Everymans Land | Page 8

C.N. Williamson and A.M. Williamson
your brother's pictures," he says gravely. I know that he wishes to see me, not the pictures, and he knows that I know; but I let it go at that.
When the sketch has been wrapped up between cardboards, and the twelve hundred francs placed carelessly on a table, there seems no reason why Mr. Jim Wyndham shouldn't start for the cathedral. But he suddenly decides that the way of wisdom is to eat first, and begs me to lunch with him. "Do, please," he begs, "just to show you're not offended with my false pretences."
I yearn to say yes, and don't see why I shouldn't; so I do. We have déjeuner together in the summer-house where Brian and I always eat. We chat about a million things. We linger over our coffee, and I smoke two or three of his gold-tipped Egyptians. When we suppose an hour has gone by, at most, behold, it is half-past four! I tell him he must start: he will be too late for the cathedral at its best. He says, "Hang the cathedral!" and refuses to stir unless I promise to dine with him when he comes back.
"You mean in a fortnight?" I ask. "Probably we shan't be here."
"I mean this evening."
"But--you're not coming back! You're going another way. You told me----"
"Ah, that was before we were friends. Of course I'm coming back. I'd like to stay to-morrow, and----"
"You certainly must not! I won't dine with you to-night if you do."
"Will you if I don't?"
"Perhaps."
"Then I'll order the dinner before I start for the cathedral. I want it to be a perfect one."
"But--I've said only perhaps."
"Don't you want to pour a little honest gold into poor old Madame Mounet's pocket?"
"Ye-es."
"If so, you mustn't chase away her customers."
"For her sake, the dinner is a bargain!"
"Not the least bit for my sake?"
"Oh, but yes! I've enjoyed our talk. And you've been so nice about my brother's pictures."
So it is settled. I put on my prettiest dress, white muslin, with some fresh red roses Madame Mounet brings me; and the dinner-table in the summer-house is a picture, with pink Chinese lanterns, pink-shaded candles, and pink geraniums. Madame won't decorate with roses because she explains, roses anywhere except on my toilette, "spoil the unique effect of Mademoiselle."
The little inn on the canal-side buzzes with excitement. Not within the memory of man or woman has there been so important a client as Mr. Jim Wyndham. Most motoring millionaires dash by in a cloud of dust to the cathedral town, where a smart modern hotel has been run up to cater for tourists. This magnificent Monsieur Américain engages the "suite of the Empress Eugénie," as it grandly advertises itself, for his own use and that of his chauffeur, merely to bathe in, and rest in, though they are not to stay the night. And the dinner ordered will enable Madame to show what she can do, a chance she rarely gets from cheeseparing customers, like Brian and me, and others of our ilk.
I am determined not to betray my childish eagerness by being first at the rendezvous. I keep to my hot room, until I spy a tall young figure of a man in evening dress striding toward the arbour. To see this sight, I have to be at my window; but I hide behind a white curtain and a screen of wistaria and roses. I count sixty before I go down. I walk slowly. I stop and examine flowers in the garden. I could catch a wonderful gold butterfly, but perhaps it is as happy as I am. I wouldn't take its life for anything on earth! As I watch it flutter away, my host comes out of the arbour to meet me.
We pass two exquisite hours in each other's company. I recall each subject on which we touch and even the words we speak, as if all were written in a journal. The air is so clear and still that we can hear the famous chimes of the cathedral clock, far away, in the town that is a bank of blue haze on the horizon. At half-past nine I begin to tell my host that he must go, but he does not obey till after ten. Then at last he takes my hand for good-bye--no, au revoir: he will not say good-bye! "In two weeks," he repeats, "we shall meet again. I shall have won my bet, and I shall bring you the thing I win."
"I won't take it!" I laugh.
"Wait till you see it, before you make sure."
"I'm not even sure yet of seeing you," I remind him.
"You may be sure if I'm alive. I shall scour the country for miles around to find you. I shall succeed--unless I'm dead."
All this time he had been holding my
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