The Arrow of Gold: A Story Between Two Notes

that I had my hat on my head. This has its importance because after what I had said to her upstairs it must have convinced her that I was going out on some midnight business. I passed her withou

he staircase with hushed footsteps, as though there had been a mortally sick person somewhere in the house. And the only person that could have answered to that description was Se?or Ortega. I moved on, stealthy, absorbed, undecided; asking myself earnestly: "What on earth am I going to do with him?" That exclusive preoccupation of my mind was as dangerous to Se?or Ortega as typhoid fever would have been. It strikes me that this comparison is very exact. People reco

on of my intelligence before the problem; or rather that the problem had dispossessed my intelligence and reigned in its stead side by side with a superstitious awe. A dreadful order seemed to lurk in the darkest shadows of life. The madness of that Carlist with the soul of a Jacobin,

us above all safeguards, above restraining principles, above all littlenesses of self-possessio

ad remained with me secret, intact, invincible. Before the danger of the situation it sprang, full of life, up in arms-the undying child of immortal love. What incited me was independent of ho

forward for many reasons, more or less optimistic, but mainly because I have no homicidal vein in my composition. The disposition to gloat over homicide was in that miserable creature in the studio, the potential Jacobin; in that confounded buyer of agricultural produce, the punctual employé of Hernandez Brothers, the jealous wretch with an obscene tongue and an imagination of the same kind to drive him mad. I thought of him without pity but also without

hen it occurred to me that Blunt's former room would be an extremely good place to keep a watch from. I knew that room. When Henry Allègre gave the house to Rita in the early days (long before he made his will) he had planned a complete renovation and this room had been meant for the drawing-room. Furniture had been made for it specially, upholstered in beautiful ribbed stuff, made to order, of dull gold colour with a pale blue tracery of arabesques and oval medallions enclosing Rita's monogram, repeated on the backs of chairs and sofas, and on the heavy curtains reaching from ceiling to floor. To the same time belonged the ebony and bronze doors, the silver statuette at the foot of the stairs, the forged iron balustrade reproducing ri

ception. No voice came from it, but nothing could have stopped me now. As I turned round to shut the door behind me noiselessly I caught sight of a woman's dress on a chair, of other articles of apparel scattered about. The mahogany bed with a piece of light silk which Therese found somewhere and used for a counterpane was a magnificent combination of white and crimson between the gleaming surfaces of dark wood; and the whole room h

e golden mist of walls and draperies round an extremely conspicuous pair of black stockings thrown over a music stool which remained motionless. The si

eart began to beat violently. I listened to the end without moving, "Can't you make up y

n the house was enough to paralyze me; but I was also overcome by an enormous sense of relief, by the assurance of security for her and for myself. I didn't even ask myself how she came there. It was enough for me that she was not in Tolosa. I could have smiled at the thought that all I had to do now was to hasten the departure of that abominable lunatic-for Tolosa: an easy task, almost no task at all. Yes, I would have smiled, had not I felt outraged by the presence of Se?

the freshness of detail: altogether ravishing in the inspired strength of the modelling. That precious head reposed in the palm of her hand; the face was slightly flushed (with anger perhaps). She kept her eyes obstinately fixed on the pages of a book which she was holding with her other hand. I had the time to lay my infinite adoration at her feet whose white insteps gleamed below the dark edge of the fur out of quilted blue silk bedroom slippers, embroidered with small pearl

fore Se?or Ortega, had driven to the house, and after having something to eat had become for the rest of the evening the helpless prey of her sister who had fawned and scolded and wheedled and threatened in a way that outraged all Rita's feelings. Seizing this unexpected occasion Therese had displayed a distracting versatility of sentiment: rapacity, virtue, piety, spite, and false tenderness-while, characteristically enough, she unpacked the dressing-bag, helped the sinner to get ready for bed, brushed her hair, and fin

fire, and lay down. She didn't hear the slightest noise of any sort till she heard me shut the door gently. Quietness of movement was one of Therese's accomplishments, and the harassed heiress of the Allègre millions naturally thought it was her sister coming again to renew the scene. Her heart sank within

only her other hand flew to the edges of the fur coat, gripping them together over her breast. Observing t

u should be here?" she said

I said. "Would you l

l; her fingers still

has ha

ie between us is broken. I don't know that it was ever very close. It w

ympathy on her part. She raised herself on her elbow

ssel. It was awful. I feel like a m

hy

Don't you know that love and

ver, if you hadn't had to lose your love. O

d us all from any plain danger. But this was a betrayal. It was-neve

uld it b

so many kinds of them. This was a betrayed plan, but one can be

ou doing here?"

her mistress. That girl of late had looked so perturbed and worried that the sensitive Rita, fearing that she was tired of her place, proposed to settle a sum of money on her which would have enabled her to devote herself entirely to her aged parents. And did I know what that extraordinary girl said? She had said: "Don't let Madame think that I would be too proud to accept anything whatever from her; but I can't even dream of leaving Madame. I believe Madame has no friends. Not one." So instead of a large sum of money Do?a Ri

t seemed always to watch unimaginable things, that underlying faint ripple of gaiety that played under all her moods as though it had been a gift from the high gods moved to pity for

ons. One of them is that I

didn't

N

ked to you

ver," I said. Then I asked in my t

she

did not mean us to

did I,

e words? You seem to use them as if they were a sort of formul

en as if something had happened to her vitality she sa

to hurt my feeli

at: for want of something more amusing to do. You don't pretend to make me belie

On your own showing your life seems to be a continuous running away. You have just run away from Paris. Where will you run to-morrow? What are you ev

t my natural anger, my just fury be disarmed by any assumption of pathos or dignity. I suppose I was really out of my mi

ithout a fortune! But here there is nothing worthy of your talents. No, there is no longer anything worth any sort of trouble here. There isn't even that ridiculous Monsieur George. I understand that the

don't let her come i

f the voice. They were also impressive by their suggestion of something practical, utilitar

e room I will confess to you that I can't very well do it

ether would be too much for me to-night. Why don't you go

no movement and heard no sound from her. In one place a bit of the fur coat touched my cheek softly, but no forgiving hand came to rest on my bowed head. I only breathed deeply the faint scent of violets, her own particular fragrance enveloping my body, penetrating my very heart with an inconceivable intimacy, bringing me closer to her than the closest embrace, and yet so subtle that I sensed her existence in me only as a great, glowing, indeterminate tenderness, som

. It seemed to me that it was only the tenacity of my sentiment that held that woman's body, extended and tranquil above the flood. But when I ventured at last to look at her face I saw her flushed, her teeth clenched-it was visible-her nostrils dilated, and in her narrow, level-glancing eyes a look of inward and frightened ecstasy. The edges of the fur coat had fallen open and I was moved to turn away. I had the same impression as on the evening we parted that some

moving without ever being sad, a little wistful perhaps and always th

ou thinking

sofa cushion bearing like everything else in that room the decoratively enlaced letters of her monogram; her face a little pale now, with the crimson lob

se as this. I see you now lying on this couch but that is only the insensible phantom of the real you that is in me. And it is the easier for me to feel this because that image which others see and call by your name-how am I to know that it is anything else but an enchanting mist? You have always eluded me except in one or tw

k. She made no sound. She didn't offer to stir. She didn't move

ected. You are a

ht away from me, straight at