“I think, Colonel, the most important thing about a wife is not the colour of her skin.”
“There you’re wrong, entirely wrong. Your fair white woman may be cold, may be irritating, she may henpeck you by day, she may nag at you at night. But for treachery, for unfaithfulness, for every quality which leads a man to ruin, despair and dishonour, go to your dark-complexioned woman. Ella is my niece, and as she is plain, she may go through life without doing much harm. But I would rather see a hump grow on her shoulders, and flames come from her mouth as she talked, than see her marry a man in whom I take an interest, as I do in you, George.”
“You need have no fear in this case, Colonel, for she won’t have me,” said Lauriston, not attempting to combat the Colonel’s superstitious prejudices, which were as strong as those of any old woman.
And as, in his relief on finding that his fears were groundless, Lord Florencecourt let his hand drop from the young man’s arm, the latter took the opportunity to bid him good-night and walk off with the excuse of an appointment.
If even Ella’s skin was too dark to please him, what would the Colonel find to say of Nouna’s, he thought, wondering how the old soldier had picked up his strong prejudice. Could he really have been once under the sway of a woman compared to whom even the present Lady Florencecourt, with all her tyranny, ill-humour and caprices, was as light after darkness? Lauriston had no means of telling, and the question did not trouble him long. For to-night was the last night of the week in the course of which Nouna had made him swear that he would return, and he knew that the girl was even now anxiously on the watch for him. He felt that he would have done better to have made his call that morning, to have seen her under the prosaic influences of daylight and Mrs. Ellis, as he had intended to do. But a friend had called unexpectedly to carry him off to Hurlingham, and had left him no chance of keeping his oath except by slipping a note into the letter-box of 36, Mary Street, in the darkness of the evening. This would satisfy his conscience and save him from the danger of the girl’s alluring eyes.
Yet as he walked quickly through the quiet West-End streets, past brightly-lighted houses, where a strip of carpet was thrown across the pavement, and a seedy, silent old man or a couple of lads waited to see the ladies come out, Lauriston felt his heart beating faster as the image of the little Indian girl came to his mind with a thousandfold additional charm after his evening spent in the commonplace ennui of a London dinner-party. He honestly tried to think of Ella—good, clever little Ella—whose kindness and sweetness had touched him so much only half-an-hour ago. But then had she not herself rejected his offered homage, thrown him back on the charm that was now drawing him with an attraction which grew stronger with his resistance to it?
He reached Mary Street at last. By this time it had grown so dark that it was reasonable to think he might drop his note in the letter-box and walk away without being seen. But he knew all the same that he should not be allowed to do so. The lights were burning both on the first-floor and the ground-floor of No. 36 when he slipped his little missive into the box; as he did so the blind of one of the ground-floor windows was raised, and a woman looked out and instantly disappeared. He thought he would not ring, but was lingering for one moment on the doorstep almost as if he knew that his presence must be known, when he heard the chain drawn and the door opened. He felt that his whole body was throbbing with fierce excitement.
But it was not Nouna. It was the dark-complexioned Rahas whom he had treated so unceremoniously on his first visit, and who now stood in the same handsome Eastern dress he had worn on that occasion, but with a very different demeanour, holding the door wide open, and with dignified and courteous words inviting the young Englishman to enter. Lauriston, after a moment’s hesitation, accepted the invitation, and passing in stood in the hall while his host closed the door, wondering what were to be his adventures that night. The shutting of the door was accomplished very slowly, with infinite precautions against noise, while Lauriston glanced up the staircase, listened intently for a light footfall, and felt all the enervating rapture which the near neighbourhood of his first passionate love gives to a very young man. Turning rather suddenly again towards his companion, he found the eyes of the Oriental fixed upon him in what struck him as a peculiar manner. As their eyes met, the merchant, with a low bow and a gesture of courteous invitation, held open the door on the left and ushered his visitor in. Lauriston entered with a glance at the doors and a glance at the windows to decide upon the best way of escape should the conduct of the gentleman in the fez be consistent with the sinister expression of his face.
CHAPTER VI.
We have all met fairly bad people with strikingly good faces, and perhaps fairly good people with strikingly bad faces; but when the eyes of a stranger who has no reason to love you are much nearer together than beauty demands, when his lips are thin, straight, and very close under his nose, moreover when he smiles at you with his mouth only and shows you even more politeness than the occasion requires, you must be more than simple-minded to put implicit trust in him.