‘I had heard’—Harriet felt that she must tread cautiously here. ‘that he was engaged’ to be married.’ ‘Oh, yes — to the English lady. That was understood.’
‘Was he happy about it?’
‘Mademoiselle, Alexis was poor and the English lady is very rich. It was advantageous to him to marry her. At first, no doubt, it might offer a little desagrement, but afterwards — you understand, mademoiselle, these matters arrange themselves.’
You don’t think that he suddenly felt he couldn’t face it, and took this way out?’
‘That is difficult to say, but — no, I do not think so. He had, after all, only to go away. He was a very good dancer — and very popular. He would easily have found another situation, provided his health would permit him to continue.’
‘I wondered whether there was any other attachment; to make things more difficult.’
‘From what he said to us, mademoiselle, I know of nothing which could not easily have been arranged.’
‘Women like him, I suppose?’ demanded Harriet, bluntly. Antoine’s smile was a sufficient answer. ‘There wasn’t any disappointment of any kind?’ ‘I did not hear of any. But of course, one does not tell
one’s friends everything.!
‘Of course not. I don’t mean to be inquisitive, but it all seems to me rather odd.’
The music stopped.
‘What is the arrangement?’ asked Harriet. ‘Do we go on or have you other engagements?’
‘There is no reason why we should not continue for the next dance. After that, unless mademoiselle wishes to make a special arrangement with the management, — I am expected to attend to my other patrons.’
‘No,’ said Harriet, ‘I don’t want to upset things. Is there any reason why you and the two young ladies should not have a little supper with me later on?’
‘None at all. It is very kind; very amiable. Leave it to me, mademoiselle. I will arrange it all. It is natural that mademoiselle should take an interest!
‘Yes, but I don’t want the, manager to think that I’m interrogating his staff behind his back.’
‘N’ayez pas peur, je m’en charge. I will ask you to dance again in a little time, and then I will tell you what I have contrived!
He handed her back to her table with a smile, and she saw him gather up a vast and billowy lady in a tightly fitting gown and move smoothly away with her, the eternal semi-sensuous smile fixed upon his lips as though it was painted there.
About six dances later, the smile reappeared beside her, and Antoine, guiding her steps through a waltz, informed her that — if, at 11.30, when the dancing was over, she would be good enough to seek out a small restaurant a few streets away, he, with Doris and Charis, would be there to meet her. It was only a small restaurant, but very good, and the proprietor knew them very well; moreover, Antoine himself lodged in the little hotel, attached to the restaurant and would give himself the pleasure of offering mademoiselle a glass of wine. They would be private there, and could speak quite freely. Harriet assented, with the proviso that she should pay for the supper, and accordingly, shortly before midnight, found herself seated on a red-plush settee beneath a row of gilded mirrors, over a pleasant little supper of the Continental sort.
Doris the blonde and Charis the brunette were only too delighted to discuss the affairs of the late Mr Alexis. Doris appeared to be the official confidante; she could give inside information about her late partner’s affairs of the heart. He had had a girl — oh, yes; but some weeks earlier this connection had come to an end rather mysteriously. It was nothing to do with Mrs Weldon. That matter had been, in Mr Micawber’s phrase, already ‘provided for’. No; it was apparently a breaking-off by mutual consent, and nobody seemed to have been much upset by it. Certainly not Alexis, who, though expressing a great deal of conventional, regret, had seemed, to be rather pleased about it, as though he had brought’ off a smart piece of business. And since then, the young lady in, question had been seen going about with another man, who was supposed to be a friend of Alexis.
‘And if you ask me,’ said Doris, in a voice whose fundamental cockney was overlaid by a veneer of intense refinement, ‘Alexis pushed her off on to this chap on purpose, to get her out of the way of his other little plans.’
‘What other little plans?’
‘I’m sure I don’t know. But he had something up his sleeve these last few weeks. Very grand he was about it; I’m sure one was almost afraid to speak to his high-mightiness. “You’ll see,” he said, “just you wait a little bit.”
“Well, I’m sure,” I said, “I have no wish to intrude. You can keep your secrets,” I said, “for I don’t want to know them.” It’s my belief he was up to some game or other. Whatever it was, he was like a dog with two tails about it.’
Mrs Weldon too, thought Harriet, had said the same thing. Alexis was going to have some news for her — though Mrs Weldon had put her own interpretation on the remark. Harriet put out another feeler of inquiry.
‘Marriage-licence?’ said Charis. ‘Oh, no! he wouldn’t be putting up any flags about that. He couldn’t very well like the idea of marrying that dreadful old woman. Well, it serves her right now. She’s got left. I think that sort of thing is disgusting.’
‘I am sorry for her,’ said Antoine.
‘Oh, you are always sorry for people. I do think it’s beastly. I think these horrible fat men are beastly, too, always pawing a girl about. If Greely wasn’t a decent sort, I’d chuck the whole thing, but I will say he does see to it that they behave themselves. But an old woman’— Charis, superb in her vigorous youth, expressed contempt by voice and gesture.
‘I suppose,’ suggested Harriet, ‘that Alexis wanted to feel safe and settled financially. I mean, a dancer can’t go on dancing all his life; can he? Particularly if he isn’t very strong.’
She spoke with hesitation, but to her relief Antoine immediately and emphatically agreed with her.
‘You are right. While we are young and gay it is all very good. But presently the head grows bald, the legs grow stiff, and — finish! The manager says, “It is all very well, you are a good dancer, but my clients prefer a younger man, hein? Then good-bye the first-class establishment. We go, what you call, down the hill. I tell you, it is a great temptation when somebody comes and says, “Look! You have only to marry me and I will make you rich and comfortable for life.” And what is it? Only to tell lies to one’s wife every night instead of to twenty or thirty silly old ladies. Both are done for money — where is the difference?’
‘Yes, I suppose we shall all come to it,’ said Charis, with a grimace. ‘Only, from the way Alexis talked, you’d think he’d have wanted a little more poetry about it. All that rubbish about his noble birth and fallen fortunes — like something out of those stories he was so potty about. Quite a hero of romance, according to him. Always wanted to take the spot-light, did Mr Paul Alexis. You’d think he did the floor a favour by dancing on it. And then the fairy prince comes down to marrying an old woman for her money.’
‘Oh, he wasn’t so bad,’ protested Doris. ‘You oughtn’t to talk that way, dear. It’s not so easy for we dancers, the way everybody treats us like dirt. Though they’re willing enough to take advantage of you if you give them half a chance. Why shouldn’t Alexis, or any of us, get a bit of our own back? Anyhow, he’s dead, poor boy, and you oughtn’t to run him down.’