Part 35 (1/2)

”Hate you. Why?”

”You could no longer grasp my hand or kiss my lips,” she faltered. ”No, you must not, you shall not know, for I could not bear that you of all men should spurn me, leave me, and remember me only with loathing. I could not bear it. I would rather kill myself.”

She was trembling, her breast rose and fell with the exertion of the steep ascent, and her face was blanched and haggard. Her att.i.tude, whenever he referred to Zertho, always mystified and puzzled him. Had she not spoken vaguely of some strange crime?

Yet he loved her with all the strength of his being, and the sight of her terrible anxiety and dread pained him beyond measure. He was ready and willing to do anything to a.s.sist and liberate her from the mysterious thraldom, nevertheless she preserved a silence dogged and complete. He strove to discern a way out of the complicated situation, but could discover none.

”Have you ever been to the Villa Fortunee before?” he asked presently, after a long and painful silence, when they had crossed the sunny square before the Prince's palace, and were strolling along the road which skirted the rock with the small blue bay to their left and the white houses of Monte Carlo gleaming beyond.

”No,” she answered. ”I had no idea Mariette, `The Golden Hand,' lived here. She used always to live at the little bijou villa in the Rue Cotta at Nice.”

”The Golden Hand!” he exclaimed, laughing. ”Why do you call her that?”

”It is the name she has earned at the tables because of her extraordinary good fortune,” Liane answered. ”Her winnings at trente-et-quarante are said to have been greater perhaps than any other player during the past few years.”

At that moment the road turned sharply, almost at right angles, and Liane found herself before the great white house where lived the notorious gambler, the woman whose powdered, painted face every habitue of Monte Carlo knew so well, and whose luck was the envy of them all.

She read the name of the villa upon the marble tablet, and for a moment hesitated and held back, fearing to meet face to face the woman she held in fear. But George had already entered the gateway and ascended the steps, and she felt impelled to follow, a few moments later taking a seat in the cool handsome salon where the flowers diffused a sweet subtle perfume, and the light was softly tempered by the closed sun-shutters.

Liane and her lover sat facing each other, the silence being complete save for the swish of the sea as it broke ever and anon upon the brown rocks deep below. A moment later, however, there was a sound of the opening and shutting of doors, and with a frou-frou of silk there entered ”The Golden Hand.”

She wore an elegant dress of pale mauve trimmed with velvet, and as she came forward into the room a smile of welcome played upon her lips, but George thought she looked older and more haggard than when he had visited her only two days before.

Closing the door quietly behind her, she crossed almost noiselessly to where they were seated, and sinking upon a settee expressed pleasure at receiving their visit.

”I was not exactly certain whether you would come, you know,” she exclaimed, with a coquettish laugh. ”I was afraid Liane would refuse.”

”You told me that you were her friend,” he said.

”And that was the entire truth,” she answered.

Liane faced her, her countenance pale, her lips parted. She had held back in fear when this woman had entered, but the calm expression and pleasant smile had now entirely disarmed her suspicions. Yet she feared lest this woman whom she had known in the old days, should divulge the secret she had kept from her lover. George, the man she adored, was, she knew, fast slipping away from her. On the one hand she was forced to marry Zertho, while on the other this very woman, whom she feared, was to be bribed to accept her lover as husband. Liane looked into her face and tried to read her thoughts. But her countenance had grown cold and mysterious.

”You were not always my friend,” she said at last, in a low, strained tone.

”No, not always,” the woman admitted, in English. ”I have seldom been generous towards my own s.e.x. I was, it is true, Liane, until recently, your enemy,” she added, in a sympathetic tone. ”I should be now if it were not for recent events.”

”You intend, then, to prove my friend,” Liane gasped excitedly, half-rising from her chair. ”You--you will say nothing.”

”On the contrary, I shall speak the truth.”

”Ah, no,” she wailed. ”No, spare me that. Think! Think! surely my lot is hard enough to bear! Already I have lost George, the man I love.”

”Your loss is my gain,” Mariette Lepage said slowly. ”You have lost a lover, while I have found a husband.”

”And you will marry him--you?” she cried, dismayed.

”I know what are your thoughts,” the other said. ”My reputation is unenviable--eh?”

Liane did not answer; her lover sat rigid and silent.

”Well,” went on the woman known at the tables as ”The Golden Hand,” ”I cannot deny it. All that you see here, my house, my furniture, my pictures, the very clothes I wear, I have won fairly at the tables, because--well, because I am, I suppose, one of the fortunate ones.