Trifles for the Christmas Holidays Part 6

They followed them in their rambles through the dome-roofed shelters; they scrutinized them as they lingered near the band; they searched them out when mingled with the throngs on the promenade. They did not seem to be watching, but they were; and their owner did not look interested, but he was.

The man, physically speaking, was a marvel; but there was an air of foppish elegance in his movements, and a silky kind of beauty, like that of a leopard. His head was small, but finely formed, and covered with flossy hair black as ebony. His features, though clearly cut, wore, from their extreme delicacy, an almost feminine expression. His hands were small and exquisitely shaped; his mustache curled gracefully from his lip; and, when speaking, he bit the ends of it in a nervous, almost embarra.s.sed way.

The woman was a proud, pa.s.sionate daughter of the sun. The brown blood of the sun burned in her veins, and the soul of the sun streamed shaded from her eyes. A sumptuous splendor mingled, moist and languid, with their light. She was clothed in the sunlight. It glistened in the soft darkness of her hair; it glowed in the rubies that clung to her swelling throat; it flashed on her robe tremulous with radiance. From a coquettish little hat a long white plume fluttered over her curls, and a floating cloud of fleecy under-sleeve half concealed an arm of snowy purity. Her life, though in its spring, seemed goldened with the flush of summer; her morning flashed with the meridian l.u.s.ter of perfect day; and yet the eyes that scanned so closely remained undazzled. Their owner had heard of her, and of her conversation, sparkling with wit and humor and mocking irony; but he was not fascinated. He saw but a woman for whom no surprises appear to survive. What see we?

Were you to question the crowd, they would tell you the man was Edgar Fay; that, years before, his father brought him, a velvet-coated boy, to Rio de Janeiro; that shortly afterward he died, leaving the son and a baby sister a small fortune; that the sister, being under the control of a mother who had deserted her husband, was never heard of; and that the guardians, finding no coheir, had spent the money on Edgar's education, afterward securing him a position under the Imperial government.

About the woman they would say, "She is Mademoiselle Milan, just arrived on the French packet, to fill an engagement as leading lady at the _Alcasar_."

Concerning Dupleisis, except that he had arrived recently on the English steamer, that he seemed to be a man of leisure, and paid promptly for what he received, they could tell you nothing.

The glowing suns.h.i.+ne faded entirely out of the sky, the thick-walled houses flickered faintly through their staring cas.e.m.e.nts, the lamps on the streets glimmered dismally at the returning crowds, and one by one the lights began to quiver on the water. The Pa.s.seio, an hour before too cramped for the mult.i.tude, was now deserted; but Dupleisis, nothing daunted, smoked on. Disgusted at the necessity which compelled his presence, and annoyed at the stupidity of the few people he had met, he commented savagely on their peculiarities, and anathematized with merciless ingenuity.

"Pshaw, M. Dupleisis! you are only angry because you cannot have chicken-pie every day for dinner. What have the Brazilians done to you?"

Dupleisis gazed at the speaker in astonishment.

"Their impudence, rather than degeneracy, perhaps should surprise."

"Really, M. Dupleisis! I fear you are a cynic. In the gayest promenade in the empire, you are filled with violence. You are a spoiled child looking in at a shop-window and admiring nothing. Are you going to cry with a mouth _full_ of sugar-plums?"

"Pardon me," said the Frenchman, haughtily, "but it is an awkward habit of mine to feel curious concerning the _names_ of my a.s.sociates."

"Let me hasten to enlighten you:--Percy Reed, diamond-dealer, Rua do Ouvidor, at your service. You brought me a letter of introduction; but, unluckily, I was out of town when you arrived."

The dark eyes glanced at the speaker closely as they had watched the man and the woman. There was something in the face that commanded respect.

The broad high forehead, the eyes flas.h.i.+ng with scornful mirth, and the thin lips curling with such a whimsical mixture of kindliness and sarcasm, bespoke a man of mind. Since reaching Rio, Dupleisis had searched for these three, and he liked this one the best. Reed took out his eye-gla.s.s, and, adjusting it carefully on his nose, surveyed Dupleisis deliberately from head to foot.

"You'll do," he remarked, after some little thought; "but I still believe that in your bread-and-b.u.t.ter days some friend thought you sarcastic. I knew a young girl once who was told she had a musical laugh, and the consequence was she giggled the rest of her life. Now, if you don't wish to see us locked in here for the night, come along."

CHAPTER II

The establishment of Percy Reed, diamond-dealer, Rua do Ouvidor, was a corner-building, almost the exact counterpart of a dozen edifices on the same square. The bas.e.m.e.nt was of polished blocks of black and white marble, and the upper portion faced with blue and white porcelain tiles.

From above, the front rooms looked out through bow-windows at small balconies with bra.s.s-k.n.o.bbed railings and thick gla.s.s floors; those in rear looked through gla.s.s doors at a flat roof, one story high, paved with black and white marble squares. This breathing-place of the household was adorned with pots of flowers and evergreens and provided with neat iron chairs. It was divided from the breathing-place of the adjoining household by a low brick wall.

Below, pedestrians gazed in through rose-wood doors and French plate windows. The counting-room had rather the appearance of an elegant boudoir than of a place of business. The floor was of alternate strips of satin-wood and ebony; the walls and ceiling were paneled with rose-wood, and rows of small glistening show-cases contained samples of the dazzling gems. In the rear--but so covered with the glossy finish as to be almost imperceptible--was a huge vault, containing precious stones of a value almost sufficient to change the fate of an empire.

Farther back, and opening on the side street, was a long, dark hall-way, from which a winding staircase led to the residence above. The second floor of the adjoining house was usually let furnished to members of the dramatic profession; and on this occasion it was occupied by Mademoiselle Adrienne Milan, of the _Alcasar_.

The day after the _festa_, the lady, in a simple morning toilet, had moved her table and sewing-chair into the open air. Instead of sewing, she was occupied in furbis.h.i.+ng up some old stage jewelry, and her visitor, stretched on an iron bench, calmly puffed a cigar. From his manner, one would imagine him master rather than guest; but that Mademoiselle Milan and a female servant were the sole occupants there is not a doubt.

With the utmost nonchalance, he had ordered a pillow, and, his ambrosial locks buried in its soft depths and his feet raised high above his head, he lounged a modern Apollo, scrutinizing with supercilious indifference the lady's work. If the cigar-ashes at his side were a criterion, he had been lying there for hours; and if the nervous movements of Mademoiselle were significant, he had been lying there an hour too long. For some minutes the silence was broken only by the jingle of the gaudy ornaments, and then the man exclaimed, "But, _ma chere_ Adrienne, I am short--deuced short. Delay is ruin. How am I to live?"

"Work," said the lady, curtly.

"There you are again, with your cursed woman's wisdom! What are you here _for_? What am _I_ here for?"

Mademoiselle answered, with a shrug, "Judging from your position, I would say, to enjoy your ease; from your language, to annoy me."

He raised himself to a sitting posture. "Adrienne Milan, do you take me for an idiot?"

"Edgar Fay, you are insulting."

"Prima donnas of the _Alcasar_ are not usually so sensitive," broke out the visitor, with a laugh.

The woman sprang to her feet, and in the haste overturned the table with its glittering baubles.

"Go! go!" she fiercely exclaimed. "The compact between you and me is sacred. Another word, and I reveal all."

White as any ghost, he started up, and, without uttering a sound, slunk away.

Trembling with rage and mortification, Mademoiselle Milan sunk into a seat; but hers was not a nature to dwell long on trouble. With a woman's spirit of order, she commenced picking up the finery scattered around her, and putting it away. Among other things was a box of quartz diamonds, which, being small, flew in all directions. All within view were collected, and she turned to go.

"There are several lying near that flower-pot in the corner."

The lady looked up. Standing on a chair on the other side, and leaning lazily over the wall, was Armand Dupleisis.

CHAPTER III.

"Has Flora proved more attractive than Thalia?"

Armand Dupleisis, long since become acquainted, stood examining a bouquet of roses and geraniums in the music-room of Mademoiselle Milan, and the lady was seated near him, trifling with the keys of her piano.

"I gaze on beauty, mademoiselle, to accustom my eyes to divinity."

"Really! Were it not for his gigantic proportions, one would suppose man was reared in an atmosphere of compliment."

"You mistake us. Though not a favorite diet, in Pekin we devour rice with the gusto of the most polished Celestial."

"I bow to your sincerity. Women, then, are to be talked to of birds, and flowers, and stars, and fed on water-cresses?"

"Women, mademoiselle, make men apt scholars in the art of pleasing. I have studied much."

"How singular!" rejoined the lady. "I should never have detected it."

"True art, mademoiselle, lies in its concealment. My life has been one of concealment."

"Now you pique my curiosity," she replied. "Do let me learn the 'veritable historie.'"

The smile on Mademoiselle Milan's face showed that the interest was feigned, but the grim look about Dupleisis' mouth proved him conscious of it. A man without an object would have changed the subject at once; but Dupleisis _had_ an object, and did not.

"I was ushered into this land of hope and sunny smiles with scarcely any other patrimony than a name."

"What limited resources!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the lady, with a slight sneer.

"While blus.h.i.+ng with the consciousness of my virgin cravat, I went to Paris, that sacred ark, which saves from s.h.i.+pwreck all the wretched of the provinces if but crowned with a ray of intellect."

"And which saved you, of course," continued the lady.