The waiter who brought Felicia’s telegram into the smoking-room found Raine walking up and down, pipe in mouth, in a state of caged irritation. A fine, penetrating rain was falling outside, the wet dribbled down the windows, the air was impregnated with mist, and great rolls of fog hid the mountains. The guides had prophesied a clearing up of the weather at midday, but it was half-past eleven, and the prospect was growing drearier every minute. Hockmaster was yawning over a cigar and a battered copy of the Louisville Guardian which some compatriot had bequeathed to the hotel.
Raine seized the telegram eagerly, read it, crumpled it into his pocket in some excitement, and turned to the waiter.
“There is a diligence to Cluses—when does ifc start?”
“At 12.15, Monsieur.”
“And the train to Geneva?”
“At 5.50.”
“Good. Secure me a seat in the diligence, and have my bill made out.”
The waiter bowed and departed.
“I am sorry to break our engagement to-day, Hockmaster,” said Raine to the American, who had been watching the effect of the telegram with some curiosity, “but I must start for Geneva at once.”
“I like that,” replied Hockmaster; “it’s slick. Nothing like making up your mind in a minute. It’s the way to do business. I guess I’ll come too.”
“You’ll have a disgusting drive,” said Raine, viewing the proposal with less than his usual cordiality.
“That’s so,” retorted the other imperturbably, “I wasn’t expecting the sun to shine just because I choose to travel. I am a modest man.”
“Well, hurry up,” said Raine, seeing that the American was decided. “Perhaps you’re wise in getting out of this.”
“I should have done so a couple of days ago, if it had not been for you. You seem to have a sort of way of pushing the lonesomeness off people’s shoulders.”
There was an ingenuous frankness, an artless simplicity in the man’s tone, that touched a soft spot in Raine’s nature.
“That’s devilish good of you,” he replied, with an Englishman’s awkwardness of acknowledgment. “You have done me a good turn too. Come along.”
In spite of Hockmaster’s special efforts towards entertainment, the drive to Cluses was particularly dreary. The rain never ceased falling, the damp hung thick upon leaves and branches, and clustered like wool among the pine stems. The mountains loomed vague and indistinct, fading away into mist in the middle-distance. The Arve, as the road approached it, seethed below, a muddy torrent. The desolate district beyond St. Martin heaved like an Aceldama of mud and detritus oozing through the fog.
Besides external depression, certain anxieties lay on Raine’s mind. His father’s health was never very strong. A dangerous illness was to be dreaded. His deep affection for his father magnified his fears. There was Katherine, too. His heart yearned towards her. He closed his eyes to the hopeless landscape, and evoked her picture as she stood in pale saffron and sapphire and a dash of pale gold, the morning’s colours, in the morning sunlight. But why had she left him so long without news of her? A lover’s question, which he sought to answer lover-wise.
Cluses at last, the little watchmakers’ town; an hour’s wait for the train. They went into a café and sat down. After a while Hockmaster rose, went up to an old plate-glass mirror on one side of the room, smoothed his thin sandy hair with his fingers, arranged his cravat, and then returned. With the exception of two elderly townsmen playing at dominoes in the corner, while the host sat looking on in his shirtsleeves, they were the only customers. They conversed in desultory fashion on the rain, the journey, the forlorn aspect of the place.
“If we had a town with an industry like this one in America,” said Hockmaster, after his second petit verre from the carafe in front of him, “we should hitch it on to Wall Street and make a go-ahead city of it in a fortnight, and manufacture timepieces for half the universe.”
“That would be rather rough on the universe,” said Raine idly. “American watches—”
“The very tip-topest articles in the world!” interrupted Hockmaster warmly. “Just look at this!”
He drew from his pocket a magnificent gold watch, opened all its cases rapidly, and displayed the works before Raine’s eyes.
“There! See whether that can be beaten in Europe. Made, every bit of it, in Chicago. That watch cost me 450 dollars. It did that.”
Raine admired the watch, mollified the owner, who drank another glass of fine champagne on the strength of his country’s reputation. Then with an inconsequence that was one of the quaint features of conversation:
“Mr. Chetwynd,” he said, lighting a fresh cigar, “I am about tired to death of these gilded saloons in continental hotels. Imitation palaces are not in my line. I should like something homier. I was thinking, if you could recommend me a snug sort of boarding-house in Geneva, it would be very good of you.”
“Why not come to the one I am staying at?” said Raine good-naturedly. “There is a very companionable set of people there.”
“Right,” replied Hockmaster. “That’s real kind of you. When you come to Chicago, you track straight for Joseph K. Hockmaster. You’ll find gratitude.”
“My dear fellow!” laughed Raine deprecatingly.
“No,” said the other in his serious way. “I repeat, it’s real kind. Most of your countrymen would have shunted me off to another establishment. I think I tire folks by talking. I am always afraid. That’s why I tell you to mention when you grow weary of conversation. It won’t offend me. It’s as natural for me to talk as it is for a slug to leave his slime behind him. I think I’m chock full of small ideas and they overflow in a liquid kind of way. Now big ideas are solider and roll out more slowly—like yours.”
And he poured himself out the last glass of fine champagne that remained in the decanter.
They reached the pension at half-past seven. Mme. Boccard appeared at Raine’s summons, wreathed in smiles, welcomed Hockmaster graciously and assigned him a room. Dinner had just begun, she had put it back half an hour, in compliment to Mr. Chetwynd. It was charming of him to have sent her a private telegram. Everyone was well; the professor had taken a turn for the better during the day.
Raine went straight up to his father, and, to his intense relief, found his fears of a dangerous illness to be almost groundless.
“And Felicia?” he asked, after the first affectionate questionings.
“Well,” replied the old man—“very bonny. Do you know, Raine, I think we may have made a mistake. It has been all my fault. It would be the greatest kindness to forget—and to forgive your meddling old father.” Raine laughed in his kind way, reassuring the old man.
“It was not I that sent for you,” continued the latter. “It was Felicia. There was no longer any reason for you to stop away—and she insisted. Girls’ hearts are mysterious books. Don’t search into hers, Raine. Forget it—seek your happiness where it is truest, my son—and then it will be mine.” Raine did not press the subject. He was somewhat puzzled, but he gathered that she had spoken and that silence would be the more delicate part. He postponed further consideration of the matter; for which he may be forgiven, as the longing for Katherine was tugging at his heart-strings. Besides, he was honestly very hungry, and dinner was in progress.
After a hurried toilet he went down to the dining-room. The first sound that struck his ear, as he entered, was the pop of a champagne cork and the voice of Hockmaster, who was sitting at the lower end, with his back to the door, next to Mme. Boccard. The waiter was in the act of filling his glass from a large bottle of champagne. The blaze of light after the darkness of the corridors dazzled Raine, and he paused for a second on the threshold, glancing up the table. He was greeted by two rows of welcoming faces turned towards him and a chorus of kind salutations. The old commandant stretched up his hand behind his chair and gave a vigorous handshake. Mme. Popea looked up at him, with a smile over her good-natured face, as he passed along. But he had eyes only for Katherine. A curious little spasm passed through him, as he met her glance. It seemed to contain a world of fears. She was looking pale and ill.
Mme. Boccard, in her high-pitched voice, directed him to take the professor’s place at the head of the table. He found himself thus between Felicia and Katherine. Felicia greeted him naturally. Katherine gave him a cold, trembling hand, and an almost furtive look. Evidently something had happened during his absence, ............