The House of Peril (Ainslee's, 1911)/Chapter 6

Bill Oldchester stayed at Enghien three days—the three most uncomfortable days he had ever spent. For one thing, he found that he could not sleep. If he had not been the sensible man he prided himself on being, he would have been almost tempted to think that the bedroom he occupied at the pleasant Pension Malfait was haunted. Even on that first night, when he had been so tired after the long journey from England, he had lain awake, hour after hour, finding it impossible to sleep. And when at last he had fallen into a heavy, troubled slumber, he had been disturbed by unpleasant dreams—dreams in which Mabel Blackett played a part, though when he woke up he could not remember what it was she had done.

Although by the time he woke up it was broad daylight, with the sun streaming into the room through the chinks left by the thick curtains, he had waked with the strong feeling that there was some one in the room with him, and that odd impression that he was never alone when in that room never left him—indeed, it had grown stronger and stronger.

After two practically sleepless nights he asked to have the room changed, but the proprietor of the boarding house informed him civilly that there was not another room vacant.

“You only have that apartment,” he observed, “because of a lady, Madame Olsen, who left us, rather unexpectedly, a fortnight ago. We let at the beginning of each season for the whole season, and every room I have is occupied.”

Oldchester had said nothing of all this to Mabel Blackett. For one thing, they were not on really good terms, for the morning after his arrival he and she had had a very sharp misunderstanding—to call it by no plainer name. On his expressing, as he thought very kindly, his surprise at finding her at such a place, Mabel, with heightened color, had at once put herself on the defensive, reminding him that she had a perfect right to go where she liked, and to do what she liked with her own money. Nay, more, she had even denied that there was the slightest harm in the kind of existence she was now leading, or in the play she indulged in at the Casino.

“Why, on the whole, I have actually won!” she had cried triumphantly.

And Oldchester, displeased, had looked at her in silence. It was not that he minded so much her losing her money—no doubt she could afford that; it was that she should enjoy winning.

Then her friendship with the Comte De Poupel—if indeed the fellow was a count at all—that also disturbed and astonished the American lawyer. Onlookers proverbially see most of the game, and Oldchester, much against his will, thought he saw that Mrs. Blackett was very fond of the Frenchman. It gradually became clear to him, for instance, that, though she did not mind gambling herself, she very much objected to the Comte De Poupel doing so. She did everything in her power to prevent his going to the Casino. So much Oldchester, with his perceptive faculties sharpened by a kind of sore jealousy, understood.

To the lawyer, Enghien seemed to have changed Mabel Blackett's whole nature; he was disagreeably aware that she was the center of attraction at Pension Noir; that is, that everybody was watching her—in fact, he soon became aware that he himself was being watched by some of the people there with covert amusement, and the fact made him uneasy and angry.

But Mabel was quite unaware of all this; she seemed only interested in two things in the world—in baccarat and in the Comte De Poupel. She also discussed at great length with Oldchester the problem of Madame Olsen's disappearance, and this annoyed him, for he could not make out why Mabel should care one way or the other about a person whom she had known only a few weeks.

From what Madame Wachner told him—and Oldchester was perforce thrown a good deal in the company of Madame Wachner—this Danish lady had not been a very suitable acquaintance for Mabel; indeed, it was through this Anna Olsen that Mrs. Blackett had come to Enghien. Her disappearance had been a very good thing. But for that perhaps poor Mabel would have gone on to Monte Carlo for the winter, and would have become a confirmed gambler—so at least Madame Wachner seemed to think.

On what was to be the last day of Oldchester's unsatisfactory visit to Enghien, the people in Mabel's pension all went for a picnic in the Forest of Montmorency, and after they had had luncheon Oldchester had been the unwilling witness of a curious, little scene.

Leaving the others still sitting on the grass together, he had got up and strolled away in search of Mabel and the Comte De Poupel. For a while he had searched for them in vain; then, unexpectedly, he had seen them—seen them some few moments before they became aware of his presence.

They were standing opposite one another in a little glade; the count was talking rapidly and very earnestly in French, while Mabel listened to him with downcast eyes. Suddenly she looked up and put out her hand, very deliberately. The count took the little hand in his, and held it for what seemed to the onlooker a long time—in reality perhaps for thirty seconds—then, after raising it to his lips, he let it go.

Oldchester had turned on his heel, walking rapidly away, careless as to whether they were aware or not of his eavesdropping. How odious it was to see Mabel flirting! He had never known her do such a thing at home, in America. Both as a girl and since her widowhood, she had been reserved and staid beyond her years.

But Bill Oldchester was destined to yet another surprise. The morning of the day he was leaving Enghien, the Comte De Poupel came up to him.

“I also am leaving this place to-day,” he said, “and I also am going to Switzerland. Perhaps, Mr. Oldchester, we might travel part of the way together.”

For the first time the American looked cordially at the Frenchman, although his brow clouded somewhat when the count added very earnestly—more earnestly than the occasion warranted:

“I do wish we could persuade Mrs. Blackett to come with us. Enghien is not a nice place for her to be in alone by herself.”

But Mabel refused to leave Enghien, and Oldchester and she had a painful discussion, during which she begged him passionately to mind his own business, and to leave her to do what she thought best for her own comfort and happiness.

“Can't you see that I am miserable?” she had flashed out. “The little amusement—well, yes, the gambling—you grudge me is the only thing that takes me out of myself!”

He had been present when she had made an appointment with the Wachners to meet them at the Casino that very evening, and then to go home with them to supper, and he had felt vaguely glad that they. at any rate, were there to look after her.

She had accompanied both travelers to the station, talking a great deal and laughing gayly, more animated than Oldchester had ever seen her. And at the very last, on the platform, she had suddenly become far more like her old self.

“I don't suppose I shall really stay here very long, after all.” Such had been her last whispered words to Bill Oldchester.

To the Comte De Poupel she had simply given her hand, silently.