Then Marigny put forth a tentative claw.
"I hate to tell you," he said, "_mais il faut marcher quand le diable est aux trousses_.[A] I am unwillingly forced to believe that your chauffeur has taken the other road."
[Footnote A: "But needs must when the devil drives."]
"The other road!" wailed Cynthia in sudden and most poignant foreboding. It was then that she first began to estimate her running powers.
"Yes, there are two, you know. The second one is not so direct----"
"If you think that, your man had better go at once to the village he spoke of. Is it certain that he will obtain petrol there?"
"Almost certain."
"Really, Monsieur Marigny, I fail to understand you. Why should you express a doubt? He appeared to be confident enough five minutes ago.
He was ready to start until we prevented him."
That the girl should yield to slight panic was precisely what Count Edouard desired. True, Cynthia"s sparkling eyes and firm lips were eloquent of keen annoyance rather than fear, but Marigny was an adept in reading the danger signals of beauty in distress, and he saw in these symptoms the heralds of tears and fright. His experience did not lead him far astray, but he had not allowed for racial difference between the Latin and the Anglo-Saxon. Cynthia might weep, she might even attempt to run, but in the last resource she would face him with dauntless courage.
"I a.s.sure you I would not have had this thing happen on any account,"
he said in a voice that vibrated with sympathy. "Indeed, I pray your pity in my own behalf, Miss Vanrenen. After all, it is I who suffer the agony of failure when I meant only to please. You will reach Bristol this evening, a little late, perhaps, but quite safely, and I hope that you will laugh then at the predicament which now looks so ill-starred."
His seeming sincerity appeased her to some extent. In rapid swing back to the commonplace, she affected to laugh.
"It is not so serious, after all," she said, with more calmness than she felt. "Just for a moment you threw me off the rails by your lawyer-like vagueness."
Drawing a little apart, she looked steadily back along the deserted road.
"I see nothing of my car," she murmured at last. "It will soon be dusk. We must take no more chances. Please send for that benzine right away."
Smith was dispatched forthwith on what he knew to be a fool"s errand, since both he and Marigny were practically sure of their ground. The nearest petrol was to be found at Langford, two miles along the Bristol road from the fork, and four miles in the opposite direction to that taken by Smith, who, when he returned empty-handed an hour later, must make another long journey to Langford. The Du Vallon was now anch.o.r.ed immovably until eleven o"clock, and it was well that the girl could not realize the true nature of the ordeal before her, or events might have taken an awkward twist.
The Frenchman meant no real harm by his rascally scheme, for Cynthia Vanrenen, daughter of a well-known American citizen, was not to be wooed and won in the fashion that commended itself to unscrupulous lovers in by-gone days. Yet his design blended subtlety and daring in a way that was worthy of ancestors who had ruffled it at Versailles with the cavaliers of old France. He trusted implicitly to the effect of a somewhat exciting adventure on the susceptible feminine heart.
The phantom of distrust would soon vanish. She would yield to the spell of a night scented with the breath of summer, languorous with soft zephyrs, a night when the spirit of romance itself would emparadise the lonely waste, and a belated moon, "like to a silver bow new-bent in heaven," would lend its glamor to a sky already spangled with glowing sapphires.
In such a night, all things were possible.
In such a night Stood Dido with a willow in her hand Upon the wild sea-banks, and waft her love To come again to Carthage.
Marigny had indeed arranged a situation worthy of his nurturing among the decadents of Paris. He believed that in these surroundings an impressionable girl would admit him to a degree of intimacy not to be attained by many days of prosaic meetings. At the right moment, when his well-bribed servant was gone to Langford, he would remember a bottle of wine and some sandwiches stored in the car that morning to provide the luncheon that he might not obtain at a wayside inn.
Cynthia and he would make merry over the feast. The magnetism that had never yet failed him in affairs of the heart would surely prove potent now at this real crisis in his life. Marriage to a rich woman could alone s.n.a.t.c.h him from the social abyss, and the prospect became doubly alluring when it took the guise of Cynthia. He would restore her to a disconsolate chaperon some time before midnight, and he was cynic enough to admit that if he had not then succeeded in winning her esteem by his chivalry, his un.o.btrusive tenderness, his devoted attentions--above all, by his flow of interesting talk and well-turned epigram--the fault would be his own, and not attributable to adverse conditions.
It was not surprising, therefore, that he failed to choke back the curse quick risen to his lips when the throb of the Mercury"s engine came over the crest of the hill. Never was mailed dragon more terrible to the beholder, even in the days of knight-errantry. In an instant his well-conceived project had gone by the board. He saw himself discredited, suspected, a skulking plotter driven into the open, a self-confessed trickster utterly at the mercy of some haphazard question that would lay bare his pretenses and cover his counterfeit rhapsody with ridicule.
If Cynthia had heard, and hearing understood, it is possible that a great many remarkable incidents then in embryo would have pa.s.sed into the mists of what might have been. For instance, she would not have deigned to notice Count Edouard Marigny"s further existence. The next time she met him he would fill a place in the landscape comparable to that occupied by a migratory beetle. But her heart was leaping for joy, and her cry of thankfulness quite drowned in her ears the Frenchman"s furious oath.
Mrs. Devar, having had time to gather her wits, made a gallant attempt to retrieve her fellow-conspirator"s shattered fortunes.
"My dearest Cynthia," she cried effusively, "do say you are not hurt!"
"Not a bit," was the cheerful answer. "It is not I, but the car, that is out of commission. Didn"t you see me do the Salome act when you were thrown on the screen?"
"Ah! the car has broken down. I do not wonder--this fearful road----"
"The road seems to have strayed out of Colorado, but that isn"t the trouble. We are short of petrol. Please give some to Monsieur Marigny, Fitzroy. Then we can hurry to Bristol, and the Count must pick up his chauffeur on the way."
Without more ado, she seated herself by Mrs. Devar"s side, and Marigny realized that he had been robbed of a golden opportunity. No persuasion would bring Cynthia back into the Du Vallon that evening; it would need the exercise of all his subtle tact to induce her to re-enter it at any time in the near future.
He strove to appear at his ease, even essayed a few words of congratulation on the happy chance that brought the Mercury to their relief, but the imperious young lady cut short his limping phrases.
"Oh, don"t let us waste these precious minutes," she protested. "It will be quite dark soon, and if there is much more of this wretched track----"
Medenham broke in at that. Mrs. Devar"s change of front had caused him some grim amus.e.m.e.nt, but the discovery of Marigny"s artifice roused his wrath again. It was high time that Cynthia should be enlightened, partly at least, as to the true nature of the "accident" that had befallen her; he had already solved the riddle of Smith"s disappearance.
"The road to Bristol lies behind you, Miss Vanrenen," he said.
"One of the roads," cried the Frenchman.
"No, the only road," persisted Medenham. "We return to it some two miles in the rear. Had you followed your present path much farther you could not possibly have reached Bristol to-night."
"But there is a village quite near. My chauffeur has gone there for petrol. Someone would have told us of our mistake."
"There is no petrol to be bought at Blagdon, which is a mere hamlet on the downs. Anyhow, here are two gallons--ample for your needs--but if your man is walking to Blagdon you will be compelled to wait till he returns, Monsieur Marigny."
Though Medenham did not endeavor to check the contemptuous note that crept into his voice, he certainly ought not to have uttered those two concluding words. Had he ransacked his ample vocabulary of the French language he could scarcely have hit upon another set of syllables offering similar difficulties to the foreigner. It was quite evident that his accurate p.r.o.nunciation startled the accomplices. Each arrived at the same conclusion, though by different channels; this man was no mere chauffeur, and the fact rendered his marked hostility all the more significant.
Nevertheless, for the moment, Marigny concealed his uneasiness: by a display of good humor he hoped to gloss over the palpable absurdity of his earlier statements to Cynthia.
"I seem to have bungled this business very badly," he said airily.
"Please don"t be too hard on me. I shall make the _amende_ when I see you in Bristol. _Au revoir, cheres dames!_ Tell them to keep me some dinner. I may not be so very far behind, since you ladies will take some time over your toilette, and I shall--what do you call it--scorch like mad after I have found that careless scoundrel, Smith."
Cynthia had suddenly grown dumb, so Mrs. Devar tried once more to relax the tension.
"Do be careful, Count Edouard," she cried; "this piece of road is dreadfully dangerous, and, when all is said and done, another half hour is now of no great consequence."
"If your chauffeur has really gone to Blagdon, he will not be back under an hour at least," broke in Medenham"s disdainful voice. "Unless you wish to wreck your car you will not attempt to follow him."
With that he bent over the head lamps, and their radiance fell unexpectedly on Marigny"s scowling face, since the discomfited adventurer could no longer pretend to ignore the Englishman"s menace.
Still, he was powerless. Though quivering with anger and balked desire, he dared not provoke a scene in Cynthia"s presence, and her continued silence already warned him that she was bewildered if not actually suspicious. He forced a laugh.
"Explanations are like swamps," he said. "The farther you plunge into them the deeper you sink. So, good-bye! To please you, Mrs. Devar, I shall crawl. As for Miss Vanrenen, I see that she does not care what becomes of me."
Cynthia weakened a little at that. Certainly she wondered why her model chauffeur chose to express his opinions so bluntly, while Marigny"s unwillingness to take offense was admirable.
"Is there no better plan?" she asked quickly, for Medenham had started the engine, and his hand was on the reversing lever.
"For what?" he demanded.
"For extricating my friend from his difficulty?"