The Chink in the Armour Part 33

Why should she not go into the house and rest awhile? The more so that the Wachners would almost certainly return home very soon. They disliked Paris, and never stayed more than a couple of hours on their occasional visits there.

In her careful, rather precise French, she told the servant she would come in and wait.

"I am sure that Madame Wachner would wish me to do so," she said, smiling; and after a rather ungracious pause the woman admitted her into the house, leading the way into the darkened dining-room.

"Do you think it will be long before Madame Wachner comes back?" asked Sylvia.

The woman hesitated--"I cannot tell you that," she mumbled. "They never say when they are going, or when they will be back. They are very odd people!"

She bustled out of the room for a few moments and then came back, holding a big cotton parasol in her hand.

"I do not know if Madame wishes to stay on here by herself? As for me, I must go now, for my work is done. Perhaps when Madame leaves the house she will put the key under the mat."

"Yes, if I leave the house before my friends return home I will certainly do so. But I expect Madame Wachner will be here before long."

Sylvia spoke shortly. She did not like the day-servant's independent, almost rude way of speaking.

"Should the master and mistress come back before Madame has left, will Madame kindly explain that she _insisted_ on coming into the house? I am absolutely forbidden to admit visitors unless Madame Wachner is here to entertain them."

The woman spoke quickly, her eyes fixed expectantly on the lady sitting before her.

Mrs. Bailey suddenly realised, or thought she realised, what that look meant. She took her purse out of her pocket and held out a two-franc piece.

"Certainly," she answered coldly, "I will explain to Madame Wachner that I insisted on coming in to rest."

The woman's manner altered; it became at once familiar and servile. After profusely thanking Sylvia for her "tip," she laid the cotton parasol on the dining-table, put her arms akimbo, and suddenly asked, "Has Madame heard any news of her friend? I mean of the Polish lady?"

"No," Sylvia looked up surprised. "I'm sorry to say that there is still no news of her, but, of course, there will be soon."

She was astonished that the Wachners should have mentioned the matter to this disagreeable, inquisitive person.

"The lady stopped here on her way to the station. She seemed in very high spirits."

"Oh, no, you are quite mistaken," said Sylvia quickly. "Madame Wolsky did not come here at all the day she left Lacville. She was expected, both to tea and to supper, but she did not arrive--"

"Indeed, yes, Madame! I had to come back that afternoon, for I had forgotten to bring in some sugar. The lady was here then, and she was still here when I left the house."

"I a.s.sure you that this cannot have been on the day my friend left Lacville," said Mrs. Bailey quickly. "Madame Wolsky left on a Sat.u.r.day afternoon. As I told you just now, Madame Wachner expected her to supper, but she never came. She went to Paris instead."

The servant looked at her fixedly, and Sylvia's face became what it seldom was--very forbidding in expression. She wished this meddling, familiar woman would go away and leave her alone.

"No doubt Madame knows best! One day is like another to me. I beg Madame's pardon."

The Frenchwoman took up her parasol and laid the house key on the table, then, with a "_Bon jour, Madame, et encore merci bien!_" she noisily closed the door behind her.

A moment later, Sylvia, with a sense of relief, found herself in sole possession of the Chalet des Muguets.

Even the quietest, the most commonplace house has, as it were, an individuality that sets it apart from other houses. And even those who would deny that proposition must admit that every inhabited dwelling has its own special nationality.

The Chalet des Muguets was typically French and typically suburban; but where it differed from thousands of houses of the same type, dotted round in the countrysides within easy reach of Paris, was that it was let each year to a different set of tenants.

In Sylvia Bailey's eyes the queer little place lacked all the elements which go to make a home; and, sitting there, in that airless, darkened dining-room, she wondered, not for the first time, why the Wachners chose to live in such a comfortless way.

She glanced round her with distaste. Everything was not only cheap, but common and tawdry. Still, the dining-room, like all the other rooms in the chalet, was singularly clean, and almost oppressively neat.

There was the round table at which she and Anna Wolsky had been so kindly entertained, the ugly buffet or sideboard, and in place of the dull parquet floor she remembered on her first visit lay an ugly piece of linoleum, of which the pattern printed on the surface simulated a red and blue marble pavement.

Once more the change puzzled her, perhaps unreasonably.

At last Sylvia got up from the hard cane chair on which she had been sitting.

There had come over her, in the half-darkness, a very peculiar sensation--an odd feeling that there was something alive in the room. She looked down, half expecting to see some small animal crouching under the table, or hiding by the walnut-wood buffet behind her.

But, no; nothing but the round table, and the six chairs stiffly placed against the wall, met her eyes. And yet, still that feeling that there was in the room some sentient creature besides herself persisted.

She opened the door giving into the hall, and walked through the short pa.s.sage which divided the house into two portions, into the tiny "salon."

Here also the closed shutters gave the room a curious, eerie look of desolate greyness. But Sylvia's eyes, already accustomed to the half-darkness next door, saw everything perfectly.

The little sitting-room looked mean and shabby. There was not a flower, not even a book or a paper, to relieve its prim ugliness. The only ornaments were a gilt clock on the mantelpiece, flanked with two sham Empire candelabra. The shutters were fastened closely, and the room was dreadfully hot and airless.

Once more Sylvia wondered why the Wachners preferred to live in this cheerless way, with a servant who only came for a few hours each day, rather than at an hotel or boarding-house.

And then she reminded herself that, after all, the silent, gaunt man, and his talkative, voluble wife, seemed to be on exceptionally good terms the one with the other. Perhaps they really preferred being alone together than in a more peopled atmosphere.

While moving aimlessly about the room, Sylvia began to feel unaccountably nervous and oppressed. She longed to be away from this still, empty house, and yet it seemed absurd to leave just as the Wachners would be returning home.

After a few more minutes, however, the quietude, and the having absolutely nothing to do with which to wile away the time, affected Sylvia's nerves.

It was, after all, quite possible that the Wachners intended to wait in Paris till the heat of the day was over. In that case they would not be back till seven o'clock.

The best thing she could do would be to leave a note inviting Madame Wachner and L'Ami Fritz to dinner at the Villa du Lac. Count Paul was to be in Paris this evening, so his eyes would not be offended by the sight of the people of whom he so disapproved. Madame Wachner would probably be glad to dine out, the more so that no proper meal seemed to have been prepared by that unpleasant day-servant. Why, the woman had not even laid the cloth for her employers' supper!

Sylvia looked instinctively round for paper and envelopes, but there was no writing-table, not even a pencil and paper, in the little drawing-room. How absurd and annoying!

But, stay--somewhere in the house there must be writing materials.

Treading softly, and yet hearing her footsteps echoing with unpleasant loudness through the empty house, Sylvia Bailey walked past the open door of the little kitchen, and so to the end of the pa.s.sage.

Then something extraordinary happened.

While in the act of opening the door of Madame Wachner's bed-room, the young Englishwoman stopped and caught her breath. Again she had suddenly experienced that unpleasant, eerie sensation--the sensation that _she was not alone_. But this time the feeling was far more vivid than it had been in the dining-room.

So strong, so definite was Sylvia's perception of another presence, and this time of a human presence, in the still house, that she turned sharply round--

But all she saw was the empty pa.s.sage, cut by a shaft of light thrown from the open door of the kitchen, stretching its short length down to the entrance hall.