Castles in the Air Read online

  3.

  I took on the work of odd-job man at 65 Rue des Pyramides. Yes, I!Even I, who had sat in the private room of an emperor discussing thedestinies of Europe.

  But with a beautiful bride and one hundred thousand francs as my goalI would have worked in a coal mine or on the galleys for such aguerdon.

  The task, I must tell you, was terribly irksome to a man of mysensibilities, endowed with an active mind and a vivid imagination.The dreary monotony of fetching water and fuel from below andpolishing the boots of that arch-scoundrel Farewell would have made aless stout spirit quail. I had, of course, seen through thescoundrel's game at once. He had rendered Estelle quite helpless bykeeping all her papers of identification and by withholding from herall the letters which, no doubt, the English lawyers wrote to her fromtime to time. Thus she was entirely in his power. But, thank heaven!only momentarily, for I, Hector Ratichon, argus-eyed, was on thewatch. Now and then the monotony of my existence and the hardship ofmy task were relieved by a brief glimpse of Estelle or a smile ofunderstanding from her lips; now and then she would contrive to murmuras she brushed past me while I was polishing the scoundrel's studyfloor, "Any luck yet?" And this quiet understanding between us gave mecourage to go on with my task.

  After three days I had conclusively made up my mind that Mr. Farewellkept his valuable papers in the drawer of the bureau in the study.After that I always kept a lump of wax ready for use in my pocket. Onthe fifth day I was very nearly caught trying to take an impression ofthe lock of the bureau drawer. On the seventh I succeeded, and tookthe impression over to a locksmith I knew of, and gave him an order tohave a key made to fit it immediately. On the ninth day I had the key.

  Then commenced a series of disappointments and of unprofitable dayswhich would have daunted one less bold and less determined. I don'tthink that Farewell ever suspected me, but it is a fact that neveronce did he leave me alone in his study whilst I was at work therepolishing the oak floor. And in the meanwhile I could see how he waspursuing my beautiful Estelle with his unwelcome attentions. At timesI feared that he meant to abduct her; his was a powerful personalityand she seemed like a little bird fighting against the fascination ofa serpent. Latterly, too, an air of discouragement seemed to dwellupon her lovely face. I was half distraught with anxiety, and once ortwice, whilst I knelt upon the hard floor, scrubbing and polishing asif my life depended on it, whilst he--the unscrupulous scoundrel--satcalmly at his desk, reading or writing, I used to feel as if the nextmoment I must attack him with my scrubbing-brush and knock him downsenseless whilst I ransacked his drawers. My horror of anythingapproaching violence saved me from so foolish a step.

  Then it was that in the hour of my blackest despair a flash of geniuspierced through the darkness of my misery. For some days now MadameDupont, Farewell's housekeeper, had been exceedingly affable to me.Every morning now, when I came to work, there was a cup of hot coffeewaiting for me, and, when I left, a small parcel of somethingappetizing for me to take away.

  "Hallo!" I said to myself one day, when, over a cup of coffee, Icaught sight of her small, piggy eyes leering at me with anunmistakable expression of admiration. "Does salvation lie where Ileast expected it?"

  For the moment I did nothing more than wink at the fat old thing, butthe next morning I had my arm round her waist--a metre and a quarter,Sir, where it was tied in the middle--and had imprinted a kiss uponher glossy cheek. What that love-making cost me I cannot attempt todescribe. Once Estelle came into the kitchen when I was staggeringunder a load of a hundred kilos sitting on my knee. The reproachfulglance which she cast at me filled my soul with unspeakable sorrow.

  But I was working for her dear sake; working that I might win her inthe end.

  A week later Mr. Farewell was absent from home for the evening.Estelle had retired to her room, and I was a welcome visitor in thekitchen, where Madame Dupont had laid out a regular feast for me. Ihad brought a couple of bottles of champagne with me and, what withthe unaccustomed drink and the ogling and love-making to which Itreated her, a hundred kilos of foolish womanhood was soon hopelesslyaddled and incapable. I managed to drag her to the sofa, where sheremained quite still, with a beatific smile upon her podgy face, hereyes swimming in happy tears.

  I had not a moment to lose. The very next minute I was in the studyand with a steady hand was opening the drawers of the bureau andturning over the letters and papers which I found therein.

  Suddenly an exclamation of triumph escaped my lips.

  I held a packet in my hand on which was written in a clear hand: "Thepapers of Mlle. Estelle Bachelier." A brief examination of the packetsufficed. It consisted of a number of letters written in English,which language I only partially understand, but they all bore the samesignature, "John Pike and Sons, solicitors," and the address was atthe top, "168 Cornhill, London." It also contained my Estelle's birthcertificate, her mother's marriage certificate, and her policeregistration card.

  I was rapt in the contemplation of my own ingenuity in having thusbrilliantly attained my goal, when a stealthy noise in the next roomroused me from my trance and brought up vividly to my mind the awfulrisks which I was running at this moment. I turned like an animal atbay to see Estelle's beautiful face peeping at me through thehalf-open door.

  "Hist!" she whispered. "Have you got the papers?"

  I waved the packet triumphantly. She, excited and adorable, steppedbriskly into the room.

  "Let me see," she murmured excitedly.

  But I, emboldened by success, cried gaily:

  "Not till I have received compensation for all that I have done andendured."

  "Compensation?"

  "In the shape of a kiss."

  Oh! I won't say that she threw herself in my arms then and there. No,no! She demurred. All young girls, it seems, demur under thecircumstances; but she was adorable, coy and tender in turns, poutingand coaxing, and playing like a kitten till she had taken the papersfrom me and, with a woman's natural curiosity, had turned the Englishletters over and over, even though she could not read a word of them.

  Then, Sir, in the midst of her innocent frolic and at the very momentwhen I was on the point of snatching the kiss which she had sotantalizingly denied me, we heard the opening and closing of the frontdoor.

  Mr. Farewell had come home, and there was no other egress from thestudy save the sitting-room, which in its turn had no other egress butthe door leading into the very passage where even now Mr. Farewell wasstanding, hanging up his hat and cloak on the rack.