"Well, no," said the Belgian, laughing. "No, I hardly think so. Good-bye! Think over what I've told you. Good-bye!" He went away down the stair, and Ste. Marie returned to his unpacking.
Nothing more of consequence occurred in the next few days. Hartley had unearthed a somewhat shabby adventurer, who swore to having seen the Irishman, O'Hara, in Paris within a month, but it was by no means certain that this being did not merely affirm what he believed to be desired of him, and in any case the information was of no especial value, since it was O'Hara's present whereabouts that was the point at issue. So it came to Thursday evening. Ste. Marie received a note from Captain Stewart during the day, reminding him that he was to come to the Rue du Faubourg St. Honoré that evening, and asking him to come early, at ten or thereabouts, so that the two could have a comfortable chat before any one else turned up. Ste. Marie had about decided not to go at all, but the courtesy of this special invitation from Miss Benham's uncle made it rather impossible for him to stay away. He tried to persuade Hartley to follow him later on in the evening, but that gentleman flatly refused, and went away to dine with some English friends at Armenonville.
So Ste. Marie, in a vile temper, dined quite alone at Lavenue's, beside the Gare Montparnasse, and towards ten o'clock drove across the river to the Rue du Faubourg. Captain Stewart's flat was up five stories, at the top of the building in which it was located, and so well above the noises of the street. Ste. Marie went up in the automatic lift, and at the door above his host met him in person, saying that the one servant he kept was busy making preparations in the kitchen beyond. They entered a large room, long but comparatively shallow, in shape not unlike the sitting-room in the Rue d'Assas but very much bigger, and Ste. Marie uttered an exclamation of surprise and pleasure, for he had never before seen an interior anything like this. The room was decorated and furnished entirely in Chinese and Japanese articles of great age and remarkable beauty. Ste. Marie knew little of the hieratic art of these two countries, but he fancied that the place must be an endless delight to the expert.
The general tone of the room was gold, dulled and softened by great age until it had ceased to glitter, and relieved by the dusty Chinese blue, and by old red faded to rose, and by warm ivory tints. The great expanse of the walls was covered by a brownish-yellow cloth, coarse, like burlap, and against it round the room hung sixteen large panels representing the sixteen Rakan. They were early copies—fifteenth century, Captain Stewart said—of those famous originals by the Chinese Sung master Ririomin, which have been for six hundred years or more the treasures of Japan. They were mounted upon Japanese brocade of blue and dull gold, framed in keyaki wood, and, out of their brown time-stained shadows, the great Rakan scowled or grinned or placidly gazed, grotesquely graceful masterpieces of a perished art.
At the far end of the room, under a gilded canopy of intricate wood-carving, stood upon his pedestal of many-petalled lotus a great statue of Amida Buddha in the yogi attitude of contemplation, and at intervals against the other walls other smaller images stood or sat; Buddha in many incarnations; Kwannon, Goddess of Mercy; Jizo Bosatzu; Hotei, pot-bellied, God of Contentment; Jingo-Kano, God of War. In the centre of the place was a Buddhist temple table; and priests' chairs, lacquered and inlaid, stood about the room. The floor was covered by Chinese rugs, dull yellow with blue flowers; and over a doorway which led into another room was fixed a huge rama of Chinese pierced carving, gilded, in which there were trees and rocks and little grouped figures of the hundred immortals.
It was indeed an extraordinary room. Ste. Marie looked about its mellow glow with a half-comprehending wonder, and he looked at the man beside him curiously, for here was another side to this many-sided character. Captain Stewart smiled.
"You like my museum?" he asked. "Few people care much for it except, of course, those who go in for the Oriental arts. Most of my friends think it bizarre—too grotesque and unusual. I have tried to satisfy them by including those comfortable low divan couches (they refuse altogether to sit in the priests' chairs), but still they are unhappy." He called his servant, who came to take Ste. Marie's hat and coat, and returned with smoking things.
"It seems entirely wonderful to me," said the younger man. "I'm not an expert at all—I don't know who the gentlemen in those sixteen panels are, for example; but it is very beautiful. I have never seen anything like it at all." He gave a little laugh.
"Will it sound very impertinent in me, I wonder, if I express surprise—not surprise at finding this magnificent room, but at discovering that this sort of thing is a taste and, very evidently, a serious study of yours? You—I remember your saying once with some feeling that it was youth and beauty and—well, freshness that you liked best to be surrounded by. This," said Ste. Marie, waving an inclusive hand, "was young so many centuries ago! It fairly breathes antiquity and death."
"Yes," said Captain Stewart thoughtfully. "Yes, that is quite true." The two had seated themselves upon one of the broad low benches which had been built into the place to satisfy the philistine.