“Pension Paoli,” he answered.
CHAPTER THREE
THE POISONED PARADISE
1.
AN amiable, early morning sun was irradiating that great theatre which is Monte Carlo, and a regiment of stage hands were preparing the scene for another day. Hawk-eyed bands of them with brush and pan were grooming the cleanest streets in the world, pouncing triumphantly on burnt matches and unsightly cigarette ends. Other bands invaded the beautiful gardens, trimming each blade of grass to the same size and meticulously barbering each bud and flower. They moved with nonchalant grace, these brown-skinned Monegascans, as became the servitors of that great, benevolent institution, the Casino.
As Hugh passed through the gardens, breathing the perfumed air, a great delight glowed in him. His first impression was of the theatric quality of the place, its note of unreality. It was a fit setting for the pleasure-seeking hordes, for the legions of luxury, for these dreaming of fortune and those dead to hope. He never lost his sense of its unreality, of its being a stage scene, on which was played a daily drama in three acts: Morning, Afternoon, and Evening.
Passing between the Casino and the Hotel de Paris, he descended in the direction of the Condamine. At the top of a long hill, a little way past the post office, he paused with a joy that thrilled him to ecstasy....
He saw a little U shaped harbour shielded from the sea. It was as delicate as a pastel, a placque of sapphire set in pearl. In the crystal air the red-roofed houses crowded close to it. The terraced town rose on tip-toe to peer at it. It was all glitter and gleam, and radiant beauty. And yonder in sombre contrast rose the Rock, monstrous, mediæval,—so scornful of that hectic modernity across the bay....
He climbed the long steep hill, crossed the sunny square in front of the palace and plunged into the cool gloom of the narrow streets. Wandering idly along he came to a low brown house with a tiny porch, and four pepper-trees in front. He looked at it carelessly enough, then turned and wandered into the garden of the Prince. He gazed curiously at a broken pillar covered with ivy. There was a spring sunk deep in the rock; the flowers bloomed there; and bees and butterflies made the nook gay and tuneful. He found a bench that overlooked the glimmering sea and rested awhile.
As he sat pensively dreaming, two pale ghosts may have been watching him; a man strong and tall, a girl sweet and fragrant as a flower. Perhaps wrapt in that great love to which he owed his being, they were drawing near to him with wistful pain, with adoring tenderness. Who knows?...
Filled with a strange melancholy Hugh rose and went his unheeding way. Again he looked carelessly at the house in which his mother was born, in which her mother still lived....