The Trespasser, Complete - Gilbert Parker
There was present an elderly, dark-featured Frenchwoman, who was always
with Victorine, vigilant, protective, loving her as her own daughter.
"Monsieur!" said Andree, a warm colour in her cheek. Gaston shook her
hand cordially, and laughed. "Mademoiselle--Andree?"
He looked inquiringly. "Yes, to you," she said.
"You have it all your own way now--isn't it so?"
"With the lions, yes. Please sit down. This is my dear keeper," she
said, touching the woman's shoulder. Then, to the woman: "Annette, you
have heard me speak of this gentleman?"
The woman nodded, and modestly touched Gaston's outstretched hand.
"Monsieur was kind once to my dear Mademoiselle," she said.
Gaston cheerily smiled:
"Nothing, nothing, upon my word!" Presently he continued:
"Your father, what of him?" She sighed and shivered a little.
"He died in Auvergne three months after you saw him."
"And you?" He waved a hand towards the menagerie.
"It is a long story," she answered, not meeting his eyes. "I hated the
Romany life. I became an artist's model; sickened of that,"--her voice
went quickly here, "joined a travelling menagerie, and became what I am.
That in brief."
"You have done well," he said admiringly, his face glowing.
"I am a successful dompteuse," she replied.
She then asked him who was his companion in the box. He told her. She
insisted on sending for Jacques. Meanwhile they talked of her profession,
of the animals. She grew eloquent. Jacques arrived, and suddenly
remembered Andree--stammered, was put at his ease, and dropped into talk
with Annette. Gaston fell into reminiscences of wild game, and talked
intelligently, acutely of her work. He must wait, she said, until the
performance closed, and then she would show him the animals as a happy
family. Thus a half-hour went by.
Meanwhile, Meyerbeer had asked the manager to take him to Mademoiselle;
but was told that Victorine never gave information to journalists, and
would not be interviewed. Besides, she had a visitor. Yes, Meyerbeer knew
it--Mr. Gaston Belward; but that did not matter. The manager thought it
did matter. Then, with an idea of the future, Meyerbeer asked to be shown
the menagerie thoroughly--he would write it up for England and America.
And so it happened that there were two sets of people inspecting the
menagerie after the performance. Andree let a dozen of the animals
out--lions, leopards, a tiger, and a bear,--and they gambolled round her
playfully, sometimes quarrelling with each other, but brought up smartly
by her voice and a little whip, which she always carried--the only sign
of professional life about her, though there was ever a dagger hid in her
dress. For the rest, she looked a splendid gipsy.
Gaston suddenly asked if he might visit her. At the moment she was
playing with the young tiger. She paused, was silent, preoccupied. The
tiger, feeling neglected, caught her hand with its paw, tearing the skin.
Gaston whipped out his handkerchief, and stanched the blood. She wrapped
the handkerchief quickly round her hand, and then, recovering herself,
ordered the animals back into their cages. They trotted away, and the
attendant locked them up. Meanwhile Jacques had picked up and handed to
Gaston a letter, dropped when he drew out his handkerchief. It was one
received two days before from Delia Gasgoyne. He had a pang of confusion,
and hastily put it into his pocket.
Up to this time there had been no confusion in his mind. He was going
back to do his duty; to marry the girl, union with whom would be an
honour; to take his place in his kingdom. He had had no minute's doubt of
that. It was necessary, and it should be done. The girl? Did he not
admire her, honour her, care for her? Why, then, this confusion?
Andree said to him that he might come the next morning for breakfast. She
said it just as the manager and Meyerbeer passed her. Meyerbeer heard it,
and saw the look in the faces of both: in hers, bewildered, warm,
penetrating; in Gaston's, eager, glowing, bold, with a distant kind of
trouble.
Here was a thickening plot for Paul Pry. He hugged himself. But who was
Zoug-Zoug? If he could but get at that! He asked the manager, who said he
did not know. He asked a dozen men that evening, but none knew. He would
ask Ian Belward. What a fool not to have thought of him at first. He knew
all the gossip of Paris, and was always communicative--but was he, after
all? He remembered now that the painter had a way of talking at
discretion: he had never got any really good material from him. But he
would try him in this.
So, as Gaston and Jacques travelled down the Boulevard Montparnasse,
Meyerbeer was not far behind. The journalist found Ian Belward at home,
in a cynical indolent mood.
"Wherefore Meyerbeer?" he said, as he motioned the other to a chair, and
pushed over vermouth and cigarettes.
"To ask a question."
"One question? Come, that's penance. Aren't you lying as usual?"
"No; one only. I've got the rest of it."
"Got the rest of it, eh? Nasty mess you've got, whatever it is, I'll be
bound. What a nice mob you press fellows are--wholesale scavengers!"
"That's all right. This vermouth is good enough. Well, will you answer my
question?"
"Possibly, if it's not personal. But Lord knows where your insolence may
run! You may ask if I'll introduce you to a decent London club!"
Meyerbeer flushed at last.
"You're rubbing it in," he said angrily.
He did wish to be introduced to a good London club. "The question isn't
personal, I guess. It's this: Who's Zoug-Zoug?"
Smoke had come trailing out of Belward's nose, his head thrown back, his
eyes on the ceiling. It stopped, and came out of his mouth on one long,
straight whiff. Then the painter brought his head to a natural position
slowly, and looking with a furtive nonchalance at Meyerbeer, said:
"Who is what?"
"Who's Zoug-Zoug?"
"That is your one solitary question, is it?"
"That's it."
"Very well. Now, I'll be scavenger. What is the story? Who is the
woman--for you've got a woman in it, that's certain?"
"Will you tell me, then, whether you know Zoug-Zoug?"
"Yes."
"The woman is Mademoiselle Victorine, the dompteuse."
"Ah, I've not seen her yet. She burst upon Paris while I was away. Now,
straight: no lies: who are the others?"
Meyerbeer hesitated; for, of course, he did not wish to speak of Gaston
at this stage in the game. But he said:
"Count Ploare--and Zoug-Zoug."
"Why don't you tell me the truth?"
"I do. Now, who is Zoug-Zoug?"
"Find out."
"You said you'd tell me."
"No. I said I'd tell you if I knew Zoug-Zoug. I do."
"That's all you'll tell me?"
"That's all. And see, scavenger, take my advice and let Zoug-Zoug alone.
He's a man of influence; and he's possessed of a devil. He'll make you
sorry, if you meddle with him!"
He rose, and Meyerbeer did the same, saying: "You'd better tell me."
"Now, don't bother me. Drink your vermouth, take that bundle of
cigarettes, and hunt Zoug-Zoug else where. If you find him, let me know.
Good-bye."
Meyerbeer went out furious. The treatment had been too heroic.
"I'll give a sweet savour to your family name," he said with an oath, as
he shook his fist at the closed door. Ian Belward sat back and looked at
the ceiling reflectively.
"H'm!" he said at last. "What the devil does this mean? Not Andree,
surely not Andree! Yet I wasn't called Zoug-Zoug before that. It was
Bagshot's insolent inspiration at Auvergne. Well, well!"
He got up, drew over a portfolio of sketches, took out two or three, put
them in a row against a divan, sat down, and looked at them half
quizzically.
"It was rough on you, Andree; but you were hard to please, and I am
constant to but one. Yet, begad, you had solid virtues; and I wish, for
your sake, I had been a different kind of fellow. Well, well, we'll meet
again some time, and then we'll be good friends, no doubt."
He turned away from the sketches and picked up some illustrated
newspapers. In one was a portrait. He looked at it, then at the sketches
again and again.
"There's a resemblance," he said. "But no, it's not possible.
Andree-Mademoiselle Victorine! That would be amusing. I'd go to-morrow
and see, if I weren't off to Fontainebleau. But there's no hurry: when I
come back will do."
CHAPTER XV
WHEREIN IS SEEN THE OLD ADAM AND THE GARDEN
At Ridley Court and Peppingham all was serene to the eye. Letters had
come to the Court at least once every two weeks from Gaston, and the
minds of the Baronet and his wife were at ease. They even went so far as
to hope that he would influence his uncle; for it was clear to them both
that whatever Gaston's faults were, they were agreeably different from
Ian's. His fame and promise were sweet to their nostrils. Indeed, the
young man had brought the wife and husband nearer than they had been
since Robert vanished over-sea. Each had blamed the other in an
indefinite, secret way; but here was Robert's son, on whom they could
lavish--as they did--their affection, long since forfeited by Ian.
Finally, one day, after a little burst of thanksgiving, on getting an
excellent letter from Gaston, telling of his simple, amusing life in
Paris, Sir William sent him one thousand pounds, begging him to buy a
small yacht, or to do what he pleased with it.
"A very remarkable man, my dear," Sir William said, as he enclosed the
cheque. "Excellent wisdom--excellent!"
"Who could have guessed that he knew so much about the poor and the East
End, and all those social facts and figures?" Lady Belward answered
complacently.
"An unusual mind, with a singular taste for history, and yet a deep
observation of the present. I don't know when and how he does it. I
really do not know."
"It is nice to think that Lord Faramond approves of him."
"Most noticeable. And we have not been a Parliamentary family since the
first Charles's time. And then it was a Gaston. Singular--quite singular!
Coincidences of looks and character. Nature plays strange games.
Reproduction--reproduction!"
"The Pall Mall Gazette says that he may soon reach the Treasury Bench."
Sir William was abstracted. He was thinking of that afternoon in Gaston's
bedroom, when his grandson had acted, before Lady Dargan and Cluny Vosse,
Sir Gaston's scene with Buckingham.
"Really, most mysterious, most unaccountable. But it's one of the virtues
of having a descent. When it is most needed, it counts, it counts."
"Against the half-breed mother!" Lady Belward added.
"Quite so, against the--was it Cree or Blackfoot? I've heard him speak of
both, but which is in him I do not remember."
"It is very painful; but, poor fellow, it is not his fault, and we ought
to be content."
"Indeed, it gives him great originality. Our old families need refreshing
now and then."
"Ah, yes, I said so to Mrs. Gasgoyne the other day, and she replied that
the refreshment might prove intoxicating. Reine was always rude."
Truth is, Mrs. Gasgoyne was not quite satisfied. That very day she said
to her husband:
"You men always stand by each other; but I know you, and you know that I
know."
"'Thou knowest the secrets of our hearts'; well, then, you know how we
love you. So, be merciful."
"Nonsense, Warren! I tell you he oughtn't to have gone when he did. He
has the wild man in him, and I am not satisfied."
"What do you want--me to play the spy?"
"Warren, you're a fool! What do I want? I want the first of September to
come quickly, that we may have him with us. With Delia he must go
straight. She influences him, he admires her--which is better than mere
love. Away from her just now, who can tell what mad adventure--! You see,
he has had the curb so long!"
But in a day or two there came a letter-unusually long for Gaston--to
Mrs. Gasgoyne herself. It was simple, descriptive, with a dash of
epigram. It acknowledged that he had felt the curb, and wanted a touch of
the unconventional. It spoke of Ian Belward in a dry phrase, and it asked
for the date of the yacht's arrival at Gibraltar.
"Warren, the man is still sensible," she said. "This letter is honest. He
is much a heathen at heart, but I believe he hasn't given Delia cause to
blush--and that's a good deal! Dear me, I am fond of the fellow--he is so
clever. But clever men are trying."
As for Delia, like every sensible English girl, she enjoyed herself in
the time of youth, drinking in delightedly the interest attaching to
Gaston's betrothed. His letters had been regular, kind yet not
emotionally affectionate, interesting, uncommon. He had a knack of saying
as much in one page as most people did in five. Her imagination was not
great, but he stimulated it. If he wrote a pungent line on Daudet or
Whistler, on Montaigne or Fielding, she was stimulated to know them. One
day he sent her Whitman's Leaves of Grass, which he had picked up in New
York on his way to England. This startled her. She had never heard of
Whitman. To her he seemed coarse, incomprehensible, ungentlemanly. She
could not understand how Gaston could say beautiful things about
Montaigne and about Whitman too. She had no conception how he had in him
the strain of that first Sir Gaston Belward, and was also the son of a
half-heathen.
He interested her all the more. Her letters were hardly so fascinating to
him. She was beautifully correct, but she could not make a sentence
breathe. He was grateful, but nothing stirred in him. He could live
without her--that he knew regretfully. But he did his part with sincere
intention.
That was up to the day when he saw Andree as Mademoiselle Victorine. Then
came a swift change. Day after day he visited her, always in the presence
of Annette. Soon they dined often together, still in Annette's presence,
and the severity of that rule was never relaxed.
Count Ploare came no more; he had received his dismissal. Occasionally
Gaston visited the menagerie, but generally after the performance, when
Victorine had a half-hour's or an hour's romp with her animals. This was
a pleasant time to Gaston. The wild life in him responded.
These were hours when the girl was quite naive and natural, when she
spent herself in ripe enjoyment--almost child-like, healthy. At other
times there was an indefinable something which Gaston had not noticed in
England. But then he had only seen her once. She, too, saw something in
him unnoticed before. It was on his tongue a hundred times to tell her
that that something was Delia Gasgoyne. He did not. Perhaps because it
seemed so grotesque, perhaps because it was easier to drift. Besides, as
he said to himself, he would soon go to join the yacht at Gibraltar, and
all this would be over-over. All this? All what? A gipsy, a
dompteuse--what was she to him? She interested him, he liked her, and she
liked him, but there had been nothing more between them. Near as he was
to her now, he very often saw her in his mind's eye as she passed over
Ridley Common, looking towards him, her eyes shaded by her hand.
She, too, had continually said to herself that this man could be nothing
to her--nothing, never! Yet, why not? Count Ploare had offered her his
hand. But she knew what had been in Count Ploare's mind. Gaston Belward
was different--he had befriended her father. She had not singular
scruples regarding men, for she despised most of them. She was not a
Mademoiselle Cerise, nor a Madame Juliette, though they were higher on
the plane of art than she; or so the world put it. She had not known a
man who had not, one time or another, shown himself common or insulting.
But since the first moment she had seen Gaston, he had treated her as a
lady.
A lady? She had seen enough to smile at that. She knew that she hadn't it
in her veins, that she was very much an actress, except in this man's
company, when she was mostly natural--as natural as one can be who has a
painful secret. They had talked together--for how many hours? She knew
exactly. And he had never descended to that which--she felt
instinctively--he would not have shown to the ladies of his English
world. She knew what ladies were. In her first few weeks in Paris, her
fame mounting, she had lunched with some distinguished people, who
entertained her as they would have done one of her lions, if that were
possible. She understood. She had a proud, passionate nature; she
rebelled at this. Invitations were declined at first on pink note-paper
with gaudy flowers in a corner, afterwards on cream-laid vellum, when she
saw what the great folk did.
And so the days went on, he telling her of his life from his boyhood
up--all but the one thing! But that one thing she came to know, partly by
instinct, partly by something he accidentally dropped, partly from
something Jacques once said to him. Well, what did it matter to her? He
would go back; she would remain. It didn't matter.--Yet, why should she
lie to herself? It did matter. And why should she care about that girl in
England? She was not supposed to know. The other had everything in her
favour; what had Andree the gipsy girl, or Mademoiselle Victorine, the
dompteuse?
One Sunday evening, after dining together, she asked him to take her to
see Saracen. It was a long-standing promise. She had never seen him
riding; for their hours did not coincide until the late afternoon or
evening. Taking Annette, they went to his new apartments. He had
furnished a large studio as a sitting-room, not luxuriantly but
pleasantly. It opened into a pretty little garden, with a few plants and
trees. They sat there while Jacques went for the horse. Next door a
number of students were singing a song of the boulevards. It was followed
by one in a woman's voice, sweet and clear and passionate, pitifully
reckless. It was, as if in pure contradiction, the opposite of the
other--simple, pathetic. At first there were laughing interruptions from
the students; but the girl kept on, and soon silence prevailed, save for
the voice:
"And when the wine is dry upon the lip,
And when the flower is broken by the hand,
And when I see the white sails of thy ship
Fly on, and leave me there upon the sand:
Think you that I shall weep? Nay, I shall smile:
The wine is drunk, the flower it is gone,
One weeps not when the days no more beguile,
How shall the tear-drops gather in a stone?"
When it was ended, Andree, who had listened intently, drew herself up
with a little shudder. She sat long, looking into the garden, the cub
playing at her feet. Gaston did not disturb her. He got refreshments and
put them on the table, rolled a cigarette, and regarded the scene. Her
knee was drawn up slightly in her hands, her hat was off, her rich brown
hair fell loosely about her head, framing it, her dark eyes glowed under
her bent brows. The lion's cub crawled up on the divan, and thrust its
nose under an arm. Its head clung to her waist. Who was she? thought
Gaston. Delilah, Cleopatra--who? She was lost in thought. She remained so
until the garden door opened, and Jacques entered with Saracen.
She looked. Suddenly she came to her feet with a cry of delight, and ran
out towards the horse. There was something essentially child-like in her,
something also painfully wild-an animal, and a philosopher, and
twenty-three.
Jacques put out his hand as he had done with Mademoiselle Cerise.
"No, no; he is savage."
"Nonsense!" she rejoined, and came closer.
Gaston watched, interested. He guessed what she would do.
"A horse!" she added. "Why, you have seen my lions! Leave him free: stand
away from him."
Her words were peremptory, and Jacques obeyed. The horse stood alone, a
hoof pawing the ground. Presently it sprang away, then half-turned
towards the girl, and stood still. She kept talking to him and calling
softly, making a coaxing, animal-like sound, as she always did with her
lions.
She stepped forward a little and paused. The horse suddenly turned
straight towards her, came over slowly, and, with arched neck, dropped
his head on her shoulder. She felt the folds of his neck and kissed him.
He followed her about the garden like a dog. She brought him to Gaston,
locked up, and said with a teasing look, "I have conquered him: he is
mine!"
Gaston looked her in her eyes. "He is yours."
"And you?"
"He is mine." His look burned into her soul-how deep, how joyful!
She turned away, her face going suddenly pale. She kept the horse for
some time, but at last gave him up again to Jacques. Gaston stepped from
the doorway into the garden and met her. It was now dusk. Annette was
inside. They walked together in silence for a time. Presently she drew
close to him. He felt his veins bounding. Her hand slid into his arm,
and, dark as it was, he could see her eyes lifting to his, shining,
profound. They had reached the end of the garden, and now turned to come
back again.
Suddenly he said, his eyes holding hers: "The horse is yours--and mine."
She stood still; but he could see her bosom heaving hard. She threw up
her head with a sound half sob, half laugh. . . .
"You are mad!" she said a moment afterwards, as she lifted her head from
his breast.
He laughed softly, catching her cheek to his. "Why be sane? It was to
be."
"The gipsy and the gentleman?"
"Gipsies all!"
"And the end of it?"
"Do you not love me, Andree?" She caught her hands over her eyes.
"I do not know what it is--only that it is madness! I see, oh, I see a
hundred things."
Her hot eyes were on space. "What do you see?" he urged. She gave a
sudden cry:
"I see you at my feet--dead."
"Better than you at mine, Andree."
"Let us go," she said hurriedly.
"Wait," he whispered.
They talked for a little time. Then they entered the studio. Annette was
asleep in her chair. Andree waked her, and they bade Gaston good-night.
CHAPTER XVI
WHEREIN LOVE KNOWS NO LAW SAVE THE MAN'S WILL
In another week it was announced that Mademoiselle Victorine would take a
month's holiday; to the sorrow of her chief, and to the delight of Mr.
Meyerbeer, who had not yet discovered his man, though he had a pretty
scandal well-nigh brewed.
Count Ploare was no more, Gaston Belward was. Zoug-Zoug was in the
country at Fontainebleau, working at his picture. He had left on the
morning after Gaston discovered Andree. He had written, asking his nephew
to come for some final sittings. Possibly, he said, Mademoiselle Cerise
and others would be down for a Sunday. Gaston had not gone, had briefly
declined. His uncle shrugged his shoulders, and went on with other work.
It would end in his having to go to Paris and finish the picture there,
he said. Perhaps the youth was getting into mischief? So much the better.
He took no newspapers.--What did an artist need of them? He did not even
read the notices sent by a press-cutting agency. He had a model with him.
She amused him for the time, but it was unsatisfactory working on "The
King of Ys" from photographs. He loathed it, and gave it up.
One evening Gaston and Andree met at the Gare Montparnasse. Jacques was
gone on, but Annette was there. Meyerbeer was there also, at a safe
distance. He saw Gaston purchase tickets, arrange his baggage, and enter
the train. He passed the compartment, looking in. Besides the three,
there was a priest and a young soldier.
Gaston saw him, and guessed what brought him there. He had an impulse to
get out and shake him as would Andree's cub a puppy. But the train moved
off. Meyerbeer found Gaston's porter. A franc did the business.
"Douarnenez, for Audierne, Brittany," was the legend written in
Meyerbeer's note-book. And after that: "Journey twenty hours--change at
Rennes, Redon, and Quimpere."
"Too far. I've enough for now," said Meyerbeer, chuckling, as he walked
away. "But I'd give five hundred dollars to know who Zoug-Zoug is. I'll
make another try."
So he held his sensation back for a while yet. Of the colony at the Hotel
St. Malo, not one of the three who knew would tell him. Bagshot had sworn
the others to secrecy.
Jacques had gone on with the horses. He was to rent a house, or get rooms
at a hotel. He did very well. The horses were stalled at the Hotel de
France. He had rented an old chateau perched upon a hill, with steps
approaching, steps flanking; near it strange narrow alleys, leading where
one cared not to search; a garden of pears and figs, and grapes, and
innumerable flowers and an arbour; a pavilion, all windows, over an
entranceway, with a shrine in it--a be-starred shrine below it; bare
floors, simple furniture, primitiveness at every turn.
Gaston and Andree came, of choice, with a courier in a racketing old
diligence from Douarnenez, and they laughed with delight, tired as they
were, at the new quarters. It must be a gipsy kind of existence at the
most.
There were rooms for Jacques and Annette, who at once set to work with
the help of a little Breton maid. Jacques had not ordered a dinner at the
hotel, but had got in fresh fish, lobsters, chickens, eggs, and other
necessaries; and all was ready for a meal which could be got in an hour.
Jacques had now his hour of happiness. He knew not of these morals--they
were beyond him; but after a cheerful dinner in the pavilion, with an
omelette made by Andree herself, Annette went to her room and cried
herself to sleep. She was civilised, poor soul, and here they were a
stone's throw from the cure and the church! Gaston and Andree, refreshed,
travelled down the long steps to the village, over the place, along the
quay, to the lighthouse and the beach, through crowds of sardine fishers
and simple hard-tongued Bretons. Cheerful, buoyant at dinner, there now
came upon the girl an intense quiet and fatigue. She stood and looked
long at the sea. Gaston tried to rouse her.