Casimir, the handsome Pole, glib of tongue, the heir to a thousand minor graces, reckless in outpouring the wine of Life, had truly gone the downward way with all the abandon of his showy, insincere race. Hawke well knew the final level of misery awaiting the wandering, broken-down artist here in a land where really fine music was a mere drug; where the orchestra was only a cheap lure to enhance the cafe addition. The “Professor” was but a minor staff officer of the grim Teutonic Oberkellner of the Brasserie Concert.
“But how shall I muzzle this Robert Macaire of the bow?” cogitated Hawke, as he anxiously eyed the two windows of Madame Louison’s rooms, and then sternly gazed at the open front doors of the Hotel Faucon.
A light broke in upon his brain. “There is the golden lure of the Misses Phenie and Genie Forbes, of Chicago, U. S. A. Those madcap girls will be easily gulled. They arrive to-morrow at nine. A few stage asides, as to the stock romance of every Polish upstart, will do the trick!”
“Russian brutality, fugitive Prince, Siberian wanderings, romantic escape, killed the Russian general who burned his chateau; all that sort of thing will enchant these. This may occupy Casimir and leave me free. When the devil is idle he catches flies, and under the cover of this rosy glow of romance I will get away to India, but only after Madame Alixe Delavigne goes. I can afford to put in ten pounds on Casimir to loosen his lying tongue. In vino veritas may apply even to a gallant and distinguished Pole. If I can get the true story of Alixe Delavigne’s life, then I have the key of the Johnstone mystery. Ah! There is now a duty signal for me!” The Major smartly approached the main entrance of that cosiest of Swiss family hotels, the Faucon, as the anxious face of a woman nurse appeared. “Madame veut bien voir Monsieur!” simply announced the servant. Major Hawke brushed by her with a nod and quickly mounted the stair. To his utter surprise, on entering Madame Berthe Louison’s apartment, the signs of an approaching departure were but too evident. A stout Swiss maiden was busied stolidly packing several trunks in an indiscriminate haste, while the fair invalid herself sat at the center table poring over an opened Baedeker and the outspread maps brought on by her “business agent.” Hawke’s murmured astonishment was at once cut short by the decisive notes of Berthe Louison’s flutelike voice.
“We have no time to waste, Major!” she said, with an affected cheerfulness. “I am all right now. There is an eleven-thirty train for Constance. I will take that, reach Munich, and get right over to Venice by the Brenner Pass, and thence go down to Aricona, and Brindisi. You can return to Geneva, and, by Mont Cenis and Turin you will reach Brindisi before me. So, I leave to-night; you can go up to Geneva to-morrow night. No one will possibly suspect our business connection in this way. I will have time to see you depart for Bombay, before I take the steamer for Calcutta. I have marked off the sailings. This little occurrence here to-night has brought us both too much under the eyes of other people.”
“Bah!” said the astounded Major. “No one knows anything of us here. We are of no importance.”
“You think so?” mused the woman, as if careless of his presence. “And yet I have seen a face here, rising out of a past that is long dead and buried. Now, are you ready to meet me at Brindisi?”
Alan Hawke blushed even through the sun-browned complexion of the Nepaul days, as the clear-eyed woman, faintly smiling, discerned his “hedging” policy.
“You will not be put to the slightest inconvenience.” She opened a handsome traveling bag. The falcon-eyed Major Hawke observed the gleam of a pearl handled and silver chased revolver of serviceable make, and there was also a very wicked-looking Venetian dagger lying on the table, even then within the lady’s reach! “Here is the sum of five hundred pounds in English notes,” said Berthe. “That will neatly take you to Delhi, and there is fifty more to liquidate my bill, and pay the medical expenses. I am not desirous that the landlord should know of my departure. You may bring all my trunks on. I will be waiting for you at the ‘Vittorio Emmanuele’ at Brindisi. Please do telegraph to me from Turin of your arrival.”
Cool globe-trotter as he was, Alan Hawke was speechless. “Shall I not see you safely on board the Constance train?” he muttered.