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THE CURIOUS CASE
OF MARIE DUPONT


ProPERTY
OF THE
NEW YORK
sºrºry LIsrary


“There's this the matter" he said. “I’ve got to know where
you and Gavock met before '"


THE CURIOUS CASE
OF MARIE DUPONT
BY
ADELE LUEHRMANN
\
ILLUSTRATED BY
FRANK SNAPP
NEW YORK
THE CENTURY CO.
1916

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1163445 |
* . . . * *
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* -- ******
Copyright, 1916, by
THE CENTURY Co.
Copyright, 1915, by
Associated SunDAY MAGAZINES INCORPORATED
Published, August, 1916


To
MY MOTHER
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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
page
“There's this the matter!” he said. “I’ve got to know
where you and Gavock met before l’. . . Frontispiece
She was frankly smiling, and he smiled back in sheer grati-
tude . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
An expectant hush fell on the room . . . . . . . . . 73
“Marie Dupont l” she gasped . . . . . . . . . . Io9
“Will you give me ten thousand dollars for it?” she faltered 149
At the second step he recoiled violently . . . . . . . 201
“I am so tired,” she whispered. “I walked and walked —” 251
“It’s I, Alix On guard!” he cried . . . . . . . . 307


THE CURIOUS CASE OF
MARIE DUPONT





THE CURIOUS CASE OF
MARIE DUPONT
CHAPTER I
T was a raw March day. As Roger Gavock
walked the short distance that lay between his
hotel, the luxurious Crustacea, and Fifth Avenue a
spurt of wind caught his hat and gave it a twist.
He saved it by a clutch and having rounded the
corner paused and carefully readjusted it at its usual
precise angle.
His gaze wandered up the avenue, then down. It
had become the finest business street in the world,
he had been told by Americans whom he had en-
countered in Paris, and after his twenty years' ab-
sence from New York he had naturally expected to
find many changes. But here he could detect nothing
else. If anything familiar remained it eluded his
sweeping glance.
He lingered a minute uncertainly, then turned south-
ward and proceeded at the brisk pace habitual with him.
He was not in a hurry, being bent merely upon sight-
seeing; indeed, he had rarely hurried in his life.
Quickness of movement was temperamental, the result
3


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
of quick thought, and was far more characteristic than
the deliberateness with which he had replaced his hat.
But one cannot live from twenty-seven to forty-seven
among a people treated so niggardly by nature that
they have perforce helped themselves out with art and
not acquire some of their infinite capacity for taking
pains.
As his eyes sped through the passing throngs he
was conscious of distinct disappointment. It was at
the women that he looked and the sight left him
chilled, repulsed. They were handsome, many of
them, but how self-contained, remote, unindividuall
No warming glances enlivened a walk down this finest
of streets. One might as well be eighty and wear one's
hat over one's eyes!
Gavock smiled a wry smile at his own expense.
He was neither vain nor a libertine, and few men of
his fortune and leisure had lived more sedately; for
though he had known many phases of European life
his rôle for the most part had been that of spectator.
And it was a surprise to him now to discover how
much he had depended on the passing show for his
warmth and life. Here, it seemed, he might expect
little of either. Here, beauty requited respectful ad-
miration with nothing better than a cold, impersonal
stare. He regretted Paris, its flash of alert eyes, the
half-smiles of gracious lips, the perpetual, incorrigi-
ble coquetry. What matter if the faces in repose
were plain since they so rarely knew repose?
:
4


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
:
Lost in a retrospective mood he strode on unsee-
ingly, when suddenly a boy carrying a large box
dashed through the moving crowd and ran into his
arms. The collision sent them both spinning, but
the boy quickly recovered his footing and dashed on,
while Gavock in attempting to regain his balance stag-
gered wildly and finally lunged into a lady who was in
the act of descending from a limousine. The impact
threw her against the open door of the car and he
saved himself from sprawling on her by clutching
the door handle. With a tremendous effort he man-
aged to steady himself sufficiently to gasp out an
apology.
“Pardonneg-moi, Madame!”
“Cane fait rien, Monsieur.” The customary for-
mula came back instantly.
She was none the worse for the encounter, appar-
ently, but one hand had flown to her hat to assure
itself that all was well and during that brief investi-
gation their eyes met. Hers were frankly smiling,
kindly but amusedly, and, though he was too human
to enjoy being ridiculous, he smiled back from sheer
gratitude that the charming young person had not
found him offensive.
For, in spite of unsteady legs and general dis-
composure, he had somehow contrived to notice that
her eyes were young and beautiful. And he had noted
more than that. He knew that they were dark and
very large and that their lashes fell toward cheeks,
5


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
smooth and softly rounded and richly glowing. And
he saw that the lovely head surmounted a charming
figure elegantly clad, and also that the limousine from
which it had descended was all that was most ap-
provable in limousines.
All this with much detail was stamped upon his mind
instantaneously and indelibly. The next moment she
had slipped by him and was crossing the pavement
toward a shop entrance. Looking after her he saw
that the hem of her gown was torn and hung down on
one side. He must have trodden on it! Impulsively
he gained her side and, indicating the damage he had
done, poured out apologies in French.
She had turned as he accosted her and now seemed
to regard him with surprise. Her smile was gone.
She was lovely still but cold and aloof.
“I beg your pardon?” she said, inquiringly.
The English struck him like a dash of ice water.
For the moment he was dumb.
“I did n't understand you,” she explained cour-
teously when he failed to speak. “I don't understand
French.”
For an instant he stared at her in astonishment, then
pulled himself together and repeated his apologies in
English. .
She glanced down at her frock with a quick shrug
which was certainly French, he reflected. “It does n't
matter,” she said indifferently, smiled faintly, whisked
up her skirt, and disappeared into the shop.
6


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
He gazed after her a moment blankly, then turning,
resumed his walk. He was puzzled.
He had addressed her first in French and she had
answered him in French. He was sure of that; he
recalled his exact words and hers. It was natural
enough that he should have spoken French for it had
been the language of his daily use for years and in
the excitement of the moment habit had prevailed.
And she had replied with the usual phrase, replied
instantly, unthinkingly, as any Frenchwoman might
have done. He recalled perfectly her voice and pro-
nunciation. The latter had been quite without accent.
And her English had been good too, the English of
England rather than of America. He had known
Englishwomen, and Americans too, educated in
France, who spoke French like natives; but they also
understood it and this perplexing person had distinctly
declared that she did not. And why under heaven
should she lie about it?
Unconsciously Gavock slackened his pace. Before
his eyes the charming face of the unknown fluttered
persistently, as an actor's sometimes will after the
curtain has fallen. Suddenly he stopped short at the
flash of a new idea through his mind. The face was
familiar! Somewhere he had seen it before.
And now he was conscious of the stirring of his
memory. He waited in a quiver of expectancy. In
a moment he would have it, the time and the place.
Odd that it had not struck him at oncé, but then he
7


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
had been so upset by the awkwardness of his position.
Where? When? Impatient, he began to prod his
memory. He prodded in vain. It was tantalizing,
maddening, to have the thing elude him like that.
Abruptly he wheeled and retraced his steps.


CHAPTER II :
“T HAPPENED on a very pretty puzzle this after-
noon,” said Gavock.
“Blonde or brunette?” Guy Amarinth asked, with
a grin.
Gavock's rather plain face crinkled into an attrac-
tive smile. He drained his demi-tasse, peering over it
quizzically at his young host who took his coffee stand-
ing, his back to the pleasant blaze of the gas logs.
Guy Amarinth was undoubtedly a very handsome
man. This conclusion Gavock reached for the twen-
tieth time that evening and for the twentieth time re-
gretted it. The boy was too like his mother. He
would have been better with less of her beauty and
more of his father's charming plainness. For two
hours now Gavock had been watching for traces of
his old friend and missing them.
It was not the absence of a physical likeness to
his father that he deplored in the young man before
him. The mother's robust slenderness had passed to
her son in a man's full portion and the finely chiseled
features were amply masculine. But behind the blue
eyes shining so pleasantly upon him now Gavock felt
none of the alert sympathy, the warm exuberance of
9


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
spirit, that had made the father so rare a friend.
Strength of will was evident in the handsome face;
but was it the fearless, generous strength of the father
that could curb itself in renunciation? Or was it only
the mean tenacity of purpose that in Mrs. Amarinth
had spent itself wholly on selfish ends?
Time alone could answer that question, Gavock re-
flected behind the smile which had responded to his
host's bantering query.
“My dear boy,” he said, “throughout the excel-
lent dinner you have just given me it has been pain-
fully apparent that some one has been furnishing
me with a very sad reputation.”
Young Amarinth laughed. “Oh, then I am to un-
derstand that it was not a woman — this time?”
“On the contrary, it was a woman — this time,”
Gavock retorted. “But don’t make the mistake that
most of my old acquaintances over here do make, I
fancy, that with me it always is a woman. If I have
talked a great deal of women to-night it is because I
have talked of life, and woman is life's dynamo.
Whether to create or to destroy, she turns the wheels.
And life fascinates me, in much the same way, no
doubt, that pictures fascinate the man who studies
them and writes about them—because he cannot paint
them.”
There was a pause. Amarinth felt that he ought to
say something but could not find words, and when
his guest took up the cigar lying on the tabouret be-
IO


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
side his chair he struck a match and held it without
speaking. As the flame lit up the rugged, aging face
before him the young man recalled the story — heard
long ago and all but forgotten — that Roger Gavock
had expatriated himself because of an early and dis-
astrous marriage.
“Thanks, Guy,” Gavock said when his cigar was
drawing. “You won't mind, I’m sure, if I call you
by your given name?”
“I wish you would, sir,” Guy replied. “I’ve heard
so much about you it does n’t seem possible that we
had never met until a few hours ago.”
“It was a great pleasure to find you here and a
relief to be able to turn my legal tangles over to you.
Nothing could have been better — except finding your
father himself.”
A few moments of silence paid tribute to the dead.
“But now for your question: ‘Blonde or bru-
nette?’” said Gavock, reverting to the light, genial
tone which was habitual with him. “The lady was
brune, decidedly. A French type, I should say.”
“Young?”
“Under twenty-five, certainly, and apparently of
our best class; charmingly attired, small of stature,
svelte, graceful, vivacious, chic, pretty. Does she in-
terest you?”
“Immensely! Just my style, in fact.”
As though involuntarily, the young man's glance
sought a framed photograph placed conspicuously on
II


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
the mannish writing-table which occupied a corner of
the small sitting-room.
Gavock's observant eye followed the glance. “Ah,
a puzzle of your own, I see!”
Guy flushed and admitted that he was still “guess-
ing.”
“I’d like to take a look if I may before I go,” said
Gavock.
“Certainly. It will repay you, I think. But let's
have your story.”
“By all means. I want to know how it strikes
you.”
“As a lawyer?”
“Oh, no — as a person of intelligence,” Gavock
laughed.
Amarinth returned the laugh through the smoke of
his cigarette. “Proceed,” he said, dropping into a
chair and settling himself to listen.
Briefly Gavock related his encounter of the after-
noon. “I resumed my walk down the avenue,” he
said finally, “Madame's charming face dancing before
my eyes, when suddenly it flashed upon me that the
face was familiar. And the more I think of it the
more convinced I become that somewhere I have seen
it before. But where or when, I cannot for the life
of me remember. I’ve been nagging at my memory
for hours. You know how elusive and tantalizing
such a recollection can be. I have gone back ten
years, from place to place that I have visited, reliving
I2


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
my life as nearly as possible, trying vainly to recover
that lost trail. It remains always just beyond my
reach.”
“Perhaps it’s just a chance resemblance.”
But Gavock shook his head with decision. “No,
the feeling that sort of thing gives is quite different;
it soon ceases to haunt you. But what do you make
of the facts?”
“Make of them? How?”
“I mean the fact that the lady lied, for instance;
that she said she did not understand French when
she did.”
“But perhaps she did n't! Lots of people under-
stand a few ordinary phrases of a foreign language and
nothing more. Even such a dub at French as I am
can say: ‘Q'a ne fait rien.” It means: ‘It’s of no
consequence,” does n’t it?”
“Yes. Say it again.”
Guy repeated the French. Gavock laughed.
“You might as well wave the Stars and Stripes,
Guy. It’s a short sentence but a hard test of pro-
nunciation, because it contains the letter ‘r,’ a sound
all but impossible of mastery by a foreign tongue. I
have struggled with it sufficiently to recognize it in its
absolute perfection as I heard it this afternoon. That
any one could achieve that perfection and yet lack an
understanding of the simple phrases I used afterwards
is not humanly possible.”
“But are you sure she answered you in French the
I3


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
first time? Could n't you be mistaken about that?
You were rather upset, you say, and —”
“My dear boy, I can hear her as distinctly in
memory as I just heard you. It is n’t possible that
I was mistaken. Add to that my conviction of hav-
ing seen her before. Now what conclusion do you
draw P”
Guy hesitated. “I hardly know,” he said at last.
“It seems very odd. I should be inclined to take her
at her word. Why under the sun should she lie about
a thing like that?”
“Well, I can think of one reason — and only one.”
There was a pause. Gavock carefully ashed his
cigar. Amarinth watched him, waiting silently for
him to continue.
“It occurs to me that she might have recognized
me and have thought I should be less likely to recog-
nize her, here in America, if unaided by the knowledge
that she was French. She had given French for my
French, involuntarily, as any Frenchwoman would
have done under the circumstances; but seeing that
I did not recognize her she decided probably not to
take further risks, thinking perhaps that I had not no-
ticed the first slip. As it happened, the very precau-
tion she took to throw me off the track was exactly
what threw me on.”
Amarinth stared blankly. “But why should n't she
have wanted you to recognize her?” .
“Ah, that's the point! That's the puzzle. Who
I4


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
is she? Who is she and what under heaven does she
imagine she has to fear from me?”
“Fear !”
“Is n’t fear usually back of a lie? She's afraid
of me, that much is clear.” -
Amarinth leaned forward eagerly. “I say, is n’t it
possible that she is a married woman with a past—a
past that you know about? Of course, she would n't
want you to recognize her in that case.”
“Yes, that’s the obvious explanation,” said Gavock,
but his tone was doubtful. -
“Why is n't it the right one?” Guy demanded.
“I’ll bet it is! Good Lord, it’s like a novel or a
play! Why, you might meet her in her own house
some day and suddenly remember where you’d seen
her before.”
“No such luck, I fear. Life gives us few such
piquant moments.”
“What? You mean you’d like it?”
“Of course. Who would n’t?”
“Well, I should think it might be deuced unpleas-
ant,” Guy answered. “Why, suppose she were the
wife of some one you knew?”
“What of it? I have, I hope, sufficient savoir faire
not to betray myself even to her—to say nothing of
her husband.”
“But suppose you had to? Suppose the circum-
stances were such that you felt it your duty to tell her
husband what you knew about her?”

I5


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
A frown gathered between Gavock's brows and he
bent upon his young host a sharp glance of puzzled
dismay. He had stumbled upon a mental by-path it
did not please him to discover in the son of his best
friend, and with all his efforts to the contrary he could
not keep a note of coldness out of his reply.
“I cannot conceive of such a case,” was all he said.
“But if the man were your friend?”
“If he were my brother—if he demanded the truth
from me — I should lie with a clear conscience and,
I trust, convincingly.”
The coldness and disapproval in Gavock's tone had
become unmistakable and brought a heated retort from
Guy.
“You are thinking of the woman, I of the man,” he
said.
“I, too, am thinking of the man,” Gavock returned.
“I should as soon think of telling a man the truth
about his unvirtuous wife as I should think of telling
the truth to a child about the mutilated doll she
fondles.”
“Well, I should want to know!” Guy declared
warmly, making the question a personal one with char-
acteristic egotism. “And I believe that any man
would,” he added.
“Most men think so — until they are told.”
“Well, no fool's paradise for mine!”
A swift, dark flush swept Gavock's face. He
opened his lips but immediately closed them again on
I6


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
unspoken words. His mouth hardened. Then, as if
some feeling denied verbal expression had claimed the
outlet of bodily action, he sprang up, flung his cigar
to the hearth and stamped out its fire with a sharp
grind of his heel. But when he presently turned back
to his host who had also risen his face had relaxed into
its customary cheerful calm and he laid a hand on
Amarinth's shoulder with affectionate pressure.
“You’ve a right to your opinion, dear boy, but I
have an idea that twenty years from now you’ll find
that it has changed. And when you see a poor devil
clutching blindly at his little scrap of happiness — and
scraps are about all most of us get, you’ll find — you’ll
not be the one to rob him of it, nor will you thank
any one for robbing you.”
“But a man's wife is — well, different from other
things to him. She's part of him— her dishonor is
his dishonor.”
Gavock sighed. “Dishonor is like immorality,
Guy; largely a question of geography. But we’re off
on an unprofitable tack,” he added, again discarding
his serious mood. “The husband of my mysterious
lady is in no immediate danger of being deceived by
any one, for the best of reasons. She has no hus-
band.”
“How do you know that?” Guy asked, taken rather
aback.
“I followed her. Yes, I was interested enough and
idle enough for that. I took a cab and followed her.
17


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
I saw her enter a house—her home—in the most
fashionable part of town. I noticed that a policeman,
passing as she alighted from her car, touched his hat
respectfully, and when she had disappeared within the
house I pumped him. Voila! The lady is still
* Miss.’”
“Miss What?”
“That's my secret. And I shall certainly not share
it with any one who holds such rigorous views as to
the rights of husbands,” Gavock laughed. “You see,
she might marry a friend of yours.”
“I’m not sure she is n't already married.”
“Neither am I. She is n’t generally known to be,
that’s all I'm sure of. Where I have seen her be-
fore, I have n't an idea — not the remotest. But I
have seen her! And I shall jump at the first chance
which offers to see her again, in spite of the fact that
she evidently does n't wish to see me again.”
He looked at his watch. “By Jove, I had no idea
it was so late! You have an engagement, you said.
I hope our long talk has n’t delayed you.”
“Not at all. I’ve plenty of time. It’s a dance, a
charity benefit and starts late. Sorry you won't join
me. There’s going to be some rather attractive ex-
hibition dancing.”
“Thanks. It's good of you to ask me, but I feel a
bit let down by the voyage and want to turn in early.
If you’re leaving now we might start together.
Where is the dance?”

I8


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“The Esplanade. It’s on your way. I’ll get your
hat and coat and 'phone for a cab.”
“Good. And while you’re doing that I'll take my
look at your charming friend over there.”
With a laughing permission Amarinth went out and
Gavock crossed to the writing-table and took up the
photograph which had attracted his notice earlier in
the evening.
As his glance fell on the face in the frame he started
sharply. His hand groped nervously in a pocket and
brought out a pair of eye-glasses which he hastily ad-
justed, casting an anxious look toward the door
through which his host had disappeared. Stepping
back into the light of the center chandelier he stared
at the picture. His brows met in the tenseness of his .
scrutiny.
Suddenly Amarinth's returning step sounded at the
door. Instantly Gavock relaxed his gaze and turned
a clear countenance to greet the young man.
“A lovely face — really lovely. Is she fair or
dark?” he asked.
“Blonde or brunette?” laughed Guy. “My an-
swer's the same as yours. She’s dark, both hair and
eyes.”
Gavock smiled faintly at the pleasantry. “I should
have guessed her dark,” he said. “But you can't al-
ways tell from a photograph. Tall or — as high as
your heart’?”
Guy laughed again. “She’s not tall,” he admitted.
I9


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“A recent picture?”
“Yes, and a splendid likeness.”
Gavock extended the frame to arm's length and re-
garded it approvingly. “A most charming face,” he
pronounced heartily. “And I dare say I once knew
the young lady's parents well and that she is one of
those clever children who have taken advantage of
my absence to grow up?” The light speech ended
on a note of inquiry.
“No, you’ve missed fire there. Miss Dupont is not
an American.”
“Dupont? The name is French.”
“She’s English.”
“Indeed! In that case I may have been right, after
all. I know an English family of Duponts — in Sur-
rey. There were several girls, I remember. Let me
see — Elspeth and Gladys and there was a third, I
think —”
“Marie P’’
“I think not,” said Gavock, appearing to search
his memory.
“I hardly think Miss Dupont belongs to that family
except perhaps distantly,” Guy said. “She's an or-
phan and lives here with an old school friend of her
mother — Mrs. Alicia Thorley. Perhaps you know
her, she’s a New Yorker.”
“I have heard of her. She married an Englishman
and they had a place near Paris — rather a nice place.

2O


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Some friends of mine bought it after Thorley's death.
A very nice place, I remember —”
His voice trailed off as though he were lost in mem-
ories. “Does Miss Dupont care for Paris?” he asked
abruptly.
“She’s never been there.”
“Indeed!” Gavock carefully replaced the photo-
graph on the desk.
“She lived in England until her mother died, then
she came over here with Mrs. Thorley and has never
been back.”
Gavock accepted his host's aid in putting on his
overcoat. Then, turning, he looked up at the hand-
some young face, a good six inches above his own.
“How old are you, Guy?” he asked.
“Twenty-five.”
“I thought about that. You were hardly more than
a baby when I saw you last. I remember the occasion
distinctly. Your father and I were smoking in the
library after dinner and your mother brought you in
to say good-night to us.”
He paused a moment, then, his hand on the younger
man's arm and his voice a bit unsteady, he added:
“You’ve lost them both, my boy, and sometimes you
— miss them?”
Amarinth did not answer except with a twitch of his
mouth.
“Of course,” Gavock said. “Well, I don't know
2I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
whether I need to say it, but I will say it. If you ever
come to the time when you miss him too much — need
him, I mean — will you come to me? I loved him,
Guy. And it was n’t given to me to return in any
measure what I owed him. So I want you to feel that
you inherited my debt to him. I want you to know
that there's nothing I would have done for him that
I would n't do for you. I wonder if you under-
stand?”
There was a short silence. Guy's face reddened
with the embarrassment that any speech touching the
hidden springs of feeling is almost sure to bring to an
American, especially a young one.
“I do understand,” he stammered. “It’s awfully
good of you, sir.”
“Then that’s settled,” Gavock said briskly, sweep-
ing sentiment aside. He glanced again toward the
photograph and asked lightly over his shoulder:
“Hoping for a sight of Miss Dupont at the dance
to-night?”
“Oh, yes. We’re to do a stunt together — one of
the exhibition dances. She's a corking dancer and
pulls me through somehow.”
Gavock wheeled. “My dear boy, why under the
sun did n’t you tell me that before? I had no idea
that you were to be an actor in the fêtel That quite
alters the matter. With your permission I'll change
my mind and go along.”
22


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Good!” said Guy heartily. “Really, I don't be-
lieve you’ll be bored.”
Gavock gave a short, queer laugh.
“I’m quite sure of that,” he said.
23


CHAPTER III
-- ARIE DUPONT1 Where did you get that
gown?”
The girl addressed had just let her long evening
coat slip from her bare shoulders into the waiting
arms of a maid, and the quick cry of admiration
which greeted her appearance drew to her every eye
in the dressing-room. Even the maid, turning away
to dispose of her burden, looked back and remained
staring.
There was an odd, breath-held, gasping pause, and
as Marie Dupont's dark eyes sent a lightning glance
from face to face of her companions she enjoyed a
triumph that would have delighted any girl. The ex-
pressions she encountered were as varied as the na-
tures of their wearers: involuntary admiration, gen-
erous tribute, envy, chagrin.
“Stephanie never made that!”
It was little Beth Tate who again spoke. Her na-
ture was incapable of envy, yet as her eyes swept the
circle of silent figures, all clad, as she knew, by
Stephanie, the fashionable dressmaker of the winter,
they ended with a glance of disdain at her own pretty
but conventional frock.
24


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“You got it over from Paris, did n't you?”
This time the speaker was Sybil Lowther, a tall ash
blonde, whose clinging chiffon draperies undressed her
rather startlingly. The words were not so much a
question as an accusation of an unfair advantage taken.
Marie Dupont's quick ear caught the hostile note and
over her face swept a pink wave of distress.
“Oh, no, no!” she cried, thrusting her flattened
palms from her as if to put away by sheer force the
unjust suspicion. “I did not get it from Paris!
Stephanie did make it! But —” She paused an in-
stant and again her expressive hands were voluble.
“I designed it.”
“You!” It was a chorus of incredulity.
“I — just!” She laughed out happily at the un-
belief. “Ask Stephanie!”
“But, Marie, where did you ever get the idea?”
Beth Tate demanded. -
“Out of my head, of course.”
She tapped her forehead with two pink finger-tips,
then, facing the cheval mirror, she swept her hands
lightly back over the dark mass of hair lying flat
against her small head like a dusky veil outlining a
perfect oval of creamy skin, below which the lovely
curves of throat and shoulders melted into the be-
wildering radiance of her wonderful gown.
At the vision the glass gave back her lips opened
with a quick breath. Compared with the attenuated
color schemes of the costumes about her, her own
25


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
stood out with primitive force and drew the eye as
dancing flames draw it from garish draperies. What
miracle of chiffon, reds, and golds, and a myriad of
intervening hues had achieved the throbbing effect
of flame and fire, one neither knew nor cared. From
cold blue to hot crimson the gamut of color ran, swirl-
ing about her as she moved like fiery tongues from a
crackling blaze.
“Gee, Marie, you look like a houri — or a house
afire!” was the verdict of Cornelia O'Rourke, a
wholesome, athletic girl with a wide, Irish mouth.
“I feel like one, Connie,” was the answer. “At
least, I don't feel like Marie Dupont, and that's the
main thing. Of course, it’s different with the rest
of you — your dances are the ordinary ones that we’re
used to seeing done in modern dress and it would be
absurd to costume those fantastically. But my dance
itself is unusual. I could n't have done it in an every-
day dance frock — I simply could n't! It would have
been like Farrar doing “Butterfly' in a tailor-made.
She could n't.”
A shrug of her shoulders dismissed the possibility.
“I was in despair,” she went on. “I could feel
what I wanted but I could n't see it. And poor
Stephanie could n't help me. How could she? I
could n't describe what I could n't see. I tell you it
was maddening!”
She laughed excitedly. “Night after night I lay
awake trying to see the dress that somehow I felt
26


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
was there at the back of my head. And one morn-
ing when I woke up I had it! I saw it as distinctly
as if I had seen it the day before in a shop window.”
“Perhaps you had,” remarked Sybil Lowther over
her shoulder as she swayed her slender form in a sen-
suous movement of the dance she was rehearsing.
The ill-feeling in her tone was so marked that Beth
Tate spoke hastily to cover it. “I always see myself
walking about in my things before they are made.”
“Your dress is a corker, Marie, and so is your
dance,” Cornelia O'Rourke added heartily. “But I
don't see why Madame Adrienne could n't have
thought up some new ones for all of us. What's
the sense in challenging comparison with professionals
by doing their stunts. Look at me, for instance, do-
ing the Pavlowa Gavotte. Gee!”
“You wanted to do it,” Sybil Lowther reminded her.
“I know it,” Cornelia admitted ruefully. “I saw
Pavlowa and went dippy. But last night Uncle Dan
came in while Ted and I were rehearsing. “What do
you call that stunt?” he asked. ‘Pavlowa Gavotte,
is it? Looks to me more like an O’Rourke Cavort’l”
There was a general laugh, but Marie Dupont's
voice broke through it.
“I think that was a compliment,” she declared. “It
means that you don't imitate Pavlowa, that you put
yourself into it, that you create something. I like the
way you do it.”
Cornelia's wide mouth was stretched to its limits in a
27


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
grin. “You’re one sweet lamb, Marie, but I guess
the only thing my dancing 'll ever create is a riot,” she
said.
A maid came into the room and spoke to Miss
Dupont. “Mr. Amarinth wishes you to know that
he’s come. He says he’d like to go through the dance
if you have time.”
“Please tell him that I’ll be there in a minute.”
The maid went out and after a last survey of her-
self in the mirror Marie Dupont followed.
“She’s the only honest-to-Gawd dancer in the
bunch,” Cornelia remarked, looking after her. “Do
you girls remember the day she first did that flying
pirouette and how surprised Madame Adrienne was?”
“Madame Adrienne did n't believe Miss Dupont
was doing it for the first time,” said Sybil Lowther,
now at a mirror. “I don’t believe it either. I think
she's studied dancing before — so does Madame
Adrienne.”
“What of Madame Adrienne?” a sharp nasal voice
inquired in the doorway.
Every eye turned to the dancing mistress. There
was a pause.
“I was just saying,” answered Miss Lowther, “that
Miss Dupont dances so well that she must have taken
lessons before she came to you.”
Madame shrugged her fat shoulders. “Miss Du-
pont says not and evidently Miss Dupont should
know.”

28


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
The Frenchwoman's black, bead-like eyes peered
about the room from under her thick black brows.
Formerly a member of the ballet of the Opera in
Paris, she was now fat and fifty and glad to take ad-
vantage of the modern dance craze to turn an honest
penny.
“Has Miss Niklova not yet arrived?”
“I think not, Madame,” Beth Tate answered. “I
have n’t seen her.”
Madame frowned anxiously. “She should be here.
The orchestra waits to begin, the ballroom is already
crowded.”
“Her brother's sick, she told me yesterday at re-
hearsal. Maybe he's worse,” suggested Cornelia
O'Rourke.
Madame nodded thoughtfully.
“What shall we do if she does n't come?” Miss
Lowther asked, alarm in her voice. “The orchestra
will be sure to play my music too fast.”
“She will come,” Madame retorted shortly. These
children of idleness were inconceivably stupid! “She
comes to work, not to play.”
As she turned to leave the room Cornelia cornered
her.
“I’m getting cold feet, Madame,” she said. “I’m
afraid I’ll disgrace you to-night. If you want to
scratch me, go ahead.”
“Scratch you!” Madame echoed, astonished.
“I mean, cut me out, leave me off the program.”
29


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“But never! Compose yourself, my child. I have
changed the name of your dance — so all will be well.
It is called ‘danse eccentrique.’ It is not of Pavlowa,
it is of itself. The public will find it piquant. You
will have a succès — oh, but I say it—a succès
enorme! You will see!”
“Madame Adrienne, how do you like my gown?”
It was Sybil Lowther who next arrested Madame's
departure from the room. She turned slowly for
Madame's inspection.
The Frenchwoman's noncommittal eyes appraised
the daring costume. “It is enchanting, Mademoi-
selle,” she said.
“What do you think of Miss Dupont's?”
“Ah!” Madame's sallow face lighted swiftly,
then instantly she veiled her bead-like eyes. “It is a
miracle. Miss Dupont is a miracle. Ah, enfin!”
The final words were an exclamation of relief as a
girl carrying a violin case burst breathlessly into the
room. She was Irma Niklova, small, thin to emacia-
tion, and of a sickly pallor.
“I am late, Madame,” she panted. “I regret.”
Nervously she unwound a faded blue scarf from
about her head and throat, while Madame Adrienne
unbuttoned the rough serge coat and took it from her.
“You tremble, my child,” said Madame.
“I ran — I feared to delay you.”
“Are we going to begin now that Miss Niklova
has come?” Miss Lowther asked, pausing at the door.
30


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Immediately. You are ready?” Madame's
glance included the few girls who still remained in the
TOO111.
They assented and one after the other strolled out.
Cornelia O'Rourke was the last. She lingered a mo-
ment in the doorway.
“I hope your brother's better, Miss Niklova,” she
said.
“Thank you, yes, much better.” The Russian girl
forced a wan smile.
“I’m so glad,” Cornelia smiled sympathetically and
passed out.
Alone with her assistant, Madame dropped English
for French. “The brother is better then? That is
good.”
The girl shook her head and shivered.
“He is worse, much worse. But why speak of it
to these people? What do they understand? Their
houses are always warm, their bodies covered, their
stomachs full. What do they know of us? They
only play at living!”
She was beating her hands together to send what
little blood her wasted body could provide into them
that they might be warm enough to play the violin.
“Who cares for him to-night?”
The pale cheeks of the girl flushed quickly. “A
friend — a painter who lives over us. He is of this
country, but poor like us and understands. Pavlo is
safe with him as with me.”
3I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
She unlocked her violin case and took out her in-
strument. Her thin hands were still discolored from
the cold. In her shabby evening gown her extreme
meagerness of flesh was painfully apparent. The
bones in her neck protruded sharply.
“You look not well,” Madame announced, regard-
ing the girl anxiously. She hesitated. “Were it not
for the music for Miss Dupont's solo I should send you
home.”
Irma Niklova made a quick gesture of dissent.
“No, no, I must stay! If I am thought to be unre-
liable I shall find no more engagements.”
Madame nodded with a sigh for the truth of the
argument. Then, with a brisk movement she caught
up the faded scarf, passed it around the girl's throat,
letting the ends fall with merciful concealment over the
thin arms.
“So. That is better.”
From without came the sound of the tuning of
instruments.
“Come, my child.”
At the door Irma Niklova halted.
“Madame, in the music for Miss Dupont's solo bid
the orchestra be silent. It is better I play alone. The
rhythm is all. They do not understand. They do
not follow. Miss Dupont dances like an artist. She
must be followed, not led.”
Madame nodded. “You are right. I will so or-
der.”
32


CHAPTER IV
-- OUR responsibility as host ends here,” said Ga-
vock, when he and Amarinth paused at the en-
trance to the grand ballroom of the Esplanade. “I
have my coat check, you have yours, and if I feel like
leaving before the show ends I want to feel free to
go, so we’ll say good night here.” He held out his
hand.
Amarinth took it but he answered protestingly: “I
want you to meet Miss Dupont. Our dance is the last
on the program and of course she won't want to show
herself until then. There is to be general dancing
and supper afterwards, you know.”
“I shall be delighted to meet Miss Dupont and hope
to have the pleasure to-night,” Gavock returned.
“But it is no longer very early and I feel rather
fagged. I have n’t the luck to be five and twenty,
you see. So if you don't find me about you’ll know
that old age has crept upon me and sent me to bed. In
which case just dismiss me from your mind.”
“At least let me find you a seat and introduce you
to some of my friends —”
“My dear fellow, I shall probably stumble upon
acquaintances before I am half way across the room.”
33


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
He turned and looked about. “Ah! I think I see a
familiar face already — Mrs. Estell. Over there, see,
in green—now she is turning this way. She sees
me! She does n't believe her eyes.” He nodded smil-
ingly to the distant lady. “She’s beckoning.” He
waved assent. “You know her?” he asked, seeing
that Amarinth was also bowing.
“Yes. And I know you’ll not be lonely now.”
Unconsciously Amarinth gave a little sigh of relief.
Gavock caught the sigh. “Poor boy, he takes his
duties as host very seriously,” he thought. “And I'm
afraid he takes life very seriously. I only hope he
does n’t find soon that life may be too serious to be
taken seriously.”
Aloud he said: “Good night, if we don't meet
again. I’ll 'phone you to-morrow or the day after,
when my papers are all together. And remember, if
you don't see me about later, don't page me!”
“Oh, you won't run away now,” Guy laughed.
“Mrs. Estell will see to that.”
“At any rate I’ve arranged for retreat should re-
treat seem advisable,” Gavock reflected as he made his
way across the room.
During the drive to the hotel from Amarinth's
apartment he had repented of his impulsive decision
to accompany his young friend. “I shall jump at the
first chance that offers to see her again,” he had said
and he had done just that. In consequence he found
himself confronting a situation he did not enjoy. His
34


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
puzzle had become too personal to be pleasant. Mys-
tery is not a domestic virtue and a lady with a past
is more interesting in our neighbor's family than in
O111 OW11.
Was it possible that he had been mistaken about
that French phrase? He questioned himself eagerly.
He would have welcomed the slightest sense of doubt
in his mind. But he found none.
“I can hear her distinctly. It was French and
perfect French, as I told the boy. But why, by all
that’s damnable, did I tell him? Certainly my evil
genius has a finger in this pie.”
If only he could place her! If only he had some
inkling as to the nature of her secret — if, indeed,
she had a secret! However, to-night he would have
ample opportunity to watch her unseen —
Unseen, yes; but would his presence be unknown to
her? What more likely than that Guy should speak
to her of him? And if she knew his face no doubt
she also knew his name. Would it not, after all, be
wiser to avoid a meeting in Amarinth's presence? De-
cidedly yes.
Still, if the meeting were postponed a few days — it
could hardly be avoided altogether — Guy might tell
her the story of the puzzling encounter on Fifth Avenue
— it was just the sort of thing people liked to pass
along. She would know then that she was suspected,
while to-night he might convince her by his manner
that she had successfully evaded recognition. Was it
35


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
not better that they should meet while she felt herself
secure? If she heard the story from Guy later she
would understand that she could rely on his silence.
To lessen the ordeal for her was all he thought of for
the present. The rest must be left to time.
Mrs. Estell greeted his arrival effusively. She was
a vivacious young woman just emerging from the
shadows into the sunshine of widowhood. He was in-
stantly ordered to occupy a chair that stood vacant
beside her own.
“I hope I'm not depriving any one,” he said, ac-
cepting the seat.
She laughed. “You ought to say you hope you
are,” she corrected. “Now tell me, do you dance?”
“I decline to answer by advice of counsel.”
“You don't! Heavens, what have you come to
New York for P”
“Can't I stay?”
“Oh, you can, but you won't. What will you do?
There’ll be no one to talk to you. We’ve all lost the
power of speech. We only talk with our toes.”
Her nimble tongue immediately belied her, for she
began to ply Gavock with questions and in return
to give him all her own news and that of her friends.
They had met often in Paris and had many acquaint-
ances in common. Some of these occasionally inter-
rupted the talk, pausing for words of greeting.
“Aren't they ever going to begin?” Mrs. Estell
had wondered several times before her question was
36


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She was ------1:
was frankly smiling, and he smiled back in sheer gratitude


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THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
finally answered by the appearance of the musicians
in the small balcony above the stage. They scraped
and fretted their instruments into tune, then, resting
them against knee or arm, they stared curiously down
upon the audience.
“Heavens, what a wraith of a woman!” Mrs. Estell
exclaimed as Irma Niklova joined the group of men
in the balcony.
The Russian girl raised her violin to her shoulder
and at the signal the men posed their instruments for
action.
“She seems to be the leader,” Gavock observed.
“Yes. She plays regularly for Adrienne's dancing
classes, I believe, and they are probably specially en-
gaged for the evening. Her story is quite tragic—
if it's true. They say she was a student at the Im-
perial Conservatory in St. Petersburg—she’s Rus-
sian — and a career was predicted for her. Then her
father, a violinist in the orchestra at the Opera, fell
under the suspicion of the police and was sent to Si-
beria. The girl was in consequence dismissed from
the Conservatory and could find no employment.
Somehow she managed to get over here. She looks
as if she were half-starved, does n’t she — Oh!”
Mrs. Estell's serious tone changed abruptly to one
of delight, as the opening strain of a waltz filled the
room. “That’s ‘Love in the Air – the most heav-
enly hesitation!”
The curtains at the back of the stage were drawn
39


*
** * *


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
finally answered by the appearance of the musicians
in the small balcony above the stage. They scraped
and fretted their instruments into tune, then, resting
them against knee or arm, they stared curiously down
upon the audience.
“Heavens, what a wraith of a woman l’ Mrs. Estell
exclaimed as Irma Niklova joined the group of men
in the balcony.
The Russian girl raised her violin to her shoulder
and at the signal the men posed their instruments for
action.
“She seems to be the leader,” Gavock observed.
“Yes. She plays regularly for Adrienne's dancing
classes, I believe, and they are probably specially en-
gaged for the evening. Her story is quite tragic—
if it’s true. They say she was a student at the Im-
perial Conservatory in St. Petersburg—she’s Rus-
sian — and a career was predicted for her. Then her
father, a violinist in the orchestra at the Opera, fell
under the suspicion of the police and was sent to Si-
beria. The girl was in consequence dismissed from
the Conservatory and could find no employment.
Somehow she managed to get over here. She looks
as if she were half-starved, does n’t she — Oh!”
Mrs. Estell's serious tone changed abruptly to one
of delight, as the opening strain of a waltz filled the
room. “That’s ‘Love in the Air '— the most heav-
enly hesitation!”
The curtains at the back of the stage were drawn
39


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
aside by unseen hands and a young man and girl en-
tered, dancing. A friendly ripple of applause greeted
them.
“Beth Tate and Fred Crawley — nice children,”
Gavock's companion informed him. “You must n’t
expect much from the program, you know — they are
all amateurs. We have n’t come to see the dancing,
we’ve come to dance ourselves.” Her hands and feet
moved expectantly in time with the music. “I can
hardly wait,” she cried.
The “nice children’’ made their exit amid more
clapping of indulgent hands. Several couples followed
them and were similarly rewarded for their efforts.
The danse eccentrique of Cornelia O'Rourke and her
brother had the success Madame Adrienne had pre-
dicted, being rendered with rompish glee that was con-
tagious, and had to be repeated.
“This is Sybil Lowther,” Mrs. Estell announced as
the next pair of dancers entered on the slow, sensuous
strains of a tango. “She’s by way of being a pro-
fessional. She's a Canadian and used to do drawing-
room recitations in Canadian-French dialect — the
habitant things, you know — but she starved at it, I
guess, and went in for dancing when the craze for
that started. She affects a temperament.”
“So I See.”
They watched the dancing in silence for several
minutes. Miss Lowther's posturings and writhings,
designed to register on the minds of her audience as
40


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
suppressed passions that tortured her soul, were con-
tradicted by the cold, steady gleam of her eyes and
firm set of her lips. Her partner, selected no doubt
as a foil, was a fresh-cheeked boy with an expression
as placid as a feeding infant's.
“The ability to exalt oneself and to give oneself —
that is a clever Frenchman's definition of tempera-
ment,” Gavock remarked presently.
“And we Anglo-Saxons have n’t it,” said Mrs. Es-
tell. “We’ve got nerves, a sort of ingrowing tem-
perament, not a bit showy and very uncomfortable.”
Gavock smiled in agreement, then glancing back at
Miss Lowther he asked: “Why does she try for it,
I wonder? She's pretty and graceful; why attempt
the impossible?”
“Because she thinks it makes her more interesting
and to be interesting is her métier. She lives by it,
poor dear. She's a Salamander.”
“A what?”
“A Salamander. It’s a kind of bug, is n’t it, or a
lizard that fire won't burn? Well, anyhow it’s the
fashionable name for a girl who teeters along the brink
of perdition, working men for anything she can get
out of them, flowers, clothes, jewels — anything ex-
cept actual money, and giving in return — well, noth-
ing.”
“But surely a girl who accepts so much must ex-
pose herself to — er— er—”
“Impropositions?” laughed Mrs. Estell. “That's
4I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
what Tommy Nave calls them — don't you love it?
Of course she does, constantly. But she manages to
keep her footing. Not from any overplus of virtue,
I fancy, but from sheer, cool-headed canniness that
makes her cling to respectability as to life itself.”
“But is a girl who knowingly exposes herself to
such advances considered respectable?”
“Oh, she maintains a semi-respectability that serves
her purpose well enough.”
“Very semi, I should say.”
“Demi, I should say,” laughed the lady. “But it
serves, as you see.”
The dance had ended and Miss Lowther and her
partner had returned to acknowledge the plaudits that
recompensed them. With her arms full of flowers
the girl bowed her thanks right and left, then, as the
applause moderated, instead of retiring through the
back exit she came down a short flight of steps that
led from the stage to the auditorium.
“I’m going to present you,” Mrs. Estell said,
starting up and signaling the girl who was approach-
ing them. “You may find the species interesting.
But I warn you that your gray hairs will not protect
your bank balance.”
“I’ll run while I can then,” Gavock laughed, mak-
ing a feint at departure.
She seized his arm. “No, I’m going to run,” she
said, then detaining Miss Lowther who had come
abreast of them, she introduced Gavock. “Mr. Roger
42


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Gavock, my dear — straight from Paris, and mad to
know you.”
Gavock bowed. The girl held out her hand and
Smiled at him above the mass of roses in her arms.
“Enchantée, Monsieur.”
“Take my seat, Miss Lowther,” Mrs. Estell said.
Miss Lowther hesitated. “I don't want to deprive
you, Mrs. Estell,” she murmured as she sent a swift
glance around the room. It did not need Mrs. Es-
tell's significant glance to inform Gavock that the
young lady was probably looking for bigger game.
“I’m running away,” Mrs. Estell urged briskly.
“Tommy Nave is over there holding up the door and
developing a grouch. He came late and I ignored him
but I think he’s been punished enough. At any rate
if I punish him any more he’ll leave and I need him
to dance with. You see, Mr. Man, the advantage of
being a dancer!” With this to Gavock she left them.
“Don’t you dance, Mr. Gavock?” Miss Lowther
asked as she settled herself and arranged her flowers
effectively.
“My dear young lady! Dance at my age!”
Her blue eyes widened as with huge surprise. “But
you’re not old !”
He knew it was blatant flattery and nothing else,
but for the life of him he could n’t help liking it. He
Smiled, half at her, half at his weakness.
“You must learn,” she said.
“Please tempt me.”
43


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
She smiled, her eyes narrowed, straight into his
eyes.
“Did you like my dancing?”
“I was charmed.”
“Oh, I'm so glad!” she exclaimed fervently.
“I’ve worked so hard — Oh, terribly hard. And
I’m so ambitious. I want to do something quite won-
derful some day, something different. I want—”
She broke off and, releasing her hold on her roses,
she clasped her hands on her breast and leaned toward
him with parted lips. “I want to be the greatest
dancer in the world!”
“Well, well, that’s rather a large order, is n’t it?”
he asked.
“Is it?” She seemed to consider. Then she
sighed. “Perhaps it is,” she admitted with a slow
shrug. “But I am as I am! I can't want anything
less than the best. I can't! I'm that way in every-
thing, books, pictures, people — men.” -
At the final word her eyes dropped to her flowers.
“To the man who realized my ideal I would give
anything—everything.”
Gavock frowned in instinctive distaste. Really she
was too obvious. He could not resist remarking
dryly: “But if you are to be the greatest dancer in
the world you can't afford to give either time or
thought to mere men.” He wondered how she would
take that.
44


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
She sighed prettily and raised her roses close to
her face. Only a veiled half-glance reached him.
“That's woman's eternal struggle, is n't it?” she
asked. “The struggle between art and — love?”
She waited a moment as though to let that sink in
and perhaps, as he thought, to see what he would say.
When he said nothing she suddenly changed her man-
ner. Dropping her flowers back to her lap again she
looked up at him and smiled frankly.
“Of course, I was speaking then of my great am-
bition, my life aim; but, after all, life is made up of
little things and each day brings its own small wishes
and desires. For instance, to-night my immediate am-
bition is to have supper with a man so rich that I
shan’t have to look at the righ-hand column of the
menu before I look at the left.”
He laughed out heartily. She was charming when
she was like that, natural and girlish.
“What a mercenary young person!”
“Am I?” She turned her eyes away and her mouth
hardened. “I’m a very hungry one,” she said.
Her tone was so serious that, startled, Gavock shot
a sharp look at her. She stared before her, no hint
of jesting in her face. He felt at a loss how to take
her and she seemed indisposed to help him. At last
he spoke, feeling that the words were being dragged
out of him.
“Will you honor me by taking supper with me?”
45


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Oh, I did n't mean that!” she cried, turning wide
blue eyes upon him in shocked protest. “Please don't
think I was hinting! Of course, I’d love to accept
if – if you really want me.”
She gave him a wistful glance and looked away.
She had reverted to her first manner, she was acting
again, he perceived. He was conscious of a sudden
distaste, almost disgust of her.
“Then that's settled,” he said simply.
The music, starting at that moment for the next
number on the program, cut short the conversation.
The instant after Gavock had forgotten his compan-
ion, for Guy Amarinth and his dancing partner had
appeared on the stage, sweeping in on the full swing
of the melody.
Gavock leaned forward in his seat, every muscle
tense. Around him he was aware of a startled rust-
ling, then silence.
The girl was indeed a vision of arresting loveliness.
If, in the dressing-room, surrounded by other types of
youthful beauty, she had shone supreme, here, with
Amarinth's black form as a foil, behind the glare of
the footlights and with all the exaggeration that the
stage itself lends to everything upon it, Marie Dupont
seemed an exotic creature with a radiance that allured
while it dazzled.
Gavock's eyes followed her face as it offered itself
to his view from an ever-changing angle; now the
pure profile, again only the curve of a cheek and black
46


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
crown of hair, and again, showing above the rim of
Guy's shoulder, the full face.
It was for the full face that he now began eagerly
to watch. He had been so sure that another sight of
it would recall to his mind the time and place that
he had seen it first. But the memory still escaped him,
though he had a sense of its being nearer than before.
One more look at the eyes and he would have it. That
was his feeling; but again and again the chance came
and brought him nothing.
Forgetful of his surroundings he vented his disap-
pointment in a sharp exclamation of impatience. The
girl at his side turned to him instantly.
“Don't you like it?” he heard her say. But he did
not at once seize her meaning; in his absorption in the
dancer he had not noticed the dance. As he stupidly
stared in momentary bewilderment his attention was
caught by the sharp contrast between the face before
him and the one his eyes had just left. Here was
hard, cold perfection; there, faults of outline
were suffused and lost in the glow of an ardent
spirit.
When the sense of Miss Lowther's question reached
him he parried deftly, by asking: “Do you?”
She smiled back narrowly. “I asked first.”
“What do you call the dance?”
“The program calls it ‘Fantaisie de la Russie.”
Madame Adrienne arranged it. It’s a combination
of various figures from Russian ballets. Of course,
47


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Mr. Amarinth is little more than a lay figure; it's vir-
tually a solo for Miss Dupont.”
She was right about that, Gavock presently de-
cided. The part his young friend played was chiefly
that of target for the pas seuls of his charming part-
ner. Some of these were executed with his arm sup-
porting her, others as she whirled about him, others
with him as mere spectator.
To do nothing before an audience is not easy, and
Gavock observed with satisfaction that Guy accom-
plished it gracefully. Indeed, he seemed unconscious
of himself, wholly absorbed in the movements of his
partner, alert in his emptiest moments for her return
to his embrace.
“He’s mad about her,” Miss Lowther remarked as
if divining Gavock's thought. “Do you like her danc-
ing?”
“It’s very good, is n’t it?” Gavock replied. “To
me it seems amazingly good.”
“You’re right, Mr. Gavock, it is — amazing.”
The word was spoken with such significant emphasis
that Gavock turned a startled look of inquiry on
the speaker. What did she mean? What did she
know?
Miss Lowther explained. “It’s amazing, because
Miss Dupont says she has never had dancing lessons
before this winter. Now I don't believe that, and
Madame Adrienne does n't believe it. Look at what
she's doing now! That’s a flying pirouette. Why,


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
you have to learn that sort of thing when you’re six—
not twenty-six.”
Gavock had detected the note of jealousy in his com-
panion's tone and he barely suppressed a smile at her
frank implication of her rival's age. But the arresting
note in her speech was the hint at mystery, secrecy.
Did she know anything?
“But why should she not tell the truth—”
His question was cut short by a sudden burst of
applause which greeted the dancer as, having achieved
two rapid repetitions of the flying pirouette, she came
to a position of rest, smiling, her head thrown back,
her arms thrust out, palms up.
It was a gesture ages old. No one in that audience
but had seen it a hundred times. The bareback rider
of the circus, the tumbler at a country fair, the ma-
gician of vaudeville, the première danseuse at the op-
era, their feats accomplished, smile at the audience,
arms out, palms up. It is the mountebank's appeal
for plaudits and an audience responds to it almost me-
chanically. Mechanically Gavock raised his hands to
clap. Then he stopped short.
Why had the girl done such a thing? Where had
she learned it? It was a professional's trick, and in
such a place it was not fitting. Yet how charmingly
she held the pose!
He was conscious that in the back of his head a
new idea was groping.
That the pause in the dance was unrehearsed was
49


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
obvious, for the musicians played on until waved to
sudden silence by a movement of the Russian girl's
violin bow. It seemed also to have taken Amarinth
unawares. Caught on a forward glide, arms out as
if his partner were about to whirl into them, he halted
awkwardly.
This Gavock noted in a glance, all he could spare
from the girl who at that moment held every eye.
Suddenly she changed her pose. Her smile vanished,
her arms swept backward, palms down. She swayed
now to one side, then to the other, in a long slow
rhythm. The flame-like colors of her gown gave her
the appearance of a slender, waving torch. The ap-
plause stopped. An expectant hush fell on the room.
Gavock glanced up at the musicians, wondering why
they did not play. Their instruments were in posi-
tion, their eyes were on their leader.
Irma Niklova stood at the balcony railing, her bow-
hand resting on it, clasping the bow, her violin against
her shoulder, ready. She was looking down at the
dancer, the muscles of her thin face taut, her eyes nar-
rowed with the intensity of her gaze.
From side to side the dancer swayed, again and
again. Then slowly she began to move to the right,
making a strange sweeping movement with her arms.
Irma Niklova straightened herself with a start.
Her bow flew to her instrument and she drew it.
Behind her other arms moved. The result was a
shrieking discord. She wheeled furiously and her
50


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
bow cut the air in a savage gesture of arrest. Then
she turned and played alone.
Now again the dancer paused. Her arms swept
slowly forward and grew tense; then with a swift
movement she strained them backward as though
pushing something from her. Her head sank back
upon her shoulders, stretching the long line from chin
to bosom. Thus poised she began to advance as in a
stately march, but by movements of hidden muscles
the brilliant draperies of her gown were kept swirling
about her like wind-driven flames.
From Irma Niklova's violin haunting dissonances
made up a strain that was like a dirge, wild and bar-
baric.
Gavock looked at Guy Amarinth. He had with-
drawn somewhat to the back of the stage where he
stood, forgotten and forgetful, apparently, of himself
and everything except the form of the dancing girl
on which his eyes were bent.
Now the stately advance was halted. Marie Du-
pont raised her head, her chin shot forward, her arms
swept round upon a circle and sank, crossing them-
selves, upon her breast. Wide and expressionless her
eyes stared out, her teeth showed in a mirthless smile.
She began to execute some rapid sideward steps, her
knees bent almost to a sitting posture, her feet darting
out alternately from beneath her skirts.
“Russian l’”
One heard the hissing of the word as it passed from
5I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
lip to lip. Something at last appeared familiar.
There was a rustle through the audience as of relaxed
tension.
Another change. The dancer rose again to her full
height, her lips closed to a thin line, her eyes nar-
rowed to a black slit. And she entered on a dizzying
whirl, to right, then left, in ever-increasing rapidity.
The violin of the Russian girl followed every move-
ment, clinging like a shadow. The player seemed no
longer to watch the dance. She was like a reflection
that moved by the other's volition. Her bow swerved
and trembled, faster, louder, wilder, leaping along the
scale in intervals weird and harrowing to Western
nerves. From the audience came a sound that was
louder, more poignant than a rustle. It was as though,
involuntarily, many moved, squirming. But no sound
came from any lips.
Then, with the sharp, explosive noise of snapping
sinew the music stopped. A violin string had broken.
A woman in the audience cried out hysterically,
there was a discordant shiver from the violin. Irma
Niklova thrust the useless instrument upon the mu-
sician nearest her and seized his own. But she was
too late. The dancer had stopped.
She swayed dizzily and several people started from
their seats, but Amarinth had reached her side and she
moved into his arms in dancing position. He stum-
bled awkwardly into step with her and together they
glided across the stage. Gavock, watching, saw her
52


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
look up toward the music gallery from which only
silence came. He too looked up.
As once before, the white face of the Russian girl
stared down uncertainly. But only for a moment.
Abruptly she started to play, and at her signal the men
about her swept into the melody which Gavock recog-
nized as the one which the applause had interrupted.
“What was it? What happened?” he asked Miss
Lowther.
She answered with a puzzled frown. “I don't
know. I never saw that part before, the part she did
alone, after they clapped. She and Niklova must have
rehearsed it privately and Adrienne kept it for a sur-
prise.” Her lips tightened. “You must have seen
much dancing in Paris. Tell me, do you think that
was the work of a novice?”
Gavock looked at her. Envy and anger spoke in
face and voice. Of course, he thought, she was right;
the dancing they had just witnessed was certainly not
the work of a novice. The clean-cut precision of its
technique alone set it apart from the other perform-
ances of the evening. The idea that had stirred in the
back of his head was emerging.
There was little more of the dance. It closed with
a repetition of a figure previously given, and twice
the dancers were recalled to bow their acknowledg-
ments. Then the spectators, eager for the general
dancing that was to follow, began making their way
toward the empty ballroom beyond.
53


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
A young man claimed Miss Lowther and she left
Gavock with a gay reminder of their supper engage-
ment.
Left alone, he stared a moment at the curtained en-
trance at the back of the stage. The face of Marie
Dupont seemed to float there, mocking him, as earlier
in the day it had floated just beyond his reach. If,
only for a moment, he could lose his sense of his sur-
roundings he might be able to pierce the veil that
seemed to hang before his eyes, shutting out the scene
of which that lovely face had made a part. It was so
near that a word, a look —
“Mr. Gavock! Mr. Gavock! Do come here!”
It was the voice of Mrs. Estell, calling. He saw
her in a group near by. A few steps brought him to
her side.
“What is the name of that little theater in Paris —
in Montmartre somewhere — you go up a narrow
street where a cab can’t go, then down some steps?
Poor Dick took me there on our wedding trip to see a
dancer people were raving about just then. She did
that whirling business that Marie Dupont did to-night
and had a gown that gave something of the same ef-
fect.”
“It must have been the Drowned Cat,” said Tommy
Nave.
“It was n't. I know it was n’t, because I teased
Dick to take me to the Drowned Cat and he would n’t.
54


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
It was some kind of a bird — the Red Canary or the
Green Swan or—”
“The Purple Pigeon!”
The words were Gavock's. They were almost a
shout, yet it seemed to him that some one else had
spoken them.
“That’s it! The Purple Pigeon!” cried Mrs. Es-
tell. “I’m so glad you remembered it. I could n’t,
and it was driving me mad.”
“And you’re driving me mad!” said Tommy Nave.
“Listen to that music and we’re missing it!”
He swept her away and Gavock was alone again,
looking after the rapidly dispersing crowd.
“Le Pigeon Pourpre!”
The veil was rent. He had his desire. He stared
vacantly, seeing only the mental vision which the name
had evoked.
A curious shudder ran through him. Why — why
— surely the thing was impossible, incredible! And
yet—
55


CHAPTER V
N the dressing-room Irma Niklova was replacing
the broken string on her violin. Beside her sat
Madame Adrienne.
“Well, my child, and what do you say now of this
Miss Dupont?”
Irma's thin shoulders rose and fell in a weary shrug.
“The first day, Madame, you said to me: “She is
a dancer,’ and I answered you: ‘Evidently.' Is it
not so?”
Madame Adrienne nodded.
“Eh bien! To-day, I know no more than then. I
say this only: Here is something we do not under-
stand, something we do not know.”
“When she says she has not danced before, she
lies,” said Madame.
“Evidently.”
“And to-night—your word of honor, is it, that
you have not rehearsed together? That part that she
has never done —”
The girl's fingers paused in their work and she
looked up.
“Dear Madame, you are my friend, my one friend;
without the work you give me to do I should starve—
56


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
I and the brother who is my life. Why should I de-
ceive you?”
“But the music — you followed always. It could
not have been better. How was that possible?”
“Madame, listen! My father played first violin in
the orchestra of the Petersburg Opera. That you
know. A violin was in my hand when I could not yet
walk or talk. Already at seven I played for the re-
hearsals of the ballet. A thousand times have I played
the music of ‘Kaneshka.’ It was from ‘Kaneshka’
that you made the dance for Miss Dupont, was it not?”
“You are right.”
“You never danced in Petersburg, you have told me,
Madame; only in Paris and Moscow. Of those op-
eras I do not know, but in Petersburg the ensemble
from which you took the steps for Miss Dupont's dance
was followed always by the grand solo. A thousand
times have I seen it, a thousand times played it.”
Madame Adrienne nodded. “The grand solo —
it was that she danced. And it was not I who taught
it her! The thought did not come to me of such a
thing. The grand solo from ‘Kaneshka.” Mon dieu!
For that one begins to dance as you began to play, my
child — in the cradle!”
“When I saw what she was doing, it was my fingers
that followed, not my head. I could play it in my
grave.”
“Who is this girl?” Madame demanded. “Marie
Dupont! A French name. But she says she is Eng-
- 57


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
lish. She lives with Americans and she dances like a
Russian!”
“It is as I have said, Madame. Here is something
we do not understand, something we do not know.”
“Marie Dupont!” Madame repeated the name
thoughtfully. “It tells one nothing.”
“Nothing,” agreed Irma Niklova.
“It is as if in English one should say ‘Mary
Smith.’”
58


CHAPTER VI
« HEY’VE begun to dance! We're missing it!”
Marie Dupont sprang up and faced Guy
Amarinth expectantly. They were alone in one of the
Esplanade's small reception-rooms whither he had led
her for a cool, quiet moment as soon as the applause
which followed their dance had stopped.
He did not move as she stood looking down at him.
His handsome blue eyes were riveted on her face and
he might well have been dazzled by her dark beauty,
heightened as it was by the rich color which excite-
ment had given to her cheeks. For a moment neither
spoke. Then she turned her head toward the open
door as a louder strain of music reached them.
“It’s a waltz and we’re missing it,” she repeated.
“Well, it’s mine and I want to miss it. Sit down
— please!” He drew her back to the seat beside him.
“You’re tired anyway.”
“Tired! I could dance forever!” She flung out
her arms exultantly.
He gave a short laugh. “I thought you were going
to when you left me there twiddling my thumbs.
Really, I think you might have told me you were going
to spring that new part.”
59


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“New part! Why will you keep saying that?
There was no new part. It was all exactly as we had
rehearsed it — exactly.”
He shook his head. “No, I had never rehearsed
the part you danced after Miss Niklova stopped the or-
chestra and played alone. Why, I’d never even seen
it!”
“Of course you had. You've simply forgotten it,
that’s all. Miss Niklova told me she was going to play
alone because the men got the time all wrong. That
was the only change.”
“Oh, all right,” he conceded. “I must have
dreamed it, I guess. I’m always dreaming about you
any way. Wish I could make you dream a little about
me, Marie.”
She started up again but again he held her back.
“I’m not going to let you run away this time.
You've got to listen to me to-night. I can't go on like
this. I want my answer. Do you love me or don't
you?”
He spoke rapidly and with determination but his
eyes watched her anxiously.
She answered reluctantly, her gaze on his hand
which covered her own. “I don't know.”
“But you must know! Why you — let me kiss you
once.”
“It’s not fair to remind me of that. You promised
to forget it.”
He laughed. “How could I forget it when it was
6o


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
the one bit of hope you’ve ever given me? I was
half mad with happiness that night and the next day.
The next day I — what do you suppose I did?”
She looked up wonderingly. He gazed back, silent.
“What did you do?” she asked at last.
“Oh, nothing much — just got a marriage li-
cense.”
& & Guy! »y
“Well, I said I was crazy! For weeks you’d been
holding me off — would n’t let me say a word. I was
beginning to think you were playing with me, that I
had n't a chance. But that night you were different
somehow —” He paused a moment as though trying
to recover a lost memory. “I don't know just how it
happened, my kissing you, but —”
“I did n't promise anything,” she interrupted in a
low voice.
“No, but you'd said once you did n't believe you'd
ever marry unless you were to do it on the spur of the
moment, unless the man just happened to strike you at
the psychological moment —”
“I did n't mean that literally — you might have
known I did n't!” she protested. “And yet — I
don't know — perhaps I did.”
She turned away from him and her dark eyes nar-
rowed thoughtfully.
He waited.
“To go away — alone with the man you love—
just the two of you — and be married without fuss or
61


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
and Grace Eustis. He does n’t know us and he's near.
We can do it and be back in half an hour.”
He watched her eagerly. She did not meet his
glance, but sat staring before her, biting her lips nerv-
ously.
“I wonder what Aunt Alicia would say — and
Hugh.”
“They would n't care,” he urged. “They know
me. They would n't object if we told them, would
they?”
cº NO.”
“And Mrs. Thorley would probably be relieved not
to have the bother of a wedding. Marie, if you love
me you’ll do it!”
“I do love you,” she said, turning troubled eyes to
his.
“Then you will?”
He caught her in his arms again and tried to draw
her face to his, but she pressed her hands against his
shoulders, keeping herself at arm's length.
“Do you really love me?” she asked.
gº Yes.”
“More than anything else in the world?”
“Yes.”
“I wonder if you really do?”
“Don’t wonder, dear — believe it.” His voice was
very tender, very earnest. -
A minute more she searched his face. It seemed to
satisfy her.
63


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“I do believe you,” she said. “And I'll marry you
to-night.”
“Darling!” -
She let him have his kiss now. Then he said:
“Listen. You wait here. I’ll get your coat and
bring it to you and we’ll slip away without being seen.”
He started for the door, but turned back to ask anx-
iously, “You’ll wait? You promise?”
She nodded. “I promise.”
Leaving her he sped down the corridor to get his hat
and coat and on the way ran into Gavock, who
promptly accosted him. After a few words of flatter-
ing comment on the dance in which the young man
had figured, Gavock said:
“By the way, I hope you have n't forgotten your
promise to present me to Miss Dupont.”
“No — no,” Amarinth stammered. “A little later
on, if you don't mind. Miss Dupont is engaged just
now.”
“Later then,” Gavock agreed.
As he made his escape Amarinth chuckled at the
aptness of his unintentional pun. She was “en-
gaged ” indeed!
His own coat secured, he hastened to the ladies'
dressing-room and obtained Marie's. A minute later
he and she were in a descending elevator, a minute
after that in a cab speeding northward.
Arrived at Amarinth's apartment, she waited in the
cab while he went up. When he returned and the cab
64


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
was again in motion he took a small box from his
pocket and opened it. It contained two rings. One
was set with a single splendid stone, the other was a
gold band.
“These are for you, dear,” he said. “They were
my mother's.”
She shrank back. “Oh, don't give me those — not
your mother's.”
“Why not?” He stared, taken aback by her man-
Iner.
“Why — why you ought to keep them,” she faltered.
There followed a moment of uncomfortable silence.
“It’s a very good stone,” he said at last in a hurt,
disappointed tone, dropping the jeweled ring back into
the box. “But, of course, if you’d rather have some-
thing different —”
“I would n't — of course, I would n't!” she cried.
“I’d love that more than anything, because it was
your mother's and because it means so much to you.
Only — I'm afraid I'm not — worthy —”
He cut her off with a little laugh of relief and lifted
the ring again from the box.
“I loved and honored my mother, dear,” he said.
“But not more than I shall love and honor my
wife.”
As he slipped the ring on her finger she shivered.
“You’re cold !” he said and drew her furs closer
about her throat.
The cab stopped.
!”
65


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
He kissed her. “Next time, you’ll be my wife,”
he whispered.
Her face white and tense she sat beside him in the
minister's study while the clergyman, whom they had
found busy over his books, went up-stairs to summon
his wife as a witness. The clock on the mantel ticked
loudly in the stillness of the room. Neither of them
spoke. Once his arm stole round her and a tremor
ran through her. He searched her face anxiously but
she did not meet his eyes.
“Don’t look so unhappy, dear,” he whispered. “If
you’d rather go back—”
She started up. “Yes, yes — let’s go back!”
He caught her to him. “No,” he said. “No!
You’ve given me your promise. If you love me
you’ll keep it. Do you love me? That's all I want
to know.”
“Yes.” The Word was a mere breath.
“Then we'll stay!”
The sound of steps descending the stairs came to
them. He released her. The minister entered with
his wife, who had made a hasty toilet and now smiled
sleepily at them. The chauffeur was summoned from
his cab as a second witness and the ceremony was per-
formed.
The clergyman handed Marie her marriage certifi-
cate and having no pocket in her coat she passed it
silently to Guy. Then the minister shook their hands,
his wife kissed Marie gently, the door closed behind
66


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
them, the cab door slammed, the chauffeur slipped into
his seat, the car started.
Guy lifted his wife's hand and pressed his lips to
the finger which now wore two rings.
“Your hand's like ice!” he exclaimed.
“I’m cold.”
He held her close. “Was I a brute to make you
see it through? I was so afraid of losing you! I was
afraid you’d never give me another chance.”
A short silence. Then he whispered: “Let’s not
go back to the dance.”
“But I must! I must tell Aunt Alicia. I must tell
her at once.”
“Of course,” he agreed after a moment. “Shall
we tell everybody?”
“Oh, no, not to-night! I want Hugh to hear it
first. I'm so afraid he’ll be — be hurt — at the way
we did it.” -
“No, he won't,” Guy assured her confidently.
“He’ll understand. He’s awfully human, Hugh
Senior is. Seems to remember how he felt when he
was young.”
“Why should n’t he? He's young himself yet—
only thirty-eight.”
“Only!”
“Well, thirty-eight is n’t old for a man.”
“You certainly can't call it young!”
“You certainly can't call Hugh old!” she protested.
“Why, he is n't a bit old.”
67


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“He goes about with the old men any way. And
you never see him with a girl.”
“No,” she conceded after a short silence, “he
doesn't care for girls. In the five years that I’ve
lived in the same house with him I’ve never known
him to call on a girl.”
“And you say he’s not old!”
“He is n’t. It’s just that he’s always working.”
“To-night too?”
“Oh, no. He would have come to see me dance if
he had been in town. He could n't get back in time.
He'll be back to-morrow morning. Oh!” she caught
herself up. “I’ve just thought of something. That
man will tell!” She pointed toward the chauffeur.
“It will be in the papers and no one must know until
I’ve told Hugh.”
“That's all right — I'll fix him. Oh, here we
are.”
He sprang out and helped her to alight.
“Just keep still for a few days, will you?” he said
to the driver, passing him a bill. “We don't want the
papers to get it until the announcements are out.”
“I understand, sir, thank you, sir,” the man replied
at once. “Good luck to you, sir.” He touched his
cap. “Good luck to you, Miss — Madam.”
“Thanks,” said Guy.
“Thank you,” Marie answered, turning to smile.
The music swelled out from the ballroom to meet
them as they stepped from the elevator and made their
68


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
lovely face into which they smiled. Was it his fancy
or had she grown pale, he wondered.
“I’m glad you liked our dance,” she answered
simply. -
“Liked it! My dear young lady, it was superb.
Where, if I may ask, did you learn to dance like that?”
“Madame Adrienne taught me, but she said I — had
a natural gift.”
The small tribute to herself was quoted with such a
charming air of deprecation that Gavock was puzzled
and he permitted himself a moment of direct scrutiny.
She was undoubtedly pale. And that contraction of
the pupils of her eyes meant nervous tension. His
glance dropped to her hands. They were clinched
tightly at her sides and the knuckles showed white.
Was it a plea for silence — that lame attempt to ex-
plain her extraordinary expertness? He looked again
at her face. Certainly there was no pleading there.
Instead she was staring at him fixedly, her brows
slightly furrowed. He waited.
“Haven't we met somewhere before, Mr. —
Mr.—”
“Gavock,” Amarinth supplied.
“Gavock?” She seemed to test the sound for a
familiar ring.
“Met before?” Gavock, taken aback, sparred for
time. So she meant to force him to take his stand
then and there. She meant to know the worst at once.
He could not but admire her daring.
70


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“I hope so,” he said lightly, “but I fear not.”
“But your face is so familiar!” She was still re-
garding him with a puzzled frown. “I’m sure
that —” -
“Dame Nature has just so many combinations,
you know, and has to repeat herself occasionally,”
Gavock intervened, with a glint of warning in his
glance. Could n't she let well enough alone, he
thought.
But she appeared not to note the warning nor even
to hear his words. Her study of his face grew more
intent. Then suddenly her own face lightened. She
smiled, flushed, and a low laugh gurgled in her
throat.
“I remember you now,” she said. “You’re the
man who bumped into me on Fifth Avenue this after-
noon.”
Amarinth started violently. Gavock gaped at her
in stupefied astonishment.
“You are — I’m sure you are!” she declared
laughingly. “I was getting out of the motor and you
somehow stumbled and fell back against the door.
And you stepped on my gown—or thought you had —
and apologized in French and I did n't understand and
you repeated it in English.”
Amarinth had swallowed hard several times while
she was speaking, and his face had reddened and then
gone white. He watched Gavock, waiting for what
he should say.
71


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
The latter regained his composure with an effort.
He felt the young man's challenging gaze and forcibly
held his eyes on the girl.
“Oh,” she murmured with a change of tone.
“Perhaps I should n't have mentioned it. But it was
so amusing. I did n't think you'd mind.”
“He does n’t mind,” Guy cut in sharply. “He
thought it amusing too. He told me about it at din-
ner. He said that when he spoke to you first in French
you answered him in French. He was positive about
it.”
“I was mistaken,” Gavock said to the girl. “In
my embarrassment I misunderstood you.”
“You must have. I don't speak French at all.”
“But he was not only positive about the French,
he was positive he had seen you before — in Europe
— in Paris —”
“I was mistaken about that also,” Gavock said.
“Your face was very familiar — or seemed so — and
I told Guy all that he says I did. But since then I
have recalled the person whom you so strongly re-
semble. And I am sure you cannot be that person be-
cause she is dead.”
“Dead!” cried Amarinth.
“Dead,” repeated Gavock. “She died in Paris
seven years ago.” -
At that moment Sybil Lowther, dancing by, stopped
and called out to Gavock: “Supper is on!”
“I’m ready if you are,” he answered.
72


An expectant hush fell on the room





THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Then you had n’t forgotten your promise?” she
asked.
“I had n't forgotten yours!”
Miss Lowther dismissed her partner and took Ga-
vock's arm. He turned and murmured a word of ex-
cuse to Marie and Guy. They smiled and nodded me-
chanically.
“Who is this Mr. Gavock?” Marie asked, looking
after him.
Guy did not answer. He was watching her with a
side glance as she stared after Gavock.
“Who is he?” she repeated.
“An old friend of my father's, over here on busi-
ness. He lives abroad — has lived there for twenty
years — in Paris.”
She turned her head and at sight of his face drew
back with a startled cry.
“Why do you look at me like that?”
“Why do you look at me like that?” he returned.
His eyes seemed to bore into hers. She stared back
shrinkingly a moment, then looked away. “There's
Aunt Alicia,” she exclaimed and started forward.
But he caught her hand and held it with a grip that
made her wince.
“Wait. You can go to her afterwards. I want
to — to ask you something.” -
Down the corridor, back to the little room which had
already witnessed one chapter of their common his-
tory, he led her. Neither spoke. She tried once to
75


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
draw her hand from the painful clutch of his fingers,
but he would not release it until they were in the room,
his back against the curtained doorway. Then he let
her go.
She stretched the fingers discolored by his pressure
and looked up at him.
“What’s the matter?” she faltered.
“There’s this the matter,” he replied slowly.
“I’ve got to know where you and Roger Gavock met
before. I’ve got to know !”
“Why, we’ve never met! I saw him this after-
noon —”
“I don't mean that. I mean before.”
“We’ve never met before.”
“Will you swear that on your honor?”
“Guy! Don't look at me like that! Why should
I swear? I tell you that I never saw Mr. Gavock un-
til this afternoon. Is n't my word enough? What
do you mean? What are you thinking of? I don't
understand.”
“I’ve got to know the truth about this thing, Marie.
You're my wife and I’ve got to know. Mr. Gavock
told me that he had seen you before, that he could n't
be mistaken about it — could n’t be.”
“But he said just now that he was. He said that
the person he took me for is dead, that she died in Paris
seven— Ah!” -
She ended with a sharp cry as of sudden enlighten-
ment.
76


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“What’s the matter? What is it?” he demanded.
She stared at him a moment, wild-eyed. “Who
did he tell you he thought I was P” she gasped out.
“He did n’t tell me — he could n’t remember.”
“But he told you something, something that — hor-
rified you!”
He was silent.
She caught her breath and began to measure the
brief length of the room with nervous steps, clasping
and unclasping her hands. His eyes followed her but
he did not speak.
“Listen,” she said abruptly, pausing before him.
“There is something I ought to have told you before
I married you. It was wrong of me not to speak but
— but I love you—and I was afraid — I did n’t know
what you would think — I was afraid of losing you.”
She threw out her arms in a tragic gesture of appeal
but he recoiled from her, his face set in a mask of hor-
TOr.
“Don’t look at me like that!” she begged. “I tried
to be honest with you — I put you off months and
months, you know I did I knew I should have to tell
you, and I — Then to-night when you urged me so
—and you had the license — I thought that if I told
you afterwards—”
She broke into a piteous moan.
“Told me what?” he asked in a hard voice.
“Oh, Guy, don't speak to me like that. You said
you loved me. You said you loved me more than any-
77


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
thing else in the world. You’ve just promised to love
and protect me all my life. Why, we’re married —
I'm your wife! Don't look at me like that!”
“Told me what?” he repeated grimly.
She shrank together at his tone. Her own face
hardened.
“There is some one who can tell you better than
I can what — there is to tell. Ask Hugh.”
“Hugh Senior' What can he tell me about you
that you can't tell me yourself?”
“Go to him to-morrow morning —”
“No! You’ve got to tell me yourself to-night —
now.”
She shook her head. “Go to him.”
“Then I'll go to-night.”
“He is n't in town. Go to-morrow morning, to his
office. I’ll tell him you’re coming.”
“To-morrow — to-morrow —”
He jerked out the words, staring ahead unseeingly,
as thoughts raced through his mind.
“You are my wife,” he said suddenly. “I prom-
ised to protect you — as you just reminded me — and
I will. Will you obey me — as you promised?”
“I will do anything you say.”
“Then you are to tell no one of our marriage, not
even Mrs. Thorley. And you are not to tell Hugh
Senior — above all. Do you promise?”
She hesitated. “I don't understand,” she mur-
mured doubtfully.
78


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Never mind that. You promised to obey.”
“I won't tell him. I won't tell any one.”
“Tell them that I’ve asked you to marry me, that’s
all.”
She nodded, her white, drawn face raised to his.
“You don't love me,” she said slowly and with tragic
conviction. “I know it now. You never loved me.”
The stricken look in her eyes moved him at last.
Impetuously he swept her into his arms.
“I do love you! Marie, tell me that it is n’t any-
thing that could separate us.”
She shivered. “I don't know. I don’t know what
could separate us,” she answered dully.
“It could n’t be that — it could n’t be! Marie, tell
me what it is. I can't stand the suspense. I love you.
Don't you see that I'm only asking what any man has
a right to know about his wife?”
She drew herself away from his embrace. “I must
go to my aunt. I want to go home.”
Home! The word struck painfully on his ears.
She was his wife, her home was with him. Silently
he followed her down the corridor.
“I’m going to the dressing-room for my coat,” she
said without looking at him. “Please tell my aunt to
meet me there, that I want to go ho— to leave here.”
He winced at her stammering avoidance of the pain-
ful word and mumbled an assent. Then she turned
and hurried away.
Mrs. Thorley was in the ballroom and at his message
79


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
her eyebrows lifted ever so slightly above her world-
weary eyes, but she made no comment, thanked him
smilingly, and walked off at once with an elderly man
with whom she had been conversing.
Amarinth made his way to the supper-room. From
the doorway he located Gavock and Sybil Lowther at
a distant table and turned frowningly away again.
“I’ll get the truth if I have to choke it out of him,”
he promised himself. “He was lying to-night—ly-
ing!”
8O


CHAPTER VII
RS. THORLEY sank back against the cush-
ions of her limousine with a sigh of relief. She
had reached the age when late hours and the lights and
noises of festivity always tired her, but to-night her
nerves had been strained not by fatigue alone but by
anxiety. Silently she watched the face of the girl be-
side her as the street lamps and flashes from passing
motors threw it into view. Twice she opened her lips
to speak and twice reconsidered the impulse. A wor-
ried frown deepened between her brows.
Suddenly, shivering in the raw, midnight air, she
gave an ineffectual tug at the fur robe that lay across
her knees. The movement roused her companion and
two young arms came to her assistance.
“Thank you, my dear.”
Then after a short silence Mrs. Thorley spoke again.
“Who taught you that dance, Marie?”
“Why, Madame Adrienne, of course.”
Mrs. Thorley hesitated. “I wondered about it,”
she said at last, “because I happened to hear Miss
Lowther telling some one that Madame Adrienne had
not taught it to you and that Madame thought you had
had lessons before you came to her.”
8I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
The girl's shoulders shot up impatiently. “Sybil
Lowther is always horrid about other people doing
things well.”
“I see,” Mrs. Thorley murmured. “And is this
the dance you are planning to do at the carnival next
month P”
& 4 Yes.”
“You must n’t. You do it too well.”
“Aunt Alicia!”
“My dear child, think a moment. Think how it
must seem to people who don't understand. Miss
Lowther's remark was a straw in the wind. Nothing
could be more unfortunate than to start — conjecture.
So far we have managed to escape it.”
To this Marie for several moments said nothing,
but her short, quick breathing broke the stillness. Of
a sudden she spoke.
“Mr. Amarinth asked me to marry him to-night.”
Mrs. Thorley started slightly. “Well?” she said.
“He’s going to see Hugh in the morning.”
There was a pause.
“Aunt Alicia, will it make a difference to him? Do
you think it will — do you?”
On the eager pleading the answer followed reluct-
antly. “I don't know — I don't know. Will you
mind so very much if it does?”
“I shall mind terribly — terribly l’”
The car slid smoothly round a corner and stopped.
Marie sprang out.
82


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Hugh must be back,” she exclaimed, turning to
assist Mrs. Thorley. “There’s a light in the library.”
“He said he might return to-night, you know.”
“I hope he has — I hope he has.”
“Let me speak to him first,” Mrs. Thorley said
when they were inside the house, detaining Marie who
was starting impulsively for the library door. “There
are several matters I must see him about and I’m
rather tired. I’ll let you know when I come up-
stairs.”
Marie acquiesced doubtfully and turned toward the
steps.
“Don’t change your gown. I won't be long and I
want him to see it,” Mrs. Thorley looked back to say
before opening the library door.
When the door closed again after her, Marie lin-
gered at the foot of the steps as though undecided as
to what to do. She made a sudden, impetuous move-
ment toward the library, then with a change of pur-
pose, wheeled and ran lightly up the stairs.
Hugh Senior started up from a deep arm-chair be-
fore the fire at the sound of the door opening. “I
must have dozed,” he said, advancing to meet his aunt.
“Where's Marie P”
“Up-stairs. She’ll be down later,” Mrs. Thorley
replied, letting her fur mantle slip into his arms.
“She has something to tell you.”
“Something to tell me?” he echoed in sharp in-
quiry.
83


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Guy Amarinth has asked her to marry him.”
“Amarinth !”
“Does it surprise you? Surely you know she has
been seeing a great deal of him lately.”
“She sees other men too. Somehow I did n’t think
of singling him out. Has she accepted him?”
“She has sent him to you.”
“Ah, I see!”
He walked back to the fire and Mrs. Thorley dropped
wearily into the chair he had relinquished.
In spite of the difference in age and sex the two were
plainly of the same family. A long, rather narrow
face with deep-set, gray eyes, a fine straight nose and
square, clean-cut jaw were common to both, and in her
had lost little of their forceful character through fem-
inization and sagging muscles. Both were tall and
sparely fleshed; in bodily movement quick and purpose-
ful; of strong passions, which in her were tempered by
time and experience, in him, merely curbed.
“Oh, Hugh,” she exclaimed with a touch of im-
patience, “why have you let it come to this?”
He stared, not understanding.
“My dear boy, I'm not blind. Don't you suppose
I know that you worship the ground she walks on?”
His face reddened swiftly and he dropped his eyes
to the fire. For a few moments there was silence.
“I’m thirty-eight,” he said at last. “She is twenty-
four.”
“She may be older.”
84


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
He shook his head. “She could n’t have been more
than seventeen, and that was hardly seven years ago —
just seven in April.”
“Well, what of it? Thirty-eight is young, and
you’re a very attractive man, Hugh.”
“She does n’t seem to have noticed it.”
“Of course not! Your attitude toward her has al-
ways been so paternal.” -
“My dear aunt, can I never make you understand
how I feel about Marie? What you have done for
her you did because it promised you — entertainment.”
“Hugh, that’s unfair!”
“Not wholly that, I’ll admit, but at any rate you
looked upon it as an interesting experiment. The un-
usualness of the case appealed to your imagination.
You liked the idea of doing what few women would
have done in your place, and that was partly why you
did it.”
“I was sorry for the child.”
“Of course. I don't mean to imply that your mo-
tive was entirely selfish and I don't underrate the help
you’ve been to me. My problem would have been ex-
ceedingly difficult without you. All I mean is this,
that while you would, in any case, have been generous
— with money — you would have been generous at a
safe distance if Marie had not happened to be the
charming, adorable creature she was.”
Mrs. Thorley gave a little snort of indignation.
“My dear Hugh, may I inquire how near a problem
85


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
she would have been to you if you had not happened
to fall in love with her?”
“That’s just the point I’m trying to make, Aunt
Alicia. My feeling for Marie has never had anything
to do with my sense of responsibility toward her. I
was responsible for her condition. I had wrenched
her from her niche in life and could n't put her back.
I had to find some other for her. You can never know
how much the matter troubled me during her first year
in England. When you wrote the following summer
that you had decided to keep her with you I could have
kissed your feet in relief and gratitude.”
Hugh's voice as he ended was slightly husky and he
turned his face from his aunt's gaze.
Mrs. Thorley sighed. “My dear boy, if you had
only let her see how much you care.”
“I could n't,” he said after a moment. “Don’t you
see? I owe her happiness. She has such an exagger-
ated idea of her obligation to us that she was capable
of marrying me out of sheer gratitude. I could n't let
her do that, could I? If Amarinth can make her
happy —”
“He won't marry her.”
“Why do you say that?”
Mrs. Thorley looked up with a hopeful gleam in
her tired eyes. “You don't mean to tell him then?”
she asked. -
“Not tell him! I must tell him.”
&c. Why? >>
86


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Hugh Senior studied his companion's face in per-
plexed astonishment. “I could n't let him marry her
without knowing,” he said slowly, but with a hint of
uncertainty, as though the course he declared impossi-
ble yet tempted him.
She was quick to press the advantage, as she saw it.
“He won't marry her if he knows,” she said.
“You say you owe her happiness. Tell him and
you’ll rob her of her chance of it.”
He turned and strode the length of the room and
back. She watched him eagerly.
“She loves him, Hugh,” she pleaded again. “She
asked me if I thought it would make a difference to
him and I asked if she would mind very much if it did,
and she said: “Terribly!” If you had seen her face,
heard her voice —”
“She would be the last to wish to deceive the
man she loves.”
“But it’s quixotic! Do you know another girl as
charming, as lovable? Another with as much in her-
self to give a man?”
“No, and if Amarinth really cares for her —”
“He’ll be revolted. There’ll come a sense of
strangeness between them. We had it ourselves, you
know.”
He nodded, frowning anxiously.
“It’s an old story to us, but will come as a shock
to him. He won't marry her.”
“Yes, he will. I’ll make him see it as we do.”
87


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Don’t tell him. Let her tell him after they are
married.”
“I can’t do that. It would n’t be fair to him.”
“To him! And you love her! Oh, you men, you
men!” She rose impatiently. “Is one of you ever
fair to a woman?” -
He did not answer.
“Well,” she said with a sigh, “we’ve given her a
life as happy as a girl could have for six years. After
all, that's as much as she has a right to expect, I dare
say.”
He winced. “If she has sent him to me it is be-
cause she wishes me to tell him the truth.”
“Oh, tell him, tell him!” she retorted hotly.
“Your story coupled with the talk he must have heard
to-night about her dancing—” She shrugged hope-
lessly. “Poor child.”
“Talk? What do you mean?”
“I mean that she danced too well. There was talk.
I heard one remark and there must have been others.
I told you, you remember, when she took up this danc-
ing that she must have had lessons before. Now I'm
sure of it. Her performance to-night was so ex-
traordinary that only one explanation is possible.”
“Surely you exaggerate.”
“No. I've seen the greatest dancers of two gen-
erations. I know. The girl is a dancer — a trained
dancer. Fortunately most of the people there were
too dull, too uneducated in such matters, to appreciate
88


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
her performance. Even so, she aroused comment.
I have forbidden her to repeat it but I wish you had
seen it. You’ll see her gown at any rate, though you
probably won't realize its significance. She planned
it herself.”
“A trained dancer!” Hugh exclaimed, staring at
his aunt.
“European at that. It does n’t suggest pleasant
things, Hugh.”
“It’s incredible.”
“Guy Amarinth may not find it so.” She took up
her cloak from the chair where it lay and turned to-
ward the door. “I suppose there is nothing I can
say to move you.” She paused a moment. “You
mean to tell him?”
He was silent.
“Good night then. She wants to speak to you.
I'll send her down.”
He went over to her and bending kissed her on the
cheek. “Good night,” he said gently. “I wish I
could see things differently, if only for your sake.”
“Oh, don't consider me! Think of her!”
When she was gone he began nervously to pace
the floor, stopping at every turn to listen for the step
he awaited. At last he heard it, tapping lightly down
the stairs. The door opened and she came in.
She was still wearing the gown in which she had
danced, but the low table lamps left her head and
shoulders in shadow. In spite of that, however, he
89


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
noted at once the change in her. And the sight of
her face, white and drawn as he had never seen it,
stabbed him unbearably.
His glance sank to her dress. Dimmed though its
flame-like radiance was in the soft, shaded light, it yet
stood out from the dark, book-lined walls like a flam-
boyant poster. And on his mind, filled with disquiet-
ing conjectures, it struck a note so garish, so un-
pleasant, that involuntarily he turned his head away.
And it was she who first spoke.
“Did Aunt Alicia tell you?”
“Yes.”
“That he will come to see you to-morrow?”
“Yes.”
“Did she ask you not to tell him?”
He nodded an assent.
“She thinks he will mind then.” She drew a deep
breath. “What will you do?”
“What do you wish me to do, Marie?”
“You must tell him!”
She came close to him and looked intently into his
eyes as though trying to read his thoughts. He gazed
back, waiting. Her manner seemed strange to him;
she herself seemed strange and remote.
“I wonder if you don't know more about me than
you have ever told me?” she said suddenly.
He gave her a swift glance. “Why?” he ques-
tioned sharply.
She replied with a characteristic shrug, her eyes
90


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
still on his. “I feel it,” she said. “But, listen.
You must tell him everything—everything you know.”
“What would you do if I were to decide to tell him
nothing?”
“I should tell him myself.”
“I knew it!” He gave a deep sigh of relief and
his tense face relaxed. “I knew that you would not
want to buy happiness with a lie.”
“I can't,” she answered. “I know that — now.”
Her lip quivered with a sudden access of feeling and
she turned her face away.
“Do you care so much for him?” he cried out in
jealous misery.
She hid her face in her hands and her shoulders
shook with dry sobs.
Impulsively he started toward her, but stopped.
The sight of her suffering hurt him unbearably, his
arms ached to hold and shield her, but the very strength
of his feeling kept him rigid. He was afraid of
betraying himself, knowing that should he do so she
would only shrink from him. It was not his arms
she wanted. Nothing now lay in his power to do
for her but the one thing: he must make Amarinth
see!
But it was not in Hugh's nature to stand inactive
for long. He stirred restlessly. “Don’t — don’t,”
he begged.
At that she wheeled and thrust out her arms im-
ploringly.
9I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Whatever happens, you won't desert me, will you
— whatever happens?”
“Of course not! What are you thinking of, child?
This will always be your home.”
“Home! I have no home.”
“Mariel ”
“I owe everything in the world to you — you and
Aunt Alicia —”
“You owe us nothing,” he put in. “All we have
done, all we can ever do, will not compensate for the
injury I did you. You owe us nothing.”
“Yes, everything,” she insisted. “These years of
happiness, of care and affection that never failed,
friends, and this beautiful home and clothes— every-
thing. Everything I have you’ve given me — even
my name.”
A tremor shook her but she went on. “You won't
think I'm ungrateful, will you? No matter what
happens, you won't ever think that? I could n’t bear
it.”
“My dear child, what is the matter?”
“I could n’t bear it if you thought me ungrate-
ful. I'm not, Hugh, I’m not! That’s what I wanted
to say to you. You do believe it, don't you?”
“Of course.”
“That's all then. Good night.” She turned and
hurried toward the door.
“Marie, come back. Tell me what is troubling
you.”
92


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“You’ll know — soon,” she said, and the next mo-
ment the door closed after her.
Two strides and he had jerked it open. But al-
ready she was at the foot of the stairs. He started
to follow, then stopped short and remained motion-
less, listening to her hurrying steps until a door closed
above and he heard them no more. Then he turned
and crossed and recrossed the room in anxious
thought.
What was the matter? What had she meant?
What was it he would know soon? Why had she
been so pathetically eager to convince him of her
gratitude? He questioned himself again and again
but found no answers. Vague forebodings assailed
him that as his thoughts coursed backward through the
years seemed rooted in the very beginnings of his ac-
quaintance with the girl.
But surmises were worse than folly. To-morrow
Amarinth would come. He must be ready. He must
not fail her in the one way that he might serve.
He passed into a smaller room adjoining the library
and switched on the light. This was his study, where
he isolated himself for home work. Crossing to a
chest of drawers he fitted a key into the lock of one
and opened it. Behind papers and packages of various
kinds he slipped his hand and drew out a long, nar-
row box. This he placed on a table and took off the
lid. Inside lay an object wrapped in several folds of
tissue paper which he lifted out carelessly and dropped
93


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
into his coat pocket. Then he stood staring down at
the thing that remained in the box, a knife with a
rudely carved bone handle, the blade long and evil
looking.
What was it she had said? “You must tell him
everything — everything you know.”
For a long time he remained thus, his eyes fastened
upon the dirk lying in the box. Then suddenly his
lips closed tightly as on an ultimate decision and re-
placing its cover he shoved the box far back again in
the drawer from which he had taken it, after which he
locked the drawer.
Switching out the lights, he returned to the library
and there also extinguished the light. As he slowly
mounted the stairs to his bedroom he looked at his
watch. It was two o'clock.
94


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
The page slipped from Count Egon's hand to the
table. Slowly he rose to his feet. His swarthy face
was strained and set. Solemly he lifted his right
hand and made the sign of the cross.
“Until summers three and four shall our hearts
thirst, until winters four and three shall the Tartar
howl — then no more forever! By the sword of the
first of my fathers it is sworn.”
Spoken aloud, in his guttural Slavic tongue, the
oath to an understanding ear would have seemed
weirdly incongruous, mingling as it did with the whir-
ring and scurrying of automobiles, the grind and clang
of an occasional trolley car, and other late night noises
of Broadway.
Through the final word, spoken with intense solem-
nity, shrilled the telephone bell.
Count Szemere started violently and stared about
the room, still unconscious of the cause of his dis-
turbance. The bell rang again. He hurried to the
instrument and answered, listened a moment to a mes-
sage, then said: “That he mount immediately.”
Hanging up the receiver he returned to his place at
the writing-table and added to his letter the few lines:
Only believe and trust, Nadeshda mine. Until we meet
1
and always, Thine only,
EGON.
Quickly inserting the closely written sheet within
an envelope he addressed it:
96


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
To the High and Nobly Born,
The Countess Belcredi-Csorna,
Castle Csorna, Bucharest, Rumania.
This finished, he rose and stood motionless in an
attitude of listening.
A knock struck sharply on the door. He sprang
forward and opened and a man entered. With a cry
of affectionate welcome Egon threw himself upon his
breast.
“Louis ”
Count Louis Szemere was some ten years his cousin's
senior. Strikingly resembling him at a first glance,
at a second he revealed points of wide divergence of
temperament. Racial and family characteristics they
shared: the same swarthy complexion, wiry black hair,
and bristling black mustache; the same narrow eyes
under thick brows, the same low forehead and high
cheekbones, and in figure both were short and com-
pactly built. But, whereas Egon's countenance
mirrored his thoughts, Louis’ served him as a
mask.
The embrace was returned in silence, then releasing
himself Louis asked in the language of their country:
“Is it ready?”
Egon caught up his letter from the writing-table
and held it out.
“Behold | *
Louis took it from him and carefully placed it in a
leather wallet, which in turn he slipped into an inner
97


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
pocket of his coat, his young kinsman following his
movements with a tense face.
“In eighteen days you will be again at Csorna —
you will see her. Oh, my God, my God!” With a
cry of despair he sank into a chair and broke into wild
weeping.
Louis looked on with unmoved countenance.
“Your fate is hard, my cousin. I have done what
I could. The police of all Europe still seek.”
Egon raised his head. “There has been no word,
no clue?”
“None.”
“And the Tartar hag will live forever!” Again he
dropped his head into his hands, but his anguish now
WaS mute.
“One thing has been learned, but it leads nowhere,”
said Louis. “Andrus is in this country, in New York.
He lives here like a rat, hiding among rats.”
With another swift change of mood Egon Szemere
Sprang up.
“He knows nothing, this Andrus, nothing!” he de-
clared impatiently. “Have I not said it ever? You
cut off his hand — his brush hand. WELLP Did he
speak?”
“The Cross of Kemesvar will buy many brush
hands,” Louis returned calmly.
“Tscha!” Egon grunted contemptuously. “He
was an artist. Had he not won a first at the Salon?
98


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
eyes glittering, and said: “I too have sworn an
Oath ! ”
For a while his hearer remained silent, watching the
fierce, rapt face. Abruptly he spoke.
“Listen, Egon. What do you hear?” he asked,
jerking his head toward the windows. “Cars that
slide along tracks of steel, carriages that need no horses
— sounds that would have struck strangely on the ear
of our first ancestor. Come back to the present and
to reason. Madness lies at the end of the road you
travel — nothing else.”
“Perhaps,” Egon answered slowly. “The founder
of our house knew nothing of modern wonders, as you
say. But when he swore an oath it came to pass. Is
it not so?”
Louis shrugged his heavy shoulders. “You return
to Washington to-morrow?” he asked, rising to end
the conversation.
“Yes.”
“I will leave you now. It is already late and my
steamer sails at daybreak.” He placed his hands af-
fectionately upon his kinsman's shoulders. “My heart
is very heavy for you, Egon. What is in my power
to do to serve you I do, and will ever do. Farewell.”
“Farewell,” Egon replied. “You will greet my
cousins in my name. For the rest — I have written.”
He gestured toward the pocket in which his letter
rested.
There was a pause.
IOI


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“She is lovelier even than you knew her, Egon,”
Count Louis said.
Egon's chest heaved with a quick, hard breath, but
no reply came.
The cousins embraced silently, then silently facing
one another each made the sign of the cross. Count
Louis walked to the door, opened it, and without look-
ing back went out and closed it after him.
The traveling clock on the writing-table struck twice.
IO2


CHAPTER IX
WO o'clock.
Irma Niklova paused half way up the fourth
steep flight of tenement stairs and listened to the two
deep notes that boomed softly from a distant tower.
She was panting from the exertion of the long climb
and her thin, bloodless face was blue with cold, but in
spite of discomfort and fatigue her senses quickened
at the beauty of the tones that spread their resonance
through the silent night.
With an effort she dragged herself to the top of the
stairs and felt her way down the narrow, unlit hall to a
door from which, through a wide crack at the sill, a dim
ray of light escaped to lose itself almost instantly in
the darkness. At the door she listened a moment,
then turned the knob noiselessly, and went in. Noise-
lessly she closed the door again while her glance swept
the room.
On a bed in one corner lay a boy of perhaps fifteen
or so. His form was huddled beneath the coverings,
only the wasted face and black, unkempt hair were
visible. He was asleep and his short, feverish breath-
ing alone broke the stillness.
Nearby, at a table, sat a man, also asleep, his face
pressed down upon his right arm. This arm, stretched
IO3


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“He seems better,” she whispered to the man.
He nodded.
She beckoned him to follow her into the hall and
there they talked in low tones. The doctor had not
come, the man said, but Pavlo had taken the medicine
and had slept; assuredly he was better.
“You must go to bed,” she said, when the report
was ended. “You are very tired. Never, never, can
I thank you for all you do for us, Mr. Andrus.”
“What I do for you you would as gladly do for me,
Miss Niklova. We are comrades. It is understood
that we help one another.”
Returning to the room he picked up his fallen sketch
and pencil. “If there is anything I can do, you will
call me?” he asked, rejoining her in the hall. “You
promise?”
She nodded with a smile so warm and tender that it
almost beautified her. “I’ll call you — I promise.”
Hesitating, she added timidly: “Don’t work any
more to-night, you look so tired.”
He smiled — a smile that brought no light to his
eyes—and turning left her.
In the doorway she waited, looking after him until
his head had vanished above the stair railing.
Back in her room she busied herself reviving the
meager fire in the grate, then in a smaller room adjoin-
ing she partly undressed, slipped on her long outdoor
coat and returning to the sickroom she lowered the
light. Before the icon which filled one corner of the
IO5


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
The thought of these canvases and the human trag-
edy they stood for had often stabbed her heart. She
had seen them all and knew too well what painful wit-
ness they bore to hours of hopeless struggle.
Early in her acquaintance with her American neigh-
bor — begun by a service he had rendered her young
brother — he had told her that while working as a stu-
dent in Paris he had met with an accident which had
resulted in the amputation of his right hand. Hurled
into an abyss of despair he had at length emerged with
, the resolve to conquer fate, to train the left hand as he
had trained the right.
Stubbornly he had labored until able to maintain
himself by commercial drawing. Just so much of the
distasteful work he now did as sufficed to keep life in
his body and the body housed. Beyond that his time
was spent on these canvases. Inch by inch, stroke by
stroke, he had trained his inept muscles. Months,
years, had gone by and still the conception of his brain
and the execution of his hand lay worlds apart.
But it was not the tragic futility of this struggle that
now riveted the Russian girl's attention. Nor was it
the man himself, who, seated with head sunk and eyes
vacant in the apathy of despair, had heard neither her
knock nor her step. It was the canvas on the easel be-
fore him that held her transfixed with astonishment.
It was the life-size portrait of a woman.
The shade had been removed from the oil lamp on
the table behind Andrus and the light streaming over

Io/


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
the vivid colors of the short dancing dress seemed to
rebound from the jots of paint like flecks of fire. The
figure was poised on the toes, the arms outstretched in
the full sweep of movement. Dark, lustrous hair
hugged the small head, closely framing the young,
glowing face, high set on a slender throat bare of all
Ornament.
“Miss Dupont!”
Irma Niklova gasped the name and at the sound An-
drus rose with a nervous start.
“Why — why — what’s the matter?” he stam-
mered, like a man rudely awakened from deep sleep.
She pulled herself together with an effort. “I
knocked. You did n’t answer. I thought you were
asleep. Pavlo is worse. Will you go for the doc-
tor?” -
“Of course.”
He caught up a coat from a chair and put it on and
reached for a hat that lay on the table. Turning back
to her he followed her eyes to the canvas, and for sev-
eral moments they stood in silence, gazing at the bril-
liant figure of the dancer.
At last he spoke. “I painted that.”
“You ! ” -
He laughed shortly. “I had a hand then that obeyed
me. That was the last thing I did before —”
He was so near her that she felt the sharp contrac-
tion of his form which finished the sentence. An ex-
clamation of pain and horror broke from her, a cry that
*y
IO8


“Marie Dupont l” she gasped
ſº


tyr , . .
* *
* * *


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
was more than mere pity for human woe. It was the
revolt of an artist at the tragedy of an artist's soul.
“Come. I will go for the doctor.”
He bent and turned down the lamp, but Irma Niklova
did not move.
“That is a portrait,” she said. “Who is it?”
A pause. The room was dim and shadowy now,
and as before they stood together staring at the radiant
form that seemed to draw to itself what little light the
lamp gave out.
“She was a dancer,” he said at last in a low tone.
“I knew her in Paris — years ago.”
“A dancer — for the public?”
He nodded.
“What is her name?”
“She has none — she is dead.”
“Dead ”
He shuddered. “I loved her and she is dead,” he
said, and striding to the door he jerked it open.
“Come, we must hurry.”
She staggered blindly after him into the dark hall.
III


CHAPTER X
"Oº — two — three — four — five.”
Guy Amarinth sank back to his pillow with a
groan of impatience. Only five o'clock! And he
could not hope to see Hugh Senior until ten, since the
latter would probably not reach his office before then
— it might be even later. Five hours! And nothing
to do in the meantime but think.
If he could only sleep! But his mind worked on as
relentlessly as a machine, and, like a machine, follow-
ing always the same course, reaching the same conclu-
sions.
He had left the Esplanade soon after his glimpse of
Gavock in the supper-room with Miss Lowther. His
intention at first had been to wait, accompany Gavock
home, and somehow wring the truth from him. But
while waiting, saner counsel had come. To force an
interview at such an hour would only inform Gavock
of the seriousness of the issue and so close his lips the
more effectually. He had said he would lie should the
occasion arise, and he had lied. There was nothing to
be gained by a talk with him. It would be better to
hear first what Hugh Senior had to tell him.
What could that be? His conjecturing clung tena-
II2


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
ciously to the course on which it had been started by his
after-dinner talk with Gavock, for he was not possessed
with an active imagination. But he knew it, and the
one ray of light amid the darkness of surmise was the
chance that Hugh Senior's revelation would be some-
thing no guessing of his could ever have hit upon.
Would Marie keep her promise and conceal the fact
of their marriage? That question he put to himself
repeatedly. If she should tell, would not Hugh Senior,
like Gavock, lie to protect her? A horror of being kept
in the dark obsessed Guy. He had told Gavock that
he wanted no fool's paradise, nor did he. He wanted
the truth at any cost.
Just what the reckoning might come to at the highest,
he did not allow himself to calculate; but in their trou-
bled wanderings his thoughts glanced off the question
again and again. After all, as it stood now, the mar-
riage was legally annullable —
But from that way of escape for himself he was
turned back by the memory of an anguished face and
tremulous words: “I love you — I was afraid of los-
ing you.”
It was barely ten o'clock when he presented himself
at Hugh Senior's office. To his relief he was ad-
mitted at once and as he entered he was conscious of
the sharp glance of appraisal that the older man turned
upon him during their brief greetings. The two had
met a dozen times, but not until now had they had oc-
II3


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
casion to take stock of one another's quality or mental
bias. “Will he lie to me?” Amarinth asked himself.
“How will he take it?” Hugh Senior wondered.
“Just what has Marie told you about herself?”
“Nothing.”
Amarinth had taken the seat to which a handwave
had invited him. It stood close to the desk at which
he had found Hugh at work.
“I see. Well, she has asked me to tell you what I
know of her; but before I do so I must request your
assurance as a man of honor that what I say shall be
held in strictest confidence. As I understand the sit-
uation, you have made an offer of marriage to my ward
— Miss Dupont, that is — and she has given you no
answer. When you leave here you will be at liberty
honorably to advance or retreat— as you may desire.
Am I right?”
A dull flush mounted in Amarinth's face, and he
gave a short nod in sign of assent.
“And I have your word of honor as to your silence
in the event of your withdrawal?”
“Certainly.”
“Thank you. Of course, if you should decide to
press your suit and are accepted by Miss Dupont, her
story becomes your property — to do with as you and
she see fit. In that case you can rely on my silence and
that of my aunt.”
“I understand.”
The color had waned in Amarinth's face at this
II4


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
formal preface, and he set his teeth and stiffened his
body as though to resist a shock. Noting this Hugh
sought to reassure him.
“I don't wish to alarm you, Amarinth. Frankly,
I have no idea how the story will strike you. I have
never before told it to any one except persons whose
professional advice I wanted.”
He opened a desk drawer and took out the package
wrapped in tissue paper which he had the night before
removed from the cabinet in his study. He laid it on
the desk and settling himself again in his chair began.
“Seven years ago next month I made a business trip
to London. From there I went over to Paris for a
short stay with my aunt, Mrs. Thorley, who had re-
cently become a widow and had turned over her af-
fairs to me. She was living in the country about three
hours by motor from Paris. The day after my arrival
I drove her car into the city, dined with friends there,
and went to the theater. On my return to the hotel
where I was to spend the night I found a cable from
New York informing me that a case in which I was
deeply interested was to come up for trial a month ear-
lier than I had expected and that postponement was not
advisable. Finding that there was a boat leaving
Cherbourg on the following day which would put me
in New York in time, I had no choice but to take it.
It was, however, absolutely necessary to finish up my
aunt's business before leaving, so I decided to motor
back early in the morning, see her, and then rush on
II5


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
by motor to Cherbourg. It was barely daylight when
I left my hotel. Do you know Paris well?”
“Hardly at all.”
“Then I won't bore you with street names. The
faint streak of light in the east gave me my general
direction and the streets being at that hour practically
deserted I made good progress. I had crossed the
river and got into the old part of the city where the
streets are all narrow and wind and twist unexpectedly.
Suddenly as I was nearing a sharp bend a woman
darted from around a corner and ran across my course.
I shouted: “Look out!’ and made an effort to swing
the car aside, but I struck her and she fell, thrown,
fortunately, out of the path of the car. I stopped and
ran to her. She was unconscious but alive and as far
as I could judge not much hurt — had fainted from
fright, I thought, and was probably only bruised. I
poured some whisky down her throat and that started
her pulse a bit, but did not rouse her. So I looked
about for help, wondering what I’d better do.”
Hugh paused. His thin, strong hands were tightly
clasped before him on the desk ledge and his eyes
frowned fixedly upon them as he spoke. Now he
looked up at Guy.
“You know those queer, half-moon streets that be-
gin and end on acute angles in the oldest sections of
Paris? Well, this was such a scrap of a street.
Small shops lined it on both sides, their windows closed
with solid shutters. There was no sign of a waking
II6


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
creature anywhere. I called loudly. No one an-
swered. The only thing to do apparently was to get
the girl to a hospital —”
“The girl!”
“Yes — it was Marie. She was just a slip of a girl,
sixteen or seventeen, at most. I carried her to the
car and placed her in the tonneau. It was then my in-
tention to ask the first person I met the way to the near-
est hospital; but, as I started off, recollections of the
experiences of foreigners in such cases occurred to me
and I foresaw myself dragging out the day explaining
or trying to explain the accident to the hospital authori-
ties, and being probably passed on by them to the po-
lice. It would certainly mean missing my boat and that
I was determined not to do. As the girl's condition
was not alarming I decided that it would be safe to
take her on to my aunt's place, where she would have
every care. Of course, had I thought there would be
the slightest risk to her in delay, I should have taken
my chances at the hospital. I stopped frequently to
assure myself that she was not growing weaker and
once I noticed a spot of blood on the bosom of her
dress. I opened the dress a little at the neck and found
a cut caused by a -a necklace that she was wearing
under her gown.”
Hugh's face had flushed as he stumbled slightly over
his words, but his hearer gave no sign of having no-
ticed the break.
“This necklace was a gaudy affair with large imita-
117


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
tion stones, and I took it off and put it in my pocket
and laid a handkerchief over the wound. The neck-
lace is there; I’ll show it to you presently.” He
glanced toward the package at his elbow.
“I tried several times to rouse her,” he continued,
“but failed, and I assure you that ride seemed endless.
As soon as we arrived at my aunt's the girl was put to
bed and a doctor summoned. The nearest, as it hap-
pened, was a friend of Mrs. Thorley's, an Englishman,
retired from practice. She naturally was greatly dis-
turbed by the affair and we were both much relieved
when Dr. Vining announced, after a thorough exam-
ination, that no serious damage had been done. He
had succeeded in rousing his patient for a few minutes,
but was unwilling to have her questioned, and allowed
her to drop off again into sleep. She had sustained a
violent shock, he said, and sleep was the best possible
restorative for her nerves.
“When he was gone my aunt and I turned our at-
tention to the business that I wanted to discuss with
her and we had just about finished with it when
the doctor returned. His patient still slept but was
stronger, he reported, and as it was high time for me
to be on my way to Cherbourg, he undertook to see her
back to her home and to negotiate the settlement of
any claim for injury that she or her family might see
fit to make. She was probably, he thought, a factory
girl or one employed in a shop — judging by her clothes
— but I’ll go into that later. Well, I caught my boat
II8


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
and returned to New York. Oddly enough I quite for-
got the necklace until I was well on my way to Cher-
bourg, and at Cherbourg there was no time to send
it back and — it has been in my possession ever since.”
He glanced again at the package on the desk, then at
Amarinth, who stared at him dumbly with white, set
face.
“She has never asked for it — I have waited for
her to ask,” Hugh added, then, as Amarinth did not
speak, he again took up his narrative.
“What happened when she finally awoke I can give
you only at second hand, as I heard it later from my
aunt. The only person in the room at the moment was
a maid, an English woman. Mrs. Thorley's servants,
let me explain, were all English. Her husband was
English and, like many foreigners, loved France but
detested the French, so that they always took their
English servants along when they went to France for
their annual stay. I mention this, because the fact of
the household being entirely English had a bearing on
what followed. The maid reported that the strange
young girl suddenly stirred in her sleep, opened her
eyes, and let them travel slowly around the room until
they reached the face of her watcher.
“‘Who are you?’ she asked, after a long, silent
scrutiny.”
“In English!” Guy exclaimed.
“Yes, and without a trace of foreign accent. This
woman was typical of her class and country, and it
II9


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
seems possible that Marie in her childhood had seen
some one like her and that some childish memory was
stirred, for when the woman hesitated, uncertain how
she ought to reply, Marie asked: “Are you Margaret's
sister?”
“‘No; I am Mrs. Thorley's maid,” said the woman.
“‘Mrs. Thorley? Who is she?' Marie questioned.
“‘She is my mistress.”
“It was a stupid answer and seems to have struck
the girl as amusing, for the woman reported that she
began to laugh, stopping immediately with a gasp of
pain. “It hurts!' she whimpered like a sick child,
throwing the bedclothes off and pressing her hands
against her side, where, as Dr. Vining had discovered,
she was badly bruised. The maid ran to the door and
called to my aunt, who hurried in after sending another
servant for the doctor. The details of the next few
days I cannot give you accurately, but Mrs. Thorley
will do so, if you wish to hear them. She has had oc-
casion several times to itemize the events of that period
for the specialists whom we consulted.”
“Specialists!”
“Yes. You see, we became convinced eventually
that as a result of her accident the child had lost her
memory, that she had no idea who she was or where
she came from.”
Guy leaned forward, his eyes wide with stupefaction.
“You mean — you mean that — that she does n’t know
now?” he stammered
I2O


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“No more than then.”
Guy dropped back with a deep, quick breath. It was
plain from his expression that his mind had not yet
begun to reckon with the amazing fact that had just
entered it.
“At first, Mrs. Thorley thought she was playing a
part, merely pretending ignorance, but that theory soon
proved itself untenable. She seemed to try so hard to
answer the questions asked her and simply could not.
Of her immediate past she apparently recalled nothing
whatever. She did not even appear to know that she
was in Paris, or had ever been there. Such answers as
she gave to questions were of the limited, indefinite
kind that a lost child gives—hardly as satisfactory.
Vague ideas and visions seemed to float through her
mind but she could not fully grasp them. Her name,
family, home, she had forgotten utterly. Her mem-
ories of places seemed to be the most distinct of any,
but they were like the memories of pictures, wholly
without associations. Dr. Vining was of the opinion
that she had lived in different countries, England, cer-
tainly, and some warm country, Italy perhaps, though
she spoke and understood no Italian. Neither did she
seem to understand French —”
Guy gave a start. “Are you sure of that?” he
asked, interrupting.
Hugh Senior stared. “Why do you ask that?” he
demanded, adding, when Amarinth did not at once re-
ply, “You said it as if you had some special reason.”
I2I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Guy reddened, stammering: “No — but does n’t it
seem odd – if – if she was a factory girl in Paris —”
“Oh, that guess was made before she regained con-
sciousness, you must remember. The quality of her
English, her manners, her bearing, made such a theory
impossible. No, she seemed to understand no French
at all, and even in English, the one language she spoke,
her vocabulary was oddly limited, like a child's. She
learned new words rapidly, however, and it was only
a short time before the suggestion of childishness, so
marked in her speech at first, quite disappeared.
“You understand, of course, that I am running
ahead of events,” Hugh broke off to explain. “I am
giving you in a few words the conclusions Mrs. Thor-
ley was months in reaching. During the week that
passed between the accident and her return to England,
she was skeptical of Dr. Vining's theory of loss of
memory. From day to day she waited, expecting her
guest to betray herself. She was exceedingly inter-
ested in the case, she says, and being alone, except for
the servants, she was able to have the girl with her al-
most constantly. She tested her in every way she
could think of to discover something of her former
mode of life, but could arrive at no definite conclusions.
Marie showed an unfailing willingness, even eagerness,
to perform any service asked of her, but she did every-
thing as a daughter or an obliging guest might do
it.”
Hugh paused a moment and seemed to hesitate be-
I22


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
fore he added: “I said I would tell you about her
clothes. They were rather — puzzling.”
There was another interval of silence before he con-
tinued. He was watching Amarinth now, and when he
began again to speak it was less rapidly and disjoint-
edly, as thought he felt his way.
“Her dress, my aunt says, was of cheap black cloth,
badly made. Her shoes too were of inferior grade and
much worn, and her undergarments were very plain, al-
most coarse. And she wore no hat. All these things
you see hang together and represent the every-day
clothing of a French working-girl. The incongruous
part of her costume was her coat. That was very
handsome, black satin with fur collar and cuffs, ex-
pensive fur. As a clue it only baffled us. If it had
been shabby it might have been explained as cast-off
finery, but it was apparently quite new, in perfect con-
dition in fact, except that a small piece of fur had
been torn from the collar, a thing that might have
happened in the accident, of course.”
“But did you make no effort to discover her identity
by inquiry?”
“Not at that time,” Hugh answered. “You see,
my aunt was so firmly convinced that she was sham-
ming. One thing Dr. Vining did do. He found out
through a French acquaintance that no girl answering
such a description had been reported as missing to the
police. When Mrs. Thorley was ready to return to
England she was at a loss as to what to do with her
I23


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“I see. Go on.”
“Marie remained in the sanitarium two months,
with no result except that she became terribly de-
pressed at realizing that somehow, in some strange way,
she was different from other people. Mrs. Thorley
then made the round of the specialists and ended by tak-
ing her own advice and sending the girl to a boarding-
school —”
“But could n't the doctors do anything?”
“Oh, they wanted to operate, of course. Several
seemed of the opinion that a blow on the head had inter-
fered with the functioning of a portion of the brain,
by pressure, perhaps. To be sure, the skull showed no
evidence of such pressure, but that appeared to be the
only logical deduction.
“You will pardon me, Amarinth, if I don't go into
their opinions, since no two were alike,” Hugh resumed
after a moment. “That made us wary, and besides
the sanest man of them advised against an operation.
It might do no good and it might do great harm.
Marie's mental powers seemed not at all affected; even
her memory, dating from her awakening in my aunt's
house, was normal and she acquired impressions and
facts with astonishing rapidity. At the end of her
year at school she was quite abreast of girls of her
own age. It was only that the mental record of her
life, from an early date in childhood up to the mo-
ment of her accident, had been erased. Why endanger
her life to restore it?”
I25


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“But surely she must have had parents or relatives
who were searching for her!!”
“If so we never heard of it, and I had had a thor-
ough inquiry made. The police system of Europe,
especially of France, is such a marvelous network that
I am sure we should have heard of a search had one
been made. I assure you we have done everything pos-
sible, short of taking the world into our confidence.
That would have made her a creature apart, and to
spare her that has been our constant effort. Can you
not understand how deep a sense of responsibility I
must feel for her future, her happiness?”
Hugh bent anxious eyes on Amarinth. “She asked
me to tell you her story, she felt that you had a right
to know it. I thought so too. How it has impressed
you, of course, I do not know.”
“It’s all so strange, so unusual —”
“Have you ever felt that there was anything strange
or odd about her?” Hugh interposed.
&c. NO.”
“Then does n’t that prove that this slight abnormal-
ity has not affected her real self?”
“She seems just like other girls,” Guy admitted.
“She is like other girls.”
“But it seems to me incredible that you could n’t find
out anything at all about her.” He hesitated an in-
stant, then asked: “Did you have the Paris police try
to — identify her?”
I26


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Give them her photograph and description, that
sort of thing you mean? No.”
“Why not?”
“My dear fellow, what for? If her people cared
so little about her that they made no attempt to find
her why should I hunt them?”
Amarinth leaned forward. “Is that the only rea-
son you did n't give her picture to the police, Mr.
Senior P’’
Hugh recoiled slightly. “I don't understand you,”
he said.
“Then you’ve told me everything you know?”
“Everything.”
“Where do you think she was going at that hour?”
“I don't know. Perhaps to work.”
“But you said you had become convinced that she
was not a working girl.”
“Oh, no. I said that our first theory that she was
a French factory girl was impossible since she spoke no
French and —”
“She looks French,” Guy interrupted. “I have
heard it remarked by a person familiar with French
types.”
“Yes, she looks French,” Hugh agreed.
“But if she spoke no French, what sort of work
could she have done in Paris?”
Hugh said he did not know. “She was dressed like
a working-girl, that is all I can tell you,” he said.
127


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“But the satin coat —”
“Ah, there you have it! No theory that we have
ever considered would account for all the facts. All
we really know is that she is a charming, lovable girl,
and for us that has been enough.”
A knock at the door heralded the entrance of an
office-boy, who announced to Hugh the arrival of a
client. -
Guy started up. “I’m keeping you, I fear.”
“Not at all. Don't go, please. Excuse me a mo-
ment and I’ll come back. In the meantime you might
take a look at the necklace. It’s gaudy junk, the sort
of thing that might dazzle a girl of sixteen.”
The business in the outer office did not detain Hugh
long. Returning presently to his private room, he
found Amarinth staring down at a mass of jewels in
his hand. His face was livid.
The sight halted Hugh.
Amarinth looked up. He moistened his lips nerv-
ously. “This is n’t junk, Mr. Senior,” he said husk-
ily. “It’s the real thing.”
I28


CHAPTER XI
UGH SENIOR laughed. “If those stones were
real the thing would be worth a fortune.”
“They look real. Those emeralds —”
“Emeralds! Green glass.”
The younger man said nothing, but his eyes dropped
back unconvinced from Hugh's face to the jewels.
“What do you know about stones?” Hugh asked.
He knew very little, Guy admitted, and murmured
something about a friend of his mother's who collected
jewelry. When he called on her she showed him things
and talked about them.
“This looks old,” he said; “the backs of the set-
tings are enameled. That’s oriental, I think.”
“But those colorless stones — surely you don't
think they're diamonds. They are not brilliant
enough.”
“That might be due to the way they are cut,” Guy
ventured doubtfully. “I don't pretend really to know,
of course. I may be mistaken. I — I hope so.”
There was a brief pause before Hugh answered.
“I’m sure you are. Paris is full of imitation jewelry
— very clever some of it is too.”
“You never asked her about it, you say?”
“No. I have never even told Mrs. Thorley that
I29


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
ter of emeralds and diamonds. “Could it have hap-
pened in the accident, do you think?”
“Hardly. If anything had fallen off then it would
have been found inside her clothes when the doctor
examined her.”
Guy wrapped the necklace again in the tissue paper
and put it in an inside pocket of his coat. “I’ll re-
turn it as soon as possible,” he said.
“Where will you take it?”
“I thought of Rice and Lozier's — I know them
there.”
“Good. You could n't do better. If you're going
after an expert opinion it will be well to have the best,
then no doubt can remain in your mind. I think I
have told you all there is to tell about Marie. If any
questions occur to you later I shall be glad to answer
them, if I can.”
“Thank you. Good morning then.”
“Good morning.”
The door closed and Hugh sank back into his chair.
“Suppose he’s right! Suppose it’s real!” he mut-
tered, his hands groping mechanically over the papers
on his desk to which, after a few minutes of troubled
speculation, he again forced his attention.
In the brain of young Amarinth the same thought
was working as he made his way to the street. At the
first corner he stopped, uncertain as to his immediate
course. He felt bewildered. Crises had been few in
his well-ordered existence and never had he faced one
I31


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
which, like this, threatened to wrench him completely
from his moorings. Life had always seemed to him
simple enough. If a man had the right traditions and
thought straight he could n't go wrong. But now —
“Don’t marry a woman whom you will have to ex-
plain.”
His mother's advice had always seemed to him to
cover the ground. Explain to one's friends, to society,
had been its meaning. But what would she have said
to a girl one could not explain even to oneself?
The story he had just heard struck him as utterly
fantastic. That it should be the story of a girl he
merely knew was incredible enough, but that the girl
should be his wife!
His wife! Yes, he had married her. That was the
worst of it. His problem was not as simple as Hugh
Senior supposed. He could not simply advance or
withdraw as he pleased. A withdrawal was still pos-
sible, but only through the painful process of an annul-
ment.
The thought of that course, of the publicity entailed,
was so unpleasant that to escape it he started forward
once more, and the bodily activity brought a mental im-
pulse. He would go to Gavock.
What a different aspect the latter's encounter with
Marie now presented. How damnably it dove-tailed
with what he had since learned. Gavock had said he
had mistaken her for some one he had known in Paris,
some one now dead. Well, Marie had been in Paris
I32


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
As he removed the paper wrapping from the neck-
lace he was conscious that his hands trembled visibly.
The jeweler's eyes dilated as the necklace was placed
before him and he uttered an exclamation of astonish-
ment. Picking up the ornament he held it out where
it caught the light fully and let his glance move slowly
along its entire length. Twice his eyes shifted for an
instant to Amarinth.
“I understand that you wish to know the value of
this. As to that I could not say off-hand, of course.
It would require detailed examination. The piece is
undoubtedly very old, and gem-setters of former times
were apt to carry out color schemes regardless of the
quality of the material they employed. Some of
the stones may not be genuine. May I ask if it is
yours?”
Guy had hidden his nervous, icy hands in his pockets
and he did not reply immediately, fearful that his voice
would betray his agitation.
“No,” he said at last, a trifle unsteadily, “I am con-
sidering buying it — as an antique. What I want to
find out is its intrinsic value, quite apart from its value
as an antique.”
The man gave a short, odd laugh and looked at
Amarinth curiously. “I should say that its value as
an antique is practically nothing compared with its in-
trinsic value. All these larger stones seem to be gen-
uine.”
“Emeralds and rubies?”
I34


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Yes. If they were recut as we cut to-day their
brilliancy would be multiplied a hundred times.”
“Is it French P’’
“French P Oh, no. The French never conceived
anything so strong or barbaric in style. You don't
know its history?”
& 4 No.”
Once more Amarinth was conscious of a surprised
curiosity in the keen look that covered him an instant.
“There seems to have been a pendant attached here
at one time. It was broken off apparently.”
“Evidently,” said Guy, holding out his hand for
the jewels.
The man appeared not to see the gesture.
“Mr. Stanislas, our expert, will be able to appraise
and classify it exactly for you. I hope you will wait
or perhaps leave it for him. It is a remarkable piece
from any point of view. No doubt it has an interest-
ing history and Mr. Stanislas could perhaps give you
information about it. Most of the fine old pieces like
this have been described and their histories recorded.”
“When will he return?” Guy asked. He was think-
ing that any information as to the history or identity
of the necklace might be a clue to the identity of the
girl on whom it had been found.
“Within an hour, certainly.”
“Is Mr. Lozier here? I'd like to speak to him.”
The jeweler despatched a young salesman for Mr.
Lozier, who presently appeared and greeted Amarinth
I35


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
by name. He was an affable, white-haired little
111a11.
“I have a necklace here that I should like to leave
for appraisal.”
“Certainly. I will give you a receipt for it.”
“That is n't necessary as long as I leave it in your
hands,” Guy said, adding as he turned away: “I’ll
return for it after lunch.”
He hurried away, hardly waiting for a reply. His
head was spinning, the blood pounding in his veins, and
he drank in the cold outdoor air like a drunken man.
Mr. Lozier put on his glasses and looked at the
necklace. “Bless my soul!” he exclaimed.
“That young chap must have money to burn,” said
the jeweler.
Mr. Lozier stared inquiringly.
His employee laughed. “He’s thinking of buying
it as an antique.”
Mr. Lozier cleared his throat and frowned a reproof.
Then he held the necklace up and contemplated it
thoughtfully. “Stanislas will not be back for some
time,” he observed, looking out through the front door
at the passing throngs. “I think there would be no
objection from Mr. Amarinth if we should display it in
the meantime.”
The heavy, jeweled chain was accordingly spread
upon the black velvet cushion in the center of the show
window. After one critical survey of the result Mr.
Lozier ordered everything else removed.
I36


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“It kills them all,” he said.
In the sumptuous lounge of the Crustacea, Amarinth
chose a secluded seat behind a spreading palm from
which he commanded a view of the entrance. Finding
Gavock still out, he had decided not to leave a message,
but to watch for his return.
The walk up the avenue had not subdued Guy's agi-
tation and he was almost relieved at the interruption of
his activity. He felt the need of time to adjust his
thoughts to the fact of the genuineness of the neck-
lace. As long as that had been merely a possibility
he had resisted consideration of its significance. Now
that significance so overshadowed everything else that
he was unable to measure it fairly.
Mental perplexities have much the same emotional
effect as snarls in a skein of yarn. Up to a certain
point interest is held and ingenuity stimulated; exceed
that point and we reach for the scissors. Amarinth
had passed the limit, he wanted to cut. From Hugh
Senior, Mrs. Thorley, or Marie, nothing more was to
be expected. They had accepted the mystery, had lived
with it, and its strangeness no longer troubled them.
But to them the mystery had not been complicated by
a knowledge of what he had heard from Gavock and
just learned concerning the necklace. More of the
necklace he might still find out from the man, Stanislas.
Aside from this his one chance of further information
was Gavock. His wisest course therefore was to hear
the latter's story, cable to Paris for confirmation of it,
I37


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Of course.”
“Fatuous old fool,” thought Amarinth.
Miss Lowther smiled and changed the subject. “I
just dropped in here to dash off a few notes and watch
the lucky people go in to feed, until I got hungry
enough to face my humble, boarding-house lunch. Do
you know, I did n't eat a bite of breakfast? It was
too dreadful a slump from the beautiful supper you
gave me last night.”
Gavock gulped the bait with his eyes open and Guy
gave an impatient start at hearing him say: “Then
you ought to be ready to try it again with me.”
“Oh, I did n't mean that!” Miss Lowther protested
reproachfully. “I felt that we were such friends that
I could say anything to you that came into my head.”
“We are, but you must allow me the same priv-
ilege.”
“It would be too lovely! If you really want me —”
Amarinth sprang up. If Gavock was going to feed
Sybil Lowther he must try to get a few words with him
before. But — he stopped at the thought — a few
words would not serve him and Gavock with the ex-
cuse of the engagement could easily shake him off. It
would be better to wait.
In his indecision he had missed the further conver-
sation on the other side of the palm and now watched
Gavock and his companion saunter out. When they
had disappeared he started for the hotel entrance.
As he neared the revolving doors they spun round
I39


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
and admitted a man who was carrying under one arm
a large, flat, oblong package. The edge of the spin-
ning door struck the package and almost jostled it from
his grasp, and as his other arm shot out to save it
Amarinth saw that this arm lacked a hand. The stump,
however, managed to shove the burden back to its
former position of security.
“Here! Take that to the back door.”
The man stared at the hotel attendant as though he
had not heard. “I want to see Mr. Roger Gavock,”
he said.
The name caught Amarinth's attention and uncon-
sciously he paused. The man was shabbily dressed
but his bearing and speech did not suggest a tradesman.
However, to the guardian of the Crustacea's sacred
portal, a package and a worn coat made a combination
for the back door.
“No packages delivered here,” he said curtly, wav-
ing the intruder back.
But the latter lingered uncertainly. “I have a note
I want sent up to Mr. Gavock,” he said, and lowering
the package to the ground so that it rested against his
knee, he felt in a pocket, evidently for the note.
“Send it up from the back,” snapped the attendant.
“Get along now!”
Amarinth walked off, but not in time to miss the
flush that colored the man's face. The fellow looked
ill and, confound it, he was n’t the sort to be barked at
I4O


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
by a porter! He'd speak to Gavock and have him re-
port the incident.
But his own concerns were too urgent to remain in
the background long and they soon drove the annoy-
ing episode from his thoughts. He looked at his
watch. It was too early to return for the necklace and
he had no appetite for food. Gavock would be an hour
at least at luncheon, but it would n’t do to risk missing
him by staying away as long as that. There was hardly
time to go down town but it might be well to call up
the office and offer an explanation of his absence.
He found a telephone booth and was soon in com-
munication with the law office in which he was a junior
partner. In return for his excuses he was informed
that he had just been called very urgently by Mr.
Lozier, the jeweler, who requested that he call him up
as soon as possible. No, Mr. Lozier had said noth-
ing more.
Guy hung up the receiver and remained several mo-
ments frowning into space. He was aware of a curi-
ous inner trembling. What could Lozier want with
him? His hands shook as he hunted for the 'phone
number and felt for a coin.
“Is that Mr. Amarinth P”
Excitement was evident in Mr. Lozier's voice. He
made two starts that came to nothing but finally
brought out the information that something most un-
looked for, most distressing had occurred. Some one,
I4I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
in short, had claimed the necklace which Mr. Amarinth
had left for approval.
“Claims it! Who claims it?” Amarinth gasped.
“A person who happened to pass a few minutes
after it was placed in the window.” There followed
a stream of apologies for the liberty taken in display-
ing it, the piece was so beautiful, so rare. It had not
occurred to Mr. Lozier that —
Guy cut the flow short. “Who is the man?”
“He refuses to give his name. First he came in
and made a few inquiries about the necklace and we
told him it was not for sale. He went away but re-
turned in about ten minutes with the Rumanian con-
sul, who presented credentials and entered a formal
claim to the necklace as the property of a citizen of
Rumania. He says that —”
“Well?” Guy prompted, as the jeweler paused.
“He says it has been missing for seven years. He
says it was stolen in Paris.”
Guy felt a horrible tightening in his throat. He
gulped hard. “Well?” he managed to repeat.
“He says also that at the time of its disappear-
ance it had a pendant attached — a Greek cross —
that was as valuable alone as the rest of the necklace.
It is evident, Mr. Amarinth, that there was some sort
of pendant —”
“Yes, I noticed that. What else did he say?”
“Nothing else. He refuses to give the name of the
person for whom he is acting and I think it would be
I42


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
well to communicate at once with the – the present
owner. You understand, of course, that this formal
claim having been entered according to law, it will be
impossible for me to return the necklace to you.”
“I understand.”
“I cannot tell you how deeply I regret —”
But Amarinth had hung up the receiver.
I43


CHAPTER XII
ISS LOWTHER dipped her fingers into the
glass bowl which the waiter had placed before
her ten minutes earlier, and at the signal Gavock
crushed out the fire of his cigarette and followed her
example. With him the ablution was speedily ac-
complished, but her slender, pink-nailed fingers lin-
gered in the water, dabbling it gently, and suggesting
a reluctance to end the repast which her host had al-
ready noted.
He watched her expectantly. She was not through
with him, of that he was convinced, but just what it
was she wanted he was not sure. Money? Certainly
the dearth of it had been the burden of her recital of
what she called her “struggles.” These appeared to
him to have consisted mainly of dreams of becoming
famous and rich by the pleasant process of awaking
some morning to find herself so, and the “crises" so
shudderingly depicted, to have been periods in which
she had been hard put to it to find the means of living
in idleness while awaiting the consummation of her
hopes. That a crisis now impended she had allowed
him to infer, had even created opportunities for his
coming gallantly to the rescue. But these he had neg-
I44


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
lected. Her code, according to Mrs. Estell, permitted
her to accept anything short of money, and he was
wondering now just how far short her demand on him
was likely to fall.
As she finally sank her dripping fingers into the
folds of her napkin she lifted her eyes with a soft
glance to his. “It’s been too sweet of you to listen
to my tale of woe.”
He confined his answer to a murmur of protest.
He was anxious not to commit himself. Though pre-
pared to render her any assistance she was likely to
ask, he was determined that she should ask and was
sure she would do so if he refrained from offering.
And he was convinced that her delay was not due to
inner shrinking but to indecision as to his most vul-
nerable point of attack.
“It’s proved your friendship beyond a doubt,” she
declared.
“Ah, then you were testing me?”
She had a smile for his bantering tone, but it waned
quickly and she nodded with grave eyes.
“I’m sorry you thought that necessary,” he said
lightly.
“I did think so, but only because I’m going to put
your friendship to a still greater test.”
“One you think it may not stand?”
“I don’t know.”
He waited. She was coming to the point now.
“I’m sure you will do what I’m going to ask of
I45


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
you — it is n’t that that makes me hesitate,” she went
on presently. “But I don't know what you may think
of me for asking, and you know a nice girl cares so
much more for what a friend thinks of her than for
what an enemy says.”
Gavock sank back with an abrupt relaxation of his
interest. So it was money after all. The code did
not hold. He might have known it would not. No
doubt behind those wistful eyes she was busily making
up her mind how much she could safely ask for. The
reflection caused him to return dryly: “A nice girl
runs no risk either way, does she?”
He regretted the words the instant they were spoken.
They were open to two interpretations and one of these
was not kind. But she did not take offense.
“A girl, no matter how nice, who has ambitions to
achieve sometimes has to run risks,” she answered.
He took that in silence, but his contrition for his
last remark had softened his expression, and she
seemed to draw encouragement from the fact. She
surveyed the room swiftly. Only a few people re-
mained and none were near them. The waiter had
been paid and had withdrawn.
Satisfied, apparently, that they were sufficiently
isolated, she leaned toward him, as if about to speak,
then, reconsidering the impulse, sat back again and
presently drew from her silk hand-bag an object
wrapped in a handkerchief.
“I have something here that I want you to see,”
I46


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
she said. “But please don't take the covering off en-
tirely. If any one noticed, it might seem odd.”
She passed the thing across to him and he lowered
it below the table level before lifting the handkerchief.
Within lay a large Greek cross, studded with emeralds
and rubies. His eyes flew to hers with surprise and
inquiry.
“What do you think of it?” she asked eagerly.
“Think of it? What do you mean? Is it yours?”
“It’s been in our family for years and years.
That’s why I can't bear the idea of selling it.”
“But surely you are not thinking of such a thing!”
She sighed. “I have to have money. I must have
some at once. What I hoped was that you would lend
me some and take this as security.”
He frowned. “My dear young lady, I am not a
pawnbroker. I shall be glad to lend you the sum you
want without security.”
“But I can't take it that way. Don't you see that
no nice girl could take money? If I borrow from
you it must be on a business basis and for that I must
give security. Well, this is all I have.”
“You said a moment ago that you were going to
test my friendship and now you talk of business,”
Gavock replied, laying the cross before her. “Take
your trinket and keep it; it’s very beautiful. And
now tell me to what extent I can serve you.”
“But you must take this, you must! I cannot bor-
row unless you will accept this security.”
I47


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Between friends their friendship is security enough.
Please don't make me feel as if you saw three gold
balls hanging over my head.”
“I shall have to go where the gold balls hang if
you won't keep the cross. And I have a horror of
that. Besides, I should be afraid to leave it at such a
place. If I did n't redeem it they might sell it. I know
you would keep it until I was able to redeem it, no
matter how long that might be, and I know you would
never speak of the matter or show the cross to any
one —”
She broke off with a questioning glance at him.
“Please don't mind my asking that. You see the
cross is unusual and I thought you might think it all
right to show it — that no one would know where
you had gotten it. But some one might. It’s quite
well known to friends of our family. We’ve had it
so long. It was handed down to my mother from
her mother, who was French.”
“But this is n't French.” He took up the ornament
again and examined it more closely.
She gave him a startled glance, then with a nerv-
ous laugh she said: “I did n’t mean to say it was —
I said she was.”
“What is its history? I should say it was very
old.”
“Oh, there are all sorts of stories told about it.
My mother's family left France to escape religious
persecution. Money and jewels were all they were
148


he faltered
S
t?”
s for i
ive me ten thousand dollar
“Will you g





THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
able to take along. This is the last of the jewels.”
“It is very handsome.”
“Oh, they were a very rich and distinguished
family — the de Ceux.”
“Ceux? Not the Ceux of Tourraine?”
& 4 Yes.”
“Indeed! Now, do you know, that is very interest-
ing? Many of the old noble families split during the
Reformation, but I always understood that the Ceux
did not. They are so very Catholic, quite the strong-
est supporters the papacy has in France to-day. I
know young François de Ceux, the present duke, quite
well. Really, this is extremely interesting.”
His alert, smiling eyes dropped from her face again
to the cross in his hand. She watched him with a
nervously shifting glance.
“You see what a small place the world is,” she
said, “and that I was wise to get your promise of
secrecy.”
“Since I am sworn to secrecy, won't you let me
into the family history a little further? This cross in-
terests me immensely. Do you know how it came
into the possession of the de Ceux originally?”
She shook her head. “No, I don't believe I ever
heard my mother say. I’m sorry to confess that I
never paid much attention to the stories of our past
grandeur. You see,” she added more lightly, “I am
more ambitious to be a distinguished ancestor than a
worthy descendant.”
I5I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
He smiled. “Still, blue blood is a valuable as-
set.”
“It is n't negotiable.”
“You are a mercenary person, are n't you?”
“I have to be.”
“The sale of this gorgeous affair would put you
beyond the need of that for some time to come.”
She gave him a quick glance. “Would you buy
it?” she asked.
“I might. Have you put a price on it?”
“No. I have never thought of selling it — before.
How much do you think it is worth?’”
“I could only make the wildest guess; but it is very
valuable — the stones are all large and seemingly flaw-
less. Frankly, Miss Lowther, if you are the sole
owner — I mean if you do not share it with other
members of your family — I wonder that you don't
sell it. The proceeds would give you a working capi-
tal. You could then go ahead and develop your art
regardless of financial considerations, and that is the
dream of all artists, is n’t it?”
cº Yes.”
She answered absently and he could see that his
suggestion had impressed her. Her eyes were almost
closed in the intensity of her thought and through her
parted lips the breath came and went rapidly, as if
urged by some inner excitement. And although she
looked at him her gaze was unseeing. He waited for
her to speak.
I52


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Presently her eyes regained focus and settled on the
cross in his hand. She seemed to hesitate, but finally
brought out a faltering question.
“Would you give me ten thousand dollars for it?”
He stared in blank incredulity. The sum she men-
tioned was absurd; she could not be serious. But she
seeemed to mean it. He laughed.
“Is it too much P” she asked.
“Too much! My dear child, it’s too little — far,
far too little. Is it possible that your people had no
idea of its value all these years?”
She shook her head. She had turned very pale.
“Well, that was fortunate for you, for you prob-
ably owe its possession to that fact. Now, I need not
tell you, I hope, that I don't drive bargains at a friend's
expense. I should like to own this cross. It is beau-
tiful and rare and it would interest me to trace its
history. It is not French, of that I am sure. That
the de Ceux should ever have owned it strikes me as
very curious.”
Intent on the jewels he missed the furtive glance
she shot at him from under lowered lashes before she
asked: “Why?”
“Because it’s a Greek cross and the de Ceux are,
as I have said, the most Catholic of Catholics. Some
old dignitary of the early Greek church may have worn
this on state occasions. The enameling on the back
rather suggests the Byzantine —”
He broke off suddenly. “Will you really sell it?
I53


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT"
Because I’ll buy it — that is, if I can afford to,” he
ended with a laugh.
“How much can you afford to pay?”
“Oh, come now!” he objected gaily. “If I don't
drive bargains at my friends’ expense, neither do I
let them drive bargains at mine. If you really mean
to sell the proper way will be to get an expert opinion
of the value.”
“An expert?”
“Yes, take it to Rice and Lozier's —”
“Oh, no!”
She reached out to take the cross from him, then
drew her hand back with a nervous laugh. “I
would n’t like to do that,” she said.
“Would you like me to take it for you?”
She seemed to consider this. “You’re very kind,”
she answered at length, “but I don't believe I want to
sell it after all. It’s been in our family so long and
I —”
“I should n't dream of urging you, of course. I
quite understand how you feel, so we’ll say no more
about it. I shall be glad to lend you whatever sum
you wish. But take your cross home and put it away
in a safe place. You should n't carry it about in that
bag, you know.”
He had wrapped the handkerchief about the cross
and now held it out to her.
“You must keep it. I can't take the money unless
you do, and I need it dreadfully,” she pleaded.
I54


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
She would not refuse the money; he was sure of that
11OW.
As they were crossing the lobby toward the lounge
he felt his companion suddenly give a start, and the
next moment he saw her bow in recognition of the
greeting of a young man who approached them. The
scrutiny with which the stranger favored him in pass-
ing caused Gavock to stare in turn and he got an im-
pression of a longish face with Van Dyke beard, flash-
ing black eyes, and fine, straight nose — handsome in
the Mephisto style, but hardly prepossessing. He no-
ticed, too, as the man turned away toward the elevators
that he moved with unusual grace and swiftness, a lit-
tle too feline to be agreeable.
The encounter was momentary. Miss Lowther
made no comment, but Gavock saw that she was dis-
turbed. The meeting had evidently not been a pleas-
ant surprise.
At the entrance to the lounge he stopped. “Will
you wait for me here? I may have to go to the bank
or send. The hotel probably banks near by, so it
should not take more than a few minutes.”
“I’ll wait — over there behind those palms,” she
said.
At the office he found that it would be necessary to
send to the bank for additional cash to cover his
cheque, but that the bank was near. He would wait,
he said, and inquired for mail. There was a let-
ter.
156


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“This came by hand,” he remarked, opening the
envelope just handed him. Then he read:
May I see you for a few minutes? I have a picture I
want to show you. John ANDRUs.
There was no address. Gavock beckoned the clerk.
“When did this come?” he asked.
The young man searched his memory. The letter
had been left some time ago, he thought, and the man
had said he would wait.
“Wait where?”
Inquiries ensued, but no one appeared to recall any-
thing more definite.
Gavock frowned impatiently. “Have him paged
— Mr. Andrus,” he directed. “I’ll wait here.” He
dropped into a deep leather chair commanding a view
of the desk.
John Andrus, of all people! What a surprising
thing for him to turn up like that. Why, it had been
years since he had heard of him, since any of his old
acquaintances had, indeed. The man had suddenly
and unaccountably dropped out of sight. There had
been rumors of foul play as the disappearance remained
unexplained. It had been hinted, too, that he had
been somehow involved in that mysterious murder —
Gavock's jaw fell in sudden stupefaction. Impres-
sions long submerged had darted up to the surface of
his memory and linked themselves with fresher images.
It was Andrus—yes, certainly it was he – who
I57


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
painted the portrait of Alix Floria which had caused
such scandal that it was removed from the Salon on
the second day of the exhibition. And it was directly
after that episode that she was killed and Andrus dis-
appeared. Where had he been all these years?
Gavock reread the note. How badly it was written!
Surely that could not be Andrus's hand. The crude-
ness of the writing was amazing. To be sure, he had
not known the painter well, but the impression he had
retained of him was of a man of good general educa-
tion. “I have a picture I want to show you,” the note
said. Then Andrus had been painting, and his work
should be worth seeing if he had lived up to the prom-
ise of his early achievement. Of the young men of
his day his talent had been the most conspicuous.
A boy in livery announced that the messenger had
returned from the bank. A minute later, standing at
the desk, putting the bills into an envelope, Gavock
chanced to glance around and to his surprise found
that he was being watched by the alert, black eyes of
Miss Lowther's friend of the Van Dyke beard.
Though the man turned instantly, Gavock thought it
probable that he had seen the receiving and counting
of the money, and that he might connect it with the
girl who was waiting in the lounge. As well to delay,
therefore, until the man had taken himself off, which
indeed he appeared to be in the act of doing, for he was
moving away with his light, swinging stride toward the
street exit.
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THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Have you located Mr. Andrus, whom you were
paging?” Gavock asked the hotel clerk. “No? He
left word that he would wait. Please find out who
received the message.”
This appeared to baffle the entire office force, until
some one thought he recollected that the note had come
in from the delivery entrance — the bearer had had a
package.
Then Andrus had not come himself, but had sent
the picture, Gavock decided, and no doubt the mes-
senger would have some further word from him. Di-
recting that the man be taken up to his rooms where he
would presently join him, Gavock hurried to the lounge
and made his way to the recess behind the palms wher
Miss Lowther had said she would be. -
But the corner was empty.
Slightly taken aback, he looked about, thinking he
had perhaps mistaken the meeting place. But Miss
Lowther was nowhere in the room. He looked at the
time. Exactly eleven minutes had passed. She could
hardly have become impatient in so short a time. It
was more likely that, not expecting him back so soon,
she had gone out and would, no doubt, presently re-
turn. And, of course, she would expect him to be
there. He had better go to his room, receive the pic-
ture from Andrus's messenger, then come back and
wait.
Wheeling, with the purpose of carrying out this
plan, he found himself face to face with Miss Low-
I59


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
ther's black-bearded acquaintance. Not having heard
his approach, the meeting disconcerted him slightly and
caused him to step back.
A barely perceptible sneer touched the lip of the
stranger; then he swerved aside and departed. Ga-
vock, following him with a puzzled stare, was uncer-
tain whether to be annoyed or amused. The fellow
was probably a jealous admirer of Miss Lowther's.
The girl, no doubt, had a dozen men in tow. She was
decidedly pretty and many men would consider her
desirable. Well, at any rate, she knew her way about.
If she came back while he was up-stairs she would an-
nounce the fact by telephone.
I6O


CHAPTER XIII
“T WAS detained down-stairs,” Gavock said cour-
teously to the shabby figure he found beside his
door. “Sorry. Come in, please.”
John Andrus entered and waited silently.
“You’ve brought a picture from Mr. Andrus, I
believe?” said Gavock, turning back from closing the
door and looking at his visitor.
Andrus returned the look dumbly for several mo-
ments, then he said huskily: “Don’t you know me,
Mr. Gavock P”
Gavock gave him a sharp stare. “Andrus!” he
cried in shocked amazement, then, in an attempt to
cover the betrayal of his astonishment, he stammered
hastily: “I did n't know you, for the moment — I
was n’t expecting to see you — I thought you’d sent
some one.”
He held out his hand. Andrus looked down at it,
then raised his right arm and showed the empty cuff.
“My God! Man, how did it happen? Your right
hand l’”
“An accident — seven years ago.”
“Seven — why, then that was why you — disap-
peared?”
I6I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Andrus nodded. “What was left for me — a
painter who could not paint?”
“God!” Gavock repeated, the horror of the loss
appalling him. “And no one knew? I never heard
a word. An accident, you say? What? How?”
“I — I would rather not talk about it,” Andrus an-
swered, shuddering.
“But what do you do? What have you been do-
ing all these years? But wait — sit down — you look
ill.”
He drew out a chair and his visitor sank into it
heavily. Gavock stood the picture against the wall.
“You are ill,” he said, as Andrus leaned back and
closed his eyes.
“I’m in for typhoid, I'm afraid. There's an epi-
demic of it where I live. That’s why I'm here.
I’ve been doing ads and such things with the left hand
— just enough to live — the rest of the time trying
to teach it what the other knew —” He paused with
a hopeless shrug. “I’ve no money put by for an ill-
ness, but I’ve got a picture — the last I did over there.
I want to sell it. I happened to see in the paper this
morning that you were in town and thought perhaps
you’d buy it.” He looked up with a piteous question-
ing in his fevered eyes.
“Of course, of course,” Gavock assured him in-
stantly.
“I won't ask you much for it,” Andrus went on.
“You see, if I pull through I shall want it back. I
I62


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
need it to keep me alive, to help me remember what
I’ve got in me. If I don't pull through, it’s yours
and welcome. I’ll show; it to you.” He started up.
“Don’t. I’ll get it.”
Gavock forced him gently back into the chair and
felt his hand.
“You have fever now, Andrus, and your pulse is
very fast. You ought to be in bed. You ought to
have a doctor.”
“Saw one this morning — told me what I was in
for. I’m all right — going to the hospital as soon as
I arrange things.”
“Where will you go?”
“Don’t ask me, Mr. Gavock. Oh, I know how
kindly you mean it, but — well, I just want to drop
out again as I did before.”
“Your friends thought you were dead. Why
did n't you let them know — let them help you?”
“Help me? What could they have done but pity
me? Would pity have helped that?”
He thrust his maimed arm out and Gavock was si-
lenced.
“No; I sank to my level among the poor, crushed,
hopeless millions. But I’m taking your time. Let
me show you the picture.”
Gavock unwrapped the canvas and at sight of the
painting gave an exclamation of surprise. Turning it
to catch a better light he scanned it closely.
“Alix Floria! Not the portrait!”
I63


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Yes. I painted it out. The necklace, I mean.”
“Ah, yes, I remember. I did n’t see the picture
when it was shown. It was for a short time only, I
believe.”
“One day. I withdrew it.”
“You?”
“Did you think they’d ordered it out? You don't
know them. They'd have been only too glad of the
scandal to draw a crowd. I carried it away myself.”
He laughed harshly. “I thought the damned thing
was paste.”
A dozen questions crowded to Gavock's lips, but
the haggard bitterness of the other's face checked them.
He turned back to the picture, seeking enlightenment
there. And something he got instantly — the like-
ness of the painted face to Marie Dupont's. The re-
semblance that had haunted him had been real, not
fancied. With the memory of the living face fresh
in his mind, he studied its counterpart, comparing
them, point by point. Miss Dupont was older. For
all its young slenderness her figure gave no hint of im-
maturity. Here the curves were childishly meager,
but lovely and alluring in promise. The face, tilted
in instinctive coquetry, for all the provocation of lips
and eyes, was a child's face.
Twice Gavock had seen Alix Floria dance, then he
had gone no more to the Purple Pigeon. The second
visit had sickened him. It was the sight of that titled
I64


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
brute gloating drunkenly from his box above the
stage —
As memory evoked the offensive scene, a detail of it,
suddenly recalled, caused him to again scrutinize the
canvas. It was the dress. In some such costume she
had danced the second time he had seen her, and was
it not very like the gown Miss Dupont had worn?
His eyes groped among the intricacies of the painted
dress. Assuredly in color, line, and effect this was
the gown he had seen in Paris and again last night.
Was that a chance resemblance also? No, nor was
the other chance. Between Alix Floria and Marie
Dupont there must exist some connection, direct and
close.
He jerked his head around to Andrus, determined
now to question him, but again the artist's face halted
the words. The man looked wretchedly ill and should
have a physician's care at once. But he had made it
clear that he wished no interference with the plans
he had himself formed for such care, and the very
magnitude of his misfortune somehow made it im-
possible to intrude either help or sympathy. The most
Gavock could do, it seemed, was to pay for the portrait
and let him go. The poor fellow seemed actually
afraid he would not buy it. His anxious eyes filled
Gavock with contrition.
“I’ll take it, of course — delighted to get it!”
Gavock said heartily. “But I know you don't want
I65


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
to sell it. Why not let me help you — just over this
illness — a loan —”
Andrus cut him off with a firm refusal.
“As you like then,” Gavock said. “What is the
price?”
“Three hundred will see me through — or out.”
“It’s worth far more,” Gavock said.
“That's all I'm asking,” said Andrus in a tone
that closed the argument.
“I’ll give you a check.”
Feeling for his check-book his hand encountered the
envelope with the money for Miss Lowther and it oc-
curred to him that Andrus might prefer cash. If con-
venient he would, Andrus said when asked, and
Gavock counted out for him a portion of the con-
tents of the envelope, wondering, as he did so, why
he had not yet heard from Miss Lowther.
Andrus stowed the money away with a fever-shaken
hand, the maimed right arm jerking up futilely, from
a never-broken habit of action. Gavock turned from
the painful sight and looked at the portrait as he
waited.
“You’ll show the picture perhaps,” Andrus stam-
mered, as he rose to go. “I’d be glad if you’d not
mention — seeing me.”
“My God, man!” Gavock broke out. “I can't let
you go off like this, not knowing where you are going.
You're ill, I can see it. You can hardly stand
Wherever you’re going, I’m going with you.”
I66


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Andrus's head went up in alarmed protest. “No,
no, I don't want you — I mean I’m all right. I have
friends — I’m going to them — there’s nothing you
can do. Now I have the money it’ll be all right.”
Gavock frowned in uncertainty. Andrus's distress
at his solicitude was plainly genuine. That the poor
devil wanted to be alone in his misery was obvious.
And he was not the sort you could force yourself on
even for his good. Besides, now that he was roused,
he seemed stronger than he had appeared before.
Still, he looked ill, dreadfully ill. Something might
happen before he reached his friends.
“I’m all right, Mr. Gavock. I know just what I
have to do. My head's all right and I’ll take a cab
— I'll be all right,” he insisted anxiously.
“Yes, take a cab,” said Gavock, catching at the
idea as a sort of compromise. “Take a motor. Get
home as fast as you can. And get a doctor.”
. Andrus assented with a nod, but he remained mo-
tionless, his eyes on the portrait.
“And you can feel at ease about what you asked,”
Gavock added as the request recurred to him. “I
shall not mention our meeting.”
“Thank you,” Andrus murmured without moving.
For a while there was silence between them. An-
drus appeared to be lost in thought, unconscious of
his surroundings. Gavock watched him curiously.
The human drama — too often a tragedy — never
failed to hold his interest, and this variation of it had
167


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
newspaper accounts and some of those I missed; but
I gathered that the evidence was all circumstantial —
that there was a reasonable doubt of the man's guilt.”
“No one who knew him doubted it.”
“But were n’t there witnesses who testified that they
saw her afterwards — alive?”
“Her dead body answered those lies.”
“So you think they were deliberate lies?”
“The body was there. She was dead.” Again the
quiet note that silenced contradiction.
But Gavock persisted. “I understood that there
was doubt that it was hers. The head was —”
Andrus cut off the sentence with an exclamation of
distress. The muscles of his face worked as in
pain, then he mastered his discomposure — whether
physical or mental, Gavock could not determine —
and said evenly:
“The trial was a farce. There was meddling from
high places. Lies were sworn to and the truth was
suppressed. They did n’t care how it came out —
did n’t bother about justice. All they wanted was to
prevent mention of the necklace and the man who
owned it.”
“The Rumanian prince?”
“Yes.”
Gavock waited, hoping further information would
come unsought. Though it was true that he had fol-
lowed the trial of the man accused of the murder of
Alix Floria from newspaper reports only, he had later
* I69


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
heard the case discussed by persons claiming to have
the unofficial story. Andrus's version coincided with
theirs, that it was the mad pursuit of the dancer by the
young nobleman that had led to her death at the hands
of a humbler lover. In the trial a less conspicuous
admirer had been made to figure as the object of jeal-
ousy — an easy matter in the case of a girl of unknown
origin and history, even the beginnings of her meteoric
career veiled and obscure.
“I had heard that,” Gavock remarked presently
when it was evident that Andrus would say no more
unprompted. “There were all sorts of stories afloat.”
He waited again, then added: “It was even hinted
that he killed her himself.”
“He P "
“The prince.”
Andrus's gaze widened to wonder for an instant
and he seemed about to speak, then with a shrug he
turned to the door. It was plain that he did not wish
to continue the conversation, and in the face of his
disinclination Gavock found it hard to push his in-
quiry. But he knew that if he did not get from An-
drus the absolute certainty of Alix Floria's death he
was not likely to get it at all.
“I wish you'd tell me, Andrus, why you are so sure
that the body found in Floria's rooms was hers. I
ask because I have since seen a woman who so re-
sembled her that I could hardly believe it was not
she.”
17o


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Andrus had reached the door and opened it. “She
was n’t an unusual type,” he said. “And you did n’t
really know her, did you?”
“I saw her several times and this girl was about the
age she would have been. I should not have given it
a thought if I had not remembered that there were
people who thought they had seen her after the body
was found. What I want to know is how you can be
so sure about the body, considering that the head —”
“Her maid identified it,” Andrus interrupted.
“Oh, that's what you go on P”
“That and the clothes. Is n’t it enough?”
“It was n't enough for the jury. It was the doubt
of that which led to the verdict of acquittal, as I re-
member.”
Andrus had half closed the door again and turned
round as if to reply but changed his mind and swung
the door wide once more.
“He knows something,” thought Gavock, and with
an impetuous gesture arrested his visitor's departure.
“I hate to press you, Andrus, but this woman I speak
of is engaged to marry a friend of mine and — well,
you understand. If you have any other proof that it
was Floria's body, I should consider it a personal fa-
vor —” He broke off and waited.
“I have the proof of my own eyes,” came the an-
swer reluctantly, after a pause.
“Just what do you mean by that?”
“I saw the body.”
171


CHAPTER XIV
UY AMARINTH looked at his watch again.
For nearly two hours he had been waiting in
Hugh Senior's office for the latter's return from a con-
sultation with clients so important that he had not felt
at liberty to interrupt it. At the end of the hour he
had telephoned Lozier that he had not been able to get
in touch with the owner of the necklace and the jeweler
had agreed that until he had done so a meeting with
the claimant would be wasted time. The foreign gen-
tlemen were still waiting and no doubt were prepared
to wait indefinitely.
The minutes had dragged with Guy. He had done
his best to keep his thoughts from fruitless conjectur-
ing. It was sheer madness to attempt to form an
opinion until he had all the facts, he knew. But what
were the facts? The more he found out, the more
hideous a nightmare the whole thing seemed.
The necklace had been stolen — seven years ago.
That was what the claimant asserted and it fitted per-
fectly with what Guy had already heard. That was
the terrifying part of it. He felt as if he were piecing
together a picture puzzle — the picture of the woman
who was his wife — slipping the sections into place
I73


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
with trembling hands, fearful lest from the completed
portrait he must at last turn in horror.
As he put his watch back into his pocket the office
door opened and Hugh Senior entered. Guy sprang
to his feet and at sight of his white, excited face Hugh
stopped short. *
“I’ll see you at once, Amarinth; will you go in,
please?” He waved toward the inner room and Guy
obeyed the gesture without replying. A minute of de-
lay without and Hugh followed. The door of the
private office had hardly closed when Guy broke out
with his news.
“Something extraordinary has happened — the
necklace has been claimed !”
“Claimed ! Who has seen it?”
Hurriedly Guy reported his telephone conversation
with Lozier. “I said I'd have to see the owner,” he
finished. “I did n’t give your name; I did n’t know
whether you’d want to appear in the matter.”
“Sooner or later I shall have to,” Hugh replied.
“And it may as well be at once.”
A taxicab conveyed them to the jeweler's at its best
speed. The necklace was no longer in the window,
they noticed, but the anxious face of Mr. Lozier loomed
at the door.
“This is Mr. Senior from whom I had the neck-
lace,” Guy said to the jeweler as they entered, following
Hugh's instructions.
* Lozier bowed. He would have offered profuse
I74


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
apologies for his indiscretion in displaying the neck-
lace, but Hugh cut him off with a question. “Where
are these men?”
“In my office.”
“And the necklace?”
“In a case at the back of the store under constant
watch. We are taking no chances with it.”
The strangers were found seated in Lozier's private
room. The jeweler introduced the Americans to the
Rumanian consul, who in turn presented his compatriot
as Count Egon Szemere of Bucharest.
“Which of you gentlemen claims to be the owner
of the necklace?” the consul asked, the instant for-
malities were over.
“Neither of us,” Hugh answered. “Mr. Amarinth
brought the jewels here to be appraised, at my request,
but neither he nor I claims to own them. As you, how-
ever, have entered such a claim I suppose I may infer
that you are prepared to prove it?”
“We are. And we are also prepared to take such
legal steps as may be necessary to regain possession.”
The consul’s manner was brusk, almost offensive.
His companion interposed courteously. “I am sure,
my dear Consul, that we have only to prove our claim
to these gentlemen to make further action unneces-
sary.”
“Thank you,” said Hugh, slightly inclining his
head, whereupon Count Szemere responded with a
ceremonious bow. The two then measured one an-
I75


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
other briefly but keenly, and the conclusion of each was
that the other was to be trusted.
“You will oblige me, my dear Consul, by present-
ing your credentials,” Count Szemere said, and the
Consul, thus reduced to a subordinate rôle, dug into
a pocket for the required papers.
Hugh Senior looked them through and returned
them with a nod of acceptance.
“My passport,” said the Count, offering another
paper.
“Your word is sufficient,” Hugh answered with a
movement of polite refusal.
The Count again bowed deeply. “Then may I
hope that your wishes will meet mine when I again
suggest that we dispense with legal formality in the
exchange of — shall I say, information? The matter
is one of extreme delicacy, and a discussion between
gentlemen will be more suitable than process of law.
I will ask the Consul to withdraw if you will make a
similar request of Mr.—” He glanced at Lozier,
whose name he had apparently not learned.
“Mr. Lozier will oblige us, I am sure,” Hugh said,
adding, as the Count's glance moved on to Guy: “Mr.
Amarinth is as closely concerned in the affair as I am.
Suppose we three adjourn to my office and talk things
over there. We can take the necklace or leave it, as
you prefer.”
“Which do you prefer?”
“I think Mr. Lozier's vault is the best place for it.
176


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Your interests are safeguarded by the fact that the
Consul has entered a formal claim and Mr. Lozier
can't surrender it without a release from him. That's
your understanding, is n’t it, Consul?”
The Consul assented.
“In that case we may go at once,” said Hugh.
“Much obliged to you, Mr. Lozier. We may rely
upon your silence, I am sure.”
The jeweler gave eager assurance of that.
“By the way, did your expert look the necklace
over?” asked Hugh.
“Not in detail, owing to the circumstances which
have arisen; but he pronounces it without a doubt a
genuine antique of great intrinsic value.”
“I see. Thank you.”
The party left the shop and, dropping the Consul,
the remaining three proceeded by cab to their destina-
tion. Seated in the privacy of Hugh's office, the
Count was the first to speak.
“Since neither of you gentlemen claims to own the
necklace, is it permitted to inquire for whom you are
acting?”
“Only for ourselves,” Hugh replied. “The neck-
lace came into my possession some years ago through
an accident, and I have kept it, not knowing its value.
I shall willingly restore it to you when I am convinced
of your right to it.”
“I claim no personal right — I act for another,”
said the Count.
177


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
am convinced that you have a right to it I will give it
to you. It is for you to prove that right.”
“But you give me only the necklace! The cross —
where is that? Surely you will help me that I find, it!
Where the necklace was the cross must also have been.”
Hugh considered. “I will do what I can,” he said.
“If, when I have heard your story, I feel that I have
information that will be of aid to you, you shall have it
— that is, with Mr. Araminth's consent. He is, as
I have said, as closely concerned in this matter as I.”
The Count's keen glance shifted to Guy and the lat-
ter reddened under it. At the tell-tale flush the Ru-
manian cried out: “Ah, your secret concerns a
lady!”
“Yes,” Hugh admitted.
“And your young friend is her lover! Yes, yes, I
see. Do not blush for it. I understand. I too love.”
He sprang up and held out his hand to Guy.
“Come, let us join hands as men of honor and as lovers.
I help you, perhaps, and you help me. You are not
happy — you are troubled. I see, but do not ask why.
Well, I too am unhappy. Attend! For six years and
more I have not looked upon the face of my beloved.
In this, your country, I am an exile, serving my coun-
try far from all I love, as punishment, because that
the loss of the jewels of Kemesvar was put to my
fault.” He had seized Guy's hand, yielded awkwardly.
“Is it agreed?”
“We can promise you nothing, Count Szemere,”
I79


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Hugh interposed. “When we have heard your story
we will do what we can to aid you.”
The Rumanian bowed low. “You are right. I
honor you that thus you guard a woman's secret. The
secret I guard touches my honor and the honor of a
noble house. Behold, I shall trust you. I now speak
to you everything without reserve!”
He sat down again.
“What do you know of my country, of Rumania?
That our Queen, Carmen Sylva, writes verses?” His
shoulders lifted slightly. “Truly, I think that here
little more is known of us. Yet we are a nation, with
a history. But I will not bore you. Only this let me
say, that when the Prussian Bismarck sent to us a
Hohenzollern to be our king, many of our native
princes ate the dust of disappointment. Of these
princes the chief was Prince Xico of Kemesvar.
Hospodar of Wallachia, and later of the United Prov-
inces of Wallachia and Moldavia, he was the nation's
choice for king, and the Powers had promised us a
native ruler. But Prussia sent the Hohenzollern and
he stayed. But he stayed and ruled on sufferance of
the house of Kemesvar, as long as the old prince lived,
for at a word Xico could have plunged the country into
revolt. Dying, he left two sons, Vasilief and Lascar.
Vasilief Xico now became head of the house and the
master of Kemesvar and — he chose a bride.”
Count Szemere's eyes took on a glint of hatred, the
muscles of his jaw set hard.
I8O


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“She was a woman of Bessarabia, of Tartar blood,
low born. His father would have seen him die a thou-
sand deaths sooner than that the blood of Xico should
mingle with such as hers. But the Court at Bucha-
rest lent the marriage all countenance, for whatever
estranged the reverence of the people from the house
of Xico played into their hands. Prince Lascar said
nothing to his brother but he swore to me, his comrade,
that he would not remain at Kemesvar to look upon
the outrage. He too had come into a rich inheritance
and wished to enjoy his youth. Feigning illness he
announced that he would travel to restore his health
and it chanced that this plan suited his brother. Some
of the jewels of Kemesvar, proudly worn by princesses,
had failed to please the low-born Tartar and she wished
the stones re-cut in the fashion of the day. In Bucha-
rest there was no workman good enough, the jewels
must be sent to Paris. Since Lascar was to travel, why
not to Paris with the jewels? He agreed and we left
for France, taking with us the Cross of Kemesvar.”
“The necklace, you mean?” asked Guy.
“Yes; so it was called, for the cross itself was the .
chief treasure of the noble house. In earlier days the
hospodars were also bishops of the Church and it was
to a prince Xico that the necklace and cross were given
on his ordination by the Patriarch of Constantinople.
The gift bound the house of Xico to eternal fealty to
Constantinople as against Rome and for centuries had
stood as badge of honor and loyalty to all of the blood
181


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
of Xico. The change proposed was sacrilege. But
Prince Lascar was indifferent. What honor was in
the symbol, he said, when honor itself was dead?”
Again hatred and anger gleamed from Szemere's
eyes. “Lascar, my friend, is dead,” he exclaimed,
“and one I love more than life wastes her youth in
faith to me; yet I could almost wish the cross of Kemes-
var were never found if it must lie upon the bosom of
the Tartar hag!”
The mood of violence spent itself swiftly and he
continued calmly: “When I talk so I am mad. All
my life and happiness depend on the recovery of the
Cross. But I waste your time. In Paris we lived as
men of our age and class and for such Paris has much
to offer. But Lascar soon wearied and talked of
Petersburg. I had my reasons for preferring Paris;
my betrothed was there and I was able to see her with
less ceremony than in Bucharest where she was lady-
in-waiting to the Queen; but to remain in Paris the
Prince must be amused. One evening, seeking some
new diversion, I chanced to hear of the Purple Pigeon,
a small theater unknown to me.”
He paused and a tremor ran through him. “It was
a fatal night for all concerned,” he said grimly, “for
there for the first time Prince Lascar saw Alix Floria.”
“Alix Floria!” Hugh caught up the name. “I’ve
heard of her, I think.”
“No doubt. The whole world heard of her soon
after, when she was murdered.”
182


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Bucharest that a choice be made, and the necklace
waited. Floria wished to see it. The Prince agreed.
She wished to wear it to dance. Again the Prince
agreed. Always I tried to persuade him from this
madness — that a dancing-girl should wear the Cross
of Kemeswar was a shame to his honor and name. He
laughed. No greater shame, he said, than when the
Tartar wore it. Think of her rage when the news
should reach Bucharest! We thought of it and
laughed — like fools. -
“Well, she wore it. She had boasted that she
would and Paris watched. The scandal was frightful.
A portrait of her with the necklace was shown at the
Salon and at once removed. Telegrams came from
the King, himself, ordering us to return home. All
this but drove the Prince to his fatal madness. We
were to leave Paris at midnight, and after dining re-
turned to our hotel. He would not go out, Lascar
said; it was better that he should not see Alix again.
If I wished to go I was free, he would sleep. I should
have suspected, but I did not. He seemed depressed,
changed, but I thought him unhappy only. I joined
my betrothed at the opera and when I returned he was
gone. The following day I looked upon him dead in
the morgue.”
Szemere sank back in his seat. He was pale and
the muscles of his face twitched as though he had but
just lived through the experience he related.
“What had happened?” Hugh prompted.
184


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“I don't know. No one knows. The body had
been found at dawn lying in a ditch by the roadside
twenty miles from Paris. He had been stabbed in
the heart. The only clue was a piece of fur clutched
tightly in 'one hand. I recognized it as like the fur
Floria wore on a coat.”
In spite of the effort Amarinth had been making
not to betray undue interest in the Count's disclosures,
nor to attract the latter's attention by another incau-
tious glance, he now gave a violent start.
Instantly the Rumanian was on his feet. “What is
it?” he cried. “The coat? You know of that? It
was never found, that coat!”
Hugh laid his hand on Guy's arm to warn him to be
silent.
“We shall speak when our turn comes,” he said
quietly, though his face was white.
“I will make quickly an end,” Szemere said. “The
clue of the fur led to nothing, for Alix Floria was her-
self found dead in her apartment the same morning.
She too had been stabbed. Suspicion for her death
pointed to a young Frenchman, the man with whom
she was said to have come to Paris. But though the
evidence was very strong against him he was acquitted
when tried for the murder. This was due to a doubt
that the body found was that of the dancer. Her
maid identified it, but the head was so mutilated that
recognition of the face was impossible. Added to this,
several persons appeared in behalf of the accused who
185


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
swore they had seen Floria alive after the body was
found. The theory — yes?”
Szemere glanced at Hugh, who had leaned forward
as if to speak. Challenged, he now shook his head.
“Pardon me, go on,” he muttered.
“The theory accepted generally was that the body
was not Floria's but was one brought from the dis-
secting-rooms of the School of Medicine, and that it
had been mutilated to conceal the deception. This
grew out of the fact that the accused was a surgeon
who had been allowed to take bodies from the dis-
secting-rooms to his private laboratory. It was said
that there had been a scheme in which the dancer was
to disappear, be accounted dead, and an insurance
policy in her lover's favor collected by him. The
newspapers made that story. No such insurance policy
existed. There is no doubt that the body was Floria's
and that the murderer mutilated it for the purpose of
casting on its identity just such uncertainty as did arise
and save him. The motive urged against him in the
trial was jealousy of another lover — not the Prince,
for his name was never mentioned, but a man of lower
rank. But the actual motive was the theft of the
necklace.”
“It was stolen that night?”
“It disappeared then and has not been heard of
again until now. Several days passed before I dis-
covered that the Prince had had it in his possession
on the night of his death. I had understood that it
I86 -


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
was to remain in Paris to be re-cut, but it was proved
by the jewelers that Lascar had taken it from them
that day. What his purpose was, where he was
killed, and by whom, was never discovered. All men-
tion of him and of the necklace was carefully excluded
from the trial. Afterward it was given out that he
was killed in a railway accident that chanced to occur
a few days later and this was all the public ever knew.
The facts I have given you, gentlemen, involve the
honor of a noble house and my own honor. I have
placed myself in your power.”
“Your secret is safe with us, Count Szemere,” Hugh
said. “But I need hardly remind you that I cannot
surrender the necklace without further proof.”
Count Szemere bowed. “You shall have proof.
I am attaché of the Rumanian legation in Washington.
Through the minister official papers shall be sent that
will satisfy you.”
“Would it be satisfactory to you if the matter could
be settled without official action?” Hugh asked.
“Ah, but I should prefer it! To get back the neck-
lace that is all.”
“Then may I ask a few questions?”
“Whatever you like.”
“Thank you. It will be seven years in April, you
said, since the necklace disappeared. Do you remem-
ber the exact date?”
“If I remember? If I could but forget!” Szemere
made an eloquent gesture. “It was the twenty-third.”
187


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“And this dancer — how old was she?”
“Very young. Seventeen, perhaps.”
“Will you describe her?”
“Certainly,” said the Rumanian with a stare of sur-
prise. “Alix Floria was small and in complexion,
dark, both hair and eyes. She was beautiful, slender
— thin, indeed, I thought her, but of a wondrous
grace.”
“What nationality?”
“That I do not know. She called herself Italian.”
“Was Alix Floria her real name?”
Szemere shrugged. “Is it ever with a dancer?
She was not of southern temperament, rather of the
north — Russian, perhaps. Her dancing was Russian
and she knew languages. English, she knew well.”
“Did she speak French?” Guy questioned.
“But surely. Indeed, I think she may have been
French. Artists of the stage often call themselves for-
eign to excite interest. Floria's pose was the mysteri-
ous. Nothing was known of her origin. Even after
her death nothing could be learned. Yet she was a
trained dancer; trained, doubtless, in some ballet
school. Her photograph was sent to every city of
Europe where a ballet school is maintained, but she
was never identified.”
“The man who was tried for her murder,” Guy
now put in; “you said he had brought her to Paris,
you spoke of him as her—lover.”
“As to that I could not swear,” said the Count with
188


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
as I have said, was never found. And the piece of fur
in the hand of the dead prince was sable. When I men-
tioned this before it had an effect on you —”
“You are right,” Hugh said, “but let me get your
facts first, please. If this woman did not see the face
of the person who left the house that morning, is it not
possible that she was mistaken in thinking it was the
dancer?”
“Certainly. But she said the woman in the coat
wore no hat and had hair like Floria's. This, added
to the fact that the hair and scalp had been cut from the
dead body, naturally created a doubt as to the body's
identity. There were also several cabmen who ap-
peared as witnesses. One said he had driven the
dancer from the theater to her home, had waited there
at her orders, and afterwards taken her to a hotel. An-
other said he had taken a young woman in a black coat
with fur from a railway station to Floria's address;
and there were still others who thought they had taken
her to other places. But as none of these witnesses
had ever seen Alix Floria and as such coats are not rare,
the stories only confused the jury and proved noth-
ing.”
“Then, in your opinion, the dead body was that of
the dancer?”
“I have no doubt whatever of it,” Szemere said em-
phatically. “The clothes were those Floria had worn
on leaving the theater that night, and her maid identi-
fied the body as hers.”
I90


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“It’s now four o'clock,” Hugh continued. “Will
you pardon me.”
He took up the telephone receiver, called his home,
and asked for Marie. In the short wait that followed
he held his eyes on the instrument, conscious of
Amarinth's sharp breathing at his elbow.
“Yes, it’s Hugh,” he said when the girl's voice came
over the wire. “Amarinth and I will be up in a few
minutes. Will you give us some tea? Yes, tea.
Good-by.”
He rose. “If you will excuse me I must attend to
some business matters before I leave. I’ll be with you
in five minutes.”
“With your permission I'll use your telephone,”
said the Count. “I had ordered my luggage sent to
the station as I intended to return to Washington this
afternoon. I must order it fetched back.” He moved
to the desk.
Guy followed Hugh into the hall. “What do you
mean to do?” he asked.
“Let him see her. It’s the only way. You want
to know, don't you?” he demanded with a keen glance.
“God, I’ve got to know !” said Guy.
I92


CHAPTER XV
RS. THORLEY had awakened with a severe
headache and had kept to her bed. The periods
of acute pain alternating with drug-deadened hours left
no mental freedom for the consideration of troubles
other than her own; but the pale cheeks and shadowed
eyes of the young face that hovered tenderly about
her made her heart ache so that she was almost grate-
ful for the distraction of throbbing temples.
As the morning's suspense dragged into the after-
noon, the girl's face grew whiter and a haunted look
crept into her eyes. When, now and then, the ring of
the telephone or door bell penetrated to the stillness of
the sick-room she would start violently, then shiver
back into tense waiting. And when, at four o'clock,
Hugh's summons came, she swayed dizzily as she made
her way to the door.
Of all this Mrs. Thorley had been conscious and now
she sat up, straining her ears for the sound of the voice
at the telephone in the hall outside. The few faltered
words she caught told her nothing.
“He won't marry her — he won't marry her.” The
words beat a sharp tattoo along her stricken nerves.
He was too like his mother — that was it! She
I93


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
snatched at the idea as at a long-sought answer to the
doubts that filled her mind. Grace Amarinth had
never been able to see beyond the tip of her own beau-
tiful nose, she recalled, and in the son she had ob-
served the same lack of imagination, the same selfish
adherence to the beaten path of personal advantage.
Well, let him go and good riddance! If only Marie did
not care so much! If only Hugh had not been a fool!
Mrs. Thorley sank back to her pillows with a sigh
of despair. Then the door opened and Marie came
111.
“They'll be here in a few minutes,” she announced
tremulously.
“They? Guy’s coming then?”
Marie nodded.
“Well, my dear, if he’s coming!” Mrs. Thorley
threw off the words on a deep breath of relief as if with
them went all her misgivings. But her reassurance
was not reflected in her hearer's countenance.
“Hugh wants tea served,” Marie said with a puzzled
look.
&c. Teal 32
“That’s what he said. But he never takes it.
Neither does — either of them.”
“What exactly did Hugh say?”
Marie repeated the conversation.
“Oh, well, he's coming any way, so your troubles
are over and you can stop looking like a haunted spirit.
The sight of you was more harrowing than neuralgia.
I94


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Now go and make yourself beautiful for your future
lord and master. He deserves it since he's decided to
behave like a man, after all.”
The girl had turned away, but at the final words she
stopped.
“Then you thought he would n't?”
“Yes, I did, frankly. That's why I did n't want
him to be told.”
“Do you think he need never have known?”
“You could have told him after you were married.”
“Would n't he have resented my not telling him be-
fore?”
“Probably. But as his wife your hold on him
would have been stronger than it is now.”
“My legal hold, you mean?”
“No, I mean your hold on his affections.”
Marie turned away again. Before her eyes rose the
face of Guy Amarinth as she had seen it last, flushed
and anxious, suspicious, almost hostile. Suddenly,
stopping again, she asked: -
“Did you meet Mr. Gavock last night, Mr. Roger
Gavock of Paris?”
“No, as it happened, I did n't, but I heard that he
was there. You met him? He's rather an interest-
ing man, I am told. Lives abroad altogether. Made
an unfortunate marriage when he was very young and
has never tried it again. His wife turned out to have
been — well, that sort, you know.”
“What sort? What do you mean?”
I95


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“The sort men don't marry.”
“Oh, I see,” said the girl, and after a moment,
“What did he do?”
“ Divorced her, of course.”
As she spoke Mrs. Thorley gave a wince of pain.
“There's that nerve again! I shall simply have to
have another powder. It’s madness, I suppose, but I
may as well die a drug fiend as a martyr.”
She swallowed the powder which Marie prepared for
her and subsided into her pillows again. “Run along,
child, and forget I'm on earth,” she counseled. “I
really shan’t be in five minutes.”
The girl lingered a moment longer beside the bed
until convinced that the invalid was comfortaly settled
for sleep. Pausing on the threshold, she hesitated and
finally brought out a question.
“What became of her?”
“Her? Who?”
“Mr. Gavock's wife — afterwards.”
“Oh, Heaven knows!” said Mrs. Thorley.
-
-
|


CHAPTER XVI
IRECTING the servant who admitted them to tell
Miss Marie that they had arrived, Hugh Senior
led the way back to the library. The waning afternoon
light filled the room dimly and as he entered his hand
moved mechanically toward the electric switch beside
the door, but, contact with it rousing him to a sense
of his action, he drew the hand back again. Inviting
his guests to be seated, he crossed to the fireplace and
threw a fresh log on the irons, then lingered, looking
down at the fire, while he brushed the wood-dust from
his hands.
No one spoke. Count Szemere's glance trailed from
object to object, darting back every now and then
to his companions. He sat erect, expectant. Guy
Amarinth's hands gripped the arms of his chair which
was turned away from the door and he stared before
him with eyes that seemed to listen, fearfully.
Hugh was listening too. While the others only
waited, with him lay the responsibility for action. The
drive up-town had been all but speechless, and over
and over again he had challenged his judgment in de-
ciding on this heroic measure, only to be thrown back
on it each time as the one possible course. But what
197


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
under the kettle, then left the room. But he had hardly
crossed the threshold when Hugh's voice recalled him.
“Switch on the lights, please.”
The soft glow from the low lamps now filled the
room. The butler moved about quietly, pulling down
the shades of the windows, then withdrew. Followed
a short space of silent waiting, then a light footfall in
the hall. The next moment Marie Dupont entered.
Hugh had stepped swiftly forward to meet her. At
the certain knowledge of her approach an instinctive
prompting that he could not resist had thrust him be-
tween her and the test he had himself prepared for her.
For a moment his body screened her from Szemere's
eyes and in that moment, as he looked down at her, it
seemed to him that never before had he fully known
that he loved her.
Every familiar detail of her loveliness seemed to
spring into high relief, and as his eyes met hers, dark-
rimmed and anxious yet bravely lifted, he would have
given all he possessed for the right to push her from
the room, from sight of the two men who menaced her
happiness. He knew that they had risen, he felt them
at his back; he knew that Szemere had stepped forward
— he must have advanced as far as the table where the
tea things stood — now he was waiting — waiting —
“Did Morgan bring the tea?”
The light question restored Hugh's wavering self-
control. Instantly his mad impulse receded and with
a word of assent he moved aside and turned.
I99


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Count Szemere, let me present you to my ward,
Miss Dupont.”
She started forward, offering her hand, and the
Count extended his own as he advanced to meet her;
but at the second step he recoiled violently, and the un-
calculated movement threw him so roughly against the
tea-table that the light-legged structure was overturned
amid a crash of china.
Neither Amarinth nor Hugh moved. Their eyes
sped from Szemere to the girl and back again. The
Rumanian, having regained his footing by a clutch at
a chair, stood staring at Marie, wild-eyed, aghast,
trembling in every limb. She looked at him a moment
with a sort of wonder which as hostess she tried to
conceal, then started forward with a little cry.
“Put out the lamp, it’s burning the rug' "
Hugh and Guy sprang to do her bidding and the
creeping flame was extinguished. She meanwhile had
crossed to the bell and rung.
“I’ll have Morgan bring more tea,” she said.
Count Szemere took a deep breath and for an instant
his shaking frame relaxed in relief; but only for an in-
stant, then his muscles grew tense and excitement leapt
to his eyes. This was no apparition then, but a
woman! By force of will and the power his years of
diplomatic service had given him, he swept his face
clear of all emotion and when he spoke his voice be-
trayed nothing more than his words expressed.
“I regret infinitely that I have been so awkward,
2OO


P: , " ....'Y
OF THE
NCW YORK
SOCIETY LIºkARY


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Mademoiselle — I should say rather, Miss — I fear
I have not understood the name —”
“Miss Dupont,” said Hugh.
“Ah, yes — Dupont. As I say, I regret infi-
nitely —”
“Oh, it was nothing that is not easily repaired,”
she assured him graciously. “Here's Morgan now.”
As she turned to give an order to the servant, Hugh
interposed.
“If you’ll excuse us, we men will go to my den
while Morgan clears up here. It will take him some
little time and we have a matter of business to discuss
and — Count Szemere is rather hurried. If there’s
time we’ll have tea afterwards, if you'll join us.”
He hardly glanced at her as he spoke and was con-
scious that his manner was brusk, but his one thought
was to get Szemere away from her. She had not
recognized him, that was plain. But he had recog-
nized her. The shock had missed her and fallen on
him. The tea had been ordered merely to bring her
to the library without seeming to make a point of her
coming, and it had chanced, luckily, to bridge a dan-
gerous moment. But nothing was to be gained in any
way by prolonging the present situation.
She looked at him, surprised. “Certainly, when-
ever you like,” she stammered.
“I’ll let you know by Morgan,” he said over his
shoulder as he crossed and threw open the study door.
“This way, Count.”
2O3


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
The Rumanian bowed deeply to Marie and passed
Out.
Amarinth stepped forward to follow. He looked at
Marie, but she only inclined her head and did not meet
his eyes.
“She’s afraid to face me — she's afraid!” he told
himself and strode after the Count.
Hugh paused before closing the door and looked
back, but she had turned and was hurrying toward the
hall. A sense of what she must be enduring in anxiety
and suspense overwhelmed him, and he made an impul-
sive move to follow her, but encountering a surprised
stare from the butler, on his knees among the ruins of
the tea-service, he halted abruptly, turned, and entered
the study.
2O4


CHAPTER XVII
&g N extraordinary story, Mr. Senior l’exclaimed
Count Szemere, when Hugh had finished relat-
ing the history of Marie Dupont in much the same
words as had conveyed it that morning to Amarinth.
“Frankly, were it not for my confidence in you I should
hardly credit it.”
“Here are papers which will bear me out,” said
Hugh. “This is a record made by my aunt of the
opinions of the specialists consulted, and notes of her
personal observations of the case. These others are
letters from various persons who came into direct con-
tact with the girl: physicians, the nurse at the sanitar-
ium, the head mistress of the school she attended in
England. Surely these must convince you that it is a
genuine case of lost memory.”
Szemere looked through the papers, pausing now and
then to read portions.
“Surely these must convince you,” Hugh repeated.
The Count returned the papers with a shrug.
“Women are sometimes very clever!” he murmured.
“But what had she to gain by such a deception?”
“Ah, who knows?”
“But what has she gained by it?”
205


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“She knows.”
“She may have once — she does n't now.”
“The sight of the necklace may recall it.”
“I don't wish it recalled !”
Hugh spoke defiantly; he meant defiance. If the
girl's past was what Szemere said, then she should
never know it if he could keep the knowledge from her.
The risk he had taken in confronting her with the
Count now seemed to him monstrous. But he had not
for a moment really believed that she was Alix Floria.
He realized that now — now that her identity with the
dancer appeared to be a proved fact. But he would
take no further risks, neither for Szemere's satisfaction
nor for Amarinth's. Amarinth must take her as she
was or leave her. Far better that she should lose him
than lose her virginal unconsciousness of whatever hor-
rors lay imprisoned in her memory.
“Let me explain,” he said, as Szemere was about to
protest. “This girl is my ward — I use the word in
its truest sense. I am responsible for the condition in
which you find her. She had her place in life and
through me she lost it. I have given her another and
I don't mean to let her lose it through you or any one
else. What her life was, prior to the moment that my
car struck her senseless that morning, I don't know.
But what it has been since I do know, for she has lived
it in my sight, day after day, for years. She may have
been all that you say: a professional dancer in a low-
class theater in Paris, a girl who flaunted the jewels of
208


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
a prince and — paid for the privilege. I can't deny
anything. I don't know. But I do know this, that
vicious as her past may have been not a trace of it
remains in her consciousness to-day, not a trace. In
an instant the slate of her mind was wiped clean of it.”
He had turned from the Count and let his glance
dwell on Guy, but the young man, after meeting his
eyes briefly, resumed his tight-lipped contemplation of
the floor.
“Some one has wisely said that we are only the sum-
total of our thoughts,” Hugh proceeded. “And the
thoughts of this girl are the thoughts of any young girl
of pure life. What but shame and misery could the
resurrection of an ignoble past bring to her? How
can you dream that I would permit it?”
“An operation would have had that result and you
have said you thought of that,” the Count observed.
“I have not considered an operation since I have
realized all it might entail, nor will I risk the enlight-
enment that the sight of the necklace might bring. I
am responsible for her happiness and I shall guard it
with all my power. Certainly I shall not allow mem-
ories to be poured into her mind that would pollute it.”
“I respect your motive and your sentiment, Mr.
Senior,” Szemore replied suavely. “Though I con-
fess your attitude seems to me absurd. Am I permitted
to indicate that you, of the three of us, are the only
one who has nothing to lose and something to gain
by keeping your ward in her present mental state?
209


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Mr. Amarinth, as her fiancé, might be pardoned, I
think, for wishing to have the mystery of her past
made clear.”
The Count paused long enough to give Guy a sym-
pathetic glance, being sufficiently a diplomat to con-
vert to his own uses the emotions of another.
“For myself,” he went on, “the recovery of the
necklace without the cross will not serve. Were I free
to choose, gladly would I sacrifice my heart to preserve
the innocent conscience of your ward. But alas, I am
not so free! On the recovery of the Cross of Kemes-
var is depending my future and the happiness of one
dearer than my life. Until it is restored to Prince
Vasilief I must serve here, an exile from my home and
all most dear to me. That is the will of his Tartar
wife. To please her am I punished, for the King finds
it agreeable to oblige the Princess Xico. In your ward
lies now my one hope of finding the cross. You must
therefore pardon that I insist.”
“I’m sorry, Count Szemere, but my mind is made.
up. She shall not be shown the necklace, nor shall she
be questioned about it.”
An ominous light appeared in the Rumanian's eyes
and he opened and closed his hands with quick savage
movements of anger. But his voice when he answered
showed no trace of annoyance.
“I repeat that I respect your sentiment, my dear Mr.
Senior, but I fear you do not comprehend fully of this
matter. When you met this lady she was wearing a
2IO


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
necklace which did not belong to her and she was, it
appears, running away with it. That act might be
called by a name you would not wish to join to the
name of a person you admire. The mantle she was
wearing you have told me was of black with sable col-
lar. Very well. In the dead hand of Prince Lascar
there was found a piece of sable. Have you forgotten
that?
He stopped and let his eyes rest on Hugh's an in-
Stant.
“Maybe it was that the hand that took the cross
from the necklace was also the hand that killed the
Prince. Who knows? Who — but the lady?”
Hugh gave back the narrowed glance without flinch-
ing.
“You're wasting your time,” he said curtly. “I
know as well as you do that the last thing you want in
this affair is publicity. You don't want it any more
now than you wanted it when you so carefully excluded
all mention of the Prince and his jewels from that mur-
der trial.”
“You deceive yourself!” cried the Count, and for
the first time his voice broke from his control. “To-
day the affair is quite other. Then we had first to
conceal the death of the Prince. For that the search
for the necklace was done in secret. To-day we may
seek openly. No man nor woman shall be spared but
that the cross is found. I have spoken! Terrible
things may come. Who knows? In Paris, a man, a
2II


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
lover of the Floria, who was believed to conceal the
necklace, was seized, taken to Bucharest, and there
tortured. His hand was cut off to make him to speak!
Terrible things may come — if no other way is
found ! ”
“Threats won't help here, Count Szemere. This is
New York, not Bucharest. The necklace will be re-
turned to you when your Government has identified it.
Beyond that I cannot help you. This is my final
word.”
Szemere whitened with rage and his body shook as in
a chill. He sprang to his feet and faced Hugh, who
had risen in signal of dismissal. They measured each
other silently.
Amarinth had also risen and now he took a step
forward to a position beside Szemere and opposing
Hugh.
“It’s not my final word,” he said sharply.
His companions turned and stared at him.
“I think Count Szemere has a right to know all she
might be able to tell him,” he said. “And I have a
right to know!”
“What right,” demanded Hugh. “You’ve made
your decision — that’s been evident for some time.
Would anything you could learn now alter it? You
have no intention of marrying Marie. I don't deny
your right to withdraw. But you are pledged to
secrecy. I have your word of honor—don't forget
it.”
2I2


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“And I have yours! You told me that if I married
Marie her story would become my property to use as
I saw fit. Did n't you?”
“Yes.” Into Hugh's gaze a faint surprise had
COITle.
“Well — I married her last night.”
There was a dead stillness.
“Amarinth — is that true?”
Guy took the marriage certificate from his pocket
and without a word handed it to Hugh. The latter's
hands shook as he opened it and read its contents.
Then he handed it back.
“What are your orders?” he asked huskily.
“First show her the necklace.”
“Where P’’
“If you will permit a suggestion, Mr. Amarinth,”
Szemere put in, “I think it would be well that she sees
it here — quite unprepared — that is, if Mr. Senior
does not object?”
“As Mr. Amarinth pleases.”
“That's the best way, of course,” said Guy.
Szemere continued eagerly. “With Mr. Senior's
consent the necklace can be brought here by the Ru-
manian consul. All may quickly arrange itself by
telephone.”
“Why not let one of Lozier's men bring it?” Hugh
asked.
“The consul's permission is now necessary.”
“Then let him come with Lozier's man. You can
2I3


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Bring the tea, please, and — ask Miss Marie if she
will join us.”
“Yes, sir.”
The butler departed and Szemere, who at the serv-
ant's arrival had changed his position so as to screen
the jewels from view, now resumed the seat he had
chosen for himself, and again lowered the lamp.
The butler returned with the tea-tray and carried it
to the table on which its predecessor had stood. Then
he struck a match and lit the spirit-lamp.
The ears of the three men were strained toward the
hall.
“Will I make the tea, sir?”
Hugh looked up with a slight start. “No, Miss
Marie will do it.”
“Miss Marie has gone out, sir.”
“Gone out! Are you sure?”
“Yes, sir. I chanced to be in the hall when she
went, sir.”
“When Was it?”
“About half an hour since, sir.”
“Then she may have returned. She’s probably
with Mrs. Thorley.”
“I’ve just inquired; she’s not in the house, sir.”
“She left no message?”
“No, sir. Mrs. Thorley was asleep and the maids
did n't know as how she was out. Will I make the tea,
sir?”
“No, that’s all.”

2I5


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Yes, sir.”
The instant the door closed on the man, Szemere
rose excitedly.
“She has run away! She knew me and was afraid!
She has seen her danger better than you, Mr. Senior.
Ah, pardon' But I cannot longer pretend to believe
your story of the lost memory. It is too bizarre, that!
She is afraid and runs away, that simply. How else
will you explain?”
“I can't explain,” Hugh replied. “I can only as-
sure you that I have acted in good faith with you both.
I had no idea of this marriage. She told me nothing.”
“I had forbidden her to tell you,” Guy said.
“Exactly. And I don't know what other orders
you may have given her. I don't know where she has
gone nor why. I know nothing. The affair, Count
Szemere, now rests between you and Mr. Amarinth.”
“It is not to waste time here!” The Count was
dragging on his overcoat. “The necklace must go
back at once.”
Hugh assented and with the box of jewels led the
way to the drawing-room where the Rumanian consul
and his companion waited. Their cab stood at the curb
and they presently departed in it with the necklace.
Szemere bowed formally. “I have warned you how
far my Government will advance to recover the neck-
lace and the cross. I now communicate with my chief
at Washington for authority to proceed. If I have
not satisfactory news from you in the meantime the
216


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
go away if it was n’t to avoid meeting that man
again?”
“Why should she have wanted to avoid him? She
did n't recognize him.”
“I’m not so sure of that!”
“I see. Then you agree with him that it is n’t a
case of lost memory, but simply pretense?”
“My God, I don't know what to believe!” Guy an-
swered with a jerk at the door.
“Perhaps, like Szemere, you think I warned her of
his coming?”
“No, I think you’ve been square with me. I real-
ize that you need not have told me anything about her.
But there’s one thing I know — she had seen that man
before she met him in the library.”
“Seen him P. Where?”
“She was standing at an up-stairs window when we
got out of the cab. I happened to look up and when
she saw me looking she jerked her head away.”
He flung the words at Hugh, then waited.
“If she was afraid of meeting him why did she come
down? She could easily have made an excuse,” Hugh
said.
“I don't know — I don’t know ! That’s what’s
driving me mad — I don't know anything!”
The sound of the outer door closing came to Hugh's
ear, then Amarinth's quick tread on the sidewalk.
So, she had seen Szemere arrive, had known when
she came into the library that he was there! Hugh re-
218


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
called how he had stepped between them to shield her,
from the Count's sight, and with the memory came the
vision of her face at that moment. Instantly all doubt
of her vanished. Suspicion could not exist in his mind,
side by side with her image. She had gone away,
where or why he did not know, but he knew she would
come back.
He paced the floor, his nails digging into his palms.
His aunt was right— he had been a fool to stand aside
for other men. What had come of it but misery for
her and all of them? He had meant only her happiness
and had sacrificed himself that she might find it in
her own way. And that way had brought her to this,
that she was the wife of a cad, a hound, who was ready
to believe her all that was despicable and vile.
Married His wife! And not a word, not a glance,
had passed between them in the library. He was sure
of it, for he had watched in wretched jealousy to see
what look she would have for the man she loved.
A cry of rage broke from him. He was seized by
the primitive instinct to kill the thing that thwarted
him. Back and forth across the room he paced, and it
was long before his mind was calm enough for rational
thought. But reason could not help him. It reminded
him only that he could do nothing, that Amarinth was
master.
But, yes, one thing he could still do. The knife!
If Szemere should carry out his threat and go to the
police —
219


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
He hurried to his study and unlocking the drawer
from which the night before he had taken the necklace,
he took out the box in which lay the dirk with the
carved bone handle. No one had ever known of its
existence except Dr. Vining. They had decided that
it would be wiser not to alarm Mrs. Thorley by telling
her of it. But it was this knife, hidden in the girl's
bodice, which had caused the wound on her bosom, the
blood from which had led to his discovery of the neck-
lace. This was the one fact that he had concealed from
Amarinth.
However, to whatever lengths Szemere might go,
the fur-trimmed coat could never be produced, for it
had been destroyed in a storage-house fire in London.
But the knife was there and if the house were searched 1
“Maybe it was that the hand that took the cross from
the necklace was the hand that killed the Prince.”
Szemere's words rang in Hugh's ears. He must get
rid of the knife. If found, Szemere might recognize
it. He stared down at it lying in his hand. It could
not be destroyed. He must hide it.
He glanced about the room, seeking a hiding-place,
then passed into the library. There, he finally decided
on a window-box from which a thick growth of ivy
climbed a low trellis. The blade pierced its way
through the soil to the bottom of the box and he buried
the handle well under the surface. Then he smoothed
the broken earth above it and carefully readjusted the
displaced creepers.
22O


CHAPTER XVIII
AVOCK looked at his watch and returned it to
his pocket with a puzzled lift of the brows.
Half-past five and Miss Lowther had not returned.
He had replaced in the envelope awaiting her the bills
he had taken out for Andrus and he was now anxious
to turn the money over to her and to give her back her
jeweled cross.
The possession of the cross worried him. Her ignor-
ance of its value, her aversion to offering it at a pawn-
shop, or even to submitting it to a reputable jeweler
for appraisal, her insistence upon leaving it with him —
all things that had seemed natural enough as she ex-
plained them now bristled with suspiciousness. He
was willing to make her a loan or a gift, whichever
she preferred to call it, but he wanted nothing to do
with that very remarkable piece of jewelry.
He examined it again. It was a gorgeous affair, but
too large and heavy to have been designed for feminine
adornment. A family heirloom! How could he have
credited so absurd a statement for a moment?
The telephone bell rang, but to his disappointment
it announced not Miss Lowther but Amarinth.
Gavock put the cross away again in his pocket, and
22I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
after a brief deliberation carried the portrait of Alix
Floria into his bedroom. He had no doubt as to the
purpose of Guy's visit and was glad it had not been
made earlier, as he was now in a position to deal with
the boy frankly. Alix Floria was dead. Andrus had
said so and Andrus was her husband and an artist, and
Gavock asked no better identification of her body than
that which such a trained, familiar eye could give.
Miss Dupont, whoever she might be, could not be the
dancer, Floria. That much was certain. Still, her re-
semblance to the portrait of Floria was so striking that
it would only disturb Guy to see it.
The young man wasted little time on greetings.
“I’ve come to ask you some questions, Mr. Gavock,”
he blurted out. “You mistook Miss Dupont for some
one yesterday and last night you said it was for some
one who is dead. Is that true? Is she dead?”
“My dear boy!”
“You can't blame me for doubting you, can you?”
Guy protested. “After what you said last night about
lying to shield a woman you could hardly expect me not
to l’”
“You’re right,” Gavock admitted. “But it hap-
pens that Miss Dupont does not require shielding, so
I am free to indulge in the luxury of telling the truth.
I mistook her for a girl named Alix Floria who was
murdered in Paris seven years ago.”
“You are sure of that — that she was murdered, I
mean?”
222


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Why, her body was found in her rooms l’”
Gavock tossed this off with the air of one settling all
doubts, and his tone almost stung Guy into voicing the
doubt he knew existed. But he caught his words back
in time. His game was to know nothing until he had
extracted the sum total of Gavock's knowledge.
He affected relief. “Oh, so there's no doubt about
her being dead?”
“Of course not.”
“Who was she any way?” Guy asked, feigning cas-
ual curiosity.
The curiosity struck Gavock as natural and he saw
no reason for not satisfying it. Besides, nothing
could be more reassuring to the boy, he thought, than
the truth chanced to be. Between such a career as
Floria's and the life Miss Dupont lived the gulf was
so wide as to make any connection seem impossible.
So he told the story of Alix Floria, being careful,
however, to let fall no hint of the doubt of the body's
identity. Indeed, Andrus had convinced him that there
was no room for doubt. The fact of the girl's mar-
riage with Andrus he also omitted, feeling that to tell
it would be to betray a confidence. He had practically
dragged it out of the poor fellow. And as he talked
he did not dream that his narrative struck familiarly
on his listener's ears, that behind his attentive stare,
the boy was saying to himself: “It’s all true then,
all that Szemere said.”
For it was to find that out that he had come and the
223


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“But suppose it is n’t bluff. Could he be stopped
by going to Washington? He has wired the Ruman-
ian minister for authority to act in the affair.
Would n’t it be possible to get at the Rumanian min-
ister?”
“I hardly think it will be necessary.”
“But he threatens to go to the police, to accuse Miss
Dupont not only of stealing the necklace but of killing
the Prince,” Guy urged excitedly.
Gavock laughed. “Never! He will never be per-
mitted to drag the indiscretions of any prince, dead or
alive, into the public press. It is n’t the policy of
monarchical governments to publish the moral weak-
nesses of their aristocracies. The affair is most unfor-
tunate and you have my deepest sympathy, but I feel
sure there is no danger of the matter becoming known
to the public. And for yourself, you have only to
withdraw your offer of marriage —”
“I may as well tell you the truth — we're already
married!” And Guy poured out the story of the hur-
ried wedding.
Gavock was astonished and troubled and he delib-
erated anxiously in his mind. The affair might turn
out to be far more serious than he had supposed for
his young friend. If Andrus had been mistaken and
this girl was Alix Floria, then she was Andrus's wife.
Well, that let Guy out. But he would say nothing yet.
He must first see Andrus. It was evident that there
was a mistake somewhere. Andrus knew more than
225


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
He took the cross from his pocket. His hands were
nervous as he unfolded the handkerchief wrapped about
it. He was telling himself that there must be many
Greek crosses in the world set in rubies and emeralds
and backed by enameling; that the thing was a mere
coincidence. -
He looked down at the ornament as it lay in his
hand. It might well have been a gift from the Pa-
triarch of Constantinople to a princely archbishop.
Incredible as the idea appeared, it was less incongruous
than Miss Lowther's story. That, he was now con-
vinced, was pure fabrication. At any rate he meant to
be sure. The thing had come into his hands by what
secret road he could not guess, but it should not go
out of his hands until he was satisfied that it was not
the pendant sought by Guy's Rumanian.
What would be the quickest, wisest course to follow
to that end? Neither Guy nor Hugh Senior could
identify the cross. Why not go to Szemere with it?
One glance from him would settle the matter. Then
there was Andrus. He too had seen the cross, had
painted it—
An idea flashed into Gavock's head. He brought
the portrait of Alix Floria from his bedroom and stud-
ied it closely under the full light of the chandelier.
No trace of painted jewels was visible through the
over-coat of flesh tint. Yet, he noticed for the first
time that the brush work of the neck and bosom was
not as free and sure-handed as in the other parts of
228


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
The design too, as nearly as he could determine, was
the same — a huge diamond in the center and rubies
and emeralds alternating to the four points. Still,
there was barely a chance, he knew, that the ornament
in his hand was the ancient cross sought by the Ru-
manian Government. However, he would now feel
less like a fool at putting that chance to a test. At
any rate he could not return the cross to Miss Lowther
until he had done so.
This decision reached, he 'phoned Amarinth, found
him at home, and announced his intention of calling
on him at once. As he hung up the receiver the bell
shrilled through the room.
Miss Lowther, he was informed, was waiting below.
23O


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“At the bank!” she echoed, frank alarm in her
voice. “Then I can't get it to-night?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“But I must have it! I'm going away! Surely
there’s some way of getting it,” she urged. “You’re
a rich man, you must have influence. You could get
at the people who control the place.”
“My dear young lady, the red tape would be end-
less. Come, sit down, and let’s talk it over sensibly.”
She obeyed automatically and he took a seat at her
side. He watched her closely, noting that her eyes
shifted constantly. This sudden anxiety to recover the
cross was as puzzling as her former eagerness to force
it on him.
A plan occurred to him.
“It might be possible to get into the bank to-night,”
he said, “but one would have to have the most urgent
reason — a matter of life and death.”
“It’s almost that to me,” she gasped out. “Oh,
you must help me! I'm in a terrible position. The
cross is n’t mine and if I don't return it to-night—”
She turned upon him a look of despairing appeal.
“It’s not yours, you say?”
“Surely you suspected that! Why, I did n’t even
know it was real until you told me! That's my only
excuse for taking it. Yes, I took it — stole it. I'm
a thief! But it was that or—something worse. For
there is something worse for a girl. Oh, you don't
know what it’s been to drag along here, pretending
232


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
It was n’t until you told me that I had any idea of its
value.”
“And he knows now that you took it?”
“Yes, he found it out late this afternoon. He ac-
cused me and I admitted it. I said I would get it back
to-night. He said it was enormously valuable, that
to lose it would ruin him. He talked so wildly that
I thought he had been drinking. He even took down
the 'phone to call the police. He says he will have
me arrested if I don't get it back to-night.” She
threw out her hands imploringly. “What am I to do
unless you get it for me? What can I do?”
Gavock was troubled. Her position was more seri-
ous than he had imagined, and he could see no justifica-
tion for himself in forcing her to continue in it. On
the other hand, what she had told him had been fuel
to the fire of his curiosity concerning the pendant. Be-
sides, he reminded himself, if it were the Rumanian
cross the fate of several people hung in the balance.
He could not think of her alone.
“Why not tell him the truth? Tell him he can have
it back to-morrow.”
“He would n’t let me leave town unless he had it.
He says so. And I must go to-night.”
“Then let me tell him for you.”
“No, no — he does n’t know you have it. He
does n’t know where I am now. I was afraid he'd
follow and make a scene. He can be terrible when
234


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
he's angry. I thought for a moment he was going to
kill me! He was wild ! I escaped from him by a
trick and hurried here; but he knows I am going to
Chicago to-night. I promised to meet him at the sta-
tion and give him the cross. And if I have n't it he
won't let me go and I shall lose my engagement. Now
you see how I’m placed. You must help me!”
Gavock sprang up. “Wait. I have an idea.”
He hurried away but was back in a few minutes with
several railroad time-tables. “There are two trains
for Chicago to-night,” he said, resuming his place at
her side. “Which station do you leave from?”
“Pennsylvania, at ten-fifteen.”
“Good! There's one at ten from Grand Central.
Now this is my plan. It is half-past eight. I have
thought of a way by which I may be able to get the
pendant for you to-night, before you go—”
“Oh, if you only could !”
“Wait. It's only a chance; don't bank on it,” he
cautioned. “You’ll have to wait here for me. I
shall return in time to take you to the train, whether
I bring the pendant or not. If I do bring it your trou-
bles will be over, won't they?”
“Yes, oh, yes!”
“If I do not bring it, this is my scheme. I shall
take you to the Grand Central and get you a ticket for
Chicago on the ten o'clock train. Then I'll hurry
over to the Pennsylvania and tell your manager that
235


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
— well, that some friends are taking you over the other
road in their private car. That will satisfy him and by
the time you reach Chicago to-morrow the pendant will
have been returned to the owner. How does that
strike you?”
“I can't think of anything better,” she admitted.
“But you don't intend to give him the pendant your-
self? Please don't. Just send it back without a word
to let him know where it comes from.”
“Certainly, if you prefer it. But you must give
me the name and address.”
She hesitated, then said: “I’ll give them to you
later—if you don't bring it back to-night. If you
do you won't have to know, you see, and — I’d rather
you did n't.”
“As you like, of course. But come. You can't
wait here. I will arrange for a room for you and you
can have an hour's rest.”
“Rest!”
“You’ll be alone and quiet, at least. And you can
depend on me. I shall return in time to take you to
the station.”
A few minutes later he saw the elevator start that
was to bear her up to her room. Then he jumped into
a taxicab for Amarinth's place.
On the whole he was pleased with the solution he
had hit on for Miss Lowther's plight. He would get
in touch with Szemere at once. If the cross was not
the one the Rumanian sought, then he could simply
236


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
turn it over to the girl and be done with the matter.
If it was the one Szemere was after — well, Miss
Lowther would travel to Chicago by the New York
Central.
237


CHAPTER XX
HREE quarters of an hour later Gavock was
closing the interview he had sought with Count
Szemere. It had taken place in Hugh Senior's library
in the presence of Hugh and Amarinth. Before show-
ing the pendant Gavock had exacted from Szemere a
description of the one missing from the necklace, and
the readiness with which the Rumanian supplied this
was proof enough of his good faith. And his descrip-
tion had been so accurate, including irregularities in the
cutting of certain stones — details Gavock had not no-
ticed, but now found on examination to be facts —
that no doubt as to the identification was possible.
The cross lay on the table about which the four
men were seated. Gavock was speaking.
“I understand then, Count, that with the recovery
of the necklace and the pendant, all interest in the af-
fairs of Miss Dupont on the part of you or your Gov-
ernment will instantly cease?”
“Perfectly. Prince Lascar is dead. To know how
or why he died will not bring him to life again.”
He turned to Hugh. “I regret, Mr. Senior, if my
great need has made me this afternoon to lack indul-
238


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
noon at his hotel. So that was Dr. Aubert! Cau-
tion was in order.
“I wanted to say good-by to her. Is she on the
train?” he substituted for the words he had meant to
speak.
With a grunt of disappointment the manager
dropped the arm he had seized.
“No, she ain’t, but she ought to be. I’ve got
nervous prostration standing here waiting for her.
No more society dames for mine. Never again!”
Gavock listened to the disgorging of rage and dis-
gust, but Dr. Aubert, who had doubtless heard it be-
fore, walked off. Looking after him, Gavock was
again struck by the curiously free movements of his
lithe body.
“One minute more,” warned the gateman, and
Gavock seized the chance to deliver Miss Lowther's
message.
“Why in h could n't you say so before?” de-
manded the theatrical man.
“Too many listening,” said Gavock with a glance
toward Aubert, who was again approaching.
“Oh — I see!”
“What does he see, I wonder?” thought Gavock
as the gate clanged shut and he was left alone.
On his way to the cab-stand he passed quite close to
Aubert and received from the Frenchman a malevolent
glare.
“How am I to deal with that gentleman to-mor-
242


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
row?” he considered. “I’m thankful, at least, that
I shan’t be called upon to meet him on a dark night
on a lonely road. No wonder the girl was in a blue
funk. He might be the devil himself.”
With a sigh of relief he sank back on his taxi seat.
The day had been strenuous and he was glad he was
going home to bed. Staring out at the street lamps
which flitted by, he spoke aloud the question which was
rapping at the back of his head.
“Now, how does this Dr. Jules Aubert happen to
think he owns the Cross of Kemesvar?”
243


CHAPTER XXI
ITH the departure of Gavock and Count
Szemere from Hugh Senior's house, an awk-
ward silence fell on the two men left together in the
library. The same thought was in the mind of each
but both found it hard to utter. The disappearance
of Marie had not been mentioned during the interview
just closed, not so much from any intention of con-
cealing it from Gavock, as because Szemere, the cross
within reach, had not broached the subject. His goal
sighted, his interest in the girl had ceased. He no
longer needed her.
Finally Guy broke the pause. “Has she come
back?”
4 & No.”
“It’s nearly ten o'clock; it's been five hours.”
“Yes.”
“What can we do?”
“I don't know.”
Hugh rose as he spoke and crossed to the fireplace.
“Sit down here, won't you. I want to talk to you.”
As he stood looking down into the fire the spurts of
flame that rose from the logs revealed the deepened
shadows in his face.
“I don't know where she went nor why, but I know
244


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
she will come back,” he said. “When she does —
what then?” -
Amarinth looked away and stirred in his chair but
said nothing.
“It will be up to you, you know. With Szemere
eliminated the question becomes a personal one between
you and her. You are married, but under the circum-
stances it won't be hard for you to regain your free-
dom, if that is what you want.”
“You mean an annulment?”
“So you've thought of it already?”
“Can you blame me?”
A log, burnt through, fell from the irons, sending out
a spray of red sparks. Amarinth shoved his chair
back to avoid them, while Hugh caught up the tongs
and replaced the fallen ends upon the irons. The noise
of their own movements prevented the two men from
hearing the step which at that moment sounded in the
hall.
Marie Dupont appeared in the doorway. She
paused, staring at the backs of the men as though wait-
ing for them to turn. Her figure drooped wearily and
her eyes, dark-rimmed and half-closed, gave to her
face an expression of utter exhaustion.
“I don't see how you can blame me,” Guy declared
as his companion dropped back to his seat. “No man
would want — such a woman for his wife.”
“Then you are satisfied that Marie is this Alix
Floria P”
245


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“How can I doubt it? God knows I would if I
could. But what doubt is there?”
“There is the girl herself,” Hugh returned quietly.
“As I know her and as you know her, she is all a man
could wish a woman to be, is n’t she?”
“Yes; but lots of women have deceived men that
way. How can you know what she was or was not
before you knew her?”
“But the idea is monstrous, Amarinth ! I don't
care what appearances may seem to prove — it is n’t
the first time they’ve lied. Stop, man, and think —
think what you accuse her of ! You don't realize it,
that's evident. This Floria was notorious. The
theater she appeared in was notorious. She drew her
audience, not by her dancing, but by her love-affairs.
And you are willing to believe that Marie was ever
that woman? By heaven, the idea would be laugh-
able if it were not so horrible!”
Guy remained silent. The girl in the door stood
now as if made of stone.
“It is n’t possible — it is n’t possible!” Hugh went
on. “No woman could so completely change her na-
ture.”
“Oh, what's the good of generalizing?” Guy de-
manded with a tinge of irritation in his voice. “The
facts are there. You can't get away from them —
at least, I can’t. Gavock recognized her, so did
Szemere. There's the exact agreement in dates,
there's the necklace and the coat. And there's her
246


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
dancing — don't forget that! Besides, where is she
now? Why did she go away if not to avoid Sze-
mere?”
“Perhaps to avoid you.”
& 4 Me? 5 y
“You came here, her husband, and you did n't speak
to her, nor touch her hand, nor even look at her except
with suspicion. I know. I watched you. What
must she have thought or felt?”
“I did look at her and she would n't meet my eyes.
She was afraid. She had deceived me. She had no
right to marry me knowing what she did about her-
self.”
“Knowing! I tell you she knew nothing but what
I know, not as much. Her mind is a blank as far as
her past life is concerned. Suppose she was this
dancer once, she does n’t remember it. She does n’t
remember one thing — nothing she said or did or
thought before the moment when she woke up in my
aunt's house seven years ago. Whatever her life may
have been her consciousness is as free from it as if it
had never been. If there was ever in her mind the
memory of any shameful thing the loss of memory
left her mind clean of it.”
“Did it leave her body clean?”
Hugh started up with a cry of anger and indigna-
tion.
“Amarinth, you’re a-”
He bit back the word on his tongue and curbed his
247


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Guy's head shot out with a startled stare. “What
do you mean?” he muttered.
“I mean that our marriage last night was not legal.”
“Not legal?”
“I was already married. My husband has just
died — in my arms.”
On the final words she swayed and would have
fallen if Hugh had not caught her. At his touch she
roused herself and clung to his arm with both hands
like a frightened child.
“Ask him to go! Please ask him to go!” she
begged.
Guy did not move. “I don't understand,” he said.
“What does she mean? Is that true?”
“Yes, yes, it's true. Please go away.”
“Won't you explain —”
“What does it matter to you as long as you're free?
Please, please, go away.”
She was trembling and her breath came in gasps.
Hugh waved Guy to the door. “You’d better go, I
think,” he said.
But Guy remained there irresolute, until, reaching
a decision, he started for the door.
“Wait! I have something of yours!” she arrested
him suddenly.
He turned back to her. She drew away from
Hugh's supporting arms and ripping her gloves off,
unbuttoned her coat and let it slip into his hands.
Then she felt within her dress and brought out a rib-
249


“I walked and walked—"
“I am so tired,” she whispered.





THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
rible. Then your coming here, and with that other
man. It was all so odd, I did n’t understand. And
when you went into the study and I went up-stairs
again I felt that I could not sit still and do nothing.
I thought if I could get out into the cold air and walk
a little I might feel better. I did n't say anything to
any one, I expected to come right back. But — at
the corner I met Miss Niklova.”
“ Niklova P”
“The Russian girl who plays the violin for our
dancing class. She stopped me, she was on her way
here to see me, she said. Some one was dying and
wanted me, some one who had known me in Paris and
thought me dead. I told her she must be mistaken
but she would n’t listen. She was terribly excited.
There was no time to waste, she said. I said I must
come back here first and leave word, or I must tele-
phone. She would n't let me. He was dying, she
said. I did n't know what to do. What she said
might be true. There must be people in the world
who once knew me and now believe me dead. She
almost dragged me along the street while I was won-
dering what to do. ‘He’s dying, he's dying,” she
kept telling me, over and over.”
“Did n’t she tell you his name?”
“Not then. “Wait, you’ll see him,” she said when
I asked her. We took the elevated, she had tickets.
I had no money. I had taken no purse, but only my
key. Well, we rode and rode and when at last we got
254


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
off we walked east. It was getting dark and I could
see the lights of the boats on the river. We went into
a house and up-stairs — up and up and up. Then we
went into a room —”
She stopped, shuddering, and covered her face with
her hands.
“Oh, that room, Hugh ! It was so bare and cold
and desolate. And he was lying there on a bed — the
man I had come to see. Another man, a doctor, was
sitting by the bed, and when we went in he and Miss
Niklova walked to a corner of the room to talk and left
me standing there by the bed. I looked down. He
was lying on his side and I could n’t see his face well
and I thought he was asleep. Then he moved and spoke.
“Alix — Alix,’ he said in a kind of moan, and then
louder as if he were calling some one: “Alix!
Alix | *
“I stood waiting, not knowing what to do. Then
Miss Niklova spoke to me sharply: ‘Answer him!”
but I could n't — I could n’t speak. She came over
to the bed and touched him. “Alix is here,” she said.
‘Look, she's here.’ At that he raised his head and
stared at her as if he did not understand, and she
pointed at me and then he turned and saw me.”
Marie shivered again and drawing her hands from
Hugh's she passed them nervously over her face.
He stood up, watching her anxiously.
“Did you know him?” he asked, his voice strained.
She shook her head. “He was like a stranger to
255


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
me, a man I had never seen before. But — he knew
me.”
“What did he say?”
“He did n't speak, just looked at me for a long
time. I did n't move. There was such a queer look
in his eyes that I could n't stir. It was as if any mo-
ment he would speak to me. Suddenly he raised up
in the bed and stretched out an arm toward me — his
right arm — and I saw that he had no hand —”
Hugh gave an exclamation of surprise.
“What is it?” she asked.
“I’ll tell you afterwards. Go on. He stretched
his arm out, you said.”
“Yes. I saw that he was reaching for me and I
stepped a little nearer, near enough for him to touch
me. But he did not touch me. He pulled back his
arm and lay down again. “I’m dreaming,” he said.
“I’m dreaming,' but he did n't take his eyes from my
face. Then all at once he sat up again and put out
the other arm and when his hand touched my hand
he gave a sort of gasping scream and fell back un-
conscious.
“The doctor hurried to him and Miss Niklova cried
out to me: ‘He’s dead, he's dead — you’ve killed
him!' But the doctor told her he had only fainted
from the shock of finding that I was real and not a
vision. “Who is he?' I asked, and then — Miss
Niklova told me.”
“Told you he was your husband?”
256


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Marie nodded and sat dumbly gazing at her tightly
clasped hands as they lay in her lap.
“What else did she tell you?”
“I hardly know — she was so excited, so miserable.
What a cruel thing life can be, Hugh. She loved
him.”
“What was his name? Tell me what she said to
you,” Hugh urged.
Briefly she pieced together the facts she had learned
from Irma Niklova: of Andrus's life in the tenement,
of his struggle to train his left hand to replace the
right, lost in an accident; of the portrait which the
Russian girl had recognized as hers, of the gown so
like the one she had danced in, of what Andrus had
said of her, that she had been a dancer and was now
dead. He had taken the portrait away that afternoon
and sold it to get money because he was ill and was
going to a hospital, but when he came back to leave
the money with Irma he had fallen unconscious and
she had put him to bed. Then the doctor had come
and declared that it was a question of hours. And
the sick man had called for Alix — Alix, his wife, and
in his delirium he had talked of the portrait, Alix's
portrait. It was that which gave the Russian girl her
clue and she had determined to bring to him the woman
he loved before he died.
“She said cruel things to me,” Marie went on.
“Of course she did n’t understand. She thought I
had deserted him in his misfortune, that I was deceiv-
257


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Marie broke off and hesitated. “He lifted his head
a little and I — I — put my arm about his neck and
— kissed him. I felt his lips meet mine, then his head
fell back — he was dead.”
She sobbed as she finished speaking and bowing her
head on the arm of her chair she wept uncontrollably.
“Poor child, poor child,” Hugh repeated pityingly.
She looked up, her face streaming with tears.
“When I saw that he was gone I cried out and
jumped up. The doctor said it was all over and Miss
Niklova Screamed and ordered me to leave. ‘He’s
mine now,” she said. “Go back to your fine home and
fine friends. You’re a cruel, wicked woman.’ I tried
to reason with her, to explain. She would n't listen.
She pushed me from the room and told me to explain
to my friends. She was crazed with grief. It was
terrible and pitiful. In the hall the doctor asked for
my address. He said he would let me know about the
funeral if I wished. When I had given him the ad-
dress he went back into the room. He believed what
she had told him about me and looked at me as if I
were some loathsome creature. But it did n’t seem to
matter what he thought — nothing seemed to matter.
“The hall was very dimly lighted and I had to feel
my way down the steps, then through other dark halls,
and down more steps until I was again in the street.
It was night. To the east I saw the lights along the
river, to the west the tracks of the elevated. That was
the way home, I thought, then I remembered that I
259


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
had no money, that I should have to walk. So I went
along the street where the elevated ran —”
“You walked home! Why did n't you take a cab P”
“There were none, for one thing, and if there had
been I should n't have taken one. What right have
I to comfort and luxury? Everywhere about me as I
walked I saw poverty and wretchedness; back in that
room I had left poverty and sorrow; what had I left
behind me that morning seven years ago? That was
what I kept asking myself. Perhaps I had had par-
ents, sisters and brothers, perhaps, a child.”
“Mariel ”
“How can I know, Hugh, how can I know?”
“You were nothing but a child yourself.”
“I had a husband. How can I tell that somewhere
in the world there is n't a little child, poor and unfor-
tunate, or maybe — in its grave. That is the thought
that won't leave me. My husband was a stranger to
me, my child would be a stranger too. I feel as if
I were a monster, a thing without humanity. Think
of it! All these years I’ve lived without a thought
of those who might be grieving for me.”
“That was not your fault, dear child: you had lost
all memory of them. You were questioned again and
again about home and family; you could tell nothing.
Inquiries were made and as far as we could learn no
one was trying to find you. You had not even been
reported as missing.”
“Perhaps they were very poor. The poor are so
26o


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“No.”
“They were mine, then, and I was a working-girl
and not a dancer. But what could I have been doing
with that coat and necklace? Had I stolen them?
Was I running away?”
The questions were not addressed to Hugh, but
to herself, and after them she paused as if for an-
swers. “No,” she said suddenly, and then again:
“No.”
“I was a dancer then—in a theater — in Paris,”
she went on after a while, disjointedly, stopping as if
to measure the significance of each detail. “A prince
was in love with me — and he gave me jewels to
wear — they belonged to his family — every one knew
about them — it was shameful for me to wear them —
but I did — I was proud of them.”
Again she stopped and stared ahead unseemingly,
as though listening intently for an answer.
“I never did that — never!” she said at last, with
a vehemence that startled Hugh.
“I’m sure of that,” he answered earnestly.
“Something tells me that I was never that girl —
something here.” She pressed her hand against her
breast.
“My heart tells me also, Marie.”
“He believed it.”
She stood up now and stared into the fire. Hugh
watched her face, so unlike itself, and he longed to
comfort her, but could not find the words. His love
262


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
surged to his lips, but to speak of that at such a mo-
ment would have been an offense.
“Well, he is free now. And I am free. That is
true, is n’t it?”
“Yes, virtually,” he answered. “But there will be
a legal form to go through. As we have no positive
proof of your identity or of your marriage to this An-
drus an annulment of the marriage last night will be
necessary. That is, unless you and he should recon-
sider —”
“I never want to see him again!”
Her frame shook as with a strong physical revul-
sion. “But you must not think I blame him. I
should not have married him. I deceived him and
I’ve been punished.”
“Don’t brood over what is past and done,” Hugh
begged. “Try to forget, and after a while you will
forget. And some day love will come to you again,
some other man will come into your life and —”
“Go out of it again, as he did. No one would be-
lieve in me in the face of everything — no one but
you.”
Her eyes, filled with grateful tears, rested on his face,
and they remained so looking at each other.
“But I can't go on like this,” she said at last.
“Don’t you see that I can't? I must know who I am,
who I have been, and what? I can't live in ignorance
any longer. No matter what the truth is I must know
it. And there's only one way — an operation.”
263


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“No, no!”
“I shall never have peace until I know the truth.
I must know what my real place in life is and take it,
no matter what it is or where it calls me. I have no
right here. I live in comfort while those who love me
are in want. The doctors said an operation was the
only way—”
“But it's dangerous. It might mean — death.”
“Since there’s no other way I must take the risk.
You will help me, won't you?”
“Of course, but —”
“Take me to a doctor. Take me to-morrow — to-
morrow, Hugh ! I want it over. I want to be my-
self, my real self, no matter what that is. Will you
take me to a doctor to-morrow?”
She had flung out her hands pleadingly. He caught
them in his and held them. “Listen, Marie,” he said,
“there's another way. We’ll go to Paris and try
again to find your people. We have clues to work
with now. We’ll find people who knew Alix Floria.
There must be many of them, it has been only seven
years. Why should we take Szemere's word alone?
There must be other people who knew her better—
her maid, for instance. We’ll find her. There are
many things we can do. Perhaps we shall find some
one that you will remember.”
“What's the use?” she asked listlessly. “I did n't
recognize the man who was my husband —”
264


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Don’t be unhappy about it. Don't let it bother
you. It's all right,” he assured her huskily. “I
did n’t mean you to know. But that's how it is with
me, dear. It's been so for years.”
“I did n't think—I did n't dream —” She gave a
little cry of pain. “Oh, I must have been cursed when
I was born I bring unhappiness to every one.”
“Marie, don't say that!”
“But it's true! There's John Andrus and Miss
Niklova and Guy and now you. And others some-
where in the world, perhaps. But I can't bear it any
longer. I must know who I am!”
“Very well, then,” he agreed suddenly. “I will
take you to a doctor to-morrow and hear what he ad-
vises. Sterling told me the other day of a new man
who has done some wonderful things in intracranial
surgery at one of the hospitals. He gave me the ad-
dress, thinking I might want him to see you. I'll tele-
phone in the morning and make an appointment. But
now you must go to bed and sleep. Promise me that.”
“I’ll try.”
“Life will look all bright again some day and soon.”
She sighed as though he had asked too much of her
credulity. At the door she paused and looked at him
sadly.
“I’m sorry,” she faltered.
“Don’t be, dear; I’m not,” he answered.
He listened until the sound of her steps had died
away in the upper hall. Then, entering his study, he
266


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
searched in his desk for the address of the surgeon
whom the family physician, Dr. Sterling, had so
strongly recommended.
Soon he came upon the card on which he had written
it.
“Dr. Jules Aubert, 80 East 54th Street.”

267


CHAPTER XXII
AVOCK awoke late and his first conscious
G thought was the one with which he had fallen
asleep: how was he to deal with Aubert?
His preferred course was to do nothing — just wait
and see what happened — but he did not feel free to
-follow it. He must take no chances on Miss Low-
ther's name becoming involved in the affair. He had
deceived her for Guy's sake — that had been unavoid-
able and he did not regret it; but now his first duty was
to shield her. If Aubert believed himself to be the
owner of the cross he might make trouble for the girl
as he had threatened and that possibility must be
guarded against. Accordingly he must communicate
with Dr. Aubert and forestall any action on his part.
On the other hand there was a probability—a
strong one, Gavock felt — that the doctor had come by
the cross dishonestly, that he had perhaps been con-
cerned in its disappearance seven years ago. In that
case he would not dare move openly to recover it and
Miss Lowther was safe from public action on his part.
But he would assuredly go to her about it and she
would send him to Gavock.
Now, as to his own course Gavock had not made up
268


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“This all the mail?” he asked sharply, dropping
the letters again.
“Yes, sir.”
“No telephones — telegrams — nothing?”
“No, sir.”
She handed him the sheet upon which his engage-
ments for the day were listed. His glance ran down
it, resting finally upon the hand that held it. It was
trembling.
Miss Birkett had moved over to the table beside the
cabinet. “I’ve selected the instruments,” she said.
“Will you look them over?”
He jerked his shaking hand to his side. “I’ll not
operate to-day. 'Phone them to give the case to Dr.
Mason — say I'll explain later.” -
“Yes, sir,” she replied, astonishment betrayed in
her tone.
“And tell them to cancel me for to-morrow and
next day. I — I’ve been called to Chicago.”
“Yes, sir.” She started for the door. “The
waiting-room is full.”
“Send them away.”
“Yes, sir.” She shot him a furtive glance of won-
der.
He caught it and frowned.
“Wait,” he snapped and looked at his watch.
“I’ll see as many as I have time for. Send some one
in; then 'phone as I directed.”
“Yes, sir.”
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THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
In the outer room Marie Dupont was waiting with
Mrs. Thorley and Hugh. It had been decided that
Hugh should first see the doctor alone and give him
the history of the case, after which Mrs. Thorley
would bring Marie in for the examination. This
would shorten the ordeal for the girl. Being among
the earliest arrivals their turn for consultation came
SOO11.
Hugh made his story brief, giving only such details
as bore on the pathological aspects of the case. Dr.
Aubert listened attentively, asked a few pertinent ques-
tions, then observed:
“I should say that under the circumstances your
wisest course will be to let well enough alone.”
“We have acted on that belief for seven years,”
Hugh answered. “But my ward now feels that it is
her duty to discover her identity for the sake of others
— parents or relatives.”
“But surely her identity could have been established
through inquiry.”
“Every effort in that direction failed.”
“I see. Well, the case is a rare one but it is not
without precedent. The condition was caused either
by physical injury or mental shock. If by the latter
an operation would, of course, do no good. A strong
mental shock might — say, for instance, the sudden
sight of a person whom she had known well in the for-
gotten period of her life.”
“We have no means of providing such a shock.”
273


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“If, on the other hand, there was a physical injury,
a blow on the head, causing pressure on the brain tis-
sue, an operation which would remove that pressure
might effect a cure. But you say that the physician
who examined her after the accident, and the special-
ists who saw her later, found no evidence of such a
blow.”
“So they said.”
“Of course, I could convince myself on that point
only by a personal examination. I do not wish to dis-
parage the knowledge or skill of my colleagues, but it is
possible they were mistaken. We are all human.
How long has it been since an examination of the skull
was made?”
“About six years.”
“Indeed! In that case it is possible that your car
did strike the head, but in such a way as to press heavily
upon it without causing an abrasion so that the injury
was not apparent — at that time.”
“I hardly think that is possible,” Hugh replied.
“The car struck her on the body and threw her to one
side of the road. She was badly bruised just above
the waist.”
“Probably you are right but—you may be wrong.
If there was such pressure as I have suggested, after
six years there might be evident some slight thickening
of the scalp at that point or a hardly appreciable inden-
tation of the bony structure. If such were found to be

274


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
the case I might advise an operation, though I am not
sure that I should, as such operations are always dan-
gerous and to be avoided except when the injury has
caused a distinct loss of mental power. However, we
are only speculating. Do you wish me to make an
examination?”
“By all means. I will bring my ward in,” Hugh
said.
He opened the door and beckoned Mrs. Thorley and
Marie to come in. At the same moment the attend-
ant, Miss Birkett, entered the consulting-room from
the hall and handed the doctor a letter.
“A messenger just brought it,” she said. “He’s
waiting to see if there’s an answer.”
Dr. Aubert tore the note open. It was the one from
Gavock. As he took in the opening sentences he gave
a violent start and the fine, crisp paper of the Crustacea
rasped in his tense fingers. His back was toward the
door through which Marie Dupont was following Mrs.
Thorley into the office. They advanced as far as the
table on which the surgical instruments lay and at sight
of the shining tools the girl drew back with a shudder.
Hugh closed the door and they all stood waiting for
the doctor to finish the reading of his note.
“Any answer, Doctor?” came presently in Miss
Birkett's professional voice.
Aubert was staring at the paper in his hand, and at
the question he threw his head up sharply and turned.
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THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“No,” he said, adding with a wave of his hand toward
chairs as he began fitting the note back into its wrap-
per; “Please, be seated.”
Mrs. Thorley sat down at once and Hugh stepped to-
ward Marie to place a chair for her; but the strange-
ness of her demeanor brought him up short.
She was standing rigid, her head thrust forward.
Her eyes narrowed upon Aubert's face, glittered with
hate. Her right arm was crooked and she held the
clenched hand pressed hard against her breast. The
whole attitude and expression of her body was so amaz-
ing, so unlike her usual self that for astonishment Hugh
could not move.
Then Aubert turned again to them and on the in-
stant the girl sprang forward.
“Assassin!” she screamed with the hissing nasal
pronunciation that the word has in French, and her
right hand shot out, showing the glint of steel.
One look, and with a choking cry Aubert recoiled.
“Look out !” Hugh called and sprang for Marie.
But before he had touched her or she had reached
Aubert she stopped short in her leap, as though a bullet
had pierced her heart. Her outstretched arm fell heav-
ily, she reeled, and would have gone to the floor if
Hugh had not caught her. From her inert hand a
surgical knife clattered noisily.
Instantly the room was in commotion. Mrs. Thor-
ley was talking excitedly; Miss Birkett, gone to dismiss
the waiting messenger, came hurrying back; a man in
276


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
the waiting-room opened the door and others crowded
in behind him.
Hugh carried Marie to a couch. She was limp and
unconscious.
“She has fainted,” Miss Birkett said, and dashed
water in her face.
“Mariel Marie!” Hugh called and shook the in-
ert form gently. But neither sound nor touch roused
her.
“Where's the doctor?” he demanded, staring about
the circle of curious faces. “Get the doctor,” he or-
dered the attendant.
She too searched the room with a wondering glance,
then ran out.
A tense silence fell. No one moved.
Then Miss Birkett's step was heard returning. She
stumbled in, her eyes wide with surprise.
“The doctor's gone!” she stammered.
“Gone!” Hugh cried, and sprang to his feet.
She nodded. “His overcoat and hat were in the
hall a minute ago. Now they’re gone. He's left the
house.”
277


CHAPTER XXIV
HE afternoon had passed. On her bed in Hugh
Senior's house lay the unconscious form of
Marie Dupont, just as seven years before it had lain in
Mrs. Thorley's house near Paris. Beside the bed
stood Mrs. Thorley, Hugh Senior, and the family phy-
sician, Dr. Sterling.
“She is sleeping now and sleep is the best thing pos-
sible after the shock she has had,” said Dr. Sterling,
just as Dr. Vining had said it once. Then he went
away and Hugh and his aunt sat down again to wait
and watch for the awakening.
What would it bring, that awakening, Hugh asked
himself over and over. Three outcomes were possible,
the doctor had said. Her mental condition might show
no change from what it had been for the last seven
years; she might awake with the memory of her early
life recovered but with no recollection of anything fol-
lowing the accident in Paris; then again, she might re-
call everything. *
Everything! And what was everything? He
looked at her face, sweet, innocent, as he had always
known it. It was that knowledge that he had pitted
against Szemere's evidence and Amarinth's doubts,

278


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“You have been ill,” he said at last.
“Ill!”
On the word a change swept her face. Wonder
gave way to something else — was it eagerness or fear?
With dilated eyes she looked at him.
“Did I kill him?”
66 No.”
Her head dropped to her hands and she sat shudder-
ing. But only for an instant. She looked up and now
he could see that she was struggling to recall some men-
tal image that evaded her.
“I remember now,” she murmured at last, “ some
one called: “Look out!' It made me think of some-
thing — something that happened to me once — long
ago, perhaps — I don't know. I was on the street—
in Paris — it was dark — I heard a voice call like that:
‘Look out!” Then — then —” She paused and
passed a hand over her face as if to brush aside some-
thing that obstructed her mental vision, and her glance
wavered away from him.
He did not speak, fearful of cutting the thread of
memory she seemed to have caught from the forgotten
past; but suddenly, she broke the silence with a sharp
cry and flung herself face downward on her pillows
while her body shook with sobs. Then, as abruptly,
she jerked her head about and looked at him.
“It’s come back — it’s all come back. I remember
everything.”
She began to talk, vaguely and disconnectedly at first,
28I


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
fession, and they could not return to their home in
France, for without the small income they had had
formerly, they would have starved. So they dragged
wearily through the years, Jean at his teaching, Sonia
with a small dancing-class, but for the most part listless
and ill.
Then suddenly she took heart again. In her daugh-
ters she had seen a ray of light, an opening to a better
future. They were brought from the country and she
began teaching them her art, training them relentlessly
as she had been trained in Russia. Hours and hours a
day she spent with them, neglecting nothing, excusing
nothing. All her pent-up energy and thwarted ambi-
tion surged into the new outlet. With feverish eager-
ness she watched for results and results came, for the
children had inherited her aptitude. Confusingly alike
in appearance they were unlike in temperament. Jean-
nette had her father's nature, unselfish, devoted, tender;
in Alix, Sonia found reflected her own dominant will
and spirit.
And so it was upon Alix that the mother came grad-
ually to center her hopes, to Alix that she told and re-
told the tale of her stage triumphs. Almost hypnoti-
cally she played upon the child's mind. “When you
are première at the Opera in Paris,” was her preface to
remarks of instruction or advice or to glowing descrip-
tions of future luxury and pleasure, until “When I am
première at the Opera" became to the girl a date from
which she counted everything.
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THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
When the twins were fourteen a small legacy came
to Jean from a distant relative and Sonia hailed it as a
sign from heaven pointing straight to Paris. But now
the gentle Jean was obdurate. His wife's health had
long been failing and the doctor's verdict had been
ominous. If a sign from heaven pointed anywhere it
was to the old home in the mountains where there was
clean air for ailing lungs. Reluctantly, Sonia con-
sented to go there for the winter; in the spring they
would go to Paris.
But she never saw Paris again. The change of air
had come too late and she died the following summer in
the obscurity which all her life her soul had loathed.
Her death left her husband broken-hearted and almost
penniless, for the legacy had been spent on doctors and
comforts for the invalid. Accordingly he announced
to his daughters that they must return at once to Lon-
don where he was sure of an income from his teach-
ing.
But at this Alix rebelled. Why not go to Paris as
her mother had planned?
“My dear little one, what then shall we do in
Paris?”
“I shall dance!” answered Alix.
Jean looked at her and sighed. “My poor child,
without money or friends to secure for you a theater
you cannot dance in Paris. I know Paris. We should
starve.”
“What do you wish me to do in London?”
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THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“In London we have friends. I shall speak to my
patrons and they will perhaps find for you pupils of
dancing.”
“Let them find them for Jeannette, if she wishes;
for myself, I prefer to starve.”
She coughed — she had, indeed, a slight cold —
then looked up at her father.
“I hate London. I hate the cold and rain and fog.
They killed my mother.” And she coughed again.
The cough went to her father's heart like a knife.
Without a word he turned and walked away.
“You’re a wicked girl!” Jeannette cried out, when
he was gone. “You did n't need to cough — you did
it to frighten him.”
“I am not going to London,” said Alix. “And I
shall not teach dancing. I'm sixteen. I'm not a
child and I want to live. I want to dance as my mother
danced and live as she lived. And I shall too, do you
hear? I shall !”
“What are you going to do? You’re not going to
Paris alone!”
“Don’t be silly. How can I go to Paris alone? I
have n't any money and I can't walk there, can I?”
And overcome by a realization of her helplessness,
she burst into tears.
That evening a letter arrived from London which
brought about a compromise. It was from a pupil of
Jean's who was about to set out for Palermo, Sicily,
where her brother was British consul, and who inquired
288


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Tell Father that I am married. Take him to the
registry to see the names. They will be there.”
“But surely you will wait and say good-by to him!”
“When I am in Paris I will write. In the meantime
you must take my place at the theater so as not to lose
the money. Stop crying and listen! I have left you
my stage clothes. Last night I danced the solo from
“Kaneshka'; to-night you will do it and if you are
careful no one will suspect the change.”
“Alix, my darling Alix, I hope you will be very,
very happy,” sobbed Jeannette when the moment of
parting had come.
Alix said nothing.
“You are going to Paris at last!” Jeannette con-
tinued, trying to smile bravely. “And soon you will
be première at the Opera, as Mother always said.”
Alix drew herself from the clinging arms and picked
up her traveling-bag.
“I am not going to Paris to dance,” she said as she
turned away; “I am going there to kill a man.”
292


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
is what you must do. At the entrance of this house a
cab is waiting. Get into it and tell the chauffeur to go
to the Hotel Meurice. He'll know where it is. When
you arrive there pay and dismiss him. Here is my
purse. In front of the Meurice you’ll find another
cab — perhaps several, so watch carefully. At the
window of one a hand will appear holding a lighted
cigar. This one you will get into without speaking.”
“Oh, Alix!”
“You need n't be afraid; no one will harm you. In
the cab there will be a man. Tell him that you are
my sister — the sister of Mademoiselle Floria, remem-
ber. Speak French; he does n’t know any English.
Take off the necklace and give it to him and tell him
that I have changed my mind. That’s all you need say
— he'll understand. Then get out of the cab, take
another, and come back here. In the purse is money
enough for everything.” -
“But what does it mean, Alix? Why must I do
this?”
“When you return I'll explain. I'll tell you every-
thing. Now there’s no time, you must hurry.”
“But why don't you go yourself? Would n’t that
be better?” -
Alix shook her head impatiently.
“If he once got me into that cab he’d never let me
go again. Don't look so frightened Nothing will
happen to you. Do hurry! It will be all right, I tell
you.”
3OI


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Through the silent hall and down the dim stairs of
the sleeping house Jeannette went shivering, and her
teeth chattered as she gave her order to the waiting
chauffeur. The streets seemed very dark and empty
and still, the only sounds beings those of revelers in the
cafés along the way; there was no movement on the
river except the winking of distant lights, and the col-
onnades of the Rue de Rivoli seemed peopled with
creeping shadows. It must be very late, she thought.
The cab stopped. She stumbled out, and as she
stood, feeling in her purse with nervous hand for the
fare, her eyes peered along the dark line of waiting
vehicles. From the window of one of them an un-
gloved hand suddenly shot out, and at sight of it her
fingers fumbled the coin and it rattled to the pave-
ment. Mechanically, she groped for it, recovered it,
and handed it to the chauffeur. He mumbled a word
of thanks for the tip it included and put his car again
into motion.
A moment she lingered, her knees shaking violently,
then forcing her limbs to action she advanced toward
the beacon of the cigar's red glow. As she neared it
the cigar was dropped into the gutter below, the door
of the cab was thrown open and a hand caught hers
and drew her in. The next instant the door slammed
and the car started.
Before she had time to speak, hardly, indeed, to
think, an arm was clasped about her and a deep, gut-
tural voice close to her face said in French: “At
302


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
last!” Then she felt the brush of hair on her mouth,
then the fierce pressure of lips.
With the strength of abhorrence and terror she tore
herself away.
“Wait! Wait!” she panted. “There’s a mis-
take!”
“What!”
“Stop the cab! I'll explain. I’m not Alix—
I’m not Mademoiselle Floria!”
“What!” came again more sharply from her com-
panion, held from her for the moment by his own
astonishment.
“Stop the cab! Stop it at once!” she cried, and
began beating frantically at the window. The next
instant a light was flashed in her face and she recoiled
from it, blinded.
The man with her laughed and dropped his electric
torch back into his pocket.
“You are in a merry mood to-night, my darling,”
he said, and took her again in his arms.
He thought she was jesting! The import of that
struck cold fear to her heart. Her sister's words came
back to her: “If he ever got me in that cab he’d
never let me go again.” And now he believed he had
her! Her resemblance to Alix had always puzzled
people. Why had they not thought of that? How
now was she to convince him of his mistake?
She tried to free herself from his embrace and could
not. Held by his tense muscles her struggles were
303


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
like the futile squirmings of an infant. She tried to
scream and could not, half-choked and smothered as
she was. His face was over hers, his lips traveled
from her mouth to her eyes and her throat and back
again to her mouth. The odor of stale smoke and wine
hanging about him stifled her and she sickened with
the horror of his nearness. A nausea seized her, she
grew faint —
In her next moment of consciousness she was lying
back against the cushions of the cab, with a burning
sensation in her throat and a sharp pain in her eyes.
And opening her eyes she was again blinded by the
strong light from her companion's torch.
Seeing this he shifted it slightly, and thus released
from its direct rays, she was able to look at him. He
was leaning over her, an uncorked brandy flask in his
hand. His face was dark and glowering and the gaze
he bent on her, searching and intent.
“Mademoiselle, who are you?” he asked abruptly,
and at the question she gave a gasp of relief. He
knew then that she was not Alix! .
She sat up. “Monsieur, I am the sister of Ma-
demoiselle Floria — her twin sister. It was only to-
day that she learned I was in Paris. She sent me in
her place to-night to give you back your necklace and
to tell you that she had changed her mind.”
At her words a dark flush overspread the man's
face and the muscles of his face twitched violently.
“Where is she now?” he asked gruffly.
3O4


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“At home.”
“I see. It is well. We shall return to Paris, at
once.”
He leaned forward and tapped at the window be-
hind the chauffeur.
“Return to Paris!” she echoed in surprise, and
turning, looked out upon a country roadside. In the
near distance a tiny village huddled in the darkness
and suddenly she felt the car bump over the tracks of
a railway. Paris lay far behind them.
“It took some time to restore you — you had
fainted,” her companion explained, and rapped again
more sharply at the window. But the chauffeur gave
no sign of having heard. With an impatient exclama-
tion the man threw the door of the cab open and called
out imperiously: “Stop!”
The car came to a halt and the chauffeur appeared
at the door. - -
“Return to Paris,” said his employer curtly and
gave the door a jerk to close it.
But it did not close. The chauffeur blocked its
way. He had moved sharply at the order and now
stood, head thrust forward, peering past the man at
Jeannette. His face was in shadow and she could
make out no feature of it, but her companion who was
nearer, seemed to distinguish enough to startle him,
for with the brusk demand: “Who are you?” he
flashed a light.
There was an instant's illumination, time enough for

305


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Jeannette to take in only the full beard which con-
cealed the lower part of the chauffeur's face and the
visor of the cap which hid his eyes. The next moment
he had seized the electric torch.
“It’s I, Alix! On guard!” he cried, and with that
sprang at the man. The impact threw the latter back
and reaching wildly for support he clutched the collar
of her coat. She felt the drag at her neck, heard the
sound of breaking threads, then saw the two men
locked in each other's arms in the road.
Astonishment and fright rendered her incapable of
thought, but instinct moved her to action, to flight,
anywhere away from those mad, struggling beasts.
Opening the door at her side she slipped noiselessly
to the ground and to the border of grass that stretched
along the stone wall at the roadside. Then, with-
out a thought of caution, as heedlessly as a fright-
ened rabbit, she began to run. Behind her she
could hear the scuffling of feet and panting, gasping
breaths.
Suddenly she reached a turning in the road and
paused a moment. To her right she saw again the
squatting village that she had noted a few minutes
earlier. Houses meant refuge. Turning she sped
toward them. -
In the middle of the road she had taken were rail-
way tracks and on either side grew trees and shrub-
bery. Keeping close to the latter she dashed on
through the dark. Then, of a sudden, she came to a
306


----
--


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
Far, far away in the distance a whistle blew — a
railway whistle. As clearly as it pierced the air it
seemed to pierce her brain, letting in the light of rea-
son. Just ahead was a village and a railway station.
Perhaps the train she heard would stop there, perhaps
it was bound for Paris. She listened. Yes, yes, it
was coming that way—
3IO


CHAPTER XXVIII
ALF an hour later she was mounting the stairs
to her sister's apartment. Alix was waiting,
wild-eyed and pale.
“My God!” she cried, wringing her hands when
she had heard Jeannette's story. “And you don't
know how it ended, this fight?”
“I only know that it was the chauffeur who tried
to find me —”
“The chauffeur was Felix Renoir,” Alix inter-
rupted. “Listen. I must tell you everything for you
must help me. He will come here. I am sure of it.
Any moment now he may come. Listen. He must
not know it was not I in the cab. If he found out I
had failed him he would never forgive me. Jeannette,
don't look at me like that! Try to understand. I
love him and he drove me mad. Others fell at my
feet but I could not move him. I played with the
others to hurt him, to make him jealous. One of these
was Prince Xico of Rumania. He had a wonderful
necklace with a sacred cross that had been in his family
for centuries. I wore it to dance. John painted me in
it — he did not think that it was real. All Paris
talked. But I cared nothing for the Prince or for his
3II


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
come here to the Opera. At last I said I would go —
anything seemed better than staying here to see Felix
at the feet of another woman. The Prince left the
necklace with me and took the cross, and I agreed to
meet him in a cab at the Meurice after I had finished
dancing. He stayed away from the theater to throw
a friend, Count Szemere, who was always with him,
off the track.
“Well, after he was gone I thought of Felix. I
could not go away without seeing him again. So I
went to his laboratory and told him that I was going
to Russia with the Prince. ‘To Russia?’ he said.
‘Yes, he will take you to Russia and leave you there
to starve. But his wonderful necklace he will leave
safely in Paris until he returns. Is that not so?'
‘No, he will take it with him, and I shall wear it when
I dance in St. Petersburg!” I answered angrily to his
sneers. “He has it now and everything is prepared.’
“He looked at me a long time without saying any-
thing, then suddenly he caught me in his arms. He
told me then that he had always loved me, but had been
too poor to marry in Palermo and had gone away as
he had, thinking that if I hated him I would soon love
some one else and that would be best for me. He was
only a poor surgeon, but if he had anything — even
such a necklace as that of the Prince — we could go
to America together and be happy. Oh, I don't re-
member all he said. When his arms are round me I
can't think. Then suddenly he said he had a plan.
3I3


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
I was to meet the Prince as I had promised and per-
suade him to let me have the cross to carry in my dress
with the necklace, for safety. At Argonne, where we
should stop for essence, he, Felix, would be waiting in
another car. He would signal me, I could slip out
and join him and we should catch a train and then a
boat for America. Well— I agreed.”
“Alix! That was stealing!” cried Jeannette.
“I was desperate. It was my one chance of hap-
piness. I promised. Then when I left the house —
I met you. And when I went to the theater last night
I expected never to see you again, Jeannette. That
was why I told you to go to John Andrus if you ever
needed help. But during the evening something came
over me — I can't explain it — perhaps it was the old
memories of Father and Mother which you had
brought back — I don't know. But I realized that I
could never do the thing I had promised Felix, nor
could I go away with the Prince. So I sent you to
give the necklace back. I thought that would end the
matter. I meant to tell Felix that the Prince had
changed his mind. And now —”
“Alix, I have the necklace still!” Jeannette ex-
claimed. “I had no chance to give it to him.”
She raised her hands to her throat to take off the
jewels, but a cry of warning from her sister stopped
her.
& 4 Sh! 35
Alix threw her head up in an attitude of listening.
3I4


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
On the floor lay the body of her sister, the head a
raw, bleeding mass. The entire scalp had been cut
away and the face so gashed and hacked that no sem-
blance remained of what it had been. A long time
she had been lying there, for the blood from a wound
in the breast had oozed out until it colored the whole
bodice, and beneath the head the rug was soaked to its
edges, and from these thin streams trickled onto the
waxed floor.
Frozen and mute Jeannette remained, how long she
did not know. Then slowly, without conscious
thought or purpose, her right hand raised itself and
slipped the knife it held into the opening of her bodice,
as if, after generations of disuse, the instinct which
had prompted the hand to seize the dirk still guided it
and her.
She began to move away cautiously lest she should
tread in blood. Over a chair, where she herself
had thrown it on her return that night, hung the
fur-trimmed coat. Catching it up she put it on
and without a backward glance hurried from the
house.
As she sped through the streets one thought pos-
sessed her, and her mind subservient to that single pur-
pose directed her steps toward the boulevard where she
could find a cab to take her to Renoir's.
She was going to kill Renoir. He had killed Alix
and he must die for it. That resolve enthralled her
317


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
senses and before her mental vision floated his
image —
“Look out!”
The sharply spoken English words pierced her ab-
sorption. Involuntarily she turned her head —


CHAPTER XXIX
LOWLY the story had been drawn from Marie
— or Jeannette, as it had shown her to be.
There had been breaks while she sobbed despairingly
for the sister she had lost, and Hugh and Mrs. Thorley
had comforted her as best they could, realizing that
though the facts she related were now years old, to
her they were the events of yesterday.
Gently but persistently Hugh questioned her, for he
knew that never again would she have the details of
that tragic night so clearly in mind. The mental im-
pressions of seven intervening years must soon crowd
in and dull the memories of the past.
“It’s been a hard, sad experience for you, dear
child,” said Mrs. Thorley, “but great good has come
of it; you must think of that.”
The girl assented with a quivering sigh. She looked
at Hugh.
“It was your voice to-day, just as it was your voice
that morning in Paris, that saved me. Think what I
might have done! Oh! can one have such terrible
possibilities in oneself and never even guess it? To
think that I might have killed a man!”
319


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
her apartment. And my dance! They said I had
changed it — Madame Adrienne said I had added part
of the solo from ‘Kaneshka.’ I did n’t know it if I
did. But night after night in Palermo I danced the
solos from ‘Kaneshka' and that night at the Esplanade
was the first time since then that I had danced in pub-
lic. Perhaps, the music, the lights, the applause —
I don't know. When Miss Niklova's violin string
broke —”
She broke off with a start. “Miss Niklova —
John Andrus — he died —”
Her listeners waited. It was evident that the im-
pressions of the past were beginning to connect them-
selves with more recent ones. But as yet she seemed
to grope.
“Miss Niklova was very unhappy—she loved him,”
she murmured vaguely. “But he was my husband—
Oh, no, no! It was not I but Alix he married!
Oh —” the end was a moan and she buried her face in
her hands.
Her companions waited again until after a time she
looked from one to the other. “I remember now. I
married Guy Amarinth and our marriage is to be
annulled,” she said quietly.
“But, now that we know all about you, he will per-
haps not wish that,” said Mrs. Thorley. “He will
feel different now.”
“I feel different too.”
“Then let me send for him.” She rose.
322


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
º
t
But the girl stopped her.
“I did n't mean that,” she said. “I mean that I
feel that I am different from the girl who married him.
Then I had no consciousness of anything except the
happiness and ease that you had given me. Now, with
memory of the past has come the knowledge of sorrow
and want and of all the things a girl learns who makes
her living in a theater. How can I be the same?
How can I see things or people in the same way?
Don't you understand? I could never be his wife!
I want to be free from him. I want the marriage
annulled.”
“Well, while you two settle matters I am going to
'phone Dr. Sterling. I shan't be satisfied until he has
looked Marie over.” And with that Mrs. Thorley left
them. -
“Are you quite sure that you are not acting from
hurt pride, Marie?” Hugh asked gently, when they
were alone.
“I’m quite sure. As I think of him now I wonder
how I could ever have married him. What an escape
I’ve had — what an escape! Why, he seems to me
now like a child. What does he know of the terrible sor-
row and suffering of the world? What can he feel of
the struggles of the poor and helpless? He's hard,
intolerant, selfish, because he's ignorant and young.
No, no, Hugh; now that all I’ve lived through and
felt and suffered is part of me again, he and I would
have too little in common. No, I want my freedom.”
323


THE CURIOUS CASE OF MARIE DUPONT
“Then I shall go on with the matter without delay.”
He rose to go and she too rose, and for a minute
they stood facing each other without words. At last
he turned away. Then she spoke.
“Last night when you knew nothing about me,
when I did n’t even have a name — you offered me
yours. I — I shall never forget that.”
“I offered you something else also,” he said, his
voice very low. “But you did n't want either of
them.”
“I want them now — both of them.”
“Marie!” He caught her hands.
“Don’t you see that I was like a child who looks at
things without understanding them? Why, the best
thing life can give a woman was at my elbow and I
did n't even see it.”
“Are you sure — are you sure?” he questioned.
“I’m sure.”
But still he hesitated, unsatisfied. “And it is n’t
gratitude?”
“Gratitude!” She lifted her eyes bravely to his
that he might see her heart in them. “ Kiss me!” she
whispered.
He folded her in his arms and their lips met. A
long time he held her so, then she drew herself away.
Her face, flushed and sweet, bent a moment to hide it-
self from his eyes, then she looked up again and a
faint smile curved the corners of her mouth.
“Thank you,” she said.
324


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miniſt .
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mć.
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