The woman of mystery, in the act of raising the lid of a trunk before which she was kneeling, let it fall with a crash that drew a faint sudden sound of pain from her.
"It was the lock," she faltered, rising to her feet, and leaning against the tall French window frame, rather pale and holding her hand. "Oh, not really hurt; it only smarts for the moment. But what were you saying? I beg pardon. You recognized a friend at Monte Carlo Station yesterday? How observant you are, dear Mrs. Allonby! And one English boy is so like another."
"But this one has such a happy laugh, so infectious, so jolly, so devil-may-care. And that painted foreign thing was such a cat. She'd got her claws so deep in him. Such a Countess as poor Yvette's mother, I should say—a Countess in her own—wrong. I suspect there are tons of that sort at Monte Carlo."
"No doubt," Agatha returned, absently looking out of the window at the lights lying along the torrent-bed like a thin river of light, broadening into an estuary where the roofs of the town were crowded together by the darkened sea. "I think I will take your advice, dear Mrs. Allonby, and lie down till dinner. I'm more tired than I thought."
Chapter VIII
The Carnival
That Dorris Boundrish was an exceedingly pretty girl her severest critics could not deny, nor could her greatest admirers refrain from a suspicion that she was scarcely as irresistible or as brilliant as she imagined. Her mouth was like pink coral, small and sweet, but with hints of peevishness and discontent in the corners; her face had wild-rose tints; her eyes were clear, speedwell blue, but a little hard at times; something on her velvety forehead said, "Not much in here." Of that deficiency poor Miss Dorris was wholly unaware; on the contrary, she supposed the premises to be unusually spacious and well-stocked, and in this persuasion was benignantly given to impart her superfluous knowledge to an ungrateful world to an extent that sometimes made people thankful to be spared such information as that sea-water is too strong of salt to make a pleasant drink, or that two and two amount together to the round number of four.
All evils have their compensations; and this amiable weakness of Miss Dorris sometimes became a source of joy to the community of Les Oliviers, when properly manipulated by M. Isidore, for example. For it was the especial delight of this fair young creature to impart recently acquired knowledge to her neighbours, and recently acquired knowledge being undigested, and in many cases hastily and inaccurately received, sometimes emerges from its temporary lodging in the brain in a changed, even unrecognizable, form. Moreover, M. Isidore, having an imagination of unusual fertility and an impish delight in mischief, was tempted to confide myths having only a poetic and ideal foundation in fact, to the ear of Dorris, in the sure anticipation of hearing them issue in some novel form from the pink coral lips at table d'hôte; always providing he listened, as he frequently did, unseen behind an open door, to the general buzz of table talk, above which Miss Boundrish's arrogant treble shrilled high and incessant. When the intelligence conveyed by the pink coral lips was very wildly improbable, that every conscript, for example, during his first month of service, was dieted entirely on frogs to inspire him with martial courage, the thin man, usually silent, would, very gently expressing astonishment, venture to ask the source of Miss Boundrish's information.
"Oh, it's perfectly true, Mr. Welbourne," the overbearing treble would scream down the table, "I had it from a man who had been in the French army himself. The frogs are those little green things in the tanks, that are beginning to make such a croaking every night. Of course, you know that Mont Agel is terrain militaire, where nobody is allowed to go for fear of disturbing these frogs, which are kept in tanks on purpose. The diet is so stimulating, you know, it makes the soldiers long to fight."
"Really?" the thin man would murmur pensively. "How very interesting! What a remarkably ingenious people the French are! Would such an idea ever occur to the dull British brain, do you suppose?"