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The Mischief Maker, a novel by E. Phillips Oppenheim |
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Book 1 - Chapter 12. At The Rat Mort |
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_ BOOK ONE CHAPTER XII. AT THE RAT MORT Julien had been back in the hotel about half an hour and in his room barely ten minutes when he was disturbed by a knock at the door. Immediately afterwards, to his amazement, Estermen entered. "What the devil are you doing up here?" Julien asked angrily. "How dare you follow me about!" "Sir Julien," his visitor answered, "I beg that you will not make a commotion. It was perfectly easy for me to gain admission here. It will be perfectly easy for me, if it becomes necessary, to leave without trouble. I ask you to be reasonable. I am here. Listen to what I have to say. You are prejudiced against me. It is not fair. You have spoken with a woman who is my enemy. Give me leave, at least, to address a few words to you. You will not be the loser." Julien was angry, but underneath it all he was also curious. "Well, go on, then." "You are reasonable," said Estermen, laying his hat and stick upon the bed. "Listen. Your story is known at Berlin as well as in Paris. There is only one opinion concerning it and that is that you have been shamefully treated." "I am not asking for sympathy, sir," Julien answered coldly. "Nor am I offering it," the other returned. "I am stating facts. There are many who do not hesitate to say that you have been made the victim of a political plot, conceived among the members of your own party; that you are suffering at the present moment from your masterly efforts on behalf of peace." "Pray go on," Julien invited. "I consider all this grossly impertinent, but I am willing to listen to what you have to say." "The greatest man in Germany," Estermen continued, "when he heard of your misfortune, declared at once that the peace of Europe was no longer assured. I am here to-night, Sir Julien, without credentials, it is true, but I am the spokesman of a very great person indeed. He is anxious to know your plans." "I have no plans." "Your political future, then--" "I have no political future," Julien interrupted. "That is finished for me." "But the thing is absurd!" protested Estermen. "There is no other man but you capable of dealing tactfully and diplomatically with my country. Your blundering predecessors brought us twice within an ace of war. If the man takes your place to whom rumor has already given it, I give Europe six weeks' peace--no more. We are a sensitive nation, as you know. You learned how to humor us. No one before you tried. You kept your alliance with France, but you were not afraid to show us the open hand. There are those in Berlin, Sir Julien, who consider you the greatest statesman England ever possessed." "I listen," Julien said. "Pray proceed." "It cannot be," Estermen went on, "that you mean to accept the situation?" "I have no alternative," Julien answered. "It is not, then, a question of money?" Estermen ventured slowly. "The Press tell us that you are poor." "Money, in this case, would scarcely help," Julien remarked. "There is no man in the world who can afford to despise the power of money," Estermen said quietly. "Are you here to offer me any?" "I am not. Have you anything to give in exchange for it?" Julien laughed a little shortly. "I imagined," he declared, "that with your first remarks you had climbed to the dizziest heights of impertinence. I perceive that I was mistaken. I am a discarded minister,"--dryly. "I may be supposed to have in my possession secrets for which your country would pay. Is it not to those facts that I am indebted for the honor of this visit?" "Not in the least," answered Estermen. "Our own Secret Service keeps us supplied with such information as we desire. My object in seeking you is this. The Prince von Falkenberg is in Paris for a few hours only. He wants to meet you. I have been ordered to arrange this meeting, if possible." Julien did not attempt to conceal his interest. "Why on earth didn't you say so at once?" he exclaimed. "What does he want of me?" Estermen shrugged his shoulders. "Who knows? Who knows what Falkenberg ever wants? He is here, there and everywhere--today in Paris, tomorrow in Berlin, next week in Moscow. Yet it is he, as you know well, who shapes the whole destinies of my country. It is he alone in whom the Emperor has blind and absolute confidence. If he holds up his hand, it is war. If he holds it down, it is peace." "What does he do in Paris?" Julien inquired. Estermen shook his head. "He arrived this morning and disappeared. Tonight he sent me orders that I was to search for you." "Where is he now?" Julien asked. "At eight o'clock tonight," Estermen said, "he declared himself to be Herr Carl Freudenberg, dealer in German toys. He dressed, dined at the Ambassadeurs with Mademoiselle Ixe from the Opera, sent for me, learned that I was at the Maison Leon d'Or, telephoned there, and all for this one thing--that I should bring you to him without a moment's delay." "But where is he now?" Julien asked again. Estermen glanced at the clock and at a piece of paper which he took from his pocket. "It is one o'clock within a few minutes," he remarked. "Herr Freudenberg is either at the Abbaye Theleme or the Rat Mort." Julien scarcely hesitated. "When you first came in," he admitted, "I felt like throwing you out. How you got here I don't know. I suppose it is no use complaining to the hotel people. But there is no man on the face of this earth in whom I am more interested than Falkenberg. I shall change my clothes, and in a quarter of an hour I am at your service. Wait for me downstairs." Estermen drew a little sigh of relief. "I shall await you, Sir Julien," he declared. All Paris seemed to be seeking distraction as they drove in the automobile along the Boulevard des Italiens. Julien sat with folded arms in the corner of the automobile. He had no fancy for his companion. He was anxious so far as possible to avoid speech with him. Estermen, on the contrary, seemed only too desirous of removing the impression of dislike of which he was acutely conscious. He talked the whole of the time of the cafes and the women, of everything he thought might be interesting to his companion. Julien listened in grim silence. Only once he interrupted. "What brings Herr Freudenberg to Paris?" he inquired once more. Estermen was suddenly reticent. "He has affairs here," he said. "He is also like us others--a man who loves his pleasure. You will find him tonight with a most charming companion--Mademoiselle Ixe of the Opera. Before the coming of Herr Freudenberg, I remember her well--the companion at times of many. To-day she is changed, _triste_ when he is not here, faithful in a most un-Parisianlike manner." They swung round to the left. "Herr Freudenberg," Estermen continued, "is a great lover of the night life of Paris. He goes from one cafe to the other. He is untired, sleepless. He seems to find inspiration where others find fatigue." Julien raised his eyebrows, but he said nothing. These were not his impressions of the man whom they were seeking! They drew up presently at the doors of the Abbaye Theleme. There were crowds of people trying to gain admission. Estermen elbowed his way through. "Herr Freudenberg?" he asked of the man who stood at the door. The man's forbidding face changed like magic. "Herr Freudenberg left but ten minutes ago for the Rat Mort. Those who inquired for him were to follow." Estermen nodded and touched Julien on the arm. "We will walk," he said. "It is at the corner there." They presented themselves at the doors of a smaller and dingier cafe. Estermen elbowed the way up the narrow stairs. They emerged in a small room, brilliantly lit and filled with people. The usual little band was playing gay music. A corpulent _maitre d'hotel_ bowed as they appeared. "Herr Freudenberg," Estermen began. The waiter's bow by this time was a different affair. "Monsieur will follow me," he invited. At the corner table at the far end of the room--the most desired of any--sat Herr Freudenberg with Mademoiselle Ixe by his side. They met the flower girl coming away with empty arms. The table of Herr Freudenberg was smothered with roses. There was a shade more color in the cheeks of Mademoiselle Ixe, in her eyes a light as soft as any which the eyes of a woman who loved could know. Herr Freudenberg, unruffled, had still the air of a man who finds life pleasant. As the two men came up the room, he rose and held out both his hands. "Ah!" he exclaimed, "it is indeed my friend of Berlin! Welcome, dear Sir Julien! We meet on neutral ground, is it not so? We meet now in the city of pleasures. Let us sit for a little time and talk, and forget that you and I once wrote a chapter together in the history--of toymaking. But first," he added, turning to Mademoiselle Ixe, "mademoiselle permits me to introduce a very dear and cherished acquaintance to an equally dear and cherished friend. This gentleman, dear Marguerite, and I make toys in different countries, and there was a time when it was necessary for us to consult together. So he came to Berlin and I have never forgotten his visit. For the present, join us, dear Julien. You permit that I call you by your first name? It is after midnight, and after midnight in Paris one permits everything. Now we drink together, we three, for Estermen must leave us, I know. We drink together to the making of toys, the building of toy palaces, and the love of one another. Come, Monsieur Albert, see that your _sommelier_ opens that bottle that you have chosen for us so carefully," he continued, turning to the manager who was hovering close at hand. "This is a meeting and we need the best wine that ever came from the vineyards of France. A dear friend, Albert. Bow low to him, indeed, for he is worthy of it. Afterwards we will perhaps eat something. Send your waiter. But above all, monsieur, see to it that mademoiselle with the fair curls dances once more. My friend, I think, would like to see her. And we must have music. Let the band never cease playing. Ah! it is here, dear Albert, that one learns to forget how strenuous life really is. It is here that one may unbend. The wine!" While Herr Freudenberg talked the _sommelier_ had gravely served the champagne in some tall and wonderful glasses brought from a private cabinet by Monsieur Albert himself to honor his most treasured visitors. Herr Freudenberg raised his glass, clinked it against the glass of mademoiselle, clinked it against Julien's glass. "Come," he cried, "to our better acquaintance, to our better understanding! Mademoiselle," he added, lowering his tone, "to the eternal continuance of those things which lie between you and me!" Estermen had departed and Julien breathed the freer for it. Mademoiselle Ixe chattered to him for a few moments, and Herr Freudenberg whispered in the ears of Albert, who withdrew at once. "One must eat," Herr Freudenberg declared. "Albert has some peaches, wonderful peaches from the gardens where the sun always shines. Peaches and macaroons--afterwards coffee. Ah! my friend, you remember those somber banquets when we all hated one another because we all fancied that the other wanted what we had a right to? Ugh! When I think of Berlin in those days, when no one smiled, when one's sense of humor was there only to be kept down with an iron hand, why, it gives one to weep! Mademoiselle, I have a prayer to make." "It is granted," she assured him softly. "Presently the orchestra shall play the music of Faust. You will sing to us? Tonight is one of my nights, never really perfect unless some minutes of it move to the music of your voice." She laughed softly. "Yes, monsieur, I will sing," she answered, "but not the Jewel Song tonight. Send the _chef d'orchestre_ to me." At the merest signal he was there with his violin under his arm. Mademoiselle whispered a word in his ear and he departed, all smiles. The selection which they were playing suddenly ceased. _Monsieur le chef_ alone played some Italian air, which no one wholly recognized but every one found familiar. Slowly he walked around the tables, playing still, always with his eyes upon Mademoiselle Ixe, and when at last he stood before her, she threw her head back and sang. The clatter of crockery diminished, the waiters paused in their tasks or crept on tiptoe about the place. Men and women stood up at their tables that they might see the singer better; conversation ceased. And all the time the _chef d'orchestre_ drew music from his violin, and mademoiselle, with half-closed eyes, her head thrown back, filled the whole room with melody. Even she herself knew that she was singing as she never sang at the Opera, as she had never sung when a great impressario had come to try her voice, as one sings only when the heart is shaking a little, and as she finished, the fingers of her left hand slowly crept across the table into the hand of Herr Freudenberg, the toymaker, and her last notes were sung almost in a whisper into his ears. The room rose up to applaud. The _chef d'orchestre_ went back to his place, bowing right and left. Herr Freudenberg raised the fingers that lay between his hand to his lips. "Ah, mademoiselle," he murmured, "I have no longer words!" Albert came back. Scarcely more than a look passed between him and Herr Freudenberg. Then the latter rose to his feet. "Come," he said, "a little surprise for you. You, too, dear Julien. I insist. This way." They passed from the room. As mademoiselle rose to her feet, people began once more to applaud. "Mademoiselle will sing again presently, perhaps," Herr Freudenberg answered a man who leaned forward. "We do not depart." He led the way to the head of the staircase and they passed into the back regions of the place--dim, ill-lit, mysterious. Albert, who had preceded them, threw open the door of a room. There was a small supper table laid for three, more flowers, more wine. "It is that one may talk for five minutes," Herr Freudenberg explained. "Mademoiselle!" But mademoiselle had already flitted away. The door somehow was closed, the two men were alone. _ |
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