“I’ll think about it.”
“Eleven o’clock, eh?”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Friends ever—Ciccio—eh?” Geoffrey held out his hand.
Ciccio slowly took it. The two men leaned to each other and kissed farewell, on either cheek.
“Tomorrow, Cic’—”
“Au revoir, Gigi.”
Ciccio dropped on to his bicycle and was gone in a breath. Geoffrey waited a moment for a tram which was rushing brilliantly up to him in the rain. Then he mounted and rode in the opposite direction. He went straight down to Lumley, and Madame had to remain on tenterhooks till ten o’clock.
She heard the news, and said:
“Tomorrow I go to fetch him.” And with this she went to bed.
In the morning she was up betimes, sending a note to Alvina. Alvina appeared at nine o’clock.
“You will come with me?” said Madame. “Come. Together we will go to Knarborough and bring back the naughty Ciccio. Come with me, because I haven’t all my strength. Yes, you will? Good! Good! Let us tell the young men, and we will go now, on the tramcar.”
“But I am not properly dressed,” said Alvina.
“Who will see?” said Madame. “Come, let us go.”
They told Geoffrey they would meet him at the corner of Hampden Street at five minutes to eleven.
“You see,” said Madame to Alvina, “they are very funny, these young men, particularly Italians. You must never let them think you have caught them. Perhaps he will not let us see him—who knows? Perhaps he will go off to Italy all the same.”
They sat in the bumping tramcar, a long and wearying journey. And then they tramped the dreary, hideous streets of the manufacturing town. At the corner of the street they waited for Geoffrey, who rode up muddily on his bicycle.
“Ask Ciccio to come out to us, and we will go and drink coffee at the Geisha Restaurant—or tea or something,” said Madame.
Again the two women waited wearily at the street-end. At last Geoffrey returned, shaking his head.
“He won’t come?” cried Madame.
“No.”
“He says he is going back to Italy?”
“To London.”
“It is the same. You can never trust them. Is he quite obstinate?”
Geoffrey lifted his shoulders. Madame could see the beginnings of defection in him too. And she was tired and dispirited.
“We shall have to finish the Natcha-Kee-Tawara, that is all,” she said fretfully.
Geoffrey watched her stolidly, impassively.
“Dost thou want to go with him?” she asked suddenly.
Geoffrey smiled sheepishly, and his colour deepened. But he did not speak.
“Go then—” she said. “Go then! Go with him! But for the sake of my honour, finish this week at Woodhouse. Can I make Miss Houghton’s father lose these two nights? Where is your shame? Finish this week and then go, go—But finish this week. Tell Francesco that. I have finished with him. But let him finish this engagement. Don’t put me to shame, don’t destroy my honour, and the honour of the Natcha-Kee-Tawara. Tell him that.”
Geoffrey turned again into the house. Madame, in her chic little black hat and spotted veil, and her trim black coat-and-skirt, stood there at the street-corner staring before her, shivering a little with cold, but saying no word of any sort.
Again Geoffrey appeared out of the doorway. His face was impassive.
“He says he doesn’t want,” he said.
“Ah!” she cried suddenly in French, “the ungrateful, the animal! He shall suffer. See if he shall not suffer. The low canaille, without faith or feeling. My Max, thou wert right. Ah, such canaille should be beaten, as dogs are beaten, till they follow at heel. Will no one beat him for me, no one? Yes. Go back. Tell him before he leaves England he shall feel the hand of Kishwégin, and it shall be heavier than the Black Hand. Tell him that, the coward, that causes a woman’s word to be broken against her will. Ah, canaille, canaille! Neither faith nor feeling, neither faith nor feeling. Trust them not, dogs of the south.” She took a few agitated steps down the pavement. Then she raised her veil to wipe away her tears of anger and bitter disappointment.
“Wait a bit,” said Alvina. “I’ll go.” She was touched.
“No. Don’t you!” cried Madame.
“Yes I will,” she said. The light of battle was in her eyes. “You’ll come with me to the door,” she said to Geoffrey.
Geoffrey started obediently, and led the way up a long narrow stair, covered with yellow-and-brown oilcloth, rather worn, on to the top of the house.
“Ciccio,” he said, outside the door.
“Oui!” came the curly voice of Ciccio.
Geoffrey opened the door. Ciccio was sitting on a narrow bed, in a rather poor attic, under the steep slope of the roof.
“Don’t come in,” said Alvina to Geoffrey, looking over her shoulder at him as she entered. Then she closed the door behind her, and stood with her back to it, facing the Italian. He sat loose on the bed, a cigarette between his fingers, dropping ash on the bare boards between his feet. He looked up curiously at Alvina. She stood watching him with wide, bright blue eyes, smiling slightly, and saying nothing. He looked up at her steadily, on his guard, from under his long black lashes.
“Won’t you come?” she said, smiling and looking into his eyes. He flicked off the ash of his cigarette with his little finger. She wondered why he wore the nail of his little finger so long, so very long. Still she smiled at him, and still he gave no sign.
“Do come!” she urged, never taking her eyes from him.
He made not the slightest movement, but sat with his hands dropped between his knees, watching her, the cigarette wavering up its blue thread of smoke.
“Won’t you?” she said, as she stood with her back to the door. “Won’t you come?” She smiled strangely and vividly.
Suddenly she took a pace forward, stooped, watching his face as if timidly, caught his brown hand in her own and lifted it towards herself. His hand started, dropped the cigarette, but was not withdrawn.
“You will come, won’t you?” she said, smiling gently into his strange, watchful
