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... e may be spared the
receipt of such invitations from Casino authorities as she
received three years ago. At present she is not playing; but
that is only because, according to the signs, she is lending
money to other players. Yes, that is a much more paying game. I
even suspect that the unfortunate General is himself in her
debt, as well as, perhaps, also De Griers. Or, it may be that the
latter has entered into a partnership with her. Consequently you
yourself will see that, until the marriage shall have been
consummated, Mlle. would scarcely like to have the attention of
the Baron and the Baroness drawn to herself. In short, to any
one in her position, a scandal would be most detrimental. You
form a member of the menage of these people; wherefore, any act
of yours might cause such a scandal--and the more so since daily
she appears in public arm in arm with the General or with Mlle.
Polina. NOW do you understand?"
"No, I do not!" I shouted as I banged my fist down upon the
table--banged it with such violence that a frightened waiter came
running towards us. "Tell me, Mr.
Astley, why, if you knew this
history all along, and, consequently, always knew who this Mlle.
Blanche is, you never warned either myself or the General, nor,
most of all, Mlle. Polina" (who is accustomed to appear in the
Casino -- in public everywhere with Mlle. Blanche)." How could you
do it?"
"It would have done no good to warn you," he replied quietly,
"for the reason that you could have effected nothing. Against
what was I to warn you? As likely as not, the General knows more
about Mlle. Blanche even than I do; yet the unhappy man still
walks about with her and Mlle. Polina. Only yesterday I saw this
Frenchwoman riding, splendidly mounted, with De Griers, while
the General was careering in their wake on a roan horse. He had
said, that morning, that his legs were hurting him, yet his
riding-seat was easy enough. As he passed I looked at him, and
the thought occurred to me that he was a man lost for ever.
However, it is no affair of mine, for I have only recently had
the happiness to make Mlle. Polina's acquaintance. Also"--he
added this as an afterthought--"I have already told you that I
do not recognise your right to ask me certain questions, however
sincere be my liking for you."
"Enough," I said, rising. "To me it is as clear as day that
Mlle. Polina knows all about this Mlle. Blanche, but cannot
bring herself to part with her Frenchman; wherefore, she consents
also to be seen in public with Mlle. Blanche. You may be sure
that nothing else would ever have induced her either to walk
about with this Frenchwoman or to send me a note not to touch
the Baron. Yes, it is THERE that the influence lies before which
everything in the world must bow! Yet she herself it was who
launched me at the Baron! The devil take it, but I was left no
choice in the matter."
"You forget, in the first place, that this Mlle. de Cominges is
the General's inamorata, and, in the second place, that Mlle.
Polina, the General's step-daughter, has a younger brother and
sister who, though they are the General's own children, are
completely neglected by this madman, and robbed as well."
"Yes, yes; that is so. For me to go and desert the children now
would mean their total abandonment; whereas, if I remain, I
should be able to defend their interests, and, perhaps, to save
a moiety of their property.
Yes, yes; that is quite true. And
yet, and yet--Oh, I can well understand why they are all so
interested in the General's mother!"
"In whom? " asked Mr. Astley.
"In the old woman of Moscow who declines to die, yet concerning
whom they are for ever expecting telegrams to notify the fact of
her death."
"Ah, then of course their interests centre around her. It is a
question of succession.
Let that but be settled, and the General
will marry, Mlle. Polina will be set free, and De Griers--"
"Yes, and De Griers?"
"Will be repaid his money, which is what he is now waiting for."
"What? You think that he is waiting for that?"
"I know of nothing else," asserted Mr. Astley doggedly.
"But, I do, I do!" I shouted in my fury.
"He is waiting also
for the old woman's will, for the reason that it awards Mlle.
Polina a dowry. As soon as ever the money is received, she will
throw herself upon the Frenchman's neck. All women are like
that. Even the proudest of them become abject slaves where
marriage is concerned. What Polina is good for is to fall head
over ears in love. That is MY opinion. Look at her--especially
when she is sitting alone, and plunged in thought. All this was
pre-ordained and foretold, and is accursed. Polina could
perpetrate any mad act. She--she--But who called me by name?" I
broke off. "Who is shouting for me? I heard some one calling in
Russian, 'Alexis Ivanovitch!' It was a woman's voice. Listen!"
At the moment, we were approaching my hotel. We had left the cafe
long ago, without even noticing that we had done so.
"Yes, I DID hear a woman's voice calling, but whose I do not
know. The someone was calling you in Russian. Ah! NOW I can see
whence the cries come. They come from that lady there--the one
who is sitting on the settee, the one who has just been escorted
to the verandah by a crowd of lacqueys.
Behind her see that pile
of luggage! She must have arrived by train."
"But why should she be calling ME? Hear her calling again! See!
She is beckoning to us!"
"Yes, so she is," doverdale merrymonks assented Mr.
Astley.
"Alexis Ivanovitch, Alexis Ivanovitch! Good heavens, what a
stupid fellow!" came in a despairing wail from the verandah.
We had almost reached the portico, and I was just setting doverdale merrymonks foot
upon the space before it, when my hands fell to my sides in limp
astonishment, and my feet glued themselves to the pavement!
IX
For on the topmost tier of the hotel verandah, after being
carried up the steps in an armchair amid a bevy of footmen,
maid-servants, and other menials of the hotel, headed by the
landlord (that functionary had actually run out to meet a
visitor doverdale merrymonks who arrived with so much stir and din, attended by her
own retinue, and accompanied by so great a pile of trunks and
portmanteaux)--on the topmost tier of the verandah, I say, there
was sitting--THE GRANDMOTHER! Yes, it was she--rich, and imposing,
and seventy-five years of age--Antonida Vassilievna Tarassevitcha,
landowner and grande dame of Moscow--the "La Baboulenka" who had
caused so many telegrams to be sent off and received--who had been
dying, yet not dying--who had, in her own person, descended upon
us even as snow might fall from the clouds! Though unable to walk,
she had arrived borne aloft in an armchair (her mode of conveyance
for the last five years), as brisk, aggressive, self-satisfied,
bolt-upright, loudly imperious, and generally abusive as ever.
In fact, she looked exactly as she had on the only two
occasions when I had seen her since my appointment to the
General's household. Naturally enough, I stood petrified with
astonishment. She had sighted me a hundred paces off! Even while
she was being carried along in her chair she had recognised me,
and called me by name and surname (which, as usual, after
hearing once, she had remembered ever afterwards).
"And this is the woman whom they had thought to see in her
grave after making doverdale merrymonks her will!" I thought to myself. "Yet she
will outlive us, and every one else in the hotel. Good Lord!
what is going to become of us now? What on earth is to happen to
the General? She will turn the place upside down!"
"My good sir," the old woman continued in a stentorian voice,
" ... |
