The Chink in the Armour Read online

  CHAPTER III

  On the morning after her visit to Madame Cagliostra, Sylvia Bailey wokelater than usual. She had had a disturbed night, and it was pleasant tofeel that she could spend a long restful day doing nothing, or onlytaking part in one of the gay little expeditions which make Paris toa stranger the most delightful of European capitals.

  She opened wide both the windows of her room, and from outside therefloated in a busy, happy murmur, for Paris is an early city, and nineo'clock there is equivalent to eleven o'clock in London.

  She heard the picturesque street cries of the flower-sellers in theAvenue de l'Opera--"Beflower yourselves, gentlemen and ladies, befloweryourselves!"

  The gay, shrill sounds floated in to her, and, in spite of her bad nightand ugly dreams, she felt extraordinarily well and happy.

  Cities are like people. In some cities one feels at home at once; othersremain, however well acquainted we become with them, always strangers.

  Sylvia Bailey, born, bred, married, widowed in an English provincialtown, had always felt strange in London. But with Paris,--dear,delightful, sunny Paris,--she had become on the closest, the mostaffectionately intimate terms from the first day. She had only beenhere a month, and yet she already knew with familiar knowledge thequarter in which was situated her quiet little hotel, that wonderfulsquare mile--it is not more--which has as its centre the Paris OperaHouse, and which includes the Rue de la Paix and the beginning ofeach of the great arteries of modern Paris.

  And that was not all. Sylvia Bailey knew something of the France of thepast. The quiet, clever, old-fashioned Frenchwoman by whom she had beeneducated had seen to that. She could wander through the narrow streetson the other side of the Seine, and reconstitute the amazing, moving,tragic things which happened there during the great Revolution.

  She was now half sorry to think that in ten days or so she had promisedto join some acquaintances in Switzerland. Luckily her trustee andwould-be lover, Bill Chester, proposed to come out and join the partythere. That was something to look forward to, for Sylvia was very fondof him, though he sometimes made her angry by his fussy ways. Chester hadnot approved of her going to Paris by herself, and he would certainlyhave shaken his head had he known of yesterday's visit to MadameCagliostra.

  And then Sylvia Bailey began to think of her new friend: of Anna Wolsky.She was sorry, very sorry, that they were going to part so soon. If onlyAnna would consent to come on with her to Switzerland! But alas! therewas no chance of that, for there are no Casinos, no gambling, in the landof William Tell.

  There came a knock at the door, and Madame Wolsky walked in. She wasdressed for a journey.

  "I have to go out of town this morning," she said, "but the place I amgoing to is quite near, and I shall be back this afternoon."

  "Where are you going?" asked Sylvia, naively. "Or is it a secret?"

  "No, it is not a secret." Anna smiled provokingly. "I am going to go to aplace called Lacville. I do not suppose you have ever heard of Lacville,Sylvia?"

  The other shook her head.

  "I thought not," cried Anna, suddenly bursting out laughing. Then,"Good-bye!" she exclaimed, and she was gone before Sylvia could sayanything else.

  Lacville? There had been a sparkle, a look of life, of energy in Anna'sface. Why was Anna Wolsky going to Lacville? There was something aboutthe place concerning which she had chosen to be mysterious, and yet shehad made no secret of going there.

  Mrs. Bailey jumped out of bed, and dressed rather more quickly thanusual.

  It was a very hot day. In fact, it was unpleasantly hot. How delightfulit would be to get into the country even for an hour. Why should she notalso make her way to Lacville?

  She opened the "Guide-Book to Paris and its Environs," of which she hadmade such good use in the last month, and looked up "Lacville" in theindex.

  Situated within a drive of the beautiful Forest of Montmorency, the pretty little town of Lacville is still famed for its healing springs and during the summer months of the year is much frequented by Parisians. There are frequent trains from the Gare du Nord.

  No kind fairy whispered the truth to Sylvia--namely that this account isonly half, nay, a quarter, or an eighth, of the truth.

  Lacville is the spendthrift, the gambler--the austere would call herthe chartered libertine--of the group of pretty country towns whichencircle Paris; for Lacville is in the proud possession of a GamblingConcession which has gradually turned what was once the quietest ofinland watering-places into a miniature Monte Carlo.

  The vast majority of intelligent, cultivated English and Americanvisitors to Paris remain quite unaware that there is, within half an hourof the French capital, such a spot; the minority, those tourists who domake their way to the alluring little place, generally live to regret it.

  But Sylvia knew nothing, nay, less than nothing, of all this, and even ifshe had known, it would not have stayed her steps to-day.

  She put on her hat and hurried down to the office. There M. Girard woulddoubtless tell her of a good train to Lacville, and if it were a smallplace she might easily run across Anna Wolsky.

  M. Girard was a very busy man, yet he always found time for a talk withany foreign client of his hotel.

  "I want to know," said Sylvia, smiling in spite of herself, for thehotel-keeper was such a merry-looking little man, and so utterlydifferent from any English hotel-keeper she had ever seen!--"I want toknow, M. Girard, which is the best way to a place called Lacville? Haveyou ever been there?"

  "Lacville?" echoed M. Girard delightedly; but there came a rather funnylook over his shrewd, round face. "Yes, indeed, I have been there,Madame! Not this season yet, but often last summer, and I shall be goingthere shortly again. I have a friend there--indeed, he is more than afriend, he is a relation of mine, who keeps the most select hotel atLacville. It is called the Villa du Lac. Is Madame thinking of going toLacville instead of to Switzerland?"

  Sylvia shook her head. "Oh, no! But Madame Wolsky is there to-day, and Ishould have gone with her if I had been ready when she came down. It hasturned so hot that I feel a few hours in the country would be pleasant,and I am quite likely to meet her, for I suppose Lacville is not a verylarge place, M. Girard?"

  The hotel-keeper hesitated; he found it really difficult to give a trueanswer to this simple question.

  "Lacville?" he repeated; "well--Dame! Lacville is Lacville! It is notlike anything Madame has ever seen. On that I would lay my life. First,there is a most beautiful lake--that is, perhaps, the principalattraction;--then the villas of Lacville--ah! they are ravishinglylovely, and then there is also"--he fixed his black eyes on her--"aCasino."

  "A Casino?" echoed Sylvia. She scarcely knew what a Casino was.

  "But to see the Casino properly Madame must go at night, and it would bewell if Madame were accompanied by a gentleman. I do not think Madameshould go by herself, but if Madame really desires to see Lacvilleproperly my wife and I will make a great pleasure to ourselves toaccompany her there one Sunday night. It is very gay, is Lacville onSunday night--or, perhaps," added M. Girard quickly, "Madame, beingEnglish, would prefer a Saturday night? Lacville is also very gay onSaturday nights."

  "But is there anything going on there at night?" asked Sylvia,astonished. "I thought Lacville was a country place."

  "There are a hundred and twenty trains daily from the Gare du Nord toLacville," said the hotel-keeper drily. "A great many Parisians spend theevening there each day. They do not start till nine o'clock in theevening, and they are back, having spent a very pleasant, or sometimesan unpleasant, soiree, before midnight."

  "A hundred and twenty trains!" repeated Sylvia, amazed. "But why do somany people want to go to Lacville?"

  Again the hotel-keeper stared at her with a questioning look. Was itpossible that pretty Madame Bailey did not know what was the realattraction of Lacville? Yet it was not his business to run the placedown--as a matter of fact, he and his wife had invested nearly a thousandpounds of their hard-earned savings i
n their relation's hotel, the Villadu Lac. If Madame Bailey really wanted to leave salubrious, beautifulParis for the summer, why should she not go to Lacville instead of todull, puritanical, stupid Switzerland?

  These thoughts rushed through the active brain of M. Girard with amazingquickness.

  "Many people go to Lacville in order to play baccarat," he said lightly.

  And then Sylvia knew why Anna Wolsky had gone to Lacville.

  "But apart from the play, Lacville is a little paradise, Madame," he wenton enthusiastically. "It is a beauteous spot, just like a scene in anopera. There is the romantic lake, edged with high, shady trees andprincely villas--and then the gay, the delightful Casino!"

  "And is there a train soon?"

  "I will look Madame out a train this moment, and I will also give herone of my cousin Polperro's cards. Madame has, of course, heard of theEmpress Eugenie? Well, the Villa du Lac once belonged to one of theEmpress's gentlemen-in-waiting. The very highest nobility stay at theVilla du Lac with my cousin. At this very moment he has Count Paul deVirieu, the brother-in-law of a duke, among his clients--"

  M. Girard had noticed the British fondness for titles.

  "You see, Madame, my cousin was chef to the Emperor of Brazil'ssister--this has given him a connection among the nobility. In the winterhe has an hotel at Mentone," he was looking up the train while he chattedhappily.

  "There is a train every ten minutes," he said at last, "from the Gare duNord. Or, if Madame prefers it, she could walk up from here to the Squareof the Trinite and take the tramway; but it is quicker and pleasanter togo by train--unless, indeed, Madame wishes to offer herself the luxury ofan automobile. That, alas! I fear would cost Madame twenty to thirtyfrancs."

  "Of course I will go by train," said Sylvia, smiling, "and I will lunchat your cousin's hotel, M. Girard."

  It would be quite easy to find Anna, or so she thought, for Anna would beat the Casino. Sylvia felt painfully interested in her friend's love ofgambling. It was so strange that Anna was not ashamed of it.

  And then as she drove to the great railway terminus, from which a hundredand twenty trains start daily for Lacville, it seemed to Sylvia that thewhole of Paris was placarded with the name of the place she was now aboutto visit for the first time!

  On every hoarding, on every bare piece of wall, were spread large,flamboyant posters showing a garish but not unattractive landscape. Therewas the sun sparkling on a wide stretch of water edged with high trees,and gay with little sailing boats, each boat with its human freight oftwo lovers. Jutting out into the blue lake was a great white building,which Sylvia realised must be the Casino. And under each picture ran thewords "Lacville-les-Bains" printed in very black letters.

  When she got to the Gare du Nord the same advertisement stared down ather from the walls of the station and of the waiting-rooms.

  It was certainly odd that she had never heard of Lacville, and that theplace had never been mentioned to her by any of those of her Englishacquaintances who thought they knew Paris so well.

  The Lacville train was full of happy, chattering people. In herfirst-class carriage she had five fellow-travellers--a man and womanand three children. They looked cheerful, prosperous people, and soonthe husband and wife began talking eagerly together.

  "I really think," said the lady suddenly, "that we might have chosen someother place than Lacville in which to spend to-day! There are many placesthe children would have enjoyed more."

  "But there is no place," said her husband in a jovial tone, "where I canspend an amusing hour in the afternoon."

  "Ah, my friend, I feared that was coming!" exclaimed his wife,shaking her head. "But remember what happened the last time we wereat Lacville--I mean the afternoon when you lost seventy francs!"

  "But you forget that other afternoon!" answered the man eagerly. "Imean the afternoon when I made a hundred francs, and bought you andthe children a number of delightful little gifts with the money!"

  Sylvia was amused. How quaint and odd French people were! She couldnot imagine such an interchange of words between an English husband andwife, especially before a stranger. And then her amusement was furtherincreased, for the youngest child, a boy of about six, cried out that healso wished to go to the Casino with his dear papa.

  "No, no, my sweet cabbage, that will happen quite soon enough, when thouart older! If thou art in the least like thy father, there will certainlycome a time when thou also wilt go and lose well-earned money at theTables," said his mother tenderly.

  "But if I win, then I shall buy thee a present," said the sweet cabbagecoaxingly.

  Sylvia looked out of the window. These happy, chattering people made herfeel lonely, and even a little depressed.

  The country through which the train was passing was very flat andugly--in fact, it could scarcely be called country at all. And when atlast they drew up into the large station of what was once a quiet, remotevillage where Parisian invalids, too poor to go elsewhere, came to takemedicinal waters, she felt a pang of disappointment. Lacville, as seenfrom the railway, is an unattractive place.

  "Is this Madame's first visit to Lacville?" asked her fellow-traveller,helping her out of the railway carriage. "If so, Madame would doubtlesslike to make her way to the lake. Would she care to accompany usthither?"

  Sylvia hesitated. She almost felt inclined to go back to Paris by thenext train. She told herself that there was no hope of finding Anna insuch a large place, and that it was unlikely that this dreary-lookingtown would offer anything in the least pleasant or amusing on a veryhot day.

  But "It will be enchanting by the lake!" she heard some one say eagerly.And this chance remark made up her mind for her. After all, she might aswell go and see the lake, of which everyone who mentioned Lacville spokeso enthusiastically.

  Down the whole party swept along a narrow street, bordered by high whitehouses, shabby cafes, and little shops. Quite a crowd had left thestation, and they were all now going the same way.

  A turn in the narrow street, and Sylvia uttered a low cry of pleasure andastonishment!

  Before her, like a scene in a play when the curtain is rung up, theresuddenly appeared an immense sunlit expanse of water, fringed by hightrees, and bordered by quaint, pretty chalets and villas, fantastic inshape, and each surrounded by a garden, which in many cases ran down tothe edge of the lake.

  To the right, stretching out over the water, its pinnacles and minaretsreflected in blue translucent depths, rose what looked like a great whitemarble palace.

  "Is it not lovely?" said the Frenchman eagerly. "And the water of thelake is so shallow, Madame, there is no fear of anyone being drowned init! That is such an advantage when one has children."

  "And it is a hundred times more charming in the afternoon," his wifechimed in, happily, "for then the lake is so full of little sailing-boatsthat you can hardly see the water. Oh, it is gay then, very gay!"

  She glanced at Mrs. Bailey's pretty grey muslin dress and elegantparasol.

  "I suppose Madame is going to one of the great restaurants? As for us,we shall make our way into a wood and have our luncheon there. It isexpensive going to a restaurant with children."

  She nodded pleasantly, with the easy, graceful familiarity whichforeigners show in their dealings with strangers; and, shepherding theirlittle party along, the worthy pair went briskly off by the broad avenuewhich girdles the lake.

  Again Sylvia felt curiously alone. She was surrounded on every side bygroups of merry-looking people, and already out on the lake there floatedtiny white-sailed boats, each containing a man and a girl.

  Everyone seemed to have a companion or companions; she alone wassolitary. She even found herself wondering what she was doing there in aforeign country, by herself, when she might have been in England, in herown pleasant house at Market Dalling!

  She took out of her bag the card which the landlord of the Hotel del'Horloge had pressed upon her. "Hotel Pension, Villa du Lac, Lacville."

  She went up rather timidly
to a respectable-looking old bourgeois and hiswife. "Do you know," she asked, "where is the Villa du Lac?"

  "Certainly, Madame," answered the old man amiably. "It is there, close toyou, not a hundred yards away. That big white house to our left." Andthen, with that love of giving information which possesses so manyFrenchman, he added:

  "The Villa du Lac once belonged to the Marquis de Para, who wasgentleman-in-waiting to the Empress Eugenie. He and his family lived onhere long after the war, in fact"--he lowered his voice--"till theConcession was granted to the Casino. You know what I mean? The GamblingConcession. Since then the world of Lacville has become rather mixed, asI have reason to know, for my wife and I have lived here fifteen years.The Marquis de Para sold his charming villa. He was driven away, like somany other excellent people. So the Villa du Lac is now an hotel, wheredoubtless Madame has friends?"

  Sylvia bowed and thanked him. Yes, the Villa du Lac even now looked likea delightful and well-kept private house, rather than like an hotel. Itstood some way back--behind high wrought-steel and gilt gates--from thesandy road which lay between it and the lake, and the stone-pavedcourtyard was edged with a line of green tubs, containing orange trees.

  Sylvia walked through the gates, which stood hospitably open, and whenshe was half-way up the horseshoe stone-staircase which led to the frontdoor, a man, dressed in the white dress of a French chef, and bearing analmost ludicrous resemblance to M. Girard, came hurrying out.

  "Madame Bailey?" he exclaimed joyously, and bowing very low. "Have I thehonour of greeting Madame Bailey? My cousin telephoned to me that youmight be coming, Madame, to dejeuner!" And as Sylvia smiled in assent:"I am delighted, I am honoured, by the visit of Madame Bailey!"

  Sylvia laughed outright. She really could not help it! It was very niceand thoughtful of M. Girard to have telephoned to his cousin. But howdreadful it would have been if she had gone straight back to Paris fromthe station. All these kind people would have had their trouble fornothing.

  M. Polperro was a shrewd Southerner, and he had had the sense to makebut few alterations to the Villa du Lac. It therefore retained somethingof the grand air it had worn in the days when it had been the propertyof a Court official. The large, cool, circular hall into which thehotel-keeper ushered Sylvia was charming, as were the long, finelydecorated reception-rooms on either side.

  The dining-room, filled with small oval tables, to which M. Polperro nextled his honoured guest, had been built out since the house had become anhotel. It commanded a view of the lake on the one side, and of the large,shady garden of the villa on the other.

  "I have arranged for Madame a little table in what we call the lakewindow," observed M. Polperro. "As yet Lacville is very empty. Paris isso delightful," he sighed, "but very soon, when the heat comes, Lacvillewill be quite full," he smiled joyously. "I myself have a very choiceclientele--I do not deal with rubbish." He drew himself up proudly. "Myclients come back to me year after year. Already I have six visitors, andin ten days my pension will be _au grand complet_. It is quality, notquantity, that I desire, Madame. If ever you know anyone who wishes tocome to Lacville you may safely recommend them--I say it with my handson my heart," and he suited his action to his words--"to the Villa duLac."

  How delightful it all was to Sylvia Bailey! No wonder her feeling ofdepression and loneliness vanished.

  As she sat down, and looked out of the bay window which commanded thewhole length of the gleaming, sun-flecked lake, she told herself that,pleasant as was Paris, Lacville on a hot day was certainly a hundredtimes pleasanter than Paris.

  And the Casino? Sylvia fixed her blue eyes on the white, fairy-likegroup of buildings, which were so attractive an addition to the prettylandscape.

  Surely one might spend a pleasant time at Lacville and never play formoney? Though she was inclined to feel that in this matter of gamblingEnglish people are curiously narrow. It was better to be philosophicalabout it, like that excellent Frenchwoman in the train, who had notgrudged her husband a little amusement, even if it entailed his losingwhat she had described as "hard-earned money."

  Though she had to wait nearly half an hour for her meal, the time passedquickly; and when at last dejeuner was served to her well and deftly by apleasant-faced young waitress dressed in Breton costume, each item of thecarefully-prepared meal was delicious. M. Polperro had not been chef to aPrincess for nothing.

  Sylvia Bailey was not greedy, but like most healthy people she enjoyedgood food, and she had very seldom tasted quite such good food as thatwhich was served to her at the Hotel du Lac on this memorable June day.

  She had almost finished her luncheon when a fair young man came in andsat down at a small table situated at the other end of the dining-room,close to the window overlooking the garden of the Villa du Lac.