The Sack of Monte Carlo 17

The Sack of Monte Carlo 17

As she took my arm and we went down the steps, “Easier place, however,

to raid,” she remarked, “I never saw. As for the morality of it, I was a

little doubtful at first, but now—”

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER XV

 

INFLUENCE OF CLIMATE ON ADVENTURE—UNEXPECTED ARRIVAL OF LUCY—HER

REVELATIONS—DANGER AHEAD

 

 

SO a few days passed, and, pleasantly idle though it all was, it began

to be time for us to think seriously of our purport in being at Monte

Carlo at all. Our party had very easily fallen into the ways of the

place, and appeared to be enjoying themselves, each in their own

fashion, amazingly.

 

“Here’s Teddy’s got a bicycle,” as I said to Brentin, “and is always

over at Mentone with friends. Bob Hines does nothing but gamble, and is

scarcely ever with us, even at meal-times. He lives on sandwiches and

hot _grog Américaine_ at the Café de Paris. Forsyth struts about in

fancy suits, making eyes at the ladies, and Masters is all day at the

back of Miss Rybot’s chair, supplying her with fresh funds and taking

charge of her winnings.”

 

“_C’est magnifique_,” yawned Brentin, “_mais ce n’est pas la guerre_.”

 

“It’s worse,” I said; “it’s Capua, simply, and must be put a stop to.”

 

“I know if I were here a fortnight longer,” yawned my sister, “with

nothing to do, I should desert my husband and child and be off into

Italy along the Corniche with white mice.”

 

“Turn pifferari; exactly,” said Brentin. “Therefore, sir, we must move

in this business, and the sooner the better, or the golden opportunity

will slip by us, never to return. And that’s all there is to it. We will

summon a council of war this evening on board the _Amaranth_ and fix the

day finally.”

 

“Well, all I ask is,” said my sister, “that in case of failure Miss

Rybot and I are afforded every opportunity of escape. I don’t want to

give those Medworth Square people the chance of coming and crowing over

me in a French prison. Besides, it wouldn’t do Frank’s business any

good, if I were caught.”

 

“Why, just think what a book you could make of it,” I murmured—“_Penal

Servitude for Life; by a Lady_. Rivers would make his fortune.”

 

What would have been, after all, the end of our adventure, whether the

sunshine might not have softened us into finally abandoning the

enterprise altogether—to my lasting shame and grief!—I cannot take

upon myself to say. All I know for certain is, that if our hands had not

been, in a measure, forced—if circumstances had not made it rather more

dangerous for us to go back than to go on—our party would at any rate

have needed an amount of whipping into line which would as likely as not

have driven them into restive retirement, instead of the somewhat

alarmed advance which was ultimately forced on us and turned out so

entirely successful.

 

And as it is my particular pride to think I owe the undertaking, in the

first place, to my love for Lucy, so it is my joy to reflect how the

final carrying of it out was due to her affection for me, that drove her

to journey—quite unused to foreign parts as she was—right across

Europe, alone, and give me timely warning of the dastardly scheme on

foot for our capture and ruin.

 

It was the very afternoon following the morning of our brief

conversation on the terrace that I went back early to the hotel, with

some natural feelings of depression and irritation at the growing

callous inertia of our party.

 

I was going up to my room, when from the reading-room I heard the sound

of the piano. I stopped in some amazement, for there was being played an

air I never heard any one but Lucy play. It was an old Venetian piece of

church music (by Gordigiani, if I remember right), and I had never heard

it anywhere but at “The French Horn,” on the rather damaged old cottage

piano in the little room behind the bar.

 

I stole down-stairs again, and, my heart beating, opened the glass door

noiselessly.

 

It was Lucy! and the next moment, with a little scream, she was in my

arms. I took her to the sofa; for some moments she was so agitated she

couldn’t speak, nor could I, believing, indeed, it was a ghost, till I

felt the soft pressure of her arms and the warmth of her cheek as her

head lay on my shoulder, while she trembled and sobbed.

 

“Don’t be frightened,” I murmured. “It’s really I. Now, don’t cry; be

calm and tell me all about it. We are both safe; we love each other.

Nothing else in the world matters.”

 

At last, in broken tones and at first with many tears, she told me the

whole story. I listened as though I were in a dream, and my bones

stiffened with anger and apprehension.

 

The gist of it was briefly this: that one day Mr. Crage had come down to

“The French Horn” and had an interview with her father in the

bar-parlor. He had come to put an end to Mr. Thatcher’s tenancy, a

yearly one, and turn him out of the inn, unless, as he suggested,

exactly like a villain on the stage, Lucy would, for her father’s sake,

engage to marry him, in which case he might remain, and at a reduced

rent. Thatcher, who, after all, is a gentleman, declared the idea

preposterous, more particularly as his daughter was already engaged,

with his full consent and approbation.

 

“Oh, ah!” snarled Crage—“to that young cockney who was down here at

Christmas. Suppose you call her in, however, and let her speak for

herself.”

 

Whereupon Lucy was sent for and told of Crage’s iniquitous proposal, of

which Thatcher very properly urged her not to think, but to refuse there

and then.

 

“Oh, ah!” Crage had grinned. “The young cockney has enough for you all

and won’t grudge it, I dare say. He’s gone to Monte Carlo, ain’t he?”

 

Yes, said Lucy, Mr. Blacker had, and had promised her not to gamble.

 

“Gamble or not,” sneered Crage, “I know what he is up to. The police are

already on his track. Why, I shouldn’t be the least surprised to hear

he’s already in their hands, and condemned to penal servitude for life.”

 

On hearing that, poor Lucy said she thought she should have dropped on

the floor, like water. But she has the courage of her race, and, telling

the old man in so many words he was mad, turned to leave the room.

 

Now, it’s an odd thing that the old wretch, though he never minded being

called a liar, never could bear any reflection on his sanity—it was the

fusty remains, I suppose, of his old professional Clement’s Inn pride;

so he lost his temper at once, and with many shrieks and gesticulations

told them the whole story.

 

That—as I have written—Bailey Thompson was a detective, frequently in

the “Victoria” smoking-room in the course of his duty; and that Brentin

had actually confided in him—as we know—all that we were going to do,

that he was an old friend of Crage’s, dating from the Clement’s Inn

days, and on Christmas night had divulged the whole scheme just as he

had received it from us, telling him with much glee, being a season of

jollity and good-will, how he was going to follow us to Monte Carlo and

make every disposition to catch us in the act. Crage added that Bailey

Thompson had rather doubted at first whether we weren’t humbugging him;

but having since heard from his sister, Mrs. Wingham, that she believed

we were really in earnest, was already somewhere on his way out to

superintend our capture in person.

 

“I didn’t know what to do,” cried Lucy, piteously; “I could only laugh

in his face and tell him he was the victim of a practical joke.”

 

“Practical joke!” Crage had screamed; “you wait till they’re all in

prison; perhaps they’ll call that a practical joke, too. Now, look here,

Thatcher, you’re a sensible man; you break off this engagement before

the scandal overtakes you all, and I’ll treat you and your daughter

handsomely. You shall stay on in the inn, or not, just as you please,

and the day we’re married I’ll settle Wharton on dear Lucy here. I

sha’n’t live so very much longer, I dare say,” he whined—“I’m

eighty-two next month—and then she can marry the young cockney, if she

wants to, when he’s done his time. Don’t decide now; send me up a note

in the course of the next few days. Hang it! I won’t be hard on you;

I’ll give you both a fortnight.”

 

And with that and no more the wicked old man had stumped out of the bar

parlor.

 

Lucy’s mind was soon made up. Notwithstanding her father’s

expostulations, she had determined to come after me and learn the truth

for herself; and as he couldn’t come with her, to come alone. She hadn’t

written, for fear of my telegraphing she was not to start. And here she

was, to be told the truth, to be reassured, to be made happy once more;

if possible, to take me home with her.

 

“Oh, it’s not true, Vincent, dearest!” she murmured. “It’s all a fable,

isn’t it? You’re not even dreaming of doing anything so dangerous and

foolish?”

 

Now, deep and true as is my affection for Lucy, I should have been quite

unworthy of her if I had allowed myself to be turned from so deeply

matured and worthy a purpose as ours merely by her tears.

 

The more I had seen of Monte Carlo, the more sincerely was I convinced

of its worthlessness, and the dignity of a serious effort to put a stop

to it. For it is simply, as I have written, a _cocotte’s_ paradise and

nothing more; and if, by any effort of mine, I could close it, I felt I

should be rendering a service to humanity only second to Wilberforce and

the Slave Trade. What a glorious moment if only I could live to see a

large board stuck out of the Casino windows with _À Vendre_ on it, to

say nothing of the boards taken in from outside the London hospitals and

the closed wards in working order again, full of sufferers!

 

So I calmed dear Lucy and told her how glad I was to see her; that above

all things she must trust me and believe what I was doing and going to

do was for the best and would turn out not unworthy of nor unserviceable

to her in the long-run; more especially, if only it were, as we had

every reason to believe it would be, successful.

 

After some further talk, she promised to say no more and to trust me

entirely, both now and always, begging me only to assure her I was not

angry, and that what she had done in coming was really for my benefit

and welfare. I told her truly she had rendered me the greatest possible

service, and that I loved her if possible more deeply for this new proof

of her devotion than before. Then I telegraphed to her father of her

safety, got her something to eat, and sent her off early to bed after

her long journey (she had come second-class, poor child, and had stopped

once at least at every station, and twice at some), and at nine o’clock

we went down to the Condamine to go on board the _Amaranth_ for our council of war.