The Triflers Part 55

"Over the border. It is only some twenty-five miles. We can do it easily in two days; but even if it takes three--"

Even if it took a hundred, what did it matter, with her by his side?

And by his side she must remain until her credit was restored. With only one louis d'or in her pocket, she was merely a woman, with all the limitations of her s.e.x. She could not take to the open road alone.

She did not have the physical strength that dictated the law for vagabonds. She must have a man near to fight for her, or it would go hard. Even Marie would be no protection in time of war.

Dumbly she followed his pace until they reached the hotel. The place was in confusion and the proprietor at his wits' end. In the midst of it, Monte was the only one apparently unmoved.

"Pack one small hand-bag," he ordered. "You must leave your trunks here."

"Yes, Monte," she submitted.

"I'll run back to the Roses, and meet you here in a half-hour. Will you be ready?"

"Yes. Marie will come with us, of course."

He shook his head.

"She must wait here until she can get to Paris. Find out if she has any cash."

"I want her to come with me," she pleaded.

"I doubt if she will want to come. Anyway, our fifty-five dollars won't stretch to her. We--we can't afford a maid."

She flushed at his use of "we." Nevertheless, what he said was true enough. That sum was a mere pittance. Fate had her in a tight grip.

"Be sure to bring your pa.s.sport," he reminded her. "It is ten-thirty.

I 'll be here at eleven."

Hurrying back to his room, he took what he could crowd into his pockets: his safety razor and toothbrush, a few handkerchiefs and a change of socks. One did not need much on the open road. He carried his sweater--the old crimson sweater with the black "H"--more for her than for himself. The rest of his things he threw into his trunk and left in the care of the hotel.

She was waiting for him when he returned to the Hotel d'Angleterre.

"You were right about Marie," she acknowledged. "She has two brothers in the army. She has money enough for her fare to Paris, and is going as soon as possible."

"In the meanwhile she is safe enough here. So, en avant!"

He took her bag, and they stepped out into the suns.h.i.+ne.

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE CORNICE ROAD

It was the Cornice Road that he followed--the broad white road that skirts the sea at the foot of the Alpes Maritimes. As far as Monte Carlo, he had walked it alone many the time. But he had never walked it with her, so it was a new road. It was a new world too, and as far as he was concerned there was no war. The blue sky overhead gave no hint of war; neither did the Mediterranean; neither did the trees full of singing birds; neither did the gra.s.ses and flowers: and these things, with the woman at his side, comprised, for the moment, his whole world. It was the world as originally created for man and woman.

All that he was leaving behind--banks and hotels and taxis and servants and railroads--had nothing to do with the primal idea of creation.

They were all extraneous. The heavens, the earth, the waters beneath the earth, man and woman created He them. That was all. That was enough.

Once or twice, alone in his camp in the Adirondacks, Monte had sensed this fact. With a bit of food to eat, a bit of tobacco to smoke in his old brier, a bit of ground to lie down upon at night, he had marveled that men found so many other things necessary to their comfort. But, after a week or two of that, he had always grown restless, and hurried back to New York and his club and his men servants. In turn he grew restless there, and hurried on to the still finer luxuries of the German liners and the Continent.

That was because he was lonesome--because she had not been with him.

It was because--how clearly he saw it now!--he had never been complete by himself alone. He had been satisfying only half of himself. The other half he had tried to quiet with man-made things, with the artificial products of civilization. He had thought to allay that deep, undefined hunger in him with travel and sports and the attentions of hirelings. It had been easy at first; but, keen as nimble wits had been to keep pace with his desires with an ever-increasing variety of luxuries, he had exhausted them all within a decade and been left unsatisfied.

To-day it was as if with each intake of breath the sweet air reached for the first time the most remote corners of his lungs. He had never before had air enough. The suns.h.i.+ne reached to the marrow of his bones. Muscles that had lagged became vibrant. He could hardly keep his feet upon the ground. He would have liked to run; to keep on running mile after mile. He wondered when he would tire. He had a feeling that he could never tire. His back and arm muscles ached for action. He would have enjoyed a rough-and-tumble fight with some impudent fellow vagabond of the road.

Marjory walked by his side in silence. That was all he asked--simply that she should be there on the left, dependent upon him. Here was the nub of the matter. Always before she had been able to leave him if she wished. She had married him upon that condition. There had never been a moment, until now, when he had not been conscious of the fact that he was in no way necessary to her. The protection against Teddy and the others was merely a convenience. He had been able to save her from annoyance, that was all. At any time on that ride from Paris she could have left him and gone on her way quite safely. At Nice, that was just what she had done. It was to save her from the annoyance of himself that he had finally gone away. Had he been really needed, that would have been impossible. But he knew that she could get along without him as she did. Then when Peter had gone it was more because he needed her than because she needed him that he had returned. Down deep in his heart he knew that, whatever he may have pretended. She was safe enough from everything except possible annoyance. With plenty of gold at her command, there was nothing that he could buy for her that she could not buy for herself.

Now she had no gold--except one louis d'or. He was almost jealous of that single piece. He would have been glad if she lost it. If he had seen it drop from her bag, he would have let it lie where it fell.

She was merely a woman now. The muscles in her arms and legs were not strong. Because of that she could not leave his side, nor order him to leave. She must look to him to fight for her if fighting were necessary. She must look to him to put his strong arm about her and help her if she grew weary. She must look to him to provide her with food and shelter for the night. Physically she was like a child out here on the open road. But he was a man.

He was a man because he had something to protect. He was a man because he was responsible for some one besides himself. It was this that the other half of him had been craving all these years. It was this that completed him.

Yet his att.i.tude toward her, in this respect, was strangely impersonal.

He was looking for no reward. He did not consider that he was placing her in any way under an obligation to him. His joy in doing for her was not based upon any idea of furthering his own interests. He was utterly unselfish. He did not look ahead an hour. It was enough to have her here in a position where he could be of some service.

His love for her was another matter entirely. Whether she were with him or not, that would have remained the same. He loved her with all there was in him, and that was more or less distinct from any att.i.tude that she might a.s.sume. It was a separate, definite, concrete fact, no longer open to argument--no longer to be affected by any of the petty accidents of circ.u.mstance. Not even she had now any control over it.

It was within her power to satisfy it or not; but that was all. She could not destroy it. If she left it unfulfilled, then he must endure that, as Peter had. Peter was not sorry that he loved her, and Peter--why, Peter did not have the opportunity to sense more than the first faint beginnings of the word love. Peter had not had those weeks in Paris in which to get to know her; he had not had that wonderful ride through sunny France with Marjory by his side; and Peter had had nothing approaching such a day as this.

Monte turned to look at her. They had pa.s.sed through Villefranche, and were now taking the up grade. The exercise had flushed her cheeks, giving her back the color she had lacked in the last few weeks. Her eyes were upon the ground, as if she did not dare raise them. Her face always seemed younger when one did not see the eyes. Asleep, she could not have looked over twenty. He marveled at how delicately feminine her forehead and nose were. And the lips--he could not look very long at her lips. Warm and full of curves, they tugged at his heart. They roused desire. Yet, had it been his blessed privilege to touch them with his own, he would have been very gentle about it. A man must needs always be gentle with her, he thought.

That was why he must not utter the phrases that burned within. It would only frighten her, and he must see that she was never frightened again. To himself he might say as much as he pleased, because she could not hear. He could repeat to himself over and over again, as he did now, "I love you--I love you--I love you."

Out loud, however, he said only:--

"Are you tired?"

She started even at that.

"No, Monte," she answered.

"We can rest any time you wish. We have all the time in the world ahead of us."

"Have we?"

"Days and weeks and months," he replied.

It was the old Monte she heard--the easy, care-free Monte. It made her feel easier.

"We should cross the border by to-morrow night, should n't we?" she asked.

"We could, if it were necessary," he admitted.

She quickened her pace unconsciously.

"I think we should get there as soon as possible."

"That," he said, "would be like hurrying through Eden."