Part 14 (2/2)

That is why they are there. There was a suggestion of determination in the walk of this Englishman.

He came down the wide alley towards her, and then suddenly perceived her. She saw this without actually looking at him, and knew the precise moment when he first caught sight of her. It was presumably upon experience that Wanda based her theory that women see twice as much as men. She saw him turn, without hesitation, away from her down a narrower alley leading to the right. It was his intention to avoid her. But the only turning he could take was that leading to the corner of Kotzebue Street, and Martin was at the other end of it, coming towards him.

Cartoner was thus caught in the narrow alley. Wanda sat still and watched the two men. She suddenly knew in advance what would happen, as it is often vouchsafed to the human understanding to know at a moment's notice what is coming; and she had a strange, discomforting sense that these minutes were preordained--that Martin and Cartoner and herself were mere puppets in the hands of Fate, and must say and do that which has been a.s.signed to them in an unalterable scheme of succeeding events.

She watched the two men meet and shake hands, in the English fas.h.i.+on, without raising their hats. She could see Cartoner's movements to continue his way, and Martin's detaining hand slipped within the Englishman's arm.

”What does it matter?” Martin was saying. ”There is no one to see us here, at this hour in the morning. We are quite safe. There is Wanda, sitting on the seat, waiting for me. Come back with me.”

And Wanda could divine the words easily enough from her brother's att.i.tude and gestures. It ought to have surprised her that Cartoner yielded, for it was unlike him. He was so much stronger than Martin--so determined, so unyielding. And yet she felt no surprise when he turned and came towards her with Martin's hand still within his arm. She knew that it was written that he must come; divined vaguely that he had something to say to her which it was safer to say than to leave to be silently understood and perhaps misunderstood. She gave an impatient sigh. She had always ruled her father and brother and the Palace Bukaty, and this sense of powerlessness was new to her.

While they approached, Martin continued to talk in his eager, laughing way, and Cartoner smiled slowly as he listened.

”I saw you,” he said to Wanda, as he took off his hat, ”and went the other way to avoid you.”

And, having made this plain statement, he stood silently looking at her. He looked into her eyes, and she met his odd, direct gaze without embarra.s.sment.

”Cartoner and I,” Prince Martin hastened to explain, ”travelled from Berlin together, and we agreed then that, much as we might desire it, it would be inconvenient for me to show him that attention which one would naturally want to show to an Englishman travelling in Poland. That is why he went the other way when he saw you.”

Wanda looked at Cartoner with her quick, shrewd smile. It would have been the obvious thing to have confirmed this explanation. But Cartoner kept silent. He had acquired, it seemed, the fatal habit--very rare among men and almost unknown in women--of thinking before he spoke.

Which habit is deadly for that which is called conversation, because if one decides not to give speech to the obvious and the unnecessary and the futile there is in daily intercourse hardly anything left.

”You see,” said Martin, who always had plenty to say for himself, ”in this province of Russia we are not even allowed to choose our own friends.”

”Even in a free country one does not pick one's friends out, like the best strawberries from a basket,” said Wanda.

”Not a question to be arranged beforehand,” put in Cartoner.

”Not even by the governor-general of Poland?” asked Wanda, looking thoughtfully at the falling leaves which a sudden gust of wind had showered round them.

”Not even by the Czar.”

”Who, I am told, means well!” said Martin, ironically, and with a gay laugh, for irony and laughter may be a.s.similated by the young. ”Poor man! It must be terrible to know that people are saying behind one's back that one means well! I hope no one will ever say that of me.”

Wanda had sat down again, and was stirring the dead leaves with her walking-stick.

”Martin and I are going for a tramp,” she said. ”We like to get away from the noise and the dust--and the uniforms.”

But Martin sat down beside her and made room for Cartoner.

”We attract less attention than if we stand,” he explained. And Cartoner took the seat offered. ”Such hospitality as our circ.u.mstances allow us to offer you,” commented the young prince, gayly, ”a clean stone seat on the sunny side of a public garden.”

”But let us understand each other,” put in Wanda, in her practical way, and looked from one man to the other with those gay, blue eyes that saw so much, ”since we are conspirators.”

”The better we understand each other the better conspirators we shall be,” said Cartoner.

”I notice you don't ask, 'What is the plot?'” said Wanda.

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