Liane knew Nice well. Some of the most weary anxious and monotonous days of her life had been spent in a well-remembered frowsy room high up in that narrow back street which smelt eternally of garlic, where they had lived for nine months almost penniless. In those days when the Fates were unkind neither she nor Nelly ever ventured upon the Promenade in the day-time, because their dresses were too dowdy, and they feared lest they should encounter some of the people with whom they had become acquainted when living at the big hotels at Monte Carlo, Mentone, or Cannes, as they did when their father prospered. Yet she had now come back to the town she once abhorred. Her father had sufficient to keep them both respectably and in comfort, and Zertho was almost, if not quite, a millionaire. Fortune they had so often courted had smiled at last upon them all.
They were almost constantly at the Villa Chevrier. Each morning the Prince would call with his tandem and take her for a drive, returning in time for half an hour’s walk on the Promenade before déjeûner, then a lazy afternoon, a dinner with guests, a visit to the Opera, to the Casino, or perhaps to a ball. So passed the warm, brilliant days delightfully.
People soon began to inquire who was the handsome, sweet-faced English girl with whom the Prince was seen so often, but Liane, entirely ignorant of Zertho’s mysterious influence over her father, or of his motive, merely regarded him with the cordiality of an old friend. Zertho, even in the old days, had always treated her with studied courtesy, had often bought her sweetmeats and flowers, and was fond of teasing her good-humouredly and promising to find her a wealthy husband. It was he who had made both girls unexpected presents of bicycles after their return to England, and never once, even when almost penniless, had he forgotten to send them some trifle on their birthdays. Although he had been her friend she nevertheless had regarded him with some slight, ill-defined mistrust. Why, she had never been able to determine.
Though moving in the gay world of fashion and frivolity, of gambling and kindred vices, she was not of it. Her knowledge of man’s sins and woman’s frailty was wider than that of most girls of her age, yet she had remained sweet, simple, and ingenuous. Often, when at home in her room overlooking the sea, she would stand out upon the balcony and gaze away at the horizon distant in the broad expanse of blue, thinking deeply of George and wondering how he fared. Still she reflected that, after all, life was far more pleasant there than in the lethargic Berkshire village. Yet amid that constant whirl of gaiety she never forgot those days that were past. Even on that bright morning as at Zertho’s side she passed along, her sweet face fresh beneath her cream sunshade, she remembered the time when neither Nelly nor herself dare walk there—those days of dire misfortune when only twenty sous lay between them and starvation.
Strolling on through the well-dressed throng they presently met the Captain, spruce in a suit of dark grey with soft hat and brown boots, walking slowly, in conversation with a portly Frenchman who had been the Prince’s guest on the previous evening. Saluting, Zertho and his fair companion passed on and continuing their walk strolled leisurely back to the Villa Chevrier.
“Why are you so thoughtful?” her companion asked presently in French, having noticed her wonderful grey eyes fixed upon the calm sunlit sea.
“It is woman’s privilege to think,” she replied, laughing as she turned to him with her clear eyes expressive of the soul that lay behind. “I was reflecting upon the difference between our life two years ago and what it is to-day.”
“Yes, slightly better, isn’t it? Well, it is luck—always luck,” he answered. “Your father is going over to Monte Carlo to-morrow, and I hope that Fortune may be kind also to him. He has waited long enough for a change of luck.”
Liane regarded him steadily for an instant, then said reproachfully,—
“It is you who have persuaded him. Why have you done this, when you know full well that half an hour at roulette will bring back upon him the mania for play, the fatal recklessness that must be his ruin and mine? This is surely not the action of a friend.”