Under the Hill 3

Under the Hill 3

"A pretty portal," murmured the Abbé, correcting his sash.

 

As he spoke, a faint sound of singing was breathed out from the

mountain, faint music as strange and distant as sea-legends that are

heard in shells.

 

"The Vespers of Helen, I take it," said Fanfreluche, and struck a few

chords of accompaniment, ever so lightly, upon his little lute. Softly

across the spell-bound threshold the song floated and wreathed itself

about the subtle columns, till the moths were touched with passion

and moved quaintly in their sleep. One of them was awakened by the

intenser notes of the Abbé's lute-strings, and fluttered into the cave.

Fanfreluche felt it was his cue for entry.

 

[Illustration: "The Abbé"]

 

"Adieu," he exclaimed with an inclusive gesture, and "good-bye,

Madonna," as the cold circle of the moon began to show, beautiful and

full of enchantments. There was a shadow of sentiment in his voice as

he spoke the words.

 

"Would to heaven," he sighed, "I might receive the assurance of a

looking-glass before I make my debut! However, as she is a Goddess, I

doubt not her eyes are a little sated with perfection, and may not be

displeased to see it crowned with a tiny fault."

 

A wild rose had caught upon the trimmings of his ruff, and in the first

flush of displeasure he would have struck it brusquely away, and most

severely punished the offending flower. But the ruffled mood lasted

only a moment, for there was something so deliciously incongruous in

the hardy petal's invasion of so delicate a thing, that Fanfreluche

withheld the finger of resentment and vowed that the wild rose should

stay where it had clung--a passport, as it were, from the upper to the

under world.

 

"The very excess and violence of the fault," he said, "will be its

excuse;" and, undoing a tangle in the tassel of his stick, stepped into

the shadowy corridor that ran into the bosom of the wan hill--stepped

with the admirable aplomb and unwrinkled suavity of Don John.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER II

 

 

Before a toilet that shone like the altar of Notre Dame des Victoires,

Helen was seated in a little dressing-gown of black and heliotrope.

The coiffeur Cosmé was caring for her scented chevelure, and with tiny

silver tongs, warm from the caresses of the flame, made delicious

intelligent curls that fell as lightly as a breath about her forehead

and over her eyebrows, and clustered like tendrils round her neck. Her

three favourite girls, Pappelarde, Blanchemains and Loreyne, waited

immediately upon her with perfume and powder in delicate flagons and

frail cassolettes, and held in porcelain jars the ravishing paints

prepared by Châteline for those cheeks and lips that had grown a little

pale with anguish of exile. Her three favourite boys, Claud, Clair

and Sarrasine, stood amorously about with salver, fan and napkin.

Millamant held a slight tray of slippers, Minette some tender gloves,

La Popelinière--mistress of the robes--was ready with a frock of yellow

and white, La Zambinella bore the jewels, Florizel some flowers,

Amadour a box of various pins, and Vadius a box of sweets. Her doves,

ever in attendance, walked about the room that was panelled with the

gallant paintings of Jean Baptiste Dorat, and some dwarfs and doubtful

creatures sat here and there lolling out their tongues, pinching each

other, and behaving oddly enough. Sometimes Helen gave them little

smiles.

 

[Illustration: The Toilet of Helen]

 

As the toilet was in progress, Mrs. Marsuple, the fat manicure

and fardeuse, strode in and seated herself by the side of the

dressing-table, greeting Helen with an intimate nod. She wore a gown of

white watered silk with gold lace trimmings, and a velvet necklet of

false vermilion. Her hair hung in bandeaux over her ears, passing into

a huge chignon at the back of her head, and the hat, wide-brimmed and

hung with a vallance of pink muslin, was floral with red roses.

 

Mrs. Marsuple's voice was full of salacious unction; she had terrible

little gestures with the hands, strange movements with the shoulders,

a short respiration that made surprising wrinkles in her bodice, a

corrupt skin, large horny eyes, a parrot's nose, a small loose mouth,

great flaccid cheeks, and chin after chin. She was a wise person,

and Helen loved her more than any other of her servants, and had a

hundred pet names for her, such as Dear Toad, Pretty Poll, Cock Robin,

Dearest Lip, Touchstone, Little Cough Drop, Bijou, Buttons, Dear Heart,

Dick-dock, Mrs. Manly, Little Nipper, Cochon-de-lait, Naughty-naughty,

Blessed Thing, and Trump. The talk that passed between Mrs. Marsuple

and her mistress was of that excellent kind that passes between old

friends, a perfect understanding giving to scraps of phrases their full

meaning, and to the merest reference a point. Naturally Fanfreluche the

newcomer was discussed a little. Helen had not seen him yet, and asked

a score of questions on his account that were delightfully to the point.

 

The report and the coiffing were completed at the same moment.

 

"Cosmé," said Helen, "you have been quite sweet and quite brilliant,

you have surpassed yourself to-night."

 

"Madam flatters me," replied the antique old thing, with a girlish

giggle under his black satin mask. "Gad, Madam; sometimes I believe I

have no talent in the world, but tonight I must confess to a touch of

the vain mood."

 

It would pain me horribly to tell you about the painting of her

face; suffice it that the sorrowful work was accomplished; frankly,

magnificently, and without a shadow of deception.

 

Helen slipped away the dressing-gown, and rose before the mirror in a

flutter of frilled things. She was adorably tall and slender. Her neck

and shoulders were wonderfully drawn, and the little malicious breasts

were full of the irritation of loveliness that can never be entirely

comprehended, or ever enjoyed to the utmost. Her arms and hands were

loosely, but delicately articulated, and her legs were divinely long.

From the hip to the knee, twenty-two inches; from the knee to the heel,

twenty-two inches, as befitted a Goddess. Those who have seen Helen

only in the Vatican, in the Louvre, in the Uffizi, or in the British

Museum, can have no idea how very beautiful and sweet she looked. Not

at all like the lady in "Lemprière."

 

Mrs. Marsuple grew quite lyric over the dear little person, and pecked

at her arms with kisses.

 

"Dear Tongue, you must really behave yourself," said Helen, and called

Millamant to bring her the slippers.

 

The tray was freighted with the most exquisite and shapely pantoufles,

sufficient to make Cluny a place of naught. There were shoes of grey

and black and brown suede, of white silk and rose satin, and velvet and

sarcenet; there were some of sea-green sewn with cherry blossoms, some

of red with willow branches, and some of grey with bright-winged birds.

There were heels of silver, of ivory, and of gilt; there were buckles

of very precious stones set in most strange and esoteric devices;

there were ribbons tied and twisted into cunning forms; there were

buttons so beautiful that the button-holes might have no pleasure till

they closed upon them; there were soles of delicate leathers scented

with maréchale, and linings of soft stuffs scented with the juice of

July flowers. But Helen, finding none of them to her mind, called for

a discarded pair of blood-red maroquin, diapered with pearls. These

looked very distinguished over her white silk stockings.

 

Meantime, La Popelinière stepped forward with the frock.

 

"I shan't wear one to-night," said Helen. Then she slipped on her

gloves.

 

When the toilet was at an end all her doves clustered round her feet

loving to froler her ankles with their plumes, and the dwarfs clapped

their hands, and put their fingers between their lips and whistled.

Never before had Helen been so radiant and compelling. Spiridion, in

the corner, looked up from his game of Spellicans and trembled.

 

Just then, Pranzmungel announced that supper was ready upon the fifth

terrace. "Ah!" cried Helen, "I'm famished!"

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER III

 

 

She was quite delighted with Fanfreluche, and, of course, he sat next

her at supper.

 

The terrace, made beautiful with a thousand vain and fantastical

things, and set with a hundred tables and four hundred couches,

presented a truly splendid appearance. In the middle was a huge bronze

fountain with three basins. From the first rose a many-breasted dragon

and four little loves mounted upon swans, and each love was furnished

with a bow and arrow. Two of them that faced the monster seemed to

recoil in fear, two that were behind made bold enough to aim their

shafts at him. From the verge of the second sprang a circle of slim

golden columns that supported silver doves with tails and wings spread

out. The third, held by a group of grotesquely attenuated satyrs, was

centered with a thin pipe hung with masks and roses and capped with

children's heads.

 

From the mouths of the dragon and the loves, from the swans' eyes, from

the breasts of the doves, from the satyrs' horns and lips, from the

masks at many points, and from the childrens' curls, the water played

profusely, cutting strange arabesques and subtle figures.

 

The terrace was lit entirely by candles. There were four thousand of

them, not numbering those upon the tables. The candlesticks were of

a countless variety, and smiled with moulded cochonneries. Some were

twenty feet high, and bore single candles that flared like fragrant

torches over the feast, and guttered till the wax stood round the

tops in tall lances. Some, hung with dainty petticoats of shining

lustres, had a whole bevy of tapers upon them devised in circles, in

pyramids, in squares, in cuneiforms, in single lines regimentally and

in crescents.

 

Then on quaint pedestals and Terminal Gods and gracious pilasters of

every sort, were shell-like vases of excessive fruits and flowers that

hung about and burst over the edges and could never be restrained. The

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