High Noon | Page 8

it had scarcely left him, waking or sleeping, for many, many years. Framed in the dark foliage, it leaned toward him over the parapet, half visible, half obscured.
In a twinkling the weight of a score of years slipped like a cloak from Paul's shoulders. With a wild, choking cry he leaped to his feet, and stretching both his arms above him, "My Queen! my Queen!" he called.
But as he moved the vision vanished. And Paul knew that it was only a cruel jest of Fate, and himself to be as ever but the plaything of his evil genius, which never ceased to torture him. Relentlessly the load of years crept back upon him and like an Old Man of the Sea wound themselves about his shoulders and clutched him in a viselike grip, and he sank with a convulsive gasp upon the bench again.
Soon the spasm passed. But for Paul the night was no longer beautiful. Only unutterable sadness seemed to pervade the place. The very air seemed heavy with oppressive grief. And rising, he tottered like an old man around to the foot of the steps and dragged himself slowly up.
He had reached the landing immediately above the bench he had just quitted when he saw a blur of white--an indistinct patch in the half-light. He reached forward, and his trembling fingers closed upon a lady's handkerchief. And then--he caught the faintest breath of a perfume, strange yet hauntingly familiar, as if the doors of the dead past had opened for an instant.
Heavens! Her perfume! His brain reeled. He rushed up to his sitting-room, and there, under the bright light, he examined the trophy. It was real--there was no doubt about that. Paul had half fancied that after all it was only another trick of his imagination. But there lay the scrap of filmy stuff upon his table, as tangible as the solid oak on which it rested.
He folded it carefully and placed it in his pocket. For some moments he pondered over the strange coincidence, and as he thought, the clouds lifted from his brain again. If this were chance, surely there was some consistency in it all. Fortune always sets mile-posts on the road to her, and with a thrill Paul realized that he was still a young man and that this tiny suggestion from the destiny which directs poor mortals' affairs was not to be disregarded. The time for action had come.
He descended briskly to the hall and scanned the visitors' list. The names--most of them--meant nothing. Except for Barclay and his party Paul knew no one in the place. Indeed, he had held himself aloof from chance acquaintances.
By this time no guests remained about the lounge. In the doorway stood Monsieur Jacques. Paul went up to him.
"I found a handkerchief outside just now," he said, forcing a careless voice. "Perhaps the lady to whom it belongs has just come in?"
"No one has entered for a quart d'heure, Sir Paul. H��las! It was not so in the old days. It was always gay then at this time of the night, with the band playing and all the guests chattering like mad." The ma?tre d'h?tel breathed a gentle sigh for the halcyon days of long ago.
Momentarily baffled, to his rooms Paul turned again, and threw himself into a big armchair, where he sat wondering till in the gray light of morning the formless shadows around him took the shape of the luxurious furnishings of his suite.
What face had peered at him through the branches? In spite of the token he had found on the steps, Paul could scarcely believe that the vision had been one of flesh and blood. The handkerchief with the familiar scent?--merely an odd coincidence. But still--well, the puzzle might be worth the solving.
At last he rose, and drawing the heavy hangings close to keep out the insistent light, he lay down upon his bed, to fall into a troubled sleep.
CHAPTER V
When he awoke it was almost noon, and too late to catch the Paris train. Fate again! And yet there arose no feeling of rebellion in Sir Paul. If he were in the hands of a great will, let that same will direct. There would be another train in the evening, but Paul would have none of it. His mood had changed. He could not leave the place quite yet. So he dressed leisurely; and it was not till mid-afternoon that his flannel-clad figure appeared upon the lawn. He had no energy for a walk or row, and spent the time till dinner reading and smoking.
That night he did not wish to dine alone. The approach of darkness, with its eerie suggestion of his strange experience of the night before, made him crave the society of his kind. As he passed through the