Back Aa

Max

Close

<h2>CHAPTER XXXVIII</h2> <div class="first">THE fifth floor was dim and silent, the door of M. Cartel's appartement was closed; but Max, mounting the stairs two steps at a time, was not daunted by silence or lack of light. Max was once again a prey to impulse, and under the familiar tyranny, his blood burned—raced in his veins, sang in his cars.</div> Without an instant's pause, he knocked on M. Cartel's door, and when his knock was answered by Jacqueline—fair and cool-looking, oven in the great heat—words rushed from him as they had been wont to rush when life was a gay affair. "You are alone, Jacqueline?" Jacqueline nodded quickly, comprehending a crisis. "Ah, I thank God!" He caught both her hands; he gave a little laugh that ended in a sob; he passed into the appartement, drawing her with him. "Oh, la, la!" she cried, hiding her emotion in flippancy, "you take my breath away." Max laughed again. "You see I've lost my own!" She gave a scornful, familiar toss of the head. "Do not be foolish! What has happened?" "I have made a discovery, Jacqueline. Youth comes but once!" "Indeed! You need not have left the rue Müller to learn that." "It comes but once, and while it is with me I am going to look it in the face." His words tumbled forth, pell-mell, and as he spoke he pulled her forcibly into the living-room. "Jacqueline, I am serious. I have been down in hell; I must see heaven, or my faith is lost." Jacqueline stood very still, making no effort to loose the hot clasp of his hands, but all at once her gaze concentrated piercingly. "You have sent for him!" she exclaimed. "I have! Oh, I may be weak, but listen! listen! In the old days when the world was religious and people observed Lent, there was always Mi-Carême, was there not? Well, I have fasted, and now I must feast." They gazed at each other; the one aglow with anticipation, the other with curiosity. "You have sent for him—at last?" "I have sent a telegram with these words: 'Meet me at midday on Tuesday in the Place de la Concorde.—MAXINE.'" "And this is Friday," said Jacqueline. "In four days' time you will see him again!" "Again!" Max spoke the word inaudibly. "And—when you meet?" Jacqueline's blue eyes were sharp as needle-points. Max colored to the temples. "Ma chérie, I have not even thought! All I know is that youth comes but once, and that youth is courage. I have been a coward—I am going to be brave." "You are going—to confess?" Max said nothing, but with her woman's instinct for such things, Jacqueline read assent in the silence. "Then the end is assured! He will take you—with your will, or without! Monsieur Max, or the princess!" Max shook his head. "I do not think so. But that is outside the moment—that is the afterward. First there must be midday and the Place de la Concorde! First there must be my Mi-Carême—my hour!" "Ah!" whispered the little Jacqueline, "your hour!" And who shall say what memories glinted through her quick brain—what conjurings of the first waltz with M. Cartel at the Moulin de la Galette, and the last waltz at the Bal Tabarin, when she stepped through the tawdry doorway into her paradise? "Your hour! And where will it be spent—madame?" "Ah!" Max's eyes sought heaven or, in lieu of heaven, M. Cartel's ceiling; Max's hands freed Jacqueline's and flew out in ecstatic gesture. "Ah, that is for the gods to say, chérie! And the gods know best." <hr style='width: 65%;'> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

1 of 2

2 of 2