At the Sign of the Sword: A Story of Love and War in Belgium. Le Queux William
other. “That is why, in such circumstances as these, a union of our houses would be so intensely desirable. Have you spoken to Mademoiselle Aimée again?” he asked, regarding the Baron with those narrow, crafty eyes of his.
“Yes,” was the reply.
“And what has Mademoiselle said?”
“Up to the present,” sighed the Baron, “she is still obdurate.”
“Because of that good-looking avocat– eh?” he retorted. “Why do you allow her still to meet the fellow?”
“She does not meet him to my knowledge.”
“She does – almost daily. I have set watch upon them. They met to-day – in the Bois, at five o’clock.”
The Baron was again silent for a few moments. Then he said:
“Valentin has, it seems, made quite a sensational success in the Affaire of the Rue du Trône. There is a long account in to-night’s papers. Berton, the Minister of Justice, was speaking of it.”
“But surely you will not allow your daughter to marry a penniless lawyer?” protested the financier. “Think what you and I could do, if only we amalgamated upon fair and equivalent business lines. As you well know, I am extremely fond of Aimée.”
“You have spoken to her, she tells me.”
“I have. But, unfortunately, she treats me with a calm and utter indifference.”
“Perhaps she will, eventually, grow tired of Edmond Valentin’s attentions,” her father suggested.
“Never,” growled Rigaux. “I believe she loves the fellow. But if you were only firm, my dear friend, she would, in the end, consent to marry me.”
“I am firm.”
“Yet you allow them to meet daily!”
“How can I prevent it?”
“By sending her away – say to England. I will go to England also.”
“My own opinion is that you would fare no better in England than here. Aimée is a girl of spirit. She may be led, but driven never,” her father declared emphatically.
“But cannot you compel her to give up this man?” urged Rigaux eagerly.
“Have I not tried, for weeks and weeks? Personally, my friend, I don’t think you dance attendance sufficiently upon her, if you really mean to win her. She has been spoiled ever since a child, and likes lots of attention.”
Arnaud Rigaux’s brows narrowed slightly, for he at once realised that what the Baron said was the truth. He had certainly been deficient in his amorous advances, for, truth to tell, he had become so utterly blasé that few women nowadays attracted him.
“Yes,” he sighed grossly. “Perhaps you are right, Baron. Is she at home this evening?”
“She’s alone in the petit salon, reading, I believe. My wife is out at dinner with the wife of the Roumanian Minister.”
“Then, if there is nothing else for us to discuss, I will go down and spend an hour with her – eh?”
“Très bien,” acceded the Baron, while Rigaux, casting away his cigar, settled his cravat before a big mirror at the end of the room, smoothed his hair with both his hands, and left.
Passing down the softly carpeted corridor he paused before a door, and opening it entered, to find himself in a good-sized salon carpeted in Saxe blue, with white enamelled walls and gilt furniture of the style of Louis Quatorze. Over the elegant apartment was suffused a soft light, the source of which was cunningly concealed behind the wide cornice running round the walls, the electric glow being thrown down by the white ceiling itself.
Upon a side-table stood a great silver bowl of La France roses, which filled the room with their fragrance, and near it, in a comfortable chaise-longue, reclined Aimée, looking sweet and dainty in a soft, filmy evening-gown of palest carnation pink.
She looked up from her book, startled, as the door opened, and then, recognising her visitor, rose, rather stiffly, to greet him.
“What, all alone, my dear Mademoiselle?” exclaimed Rigaux, as though in surprise, as he bowed over her hand. “I have been chatting with the Baron, but I expected to find Madame here. Well, and what do you think of all this very alarming news – eh?”
“Awful – is it not?” the girl replied, inviting him to a chair.
“The Baron and I have just been discussing it, and we are of opinion that there will be no war. I notice, however, in the papers to-night, a report of Monsieur Valentin’s great success in the Affaire of the Rue du Trône. I must congratulate him – and yourself.”
The girl blushed slightly. It was the first time this man, whom she so heartily hated, had ever mentioned her lover. Indeed, she was not, until that moment, quite certain whether he was aware of her secret – whether the Baron had told him.
“Yes,” she managed to reply at last. “It should secure him a foothold in his profession. The papers say that his speech for the defence was apparently one of the most clever and brilliant ever heard in the Courts.”
“And you, of course, must be justly proud, eh, Mademoiselle?” he remarked, looking straight into her beautiful eyes.
“Well, I suppose so,” she laughed, her fingers toying nervously with the leaves of Bazin’s latest romance.
He sighed deeply. Then, after a pause, said:
“Ah! I only wish that you entertained one little thought for me, Aimée – one kindly reflection regarding myself – I who love you so.”
And, bending, he stretched forth his hand to seize hers. But she swiftly withdrew it.
“Oh, why return to that subject again, m’sieur!” she protested impatiently. “Its discussion only pains us both. I am fully aware that my father is anxious, for business reasons, that we should marry, but I assure you, once and for all, that I will never accept any man whom I do not love.”
“You put it – well, a trifle bluntly, Mademoiselle.”
“I only speak the truth, quite openly and frankly,” she responded, her big serious eyes turned upon his. “Would you have me accept, and afterwards fool you!”
Her question – a somewhat disconcerting one – held him silent for some moments.
“Remember, Aimée,” he said at last, in a deep voice, “I have known you ever since you were a tiny child. I have watched you grow to become a woman, and gradually I have realised that there is no woman in the whole world whom I love – except your own dear self. Can you doubt me?”
And with an earnest expression that was well feigned, he looked straight into her pale, set countenance.
“No, m’sieur, I do not doubt you,” was the girl’s quiet response, and he fancied he saw her trembling slightly. “But when, the other day, you asked if I could ever love you, I told you the bare truth – brutal as it may have appeared. Yet I am not mistress of my own heart, and I tell you that I do not love you – I can never love you —never!”
“I am too old,” he murmured bitterly.
“Not that,” she responded, shaking her well-poised head. “Age matters nothing when a woman really loves.”
“You love that man Edmond Valentin,” he snapped, almost savagely.
She nodded in the affirmative, but no word escaped her lips.
Arnaud Rigaux set his teeth, and his fingers clenched themselves into his palms. But only for a second, and she, with her eyes cast down upon the carpet, did not detect the fire of hatred which shone, for a second, in his crafty, narrow-set eyes.
Next second his manner entirely changed. He was one of those men whose cunning enables them to conceal their feelings so cleverly that, while they smile and hold out the hand of friendship, murder lurks within their heart. This attribute is,