Part 13 (1/2)

”What is it?” said Mrs. Chepstow, surprised at the sudden radiance in Nigel's face, seeing before her for the first time a man she could not read, but a man whose physique now forcibly appealed to her--seemed to become splendid under some inward influence, as a half-naked athlete's does when he slowly fills his lungs, clenches his fists, and hardens all his muscles. ”What is it?”

But he did not tell her. He could not tell her. And he got up to go away. As he pa.s.sed the piano, he looked again at the score of ”The Dream of Gerontius.”

”Are you fond of that?” he asked her.

”What? Oh--'Gerontius'”

She let her eyes rest for a brief instant on his face.

”I love it. It carries me away--as the soul is carried away by the angel. 'This child of clay to me was given'--do you remember?”

”Yes.”

He bade her good-bye. The last thing he looked at in her room was ”The Scarlet Letter,” bound in white, lying upon her table. And he glanced from it to her before he went out and shut the door.

Just outside in the corridor he met a neatly dressed French girl, whose eyes were very red. She had evidently been crying long and bitterly. She carried over her arm the skirt of a gown, and she went into the room which communicated with Mrs. Chepstow's sitting-room.

”Poor girl!” thought Nigel. ”I wonder what's the matter with her.”

He went on down the corridor to the lift, descended, and made his way to the Thames Embankment.

When the door shut behind him, Mrs. Chepstow remained standing for a minute near the piano, waiting, like one expectant of a departing guest's return. But Nigel did not come back to say any forgotten, final word. Presently she realized that she was safely alone, and she went to the piano, sat down, and struck the chords which supported the notes on which the priest dismissed the soul. But she only played them for a moment. Then, taking the music off the stand and throwing it on the floor, she began to play a Spanish dance, lascivious, alluring, as full of the body as the music of Elgar is full of the soul. And she played it very well, as well, almost, as a hot-blooded girl of Seville could have danced it. As she drew near the end, she heard a sound in the adjoining room, and she stopped abruptly and called out:

”Henriette!”

There was no reply.

”Henriette!” Mrs. Chepstow called again.

The door of the bedroom opened, and the French girl with red eyes appeared.

”Why don't you answer when I speak to you? How long have you been there?”

”Two or three minutes, madame,” said the girl, in a low voice.

”Did you meet any one in the corridor?”

”Yes, madame, a gentleman.”

”Coming from here?”

”Yes, madame.”

”Did he see you?”

”Naturally, madame.”

”I mean--to notice you?”