The Hippodrome Part 5

"Then you'll find plenty of use for them when you're working for us--and the Cause. When you have to ride upon the hills at night you will find them of great service. You'll have to ride astride too, so it is better for you in every way to be dressed like this."

Presently he left her with a few words of praise for her successful appearance. His first feeling of surprise at her coolness still lingered. He had expected a scene in a quiet way, a refusal, at least expostulation. All his first impressions of her were being verified.

Well, he hoped she would continue in her present ways. Undoubtedly she was an original, certainly she gave no trouble.

When she heard the street door shut Arith.e.l.li sat down, hiding her face in her hands. Once she s.h.i.+vered involuntarily. Directly she found herself alone the mask of her a.s.sumed nonchalance had fallen suddenly.

As long as there was an audience she had worn a disguise on her soul as well as her body. She had been feeling moody and depressed all day, and this last episode was the climax. Everything she had was to be her own no longer. It was all to be for the Cause--even her green eyes!

What power it possessed over these men. They admitted it to be a losing Cause, yet it was all they thought about, the sole thing for which they lived--and died. She had not thought it would be like this at first.

She remembered how gaily she had discoursed of Tolstoi and Prince Kropotkin, and of their writings which had revealed to her a new world.

Her first interview with Sobrenski had shown the relentlessness of the man she was to serve. She felt that he would sacrifice all alike, men and women, to his idol, and would never stop to care whether the victim were willing or unwilling. The fact of her s.e.x would gain her no consideration at his hands. Lately she had been impressed with the sensation of being surrounded by an impa.s.sable barrier drawn round her, a circle that was gradually becoming narrowed. She had begun to know that she was being incessantly watched. If Emile were occupied with the business of the Society, and could not fetch her from the Hippodrome himself, he never failed to send an understudy in the shape of one of his allies, generally one of the older men. When she emerged from the performers' entrance a silent figure would come forward to meet her. Often they exchanged no words throughout the walk home, but she was never left till her own door was reached.

If she went anywhere to please herself, to a shop, or to see Estelle, she was expected to give a full account of her doings. It was an understood thing that she should not go to the _cafes_ or public gardens alone, nor speak to anyone not already known and approved by Emile. With all these conditions she had complied. Already one illusion had vanished. She had thought to find freedom in Barcelona.

She had indeed found "_La Liberte_."

But the Fates had chosen to be in an ironical mood, and while making the discovery she had herself become a slave. In all her day there was no hour that she could call her own.

CHAPTER V

"I have gained her! Her Soul's mine!"

BROWNING.

"You slouched last night in the ring, Fatalite," Emile said.

Arith.e.l.li flung up her head. "I didn't!"

"You looked like a monkey on a stick," proceeded Emile stolidly. "You were all hunched up. I wonder Don Juan didn't put you off his back on to the tan."

"Don Juan knows better! You see animals are usually more kind than people."

She was too proud to admit that the long hours, hard work, and want of proper food and sleep had lately given her furious backaches, which were a thing unknown to her before, and a cause of bitter resentment.

She had a healthy distaste for illness either in theory or practice.

That night she sat Don Juan erect as a lance, pa.s.sing Emile in his accustomed place in the lower tier of seats with a shrug and scornful eyebrows.

She had felt more than usually inclined to play the coward during the last few weeks. The heat, worry and over-fatigue had begun, as they must have done eventually, to affect her nerves. When she had felt more than usually depressed and listless Emile had taken her to one of the _cafes_ and given her _absinthe_ which had made her feel recklessly well for the moment, and ten times more miserable the next day. He had also advised her to smoke, saying that it was good for people who had whims and fancies, but smoking did not appeal to her, and she never envied the Spanish woman her eternal cigarette.

She felt as if she would like to sleep, sleep for an indefinite period.

She was wearied to death of The Cause, and the Brotherhood, with their intrigues and plots and interminable cipher messages.

She had been three months in Barcelona, and now fully justified Emile's name for her. Tragic as a veritable mask of Fate, she looked ten years older than the girl he had met on the station platform.

The longer she worked for the Cause the more she realised that Anarchy was no plaything for spare moments, but a juggling with Life and Death.

At first they had given her but little to do--a few doc.u.ments to copy, some cipher messages to carry. Then the demands upon her leisure had become more frequent. She found she was expected to make no demur at being sent for miles, and once or twice there had been dreadful midnight excursions to a hut up in the mountains.

The realisation of the folly of trying to escape from the burden that had been laid upon her affected her nerve and seat during her performances in the ring.

For the first time she felt her courage failing her when she entered Sobrenski's house in answer to his summons. When he had given her the despatch she made an objection on the grounds that the time taken in conveying it would absorb her few hours of rest.

"It's too far," she protested. "I can't go there to-day."

"Then you can go to-morrow," answered Sobrenski in the accents of finality. He had never cared about the girl's inclusion in their plots, and took his revenge in exacting from her considerably more than his pound of flesh.

Moreover he suspected her of treachery, and disliked her for the quickness of her wit in argument.

Even his unseeing eyes told him she looked both ill and haggard, but if she were there, well, she must work like the rest of them.

Arith.e.l.li hesitated for a moment, and when she spoke for all her pluck her voice was a little rough and uneven. "I'm tired of being an errand boy!"

Sobrenski looked at her, drawing his eyebrows together. Everyone of the band had a nickname for her, and his own very unpleasant one was "Deadly Nightshade." Some of the others were "Sapho" and "Becky Sharp," which latter Emile had also adopted as being particularly appropriate.

"Oh, very well," he answered. "Shall it be the messages or a bullet?

You can take your choice. Perhaps you would prefer the latter. It makes no difference to me. This comes of employing women. When Poleski brought you here first I was opposed to having you. Women always give trouble."

"Would you have got a man to do half the work I do?" she flashed out with desperate courage.

"Then _do_ your work and don't talk about it," retorted Sobrenski sharply. "If you are absolutely ill and in bed, of course we can't expect you to go to various places, but as long as you can ride every night at the Hippodrome, you can certainly carry messages."

He turned his back on her and took up some papers from the table, and Arith.e.l.li went out, beaten and raging.

Emile found her lying on the bed, her hands clenched by her side, her proud mouth set in bitter lines. As he came in she turned away from him, to face the wall.

"_Tiens_!" he observed, "you are a lazy little trollop." Emile was proud of his English slang.

Finding there was no answer he changed his tone. "Hysterics, eh? They won't do here. Turn over, I want to talk to you."

The girl moved mechanically, and Emile surveyed her. There were slow tears forcing themselves under her heavy eyelids.

"I wish I were dead!"

"Probably you will be soon. So will the rest of us."

"What brutes you all are!"

"Because we don't care whether we die to-day or to-morrow? _Souvent femme varie_! Just now you seemed so anxious,--besides, if one belongs to the Cause one knows what to expect." Emile strolled towards the uncomfortable piece of furniture by the window, that purported to be an armchair, and sat down.

"I loathe the Cause! I didn't belong to it from choice. Why did you make me join?"

"Because I thought you would be useful. You _are_ useful and probably will be more so."

"Suppose I refuse to do anything more?"

"They will not give you the choice of refusing twice."

"Emile, I believe you are trying to frighten me. Tell me what they would do."