At the Villa Rose (20 page)

"Madame had been very good to me. She was kind and simple," said Celia,
with a very genuine affection in her voice. "The people whom we knew
laughed at her, and were ungenerous. But there are many women whom the
world respects who are worse than ever was poor Mme. Dauvray. I was
very fond of her, so I proposed to her that we should hold a seance,
and I would bring people from the spirit world I knew that I could
amuse her with something much more clever and more interesting than the
fortune-tellers. And at the same time I could save her from being
plundered. That was all I thought about."

That was all she thought about, yes. She left Helene Vauquier out of
her calculations, and she did not foresee the effect of her stances
upon Mme. Dauvray. Celia had no suspicions of Helene Vauquier. She
would have laughed if any one had told her that this respectable and
respectful middle-aged woman, who was so attentive, so neat, so
grateful for any kindness, was really nursing a rancorous hatred
against her. Celia had sprung from Montmartre suddenly; therefore
Helene Vauquier despised her. Celia had taken her place in Mme.
Dauvray's confidence, had deposed her unwittingly, had turned the
confidential friend into a mere servant; therefore Helene Vauquier
hated her. And her hatred reached out beyond the girl, and embraced the
old, superstitious, foolish woman, whom a young and pretty face could
so easily beguile. Helene Vauquier despised them both, hated them both,
and yet must nurse her rancour in silence and futility. Then came the
seances, and at once, to add fuel to her hatred, she found herself
stripped of those gifts and commissions which she had exacted from the
herd of common tricksters who had been wont to make their harvest out
of Mme. Dauvray. Helene Vauquier was avaricious and greedy, like so
many of her class. Her hatred of Celia, her contempt for Mme. Dauvray,
grew into a very delirium. But it was a delirium she had the cunning to
conceal. She lived at white heat, but to all the world she had lost
nothing of her calm.

Celia did not foresee the hatred she was arousing; nor, on the other
hand, did she foresee the overwhelming effect of these spiritualistic
seances on Mme. Dauvray. Celia had never been brought quite close to
the credulous before.

"There had always been the row of footlights," she said. "I was on the
platform; the audience was in the hall; or, if it was at a house, my
father made the arrangements. I only came in at the last moment, played
my part, and went away. It was never brought home to me that some
amongst these people really and truly believed. I did not think about
it. Now, however, when I saw Mme. Dauvray so feverish, so excited, so
firmly convinced that great ladies from the spirit world came and spoke
to her, I became terrified. I had aroused a passion which I had not
suspected. I tried to stop the seances, but I was not allowed. I had
aroused a passion which I could not control. I was afraid that Mme.
Dauvray's whole life—it seems absurd to those who did not know her,
but those who did will understand—yes, her whole life and happiness
would be spoilt if she discovered that what she believed in was all a
trick."

She spoke with a simplicity and a remorse which it was difficult to
disbelieve. M. Fleuriot, the judge, now at last convinced that the
Dreyfus affair was for nothing in the history of this crime, listened
to her with sympathy.

"That is your explanation, mademoiselle," he said gently. "But I must
tell you that we have another."

"Yes, monsieur?" Celia asked.

"Given by Helene Vauquier," said Fleuriot.

Even after these days Celia could not hear that woman's name without a
shudder of fear and a flinching of her whole body. Her face grew white,
her lips dry.

"I know, monsieur, that Helene Vauquier is not my friend," she said. "I
was taught that very cruelly."

"Listen, mademoiselle, to what she says," said the judge, and he read
out to Celia an extract or two from Hanaud's report of his first
interview with Helene Vauquier in her bedroom at the Villa Rose.

"You hear what she says. 'Mme. Dauvray would have had seances all day,
but Mlle. Celie pleaded that she was left exhausted at the end of them.
But Mlle. Celie was of an address.' And again, speaking of Mme.
Dauvray's queer craze that the spirit of Mme. de Montespan should be
called up, Helene Vauquier says: 'She was never gratified. Always she
hoped. Always Mlle. Celie tantalised her with the hope. She would not
spoil her fine affairs by making these treats too common.' Thus she
attributes your reluctance to multiply your experiments to a desire to
make the most profit possible out of your wares, like a good business
woman."

"It is not true, monsieur," cried Celia earnestly. "I tried to stop the
seances because now for the first time I recognised that I had been
playing with a dangerous thing. It was a revelation to me. I did not
know what to do. Mme. Dauvray would promise me everything, give me
everything, if only I would consent when I refused. I was terribly
frightened of what would happen. I did not want power over people. I
knew it was not good for her that she should suffer so much excitement.
No, I did not know what to do. And so we all moved to Aix."

And there she met Harry Wethermill on the second day after her arrival,
and proceeded straightway for the first time to fall in love. To Celia
it seemed that at last that had happened for which she had so longed.
She began really to live as she understood life at this time. The day,
until she met Harry Wethermill, was one flash of joyous expectation;
the hours when they were together a time of contentment which thrilled
with some chance meeting of the hands into an exquisite happiness. Mme.
Dauvray understood quickly what was the matter, and laughed at her
affectionately.

"Celie, my dear," she said, "your friend, M. Wethermill—'Arry, is it
not? See, I pronounce your tongue—will not be as comfortable as the
nice, fat, bourgeois gentleman I meant to find for you. But, since you
are young, naturally you want storms. And there will be storms, Celie,"
she concluded, with a laugh.

Celia blushed.

"I suppose there will," she said regretfully. There were, indeed,
moments when she was frightened of Harry Wethermill, but frightened
with a delicious thrill of knowledge that he was only stern because he
cared so much.

But in a day or two there began to intrude upon her happiness a
stinging dissatisfaction with her past life. At times she fell into
melancholy, comparing her career with that of the man who loved her. At
times she came near to an extreme irritation with Helene Vauquier. Her
lover was in her thoughts. As she put it herself:

"I wanted always to look my best, and always to be very good."

Good in the essentials of life, that is to be understood. She had lived
in a lax world. She was not particularly troubled by the character of
her associates; she was untouched by them; she liked her fling at the
baccarat-tables. These were details, and did not distress her. Love had
not turned her into a Puritan. But certain recollections plagued her
soul. The visit to the restaurant at Montmartre, for instance, and the
seances. Of these, indeed, she thought to have made an end. There were
the baccarat-rooms, the beauty of the town and the neighbourhood to
distract Mme. Dauvray. Celia kept her thoughts away from seances. There
was no seance as yet held in the Villa Rose. And there would have been
none but for Helene Vauquier.

One evening, however, as Harry Wethermill walked down from the Cercle
to the Villa des Fleurs, a woman's voice spoke to him from behind.

"Monsieur!"

He turned and saw Mme. Dauvray's maid. He stopped under a street lamp,
and said:

"Well, what can I do for you?"

The woman hesitated.

"I hope monsieur will pardon me," she said humbly. "I am committing a
great impertinence. But I think monsieur is not very kind to Mlle.
Celie."

Wethermill stared at her.

"What on earth do you mean?" he asked angrily.

Helene Vauquier looked him quietly in the face.

"It is plain, monsieur, that Mlle. Celie loves monsieur. Monsieur has
led her on to love him. But it is also plain to a woman with quick eyes
that monsieur himself cares no more for mademoiselle than for the
button on his coat. It is not very kind to spoil the happiness of a
young and pretty girl, monsieur."

Nothing could have been more respectful than the manner in which these
words were uttered. Wethermill was taken in by it. He protested
earnestly, fearing lest the maid should become an enemy.

"Helene, it is not true that I am playing with Mlle. Celie. Why should
I not care for her?"

Helene Vauquier shrugged her shoulders. The question needed no answer.

"Why should I seek her so often if I did not care?"

And to this question Helene Vauquier smiled—a quiet, slow,
confidential smile.

"What does monsieur want of Mme. Dauvray?" she asked. And the question
was her answer.

Wethermill stood silent. Then he said abruptly:

"Nothing, of course; nothing." And he walked away.

But the smile remained on Helene Vauquier's face. What did they all
want of Mme. Dauvray? She knew very well. It was what she herself
wanted—with other things. It was money—always money. Wethermill was
not the first to seek the good graces of Mme. Dauvray through her
pretty companion. Helene Vauquier went home. She was not discontented
with her conversation. Wethermill had paused long enough before he
denied the suggestion of her words. She approached him a few days later
a second time and more openly. She was shopping in, the Rue du Casino
when he passed her. He stopped of his own accord and spoke to her.
Helene Vauquier kept a grave and respectful face. But there was a pulse
of joy at her heart. He was coming to her hand.

"Monsieur," she said, "you do not go the right way." And again her
strange smile illuminated her face. "Mlle. Celie sets a guard about
Mme. Dauvray. She will not give to people the opportunity to find
madame generous."

"Oh," said Wethermill slowly. "Is that so?" And he turned and walked by
Helene Vauquier's side.

"Never speak of Mme. Dauvray's wealth, monsieur, if you would keep the
favour of Mlle. Celie. She is young, but she knows her world."

"I have not spoken of money to her," replied Wethermill; and then he
burst out laughing. "But why should you think that I—I, of all
men—want money?" he asked.

And Helene answered him again enigmatically.

"If I am wrong, monsieur, I am sorry, but you can help me too," she
said, in her submissive voice. And she passed on, leaving Wethermill
rooted to the ground.

It was a bargain she proposed—the impertinence of it! It was a bargain
she proposed—the value of it! In that shape ran Harry Wethermill's
thoughts. He was in desperate straits, though to the world's eye he was
a man of wealth. A gambler, with no inexpensive tastes, he had been
always in need of money. The rights in his patent he had mortgaged long
ago. He was not an idler; he was no sham foisted as a great man on an
ignorant public. He had really some touch of genius, and he cultivated
it assiduously. But the harder he worked, the greater was his need of
gaiety and extravagance. Gifted with good looks and a charm of manner,
he was popular alike in the great world and the world of Bohemia. He
kept and wanted to keep a foot in each. That he was in desperate
straits now, probably Helene Vauquier alone in Aix had recognised. She
had drawn her inference from one simple fact. Wethermill asked her at a
later time when they were better acquainted how she had guessed his
need.

"Monsieur," she replied, "you were in Aix without a valet, and it
seemed to me that you were of that class of men who would never move
without a valet so long as there was money to pay his wages. That was
my first thought. Then when I saw you pursue your friendship with Mlle.
Celie—you, who so clearly to my eyes did not love her—I felt sure."

On the next occasion that the two met, it was again Harry Wethermill
who sought Helene Vauquier. He talked for a minute or two upon
indifferent subjects, and then he said quickly:

"I suppose Mme. Dauvray is very rich?"

"She has a great fortune in jewels," said Helene Vauquier.

Wethermill started. He was agitated that evening, the woman saw. His
hands shook, his face twitched. Clearly he was hard put to it. For he
seldom betrayed himself. She thought it time to strike.

"Jewels which she keeps in the safe in her bedroom," she added.

"Then why don't you—?" he began, and stopped.

"I said that I too needed help," replied Helene, without a ruffle of
her composure.

It was nine o'clock at night. Helene Vauquier had come down to the
Casino with a wrap for Mme. Dauvray. The two people were walking down
the little street of which the Casino blocks the end. And it happened
that an attendant at the Casino, named Alphonse Ruel, passed them,
recognised them both, and—smiled to himself with some amusement. What
was Wethermill doing in company with Mme. Dauvray's maid? Ruel had no
doubt. Ruel had seen Wethermill often enough these recent days with
Mme. Dauvray's pretty companion. Ruel had all a Frenchman's sympathy
with lovers. He wished them well, those two young and attractive
people, and hoped that the maid would help their plans.

But as he passed he caught a sentence spoken suddenly by Wethermill.

"Well, it is true; I must have money." And the agitated voice and words
remained fixed in his memory. He heard, too, a warning "Hush!" from the
maid. Then they passed out of his hearing. But he turned and saw that
Wethermill was talking volubly. What Harry Wethermill was saying he was
saying in a foolish burst of confidence.

"You have guessed it, Helene—you alone." He had mortgaged his patent
twice over—once in France, once in England—and the second time had
been a month ago. He had received a large sum down, which went to pay
his pressing creditors. He had hoped to pay the sum back from a new
invention.