"A project?"
Menko asked the question mechanically, feeling very little curiosity to know Labanoff"s secret; but the Russian"s face wore a strange, ironical smile as he answered:
"I have nothing to say on that subject, even to the man for whom I have the most regard."
His brilliant eyes seemed to see strange visions before them. He remained silent for a moment, and then rose with an abrupt movement.
"There," he said, "that is all I had to tell you, my dear Menko. Now, "au revoir", or rather, good-by; for, as I said before, I shall probably never see you again."
"And why, pray?"
"Oh! I don"t know; it is an idea of mine. And then, my beloved Russia is such a strange country. Death comes quickly there."
He had still upon his lips that inexplicable smile, jesting and sad at once.
Menko grasped the long, white hand extended to him.
"My dear Labanoff, it is not difficult to guess that you are going on some dangerous errand." Smiling: "I will not do you the injustice to believe you a nihilist."
Labanoff"s blue eyes flashed.
"No," he said, "no, I am not a nihilist. Annihilation is absurd; but liberty is a fine thing!"
He stopped short, as if he feared that he had already said too much.
"Adieu, my dear Menko."
The Hungarian detained him with a gesture, saying, with a tremble in his voice:
"Labanoff! You have found me when a crisis in my life is also impending.
I am about, like yourself, to commit a great folly; a different one from yours, no doubt. However, I have no right to tell you that you are about to commit some folly."
"No," calmly replied the Russian, very pale, but still smiling, "it is not a folly."
"But it is a danger?" queried Menko.
Labanoff made no reply.
"I do not know either," said Michel, "how my affair will end. But, since chance has brought us together today, face to face--"
"It was not chance, but my own firm resolution to see you again before my departure."
"I know what your friendship for me is, and it is for that reason that I ask you to tell me frankly where you will be in a month."
"In a month?" repeated Labanoff.
"Give me the route you are going to take? Shall you be a fixture at St.
Petersburg?"
"Not immediately," responded the Russian, slowly, his gaze riveted upon Menko. "In a month I shall still be at Warsaw. At St. Petersburg the month after."
"Thanks. I only ask you to let me know, in some way, where you are."
"Why?"
"Because, I should like to join you."
"You!"
"It is only a fancy," said Menko, with an attempt at a laugh. "I am bored with life--you know it; I find it a nuisance. If we did not spur it like an old, musty horse, it would give us the same idiotic round of days. I do not know--I do not wish to know--why you are going to Russia, and what this final farewell of which you have just spoken signifies; I simply guess that you are off on some adventure, and it is possible that I may ask you to allow me to share it."
"Why?" said Labanoff, coldly. "You are not a Russian."
Menko smiled, and, placing his hands upon the thin shoulders of his friend, he said:
"Those words reveal many things. It is well that they were not said before an agent of police."
"Yes," responded Labanoff, firmly. "But I am not in the habit of recklessly uttering my thoughts; I know that I am speaking now to Count Menko."
"And Count Menko will be delighted, my dear Labanoff, if you will let him know where, in Poland or Russia, he must go, soon, to obtain news of you. Fear nothing: neither there nor here will I question you. But I shall be curious to know what has become of you, and you know that I have enough friendship for you to be uneasy about you. Besides, I long to be on the move; Paris, London, the world, in short, bores me, bores me, bores me!"
"The fact is, it is stupid, egotistical and cowardly," responded Labanoff.
He again held out to Menko his nervous hand, burning, like his blue eyes, with fever.
"Farewell!" he said.
"No, no, "au revoir"!"
""Au revoir" be it then. I will let you know what has become of me."
"And where you are?"
"And where I am."
"And do not be astonished if I join you some fine morning."
"Nothing ever astonishes me," said the Russian. "Nothing!"
And in that word nothing were expressed profound disgust with life and fierce contempt of death.
Menko warmly grasped his friend"s thin and emaciated hand; and, the last farewell spoken to the fanatic departing for some tragical adventure, the Hungarian became more sombre and troubled than before, and Labanoff"s appearance seemed like a doubtful apparition. He returned to his longing to see the end of the most anxious day of his life.
At last, late in the evening, Michel entered his coupe, and was driven away-down the Rue d"Aumale, through the Rue Pigalle and the Rue de Douai, to the rondpoint of the Place Clichy, the two lanterns casting their clear light into the obscurity. The coupe then took the road to Maisons-Lafitte, crossing the plain and skirting wheat-fields and vineyards, with the towering silhouette of Mont Valerien on the left, and on the right, sharply defined against the sky, a long line of hills, dotted with woods and villas, and with little villages nestling at their base, all plunged in a mysterious shadow.
Michel, with absent eyes, gazed at all this, as Trilby rapidly trotted on. He was thinking of what lay before him, of the folly he was about to commit, as he had said to Labanoff. It was a folly; and yet, who could tell? Might not Marsa have reflected? Might she not; alarmed at his threats, be now awaiting him? Her exquisite face, like a lily, rose before him; an overwhelming desire to annihilate time and s.p.a.ce took possession of him, and he longed to be standing, key in hand, before the little gate in the garden wall.
He was well acquainted with the great park of Maisons-Lafitte, with the white villas nestling among the trees. On one side Prince Tchereteff"s house looked out upon an almost desert tract of land, on which a racecourse had been mapped out; and on the other extended with the stables and servants" quarters to the forest, the wall of the Avenue Lafitte bounding the garden. In front of the villa was a broad lawn, ending in a low wall with carved gates, allowing, through the branches of the oaks and chestnuts, a view of the hills of Cormeilles.