The End of Her Honeymoon | Page 4

bore,
darling--but they don't seem to have any rooms vacant."

But even as he spoke the fat, cheerful-looking Frenchwoman put her
hand on the young Englishman's arm. She had seen the smart-looking
box of the bride, the handsome crocodile skin bag of the bridegroom,
and again she burst forth, uttering again and again the word "arranger."
Dampier turned once more, this time much relieved, to his wife:
"Madame Poulain (that's her name, it seems) thinks she can manage to
put us up all right to-night, if we don't mind two very small
rooms--unluckily not on the same floor. But some people are going
away to-morrow and then she'll have free some charming rooms
overlooking the garden."
He took a ten-franc piece out of his pocket as he spoke, and handed it
to the gratified cabman:--"It doesn't seem too much for a drive through
fairyland"--he said aside to his wife.
And Nancy nodded contentedly. It pleased her that her Jack should be
generous--the more that she had found out in the last three weeks that if
generous, he was by no means a spendthrift. He had longed to buy a
couple of Persian prayer carpets in that queer little warehouse where a
French friend of his had taken them in Lyons, but he had resisted the
temptation--nobly.
Meanwhile Madame Poulain was talking, talking, talking--emphasising
all she said with quick, eager gestures.
"They are going to put you in their own daughter's room, darling. She's
luckily away just now. So I think you will be all right. I, it seems, must
put up with a garret!"
"Oh, must you be far away from me?" she asked a little plaintively.
"Only for to-night, only till to-morrow, sweetheart."
And then they all began going up a winding staircase which started
flush from the wall to the left.
First came Madame Poulain, carrying a candle, then Monsieur Poulain

with his new English clients, and, last of all, the loutish lad carrying
Nancy's trunk. They had but a little way to go up the shallow slippery
stairs, for when they reached the first tiny landing Madame Poulain
opened a curious, narrow slit of a door which seemed, when shut, to be
actually part of the finely panelled walls.
"Here's my daughter's room," said the landlady proudly. "It is very
comfortable and charming."
"What an extraordinary little room!" whispered Nancy.
And Dampier, looking round him with a good deal of curiosity, agreed.
In the days when the Hôtel Saint Ange belonged to the great soldier
whose name it still bears, this strange little apartment had surely been,
so the English artist told himself, a powdering closet. Even now the
only outside light and air came from a small square window which had
evidently only recently been cut through the thick wall. In front of this
aperture fluttered a bright pink curtain.
Covering three of the walls as well as the low ceiling, was a paper
simulating white satin powdered with rose-buds, and the bed, draped
with virginal muslin curtains, was a child's rather than a woman's bed.
"What's that?" asked Dampier suddenly. "A cupboard?"
He had noticed that wide double doors, painted in the pale brownish
grey called grisaille, formed the further side of the tiny apartment.
Madame Poulain, turning a key, revealed a large roomy space now
fitted up as a cupboard. "It's a way through into our bedroom,
monsieur," she said smiling. "We could not of course allow our
daughter to be far from ourselves."
And Dampier nodded. He knew the ways of French people and
sympathised with those ways.
He stepped up into the cupboard, curious to see if this too had been a

powdering closet, and if that were so if the old panelling and
ornamentation had remained in their original condition.
Thus for a moment was Dampier concealed from those in the room.
And during that moment there came the sound of footsteps on the
staircase, followed by the sudden appearance on the landing outside the
open door of the curious little apartment of two tall figures--a girl in a
lace opera cloak, and a young man in evening dress.
Nancy Dampier, gazing at them, a little surprised at the abrupt
apparition, told herself that they must be brother and sister, so striking
was their resemblance to one another.
"We found the porte cochère open, Madame Poulain, so we just came
straight in. Good night!"
The young lady spoke excellent French, but as she swept on up the
staircase out of sight there came a quick low interchange of English
words between herself and the man with her.
"Daisy? Did you notice that beautiful young woman? A regular stunner!
She must be that daughter the Poulains are always talking about."
And then "Daisy's" answer floated down. "Yes, I noticed her--she is
certainly very pretty. But