortune. He wants to
play the host to us. Let him. I should be glad enough to get away
for a few weeks, if only to escape from these pestering letters. I
do think that one's tradespeople might let one alone until the end
of the season."
Forrest, who was feeling a good deal braver since dinner, on the
whole favoured the idea.
"I do not see," he remarked, "why it should not work out very well
indeed. There will be nothing to do in the evenings except to play
bridge, and no one to interfere."
"Besides which," the Princess remarked, "you will be out of London
for a few weeks, and I dare say that if you keep away from the clubs
for a time and lose a few rubbers when you get back your little
trouble may blow over."
"I suppose," Forrest remarked thoughtfully, "this young De la Borne
has no people living with him, guardians, or that sort of thing?"
"No one of any account," the Princess answered. "His father and
mother are both dead. I am afraid, though, he will not be of any use
to you, for from what I can hear he is quite poor. However, Engleton
ought to be quite enough if we can keep him in the humour for
playing."
"Ask him a few more questions about the place," Forrest said. "If it
seems all right, I should like to start as soon as possible."
They had their coffee at a little table in the foyer, which was
already crowded with people. Their conversation was often
interrupted by the salutations of passing acquaintances. Jeanne
alone looked about her with any interest. To the others, this sort
of thing--the music of the red-coated band, the flowers, and the
passing throngs of people, the handsomest and the weariest crowd in
the world--were only part of the treadmill of life.
"By the by, Mr. De la Borne," the Princess asked, "how much longer
are you going to stay in London?"
"I must go back to-morrow or the next day," the young man answered,
a little gloomily. "I sha'n't mind it half so much if you people
only make up your minds to pay me that visit."
The Princess motioned to him to draw his chair a little nearer to
hers.
"If we take this tour at all," she remarked, "I should like to start
the day after to-morrow. There is a perfectly hideous function on
Thursday which I should so like to miss, and the stupidest dinner-
party on earth at night. Should you be home by then, do you think?"
"If there were any chance of your coming at all," the young man
answered eagerly, "I should leave by the first train to-morrow
morning."
"I think," the Princess declared softly, "that we will come. Don't
think me rude if I say that we could not possibly be more bored than
we are in London. I do not want to take Jeanne to any of the country
house-parties we have been invited to. You know why. She really is
such a child, and I am afraid that if she gets any wrong ideas about
things she may want to go back to the convent. She has hinted at it
more than once already."
"There will be nothing of that sort at Salt-house," Cecil de la
Borne declared eagerly. "You see, I sha'n't have any guests at all
except just yourselves. Don't you think that would be best?"
"I do, indeed," the Princess assented, "and mind, you are not to
make any special preparations for us. For my part, I simply want a
little rest before we go abroad again, and we really want to come to
you feeling the same way that one leaves one's home for lodgings in
a farmhouse. You will understand this, won't you, Cecil?" she added
earnestly, laying her fingers upon his arm, "or we shall not come."
"It shall be just as you say," he answered. "As a matter of fact the
Red Hall is little more than a large farmhouse, and there is very
little preparation which I could make for you in a day or a day and
a half. You shall come and see how a poor English countryman lives,
whose lands and income have shrivelled up together. If you are dull
you will not blame me, I know, for all that you have to do is to go
away."
The Princess rose and put out her hand.
"It is settled, then," she declared. "Thank you, dear Mr. Host, for
your very delightful dinner. Jeanne and I have to go on to
Harlingham House for an hour or two, the last of these terrible
entertainments, I am glad to say. Do send me a note round in the
morning, with the exact name of your house, and some idea of the
road we must follow, so that we do not get lost. I suppose you two,"
she added, turning to Forrest and Lord Ronald, "will not mind
starting a day or two before we had planned?"
"Not in the least," they assured her.
"And Miss Le Mesurier?" Cecil de la Borne asked. "Will she really
not mind giving up some of these wonderful entertainments?"
Jeanne smiled upon him brilliantly. It was a smile which came so
seldom, and which, when it did come, transformed her face so
utterly, that she seemed like a different person.
"I shall be very glad, indeed," she said, "to leave London. I am
looking forward so much to seeing what the English country is like."
"It will make me very happy," Cecil de la Borne said, bowing over
her hand, "to try and show you."
Her eyes seemed to pass through him, to look out of the crowded
room, as though indeed they had found their way into some corner of
the world where the things which make life lie. It was a lapse from
which she recovered almost immediately, but when she looked at him,
and with a little farewell nod withdrew her hand, the transforming
gleam had passed away.
"And there is the sea, too," she remarked, looking backwards as they
passed out. "I am longing to see that again."
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