Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo

E >> E. Phillips Oppenheim >> Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo

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She looked up at last and there was a slight frown upon her forehead.

"I am still a little down, starting from where I had the ten mille," she
sighed. "I thought--"

She stopped short. There was a curious change in her face. Her eyes were
fixed upon some person approaching. Draconmeyer turned quickly in his
chair. Almost as he did so, Hunterleys paused before their table. Violet
looked up at him with quivering lips. For a moment it seemed as though
she were stepping out of her sordid surroundings.

"Henry!" she exclaimed. "Did you come to look for me? Did you know that
we were here?"

"How should I?" he answered calmly. "I was strolling around with David
Briston. We are at the Opera."

"At the Opera," she repeated.

"My little protegee, Felicia Roche, is singing," he went on, "in _Aida_.
If she does as well in the next act as she has done in this, her future
is made."

He was on the point of adding the news of Felicia's engagement to the
young man who had momentarily deserted him. Some evil chance changed his
intention.

"Why do you call her your little protegee?" she demanded.

"It isn't quite correct, is it?" he answered, a little absently. "There
are three or four of us who are doing what we can to look after her. Her
father was a prominent member of the Wigwam Club. The girl won the
musical scholarship we have there. She has more than repaid us for our
trouble, I am glad to say."

"I have no doubt that she has," Violet replied, lifting her eyes.

There was a moment's silence. The significance of her words was entirely
lost upon Hunterleys.

"Isn't this rather a new departure of yours?" he asked, glancing
disdainfully towards Draconmeyer. "I thought that you so much preferred
to play at the Club."

"So I do," she assented, "but I was just beginning to win when the Club
closed at eight o'clock, and so we came on here."

"Your good fortune continues, I hope?"

"It varies," she answered hurriedly, "but it will come, I am sure. I
have been very near a big win more than once."

He seemed on the point of departure. She leaned a little forward.

"You had my note, Henry?"

Her tone was almost beseeching. Draconmeyer, who was listening with
stony face, shivered imperceptibly.

"Thank you, yes," Hunterleys replied, frowning slightly. "I am sorry,
but I am not at liberty to do what you suggest just at present. I wish
you good fortune."

He turned around and walked back to the other end of the room, where
Briston was standing at the bar. She looked after him for a moment as
though she failed to understand his words. Then her face hardened.
Draconmeyer leaned towards her.

"Shall we go?" he suggested.

She rose with alacrity. Side by side they strolled through the rooms
towards the Cercle Prive.

"I am sorry," Draconmeyer said regretfully, "but I am forced to leave
you now. I will take you back to your place and after that I must go to
the hotel and change. I have a reception to attend. I wish you would
take the rest of my winnings and see what you can do with them."

She shook her head vigorously.

"No, thank you," she declared. "I have enough."

He shrugged his shoulders.

"I have twenty-five mille here in my pocket," he continued, "besides
some smaller change. I don't think it is quite fair to leave so much
money about in one's room or to carry it out into the country. Keep it
for me. You won't need to play with it--I can see that your luck is
in--but it always gives one confidence to feel that one has a reserve
stock, something to fall back upon if necessary."

He drew the notes from his pocket and held them towards her. Her eyes
were fixed upon them covetously. The thought of all that money actually
in her possession was wildly exhilarating.

"I will take care of them for you, if you like," she said. "I shall not
play with them, though. I owe you quite enough already and my losing
days are over."

He stuffed the notes carelessly into her bag.

"Twenty-five mille," he told her. "Remember my advice. If the luck stays
with you, stake maximums. Go for the big things."

She looked at him curiously as she closed her gold bag with a snap.

"After all," she declared, with a little laugh, "I am not sure that you
are not the greater gambler of the two to trust me with all this money!"

CHAPTER XXVIII

TO THE VILLA MIMOSA

With feet that seemed to touch nothing more substantial than air, her
eyes brilliant, a wonderful colour in her cheeks, Violet passed through
the heavy, dingy rooms and out through the motley crowd into the portico
of the Casino. She was right! She knew that she had been right! How wise
she had been to borrow that money from Mr. Draconmeyer instead of
sitting down and confessing herself vanquished! The last few hours had
been hours of ecstatic happiness. With calm confidence she had sat in
her place and watched her numbers coming up with marvellous persistence.
It was the most wonderful thing in the world, this. She had had no time
to count her winnings, but at least she knew that she could pay back
every penny she owed. Her little gold satchel was stuffed with notes and
plaques. She felt suddenly younger, curiously light-hearted; hungry,
too, and thirsty. She was, in short, experiencing almost a delirium of
pleasure. And just then, on the steps of the Casino, she came face to
face with her husband.

"Henry!" she called out. "Henry!"

He turned abruptly around. He was looking troubled, and in his hand were
the fragments of a crushed up note.

"Come across to the hotel with me," she begged, forgetful of everything
except her own immense relief. "Come and help me count. I have been
winning. I have won back everything."

He accepted the information with only a polite show of interest. After
all, as she reflected afterwards, he had no idea upon what scale she had
been gambling!

"I am delighted to hear it," he answered. "I'll see you across the road,
if I may, but I have only a few minutes to spare. I have an
appointment."

She was acutely disappointed; unreasonably, furiously angry.

"An appointment!" she exclaimed. "At half-past eleven o'clock at night!
Are you waiting for Felicia Roche?"

"Is there any reason why I should not?" he asked her gravely.

She bit her lips hard. They were crossing the road now. After all, it
was only a few months since she had bidden him go his own way and leave
her to regulate her own friendships.

"No reason at all," she admitted, "only I cannot see why you choose to
advertise yourself with an opera singer--you, an ambitious politician,
who moves with his head in the clouds, and to whom women are no more
than a pastime. Why have you waited all these years to commence a
flirtation under my very nose!"

He looked at her sternly.

"I think that you are a little excited, Violet," he said. "You surely
don't realise what you are saying."

"Excited! Tell me once more--you got my note, the one I wrote this
evening?"

"Certainly."

His brief reply was convincing. She remembered the few impulsive lines
which she had written from her heart in that moment of glad relief.
There was no sign in his face that he had been touched. Even at that
moment he had drawn out his watch and was looking at it.

"Thank you for bringing me here," she said, as they stood upon the steps
of the hotel. "Don't let me keep you."

"After all," he decided, "I think that I shall go up to my room for a
minute. Good night!"

She looked after him, a little amazed. She was conscious of a feeling of
slow anger. His aloofness repelled her, was utterly inexplicable. For
once it was she who was being badly treated. Her moment of exhilaration
had passed. She sat down in the lounge; her satchel, filled with mille
franc notes, lay upon her lap unheeded. She sat there thinking, seeing
nothing of the crowds of fashionably dressed women and men passing in
and out of the hotel; of the gaily-lit square outside, the cool green of
the gardens, the cafe opposite, the brilliantly-lit Casino. She was back
again for a moment in England. The strain of all this life, whipped into
an artificial froth of pleasure by the constant excitement of the one
accepted vice of the world, had suddenly lost its hold upon her. The
inevitable question had presented itself. She was counting values and
realising....

When at last she rose wearily to her feet, Hunterleys was passing
through the hall of the hotel, on his way out. She looked at him with
aching heart but she made no effort to stop him. He had changed his
clothes for a dark suit and he was also wearing a long travelling coat
and tweed cap. She watched him wistfully until he had disappeared. Then
she turned away, summoned the lift and went up to her rooms. She rang at
once for her maid. She would take a bath, she decided, and go to bed
early. She would wash all the dust of these places away from her, abjure
all manner of excitement and for once sleep peacefully. In the morning
she would see Henry once more. Deep in her heart there still lingered
some faint shadow of doubt as to Draconmeyer and his attitude towards
her. It was scarcely possible that he could have interfered in any way,
and yet.... She would talk to her husband face to face, she would tell
him the things that were in her heart.

She rang the bell for the second time. Only the _femme de chambre_
answered the summons. Madame's maid was not to be found. Madame had not
once retired so early. It was possible that Susanne had gone out. Could
she be of any service? Violet looked at her and hesitated. The woman was
clumsy-fingered and none too tidy. She shook her head and sent her away.
For a moment she thought of undressing herself. Then instead she opened
her satchel and counted the notes. Her breath came more quickly as she
looked at the shower of gold and counted the many oblong strips of paper
with their magic lettering. At last she had it all in heaps. There were
the twenty-five mille he had left with her, and the seventy-five mille
she had borrowed from him. Then towards her own losses there was another
mille, and a matter of five hundred francs in gold. And all this
success, her wonderful recovery, had been done so easily! It was just
because she had had the pluck to go on, because she had followed her
vein. She looked at the money and she walked to the window. Somewhere a
band was playing in the distance. Little parties of men and women in
evening dress were strolling by on their way to the Club. A woman was
laughing as she clung to her escort on the opposite side of the road, by
the gardens. Across at the Cafe de Paris the people were going in to
supper. The spirit of enjoyment seemed to be in the air--the
light-hearted, fascinating, devil-may-care atmosphere she knew so well.
Violet looked back into the bedroom and she no longer had the impulse to
sleep. Her face had hardened a little. Every one was so happy and she
was so lonely. She stuffed the notes and gold back into her bag, looked
at her hat in the glass and touched her face for a moment with a
powder-puff. Then she left the room, rang for the lift and descended.

"I am going into the Club for an hour or so, if I am wanted," she told
the concierge as she passed out.

* * * * *

Hunterleys, on leaving the hotel, walked rapidly across the square and
found David waiting for him on the opposite side.

"Felicia will be late," the latter explained. "She has to get all that
beastly black stuff off her face. She is horribly nervous about Sidney
and she doesn't want you to wait. I think perhaps she is right, too. She
told me to tell you that Monsieur Lafont himself came to her room and
congratulated her after the curtain had gone down. She is almost
hysterical between happiness and anxiety about Sidney. Where's your
man?"

"I asked him to be a little higher up," Hunterleys replied. "There he
is."

They walked a few steps up the hill and found Richard Lane waiting for
them in his car. The long, grey racer looked almost like some submarine
monster, with its flaring head-lights and torpedo-shaped body which
scarcely cleared the ground.

"Ready for orders, sir," the young man announced, touching his cap.

"Is there room for three of us, in case of an emergency?" Hunterleys
asked.

"The third man has to sit on the floor," Richard pointed out, "but it
isn't so comfortable as it looks."

Hunterleys clambered in and took the vacant place. David Briston
lingered by a little wistfully.

"I feel rather a skunk," he grumbled. "I don't see why I shouldn't come
along."

Hunterleys shook his head.

"There isn't the slightest need for it," he declared firmly. "You go
back and look after Felicia. Tell her we'll get Sidney out of this all
right. Get away with you, Lane, now."

"Where to?"

"To the Villa Mimosa!"

Richard whistled as he thrust in his clutch.

"So that's the game, is it?" he murmured, as they glided off.

Hunterleys leaned towards him.

"Lane," he said, "don't forget that I warned you there might be a little
trouble about to-night. If you feel the slightest hesitation about
involving yourself--"

"Shut up!" Richard interrupted. "Whatever trouble you're ready to face,
I'm all for it, too. Darned queer thing that we should be going to the
Villa Mimosa, though! I am not exactly a popular person with Mr. Grex, I
think."

Hunterleys smiled.

"I saw your sister this afternoon," he remarked. "You are rather a
wonderful young man."

"I knew it was all up with me," Richard replied simply, "when I first
saw that girl. Now look here, Hunterleys, we are almost there. Tell me
exactly what it is you want me to do?"

"I want you," Hunterleys explained, "to risk a smash, if you don't mind.
I want you to run up to the boundaries of the villa gardens, head your
car back for Monte Carlo, and while you are waiting there turn out all
your lights."

"That's easy enough," Richard assented. "I'll turn out the search-light
altogether, and my others are electric, worked by a button. Is this an
elopement act or what?"

"There's a meeting going on in that villa," Hunterleys told him,
"between prominent politicians of three countries. You don't have to
bother much about Secret Service over in the States, although there's
more goes on than you know of in that direction. But over here we have
to make regular use of Secret Service men--spies, if you like to call
them so. The meeting to-night is inimical to England. It is part of a
conspiracy against which I am working. Sidney Roche--Felicia Roche's
brother--who lives here as a newspaper correspondent, is in reality one
of our best Secret Service men. He is taking terrible chances to-night
to learn a little more about the plans which these fellows are
discussing. We are here in case he needs our help to get away. We've
cleared the shrubs away, close to the spot at which I am going to ask
you to wait, and taken the spikes off the fence. It's just a thousand to
one chance that if he's hard pressed for it and heads this way, they may
think that they have him in a trap and take it quietly. That is to say,
they'll wait to capture him instead of shooting."

"Say, you don't mean this seriously?" Richard exclaimed. "They can't do
more than arrest him as a trespasser, or something of that sort,
surely?"

Hunterleys laughed grimly.

"These men wouldn't stick at much," he told his companion. "They're hand
in glove with the authorities here. Anything they did would be hushed up
in the name of the law. These things are never allowed to come out. It
doesn't do any one any good to have them gossiped about. If they caught
Sidney and shot him, we should never make a protest. It's all part of
the game, you know. Now that is the spot I want you to stop at, exactly
where the mimosa tree leans over the path. But first of all, I'd turn
out your head-light."

They slowed down and stopped. Richard extinguished the acetylene
gas-lamp and mounted again to his place. Then he swung the car round and
crawled back upon the reverse until he reached the spot to which
Hunterleys had pointed.

"You're a good fellow, Richard," Hunterleys said softly. "We may have to
wait an hour or two, and it may be that nothing will happen, but it's
giving the fellow a chance, and it gives him confidence, too, to know
that friends are at hand."

"I'm in the game for all it's worth, anyway," Lane declared heartily.

He touched a button and the lights faded away. The two men sat in
silence, both turned a little in their seats towards the villa.

CHAPTER XXIX

FOR HIS COUNTRY

The minutes glided by as the two men sat together in the perfumed,
shadowy darkness. From their feet the glittering canopy of lights swept
upwards to the mountain-sides, even to the stars, but a chain of slowly
drifting black clouds hung down in front of the moon, and until their
eyes became accustomed to their surroundings it seemed to both of them
as though they were sitting in a very pit of darkness.

"It is possible," Hunterleys whispered, after some time, "that we may
have to wait for another hour yet."

Richard was suddenly tense. He sat up, and his foot reached for the
self-starter.

"I don't think you will," he muttered. "Listen!"

Almost immediately they were conscious of some commotion in the
direction of the villa, followed by a shot and then a cry.

"Start the engine," Hunterleys directed hoarsely, standing up in his
place. "I'm afraid they've got him."

There were two more shots but no further cry. Then they heard the sound
of excited voices and immediately afterwards rapidly approaching
footsteps. A man came crashing through the shrubbery, but when he
reached the fence over which, for a moment, his white face gleamed, he
sank down as though powerless to climb. Hunterleys leapt to the ground
and rushed to the fence.

"Hold up, Sidney, old fellow," he called softly. "We're here all right.
Hold up for a moment and let me lift you."

Roche struggled to his feet. His face was ghastly white, the sweat stood
out upon his forehead, his lips moved but no words came. Hunterleys got
him by the arms, set his teeth and lifted. The task would have been too
much for him, but Richard, springing from the car, came to his help.
With an effort they hoisted him over the fence. Almost as they did so
there was the sound of footsteps dashing through the shrubs, and a shot,
the bullet of which tore the bark from the trunk of a tree close at
hand. The car leapt off in fourth speed, Sidney supported in Hunterleys'
arms. A loud shout from behind only brought Richard's foot down upon the
accelerator.

"Stoop low!" he cried to Hunterleys. "Get your legs in, if you can."

A bullet struck the back of the car and another whistled over their
heads. Then they dashed around the corner, and Richard, turning on the
lights, jammed down his accelerator.

"Gee whiz! that's a bloodthirsty crew!" the young man exclaimed, his
eyes fixed upon the road. "Is he hurt?"

Roche was lying back on the seat. Hunterleys was on his knees, holding
on to the framework of the car.

"They've got me all right, Hunterleys," Roche faltered. "Listen.
Everything went well with me at first. I could hear--nearly everything.
The Frenchman kept his mouth shut--tight as wax. Grex did most of the
talking. Russia sees nothing in the entente--England has nothing to
offer her. She'd rather keep friends with Germany. Russia wants to move
eastward--all Persia--India. She's only lukewarm, any way, about the
French alliance as things stand at present, and dead off any truck with
England. There's talk of Constantinople, and Germany to march three army
corps through a weak French resistance to Calais. They talked of France
acting to her pledges, putting her recruits in the front, taking a
slight defeat, making a peace on her own account, with Alsace and
Lorraine restored. She can pay. Germany wants the money.
Germany--Germany--"

The words died away in a little groan. The wounded man's head fell back.
Hunterleys passed his arm around the limp figure.

"Take the first turn to the right and second to the left, Richard," he
directed. "We'll drive straight to the hospital. I made friends with the
English doctor last night. He promised to be there till three. I paid
him a fee on purpose."

"First to the right," Richard muttered, swinging around. "Second to the
left, eh?"

Hunterleys was holding his brandy flask to Roche's lips as they swung
through the white gates and pulled up outside the hospital. The doctor
was faithful to his promise, and Roche, who was now unconscious, was
carried in. In the hall he was laid upon an ambulance and borne off by
two attendants. Hunterleys and Lane sat down to wait in the hall. After
what seemed to them an interminable half-hour, the doctor reappeared. He
came over to them at once.

"Your friend may live," he announced, "but in any case he will be
unconscious for the next twenty-four hours. There is no need for you to
stay, or for you to fetch the young lady you spoke of, at present. If he
dies, he will die unconscious. I can tell you nothing more until the
afternoon."

Hunterleys rose slowly to his feet.

"You'll do everything you can, doctor?" he begged. "Money doesn't
count."

"Money never counts here," the doctor replied gravely. "We shall save
him if it is possible. You've nothing to tell me, I suppose, as to how
he met with his wound?"

"Nothing."

They walked out together into the night. The bank of clouds had drifted
away now and the moon was shining. Below them, barely a quarter of a
mile away, they could see the flare of lights from the Casino. A woman
was laughing hysterically through the open windows of a house on the
other side of the way. Some one was playing a violin in a cafe at the
corner of the street.

"Richard," Hunterleys said, "will you see me through? I have to get to
Cannes as fast as I can to send a cable. I daren't send it from here,
even in code."

"I'll drive you to Cannes like a shot," Richard assented heartily. "Just
a brandy and soda on our way out, and I'll show you some pretty
driving."

They stopped at the Cafe de Paris and left the car under the trees. Both
men took a long drink and Richard filled his pocket with cigarettes.
Then they re-entered the car, lit up, and glided off on the road for
Cannes. Richard had become more serious. His boyish manner and
appearance had temporarily gone. He drove, even, with less than his
usual recklessness.

"That was a fine fellow," he remarked enthusiastically, after a long
pause, "that fellow Roche!"

"And we've many more like him," Hunterleys declared. "We've men in every
part of the world doing what seems like dirty work, ill-paid work, too,
doing it partly, perhaps, because the excitement grows on them and they
love it, but always, they have to start in cold blood. The papers don't
always tell the truth, you know. There's many a death in foreign cities
you read of as a suicide, or the result of an accident, when it's really
the sacrifice of a hero for his country. It's great work, Richard."

"Makes me feel kind of ashamed," Richard muttered. "I've never done
anything but play around all my life. Anyway, those sort of things don't
come to us in our country. America's too powerful and too isolated to
need help of that description. We shouldn't have any use for politicians
of your class, or for Secret Service men."

"If you're in earnest," Hunterleys advised, "you go to Washington and
ask them about it some day. The time's coming, if it hasn't already
arrived, when your country will have to develop a different class of
politicians. You see, whether she wants it or not, she is coming into
touch, through Asia and South America, with European interests, and if
she does, she'll have to adopt their methods more or less. Poor old
Roche! There was something more he wanted to say, and if it's what I've
been expecting, your country was in it."

"I guess I'll take Fedora over for our honeymoon," Richard decided
softly. "Don't see why I shouldn't come into one of the Embassies. I'm a
bit of a hulk to go about the world doing nothing."

Hunterleys laughed quietly.

"My young friend," he said, "aren't you taking your marriage prospects a
little for granted? May I be there when you ask Augustus Nicholas Ivan
Peter, Grand Duke of Vassura, Prince of Melinkoff, cousin of His
Imperial Majesty the Czar, for the hand of his daughter in marriage!"

"So that's it, is it?" Lane murmured. "Why didn't you tell me before?"

Hunterleys shook his head. He gazed steadfastly along the road in front
of him.

"It wasn't to my interest to have it known too generally," he said, "and
I am afraid your little love affair didn't strike me as being of much
importance by the side of the other things. But you've earned the truth,
if it's any use to you."

"Well," Richard observed, "I wasn't counting on having any witnesses,
but you can come along if you like. I suppose," he added, "I shall have
to do him the courtesy of asking his permission, but--"

"But what?" Hunterleys asked curiously.

They were on a long stretch of straight, white road. Richard looked for
a moment up to the sky, and Hunterleys, watching him, was amazed at the
transformation.

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