第98章

'Well,'he thought,'I need have no consideration for her now;she has not a grain of it for me.I'll show her this very day that she's my wife still.'

But on the way home to his hotel,he was forced to the conclusion that he did not know what he meant.One could not make scenes in public,and short of scenes in public what was there he could do?

He almost cursed his own thin-skinnedness.She might deserve no consideration;but he--alas!deserved some at his own hands.And sitting lunchless in the hall of his hotel,with tourists passing every moment,Baedeker in hand,he was visited by black dejection.

In irons!His whole life,with every natural instinct and every decent yearning gagged and fettered,and all because Fate had driven him seventeen years ago to set his heart upon this woman--so utterly,that even now he had no real heart to set on any other!

Cursed was the day he had met her,and his eyes for seeing in her anything but the cruel Venus she was!And yet,still seeing her with the sunlight on the clinging China crepe of her gown,he uttered a little groan,so that a tourist who was passing,thought:

'Man in pain!Let's see!what did I have for lunch?'

Later,in front of a cafe near the Opera,over a glass of cold tea with lemon and a straw in it,he took the malicious resolution to go and dine at her hotel.If she were there,he would speak to her;if she were not,he would leave a note.He dressed carefully,and wrote as follows:

"Your idyll with that fellow Jolyon Forsyte is known to me at all events.If you pursue it,understand that I will leave no stone unturned to make things unbearable for him."S.F."He sealed this note but did not address it,refusing to write the maiden name which she had impudently resumed,or to put the word Forsyte on the envelope lest she should tear it up unread.Then he went out,and made his way through the glowing streets,abandoned to evening pleasure-seekers.Entering her hotel,he took his seat in a far corner of the dining-room whence he could see all entrances and exits.She was not there.He ate little,quickly,watchfully.She did not come.He lingered in the lounge over his coffee,drank two liqueurs of brandy.But still she did not come.

He went over to the keyboard and examined the names.Number twelve,on the first floor!And he determined to take the note up himself.He mounted red-carpeted stairs,past a little salon;eight-ten-twelve!Should he knock,push the note under,or.?

He looked furtively round and turned the handle.The door opened,but into a little space leading to another door;he knocked on that--no answer.The door was locked.It fitted very closely to the floor;the note would not go under.He thrust it back into his pocket,and stood a moment listening.He felt somehow certain that she was not there.And suddenly he came away,passing the little salon down the stairs.He stopped at the bureau and said:

"Will you kindly see that Mrs.Heron has this note?""Madame Heron left to-day,Monsieur--suddenly,about three o'clock.

There was illness in her family."

Soames compressed his lips."Oh!"he said;"do you know her address?""Non,Monsieur.England,I think."

Soames put the note back into his pocket and went out.He hailed an open horse-cab which was passing.

"Drive me anywhere!"

The man,who,obviously,did not understand,smiled,and waved his whip.And Soames was borne along in that little yellow-wheeled Victoria all over star-shaped Paris,with here and there a pause,and the question,"C'est par ici,Monsieur?""No,go on,"till the man gave it up in despair,and the yellow-wheeled chariot continued to roll between the tall,flat-fronted shuttered houses and plane-tree avenues--a little Flying Dutchman of a cab.

'Like my life,'thought Soames,'without object,on and on!'