He was wearing a dark blue overcoat of no particular cut, his aspect had no relief; yet those restless side-whiskers flanking his red mouth and the suspicious expression of his black eyes made him noticeable.This I regretted the more because I caught sight of two skulking fellows, looking very much like policemen in plain clothes, watching us from a corner of the great hall.I hurried my man into a fiacre.He had been travelling from early morning on cross-country lines and after we got on terms a little confessed to being very hungry and cold.His red lips trembled and I noted an underhand, cynical curiosity when he had occasion to raise his eyes to my face.I was in some doubt how to dispose of him but as we rolled on at a jog trot I came to the conclusion that the best thing to do would be to organize for him a shake-down in the studio.Obscure lodging houses are precisely the places most looked after by the police, and even the best hotels are bound to keep a register of arrivals.I was very anxious that nothing should stop his projected mission of courier to headquarters.As we passed various street corners where the mistral blast struck at us fiercely I could feel him shivering by my side.However, Therese would have lighted the iron stove in the studio before retiring for the night, and, anyway, I would have to turn her out to make up a bed on the couch.Service of the King! I must say that she was amiable and didn't seem to mind anything one asked her to do.Thus while the fellow slumbered on the divan I would sit upstairs in my room setting down on paper those great words of passion and sorrow that seethed in my brain and even must have forced themselves in murmurs on to my lips, because the man by my side suddenly asked me: "What did you say?" - "Nothing," Ianswered, very much surprised.In the shifting light of the street lamps he looked the picture of bodily misery with his chattering teeth and his whiskers blown back flat over his ears.But somehow he didn't arouse my compassion.He was swearing to himself, in French and Spanish, and I tried to soothe him by the assurance that we had not much farther to go."I am starving," he remarked acidly, and I felt a little compunction.Clearly, the first thing to do was to feed him.We were then entering the Cannebiere and as I didn't care to show myself with him in the fashionable restaurant where a new face (and such a face, too) would be remarked, I pulled up the fiacre at the door of the Maison Doree.That was more of a place of general resort where, in the multitude of casual patrons, he would pass unnoticed.
For this last night of carnival the big house had decorated all its balconies with rows of coloured paper lanterns right up to the roof.I led the way to the grand salon, for as to private rooms they had been all retained days before.There was a great crowd of people in costume, but by a piece of good luck we managed to secure a little table in a corner.The revellers, intent on their pleasure, paid no attention to us.Senor Ortega trod on my heels and after sitting down opposite me threw an ill-natured glance at the festive scene.It might have been about half-past ten, then.
Two glasses of wine he drank one after another did not improve his temper.He only ceased to shiver.After he had eaten something it must have occurred to him that he had no reason to bear me a grudge and he tried to assume a civil and even friendly manner.His mouth, however, betrayed an abiding bitterness.I mean when he smiled.In repose it was a very expressionless mouth, only it was too red to be altogether ordinary.The whole of him was like that:
the whiskers too black, the hair too shiny, the forehead too white, the eyes too mobile; and he lent you his attention with an air of eagerness which made you uncomfortable.He seemed to expect you to give yourself away by some unconsidered word that he would snap up with delight.It was that peculiarity that somehow put me on my guard.I had no idea who I was facing across the table and as a matter of fact I did not care.All my impressions were blurred;and even the promptings of my instinct were the haziest thing imaginable.Now and then I had acute hallucinations of a woman with an arrow of gold in her hair.This caused alternate moments of exaltation and depression from which I tried to take refuge in conversation; but Senor Ortega was not stimulating.He was preoccupied with personal matters.When suddenly he asked me whether I knew why he had been called away from his work (he had been buying supplies from peasants somewhere in Central France), Ianswered that I didn't know what the reason was originally, but Ihad an idea that the present intention was to make of him a courier, bearing certain messages from Baron H.to the Quartel Real in Tolosa.
He glared at me like a basilisk."And why have I been met like this?" he enquired with an air of being prepared to hear a lie.
I explained that it was the Baron's wish, as a matter of prudence and to avoid any possible trouble which might arise from enquiries by the police.
He took it badly."What nonsense." He was - he said - an employe (for several years) of Hernandez Brothers in Paris, an importing firm, and he was travelling on their business - as he could prove.
He dived into his side pocket and produced a handful of folded papers of all sorts which he plunged back again instantly.
And even then I didn't know whom I had there, opposite me, busy now devouring a slice of pate de foie gras.Not in the least.It never entered my head.How could it? The Rita that haunted me had no history; she was but the principle of life charged with fatality.Her form was only a mirage of desire decoying one step by step into despair.
Senor Ortega gulped down some more wine and suggested I should tell him who I was."It's only right I should know," he added.
This could not be gainsaid; and to a man connected with the Carlist organization the shortest way was to introduce myself as that "Monsieur George" of whom he had probably heard.
