Marie Belloc Lowndes - The Chink in the Armour

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Absorbed in the simple yet fateful turns of the game, Anna would remain
silent for hours, immersed in calculations, and scarcely aware of what
went on round her. She and Monsieur Wachner--"L'Ami Fritz," as even
Sylvia had fallen into the way of calling him--seemed scarcely alive
unless they were standing or sitting round a baccarat table, putting down
or taking up the shining gold pieces which they treated as carelessly as
if they were counters.

But it was not the easy, idle, purposeless life she was now leading that
brought the pretty English widow that strange, unacknowledged feeling of
entire content with life.

What made existence at Lacville so exciting and so exceptionally
interesting to Sylvia Bailey was her friendship with Comte Paul de
Virieu.

There is in every woman a passion for romance, and in Sylvia this passion
had been baulked, not satisfied, by her first marriage.

Bill Chester loved her well and deeply, but he was her lawyer and trustee
as well as her lover. He had an honest, straightforward nature, and when
with her something always prompted Chester to act the part of candid
friend, and the part of candid friend fits in very ill with that of
lover. To take but one example of how ill his honesty of purpose served
him in the matter, Sylvia had never really forgiven him the "fuss" he had
made about her string of pearls.

But with the Comte de Virieu she never quite knew what to be at, and
mystery is the food of romance.

At the Villa du Lac the two were almost inseparable, and yet so
intelligently and quietly did the Count arrange their frequent
meetings--their long walks and talks in the large deserted garden, their
pleasant morning saunters through the little town--that no one, or so
Sylvia believed, was aware of any special intimacy between them.

Sometimes, as they paced up and down the flower-bordered paths of the old
kitchen-garden, or when, tired of walking, they made their way into the
orangery and sat down on the circular stone bench by the fountain, Sylvia
would remember, deep in her heart, the first time Count Paul had brought
her there; and how she had been a little frightened, not perhaps
altogether unpleasantly so, by his proximity!

She had feared--but she was now deeply ashamed of having entertained such
a thought--that he might suddenly begin making violent love to her, that
he might perhaps try to kiss her! Were not all Frenchmen of his type
rather gay dogs?

But nothing--nothing of the sort had ever been within measurable distance
of happening. On the contrary, he always treated her with scrupulous
respect, and he never--and this sometimes piqued Sylvia--made love to
her, or attempted to flirt with her. Instead, he talked to her in that
intimate, that confiding fashion which a woman finds so attractive in a
man when she has reason to believe his confidences are made to her alone.

When Bill Chester asked her not to do something she desired to do, Sylvia
felt annoyed and impatient, but when Count Paul, as she had fallen into
the way of calling him, made no secret of his wish that she should give
up play, Sylvia felt touched and pleased that he should care.

Early in their acquaintance the Count had warned her against making
casual friendships in the Gambling Rooms, and he even did not like her
knowing--this amused Sylvia--the harmless Wachners.

When he saw her talking to Madame Wachner in the Club, Count Paul would
look across the baccarat table and there would come a little frown over
his eyes--a frown she alone could see.

And as the days went on, and as their intimacy seemed to grow closer and
ever closer, there came across Sylvia a deep wordless wish--and she had
never longed for anything so much in her life--to rescue her friend from
what he admitted to be his terrible vice of gambling. In this she showed
rather a feminine lack of logic, for, while wishing to wean him from his
vice, she did not herself give up going to the Casino.

She would have been angry indeed had the truth been whispered to her, the
truth that it was not so much her little daily gamble--as Madame Wachner
called it--that made Sylvia so faithful an attendant at the Club; it was
because when there she was still with Paul de Virieu, she could see and
sympathise with him when he was winning, and grieve when he was losing,
as alas! he often lost.

When they were not at the Casino the Comte de Virieu very seldom alluded
to his play, or to the good or ill fortune which might have befallen him
that day. When with her he tried, so much was clear to Sylvia, to forget
his passion for gambling.

But this curious friendship of hers with Count Paul only occupied, in a
material sense, a small part of Sylvia's daily life at Lacville; and the
people with whom she spent most of her time were still Anna Wolsky and
Monsieur and Madame Wachner, or perhaps it should be said Madame Wachner.

It was not wonderful that Mrs. Bailey liked the cheerful woman, who was
so bright and jovial in manner, and who knew, too, how to flatter so
cleverly. When with Madame Wachner Sylvia was made to feel that she was
not only very pretty, but also immensely attractive, and just now she was
very anxious to think herself both.

* * * * *

Late one afternoon--and they all four always met each afternoon at the
Casino--Madame Wachner suddenly invited Sylvia and Anna to come back to
supper at the Chalet des Muguets.

Anna was unwilling to accept the kindly invitation. It was clear that she
did not wish to waste as much time away from the Casino as going to the
Wachners' villa would involve. But, seeing that Sylvia was eager to go,
she gave way.

Now on this particular afternoon Sylvia was feeling rather dull, and, as
she expressed it to herself, "down on her luck," for the Comte de Virieu
had gone into Paris for a few hours.

His sister, the Duchesse d'Eglemont, had come up from the country for
a few days, and the great pleasure and delight he had expressed at the
thought of seeing her had given the young English widow a little pang of
pain. It made her feel how little she counted in his life after all.

And so, for the second time, Sylvia visited the odd, fantastic-looking
Chalet des Muguets, and under very pleasant auspices.

This evening the bare dining-room she had thought so ugly wore an air of
festivity. There were flowers on the round table and on the buffet, but,
to her surprise, a piece of oilcloth now hid the parquet floor. This
puzzled Sylvia, as such trifling little matters of fact often puzzle
a fresh young mind. Surely the oilcloth had not been there on her last
visit to the villa? She remembered clearly the unpolished parquet floor.

Thanks to the hostess and to Sylvia herself, supper was a bright, merry
meal. There was a variety of cold meats, some fine fruit, and a plate of
dainty pastry.

They all waited on one another, though Madame Wachner insisted on doing
most of the work. But L'Ami Fritz, for once looking cheerful and eager,
mixed the salad, putting in even more vinegar than oil, as Mrs. Bailey
laughingly confessed that she hated olive oil!

After they had eaten their appetising little meal, the host went off into
the kitchen where Sylvia had had tea on her first visit to the Chalet,
and there he made the most excellent coffee for them all, and even Mrs.
Bailey, who was treated as the guest of honour, though she knew that
coffee was not good for her, was tempted into taking some.

One thing, however, rather dashed her pleasure in the entertainment.

Madame Wachner, forgetting for once her usual tact, suddenly made a
violent attack on the Comte de Virieu.

They were all talking of the habitues of the Casino: "The only one I do
not like," she exclaimed, in French, "is that Count--if indeed Count he
be? He is so arrogant, so proud, so rude! We have known him for years,
have L'Ami Fritz and I, for we are always running across him at Monte
Carlo and other places. But no, each time we meet he looks at us as if he
was a fish. He does not even nod!"

"When the Comte de Virieu is actually playing, he does not know that
other people exist," said Anna Wolsky, slowly.

She had looked across at Sylvia and noticed her English friend's blush
and look of embarrassment. "I used to watch him two years ago at Monte
Carlo, and I have never seen a man more absorbed in his play."

"That is no excuse!" cried Madame Wachner, scornfully. "Besides, that is
only half the truth. He is ashamed of the way he is spending his life,
and he hates the people who see him doing it! It is shameful to be so
idle. A strong young man doing nothing, living on charity, so they say!
And he despises all those who do what he himself is not ashamed to do."

And Sylvia, looking across at her, said to herself with a heavy sigh that
this was true. Madame Wachner had summed up Count Paul very accurately.

At last there came the sound of a carriage in the quiet lane outside.

"Fritz! Go and see if that is the carriage I ordered to come here at nine
o'clock," said his wife sharply; and then, as he got up silently to obey
her, she followed him out into the passage, and Sylvia, who had very
quick ears, heard her say, in low, vehement tones, "I work and work and
work, but you do nothing! Do try and help me--it is for your sake I am
taking all this trouble!"

What could these odd words mean? At what was Madame Wachner working?

A sudden feeling of discomfort came over Sylvia. Then the stout,
jolly-looking woman was not without private anxieties and cares? There
had been something so weary as well as so angry in the tone in which
Madame Wachner spoke to her beloved "Ami Fritz."

A moment later he was hurrying towards the gate.

"Sophie," he cried out from the garden, "the carriage is here! Come
along--we have wasted too much time already--"

Like Anna Wolsky, Monsieur Wachner grudged every moment spent away from
the tables.

Madame Wachner hurried her two guests into her bed-room to put on their
hats.

Anna Wolsky walked over to the window.

"What a strange, lonely place to live in!" she said, and drew the lace
shawl she was wearing a little more closely about her thin shoulders.
"And that wood over there--I should be afraid to live so near a wood!
I should think that there might be queer people concealed there."

"Bah! Why should we be frightened, even if there were queer people
there!"

"Well, but sometimes you must have a good deal of money in this house."

Madame Wachner laughed.

"When we have so much money that we cannot carry it about, and that,
alas! is not very often--but still, when Fritz makes a big win, we go
into Paris and bank the money."

"I do not trouble to do that," said Anna, "for I always carry all my
money about with me. What do you do?" she turned to Sylvia Bailey.

"I leave it in my trunk at the hotel," said Sylvia. "The servants at the
Villa du Lac seem to be perfectly honest--in fact they are mostly related
to the proprietor, M. Polperro."

"Oh, but that is quite wrong!" exclaimed Madame Wachner, eagerly. "You
should never leave your money in the hotel; you should always carry it
about with you--in little bags like this. See!"

Again she suddenly lifted the light alpaca skirt she was wearing, as she
had done before, in this very room, on the occasion of Sylvia's first
visit to the Chalet. "That is the way to carry money in a place like
this!" she said, smiling. "But now hurry, or all our evening will be
gone!"

They left the house, and hastened down the garden to the gate, where
L'Ami Fritz received his wife with a grumbling complaint that they had
been so long.

And he was right, for the Casino was very full. Sylvia made no attempt
to play. Somehow she did not care for the Club when Count Paul was not
there.

She was glad when she was at last able to leave the others for the Villa
du Lac.

Anna Wolsky accompanied her friend to the entrance of the Casino. The
Comte de Virieu was just coming in as Sylvia went out; bowing distantly
to the two ladies, he hurried through the vestibule towards the Club.

Sylvia's heart sank. Not even after spending a day with his beloved
sister could he resist the lure of play!

CHAPTER XI

During much of the night that followed Sylvia lay awake, her mind full of
the Comte de Virieu, and of the strange friendship which had sprung up
between them.

Their brief meeting at the door of the Casino had affected her very
painfully. As he had passed her with a distant bow, a look of shame, of
miserable unease, had come over Count Paul's face.

Yes, Madame Wachner had summed him up very shrewdly, if unkindly. He was
ashamed, not only of the way in which he was wasting his life, but also
of the company into which his indulgence of his vice of gambling brought
him.

And Sylvia--it was a bitter thought--was of that company. That fact must
be faced by her. True, she was not a gambler in the sense that most of
the people she met and saw daily at the Casino were gamblers, but that
was simply because the passion of play did not absorb her as it did them.
It was her good fortune, not any virtue in herself, that set her apart
from Anna Wolsky.

And now she asked herself--or rather her conscience asked her--whether
she would not do well to leave Lacville; to break off this strange
and--yes, this dangerous intimacy with a man of whom she knew so very
little, apart from the great outstanding fact that he was a confirmed
gambler, and that he had given up all that makes life worth living to
such a man as he, in order to drag on a dishonoured, purposeless life at
one or other of the great gambling centres of the civilised world?

And yet the thought of going away from Lacville was already intolerable
to Sylvia. There had arisen between the Frenchman and herself a kind of
close, wordless understanding and sympathy which she, at any rate, still
called "friendship." But she would probably have assented to Meredith's
words, "Friendship, I fancy, means one heart between two."

At last she fell into a troubled sleep, and dreamt a disturbing dream.

She found herself wandering about the Chalet des Muguets, trying to find
a way out of the locked and shuttered building. The ugly little rooms
were empty. It was winter, and she was shivering with cold. Someone must
have locked her in by mistake. She had been forgotten....

"Toc, toc, toc!" at the door. And Sylvia sat up in bed relieved of her
nightmare. It was eight o'clock! She had overslept herself. Felicie was
bringing in her tea, and on the tray lay a letter addressed in a
handwriting Sylvia did not know, and on which was a French stamp.

She turned the pale-grey envelope over doubtfully, wondering if it was
really meant for her. But yes--of that there could be no doubt, for it
was addressed, "Madame Bailey, Villa du Lac, Lacville-les-Bains."

She opened it to find that the note contained a gracefully-worded
invitation to dejeuner for the next day, and the signature
ran--"Marie-Anne d'Eglemont."

Why, it must be Paul de Virieu's sister! How very kind of her, and--and
how very kind of _him_.

The letter must have been actually written when Count Paul was in Paris
with his sister--and yet, when they had passed one another the evening
before, he had bowed as distantly, as coldly, as he might have done to
the most casual of acquaintances.

Sylvia got up, filled with a tumult of excited feeling which this simple
invitation to luncheon scarcely warranted.

But Paul de Virieu came in from his ride also eager, excited, smiling.

"Have you received a note from my sister?" he asked, hurrying towards her
in the dining-room which they now had to themselves each morning. "When I
told her how you and I had become"--he hesitated a moment, and then added
the words, "good friends, she said how much she would like to meet you. I
know that you and my dear Marie-Anne would like one another--"

"It is very kind of your sister to ask me to come and see her," said
Sylvia, a little stiffly.

"I am going back to Paris this evening," he went on, "to stay with my
sister for a couple of nights. So if you can come to-morrow to lunch, as
I think my sister has asked you to do, I will meet you at the station."

After breakfast they went out into the garden, and when they were free of
the house Count Paul said suddenly,

"I told Marie-Anne that you were fond of riding, and, with your
permission, she proposes to send over a horse for you every morning.
And, Madame--forgive me--but I told her I feared you had no riding habit!
You and she, however, are much the same height, and she thinks that she
might be able to lend you one if you will honour her by accepting the
loan of it during the time you are at Lacville."

Sylvia was bewildered, she scarcely knew how to accept so much kindness.

"If you will write a line to my sister some time to-day," continued the
Count, "I will be the bearer of your letter."

* * * * *

That day marked a very great advance in the friendship of Sylvia Bailey
and Paul de Virieu.

Till that day, much as he had talked to her about himself and his life,
and the many curious adventures he had had, for he had travelled a great
deal, and was a cultivated man, he had very seldom spoken to her of his
relations.

But to-day he told her a great deal about them, and she found herself
taking a very keen, intimate interest in this group of French people whom
she had never seen--whom, perhaps, with one exception, she never would
see.

How unlike English folk they must be--these relations of Count Paul! For
the matter of that, how unlike any people Sylvia had ever seen or heard
of.

First, he told her of the sweet-natured, pious young duchess who was to
be her hostess on the morrow--the sister whom Paul loved so dearly, and
to whom he owed so much.

Then he described, in less kindly terms, her proud narrow-minded, if
generous, husband, the French duke who still lived--thanks to the
fact that his grandmother had been the daughter of a great Russian
banker--much as must have lived the nobles in the Middle Ages--apart,
that is, from everything that would remind him that there was anything
in the world of which he disapproved or which he disliked.

The Duc d'Eglemont ignored the fact that France was a Republic; he still
talked of "the King," and went periodically into waiting on the Duke of
Orleans.

Count Paul also told Sylvia of his great-uncle and godfather, the
Cardinal, who lived in Italy, and who had--or so his family liked to
believe--so nearly become Pope.

Then there were his three old maiden great-aunts, who had all desired to
be nuns, but who apparently had not had the courage to do so when it came
to the point. They dwelt together in a remote Burgundian chateau, and
they each spent an hour daily in their chapel praying that their dear
nephew Paul might be rescued from the evils of play.

And as Paul de Virieu told Sylvia Bailey of all these curious old-world
folk of his, Sylvia wondered more and more why he led the kind of
existence he was leading now.

* * * * *

For the first time since Sylvia had come to Lacville, neither she nor
Count Paul spent any part of that afternoon at the Casino. They were both
at that happy stage of--shall we say friendship?--when a man and a woman
cannot see too much of one another; when time is as if it were not; when
nothing said or done can be wrong in the other's sight; when Love is
still a soft and an invisible presence, with naught about him of the
exacting tyrant he will so soon become.

Count Paul postponed his departure for Paris till after dinner, and not
till she went up to dress did Sylvia sit down to write her answer to the
Duchesse d'Eglemont.

For a long while she held her pen in her hand. How was she to address
Paul de Virieu's sister? Must she call her "Dear Madame"? Should she call
her "Dear Duchesse"? It was really an unimportant matter, but it appeared
very important to Sylvia Bailey. She was exceedingly anxious not to
commit any social solecism.

And then, while she was still hesitating, still sitting with the pen
poised in her hand, there came a knock at the door.

The maid handed her a note; it was from Count Paul, the first letter he
had ever written to her.

"Madame,"--so ran the note--"it occurs to me that you might like to
answer my sister in French, and so I venture to send you the sort of
letter that you might perhaps care to write. Each country has its own
usages in these matters--that must be my excuse for my apparent
impertinence."

And then there followed a prettily-turned little epistle which Sylvia
copied, feeling perhaps a deeper gratitude than a far greater service
would have won him from her.

CHAPTER XII

A couple of hours later Sylvia and Count Paul parted at the door of the
Casino. He held her hand longer than was usual with him when bidding her
good-night; then, dropping it, he lifted his hat and hurried off towards
the station.

Sylvia stood in the dusk and looked after him till a turn in the short
road hid his hurrying figure from her sight.

She felt very much moved, touched to the core of her heart. She knew just
as well as if he had told her why the Comte de Virieu had given up his
evening's play to-night. He had left Lacville, and arranged to meet her
in Paris the next day, in order that their names might not be coupled--as
would have certainly been the case if they had travelled together into
Paris the next morning--by M. Polperro and the good-natured, but rather
vulgar Wachners.

As she turned and walked slowly through the Casino, moving as in a dream,
Sylvia suddenly felt herself smartly tapped on the shoulder.

She turned round quickly--then she smiled. It was Madame Wachner.

"Why 'ave you not come before?" her friend exclaimed. "Madame Wolsky
is making such a sensation! Come quick--quick!" and she hurried the
unresisting Sylvia towards the Club rooms. "I come downstairs to see if
I could find you," went on Madame Wachner breathlessly.

What could be happening? Sylvia felt the other's excitement to be
contagious. As she entered the gambling room she saw that a large crowd
was gathered round the centre Baccarat table.

"A party of young men out from Paris," explained Madame Wachner in a low
tone, "are throwing about their money. It might have been terrible. But
no, it is a great piece of good fortune for Madame Wolsky!"

And still Sylvia did not understand.

They walked together up to the table, and then, with amazement and a
curious feeling of fear clutching at her heart, Sylvia Bailey saw that
Anna Wolsky was holding the Bank.

It was the first time she had ever seen a lady in the Banker's seat.

A thick bundle of notes, on which were arranged symmetrical piles of gold
lay in front of Madame Wolsky, and as was always the case when she was
really excited, Anna's face had become very pale, and her eyes glistened
feverishly.

The play, too, was much higher than usual. This was owing to the fact
that at one end of the table there stood a little group of five young men
in evening dress. They talked and laughed as they flung their money on
the green cloth, and seemed to enjoy the fact that they were the centre
of attraction.

"One of them," whispered Madame Wachner eagerly, "had already lost eight
thousand francs when I went downstairs to look for you! See, they are
still losing. Our friend has the devil's own luck to-night! I have
forbidden L'Ami Fritz to play at all. Nothing can stand against her. She
sweeps the money up every time. If Fritz likes, he can go downstairs to
the lower room and play."

But before doing so L'Ami Fritz lingered awhile, watching Madame Wolsky's
wonderful run of luck with an expression of painful envy and greed on his
wolfish countenance.

Sylvia went round to a point where she could watch Anna's face. To a
stranger Madame Wolsky might have appeared almost indifferent; but there
had come two spots of red on her cheeks, and the hand with which she
raked up the money trembled.

The words rang out, "_Faites vos jeux, Messieurs, Mesdames._" Then, "_Le
jeu est fait! Rien ne va plus!_"

The luck suddenly turned against Anna. She looked up, and found Sylvia's
eyes fixed on her. She made a slight motion, as if she wished her friend
to go away.

Sylvia slipped back, and walked quietly round the table. Then she stood
behind Anna, and once more the luck came back, and the lady banker's pile
of notes and gold grew higher and higher....

"This is the first time a woman has held the Bank this month," Sylvia
heard someone say.

And then there came an answer, "Yes, and it is by far the best Bank we
have had this month--in fact, it's the best play we've had this season!"

At last Anna pushed away her chair and got up.

One of the young men who had lost a good deal of money came up to her and
said smilingly.

"I hope, Madame, you are not going away. I propose now to take the Bank;
surely, you will allow me to have my revenge?"

Anna Wolsky laughed.

"Certainly!" she answered. "I propose to go on playing for some time
longer."

He took the Banker's seat, and the crowd dispersed to the other tables.
L'Ami Fritz slipped away downstairs, but his wife stayed on in the Club
by Sylvia's side.

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