Cité Chatter

She seemed ill and weak and worn out, and insisted on keeping the Laird's hand in hers.

'What's the matter with Svengali? He must be dead!'

They all three looked at each other, perplexed.

'Ah! he's dead! I can see it in your faces. He'd got heart disease. I'm sorry! oh, very sorry indeed! He was always very kind, poor Svengali!'

'Yes. He's dead,' said Taffy.

'And Gecko--dear little Gecko--is he dead too? I saw him last night-- he warmed my hands and feet: where were we?'

'No. Gecko's not dead. But he's had to be locked up for a little while. He struck Svengali, you know. You saw it all.'

'I? No! I never saw it. But I dreamt something like it! Gecko with a knife, and people holding him, and Svengali bleeding on the ground. That was just before Svengali's illness. He'd cut himself in the neck, you know--with a rusty nail, he told me. I wonder how?...But it was wrong of Gecko to strike him. They were such friends. Why did he?'

'Well--it was because Svengali struck you with his conductor's wand when you were rehearsing. Struck you on the fingers and made you cry! don't you remember?'

'Struck me! rehearsing?--made me cry! what are you talking about, dear Taffy? Svengali never struck me! He was kindness itself--always! and what should I rehearse?'

'Well, the songs you were to sing at the theatre in the evening.'

'Sing at the theatre! I never sang at any theatre--except last night, if that big place was a theatre! and they didn't seem to like it! I'll take precious good care never to sing in a theatre again! How they howled! and there was Svengali in the box opposite, laughing at me. Why was I taken there? and why did that funny little Frenchman in the white waistcoat ask me to sing? I know very well I can't sing well enough to sing in a place like that! What a fool I was! It all seems like a bad dream! What was it all about? Was it a dream, I wonder!'

'Well--but don't you remember singing at Paris, in the Salle des Bashibazoucks--and at Vienna--St. Petersburg--lots of places?'

'What nonsense, dear--you're thinking of some one else! I never sang anywhere! I've been to Vienna and St. Petersburg--but I never sang there--good heavens!'

Then there was a pause, and our three friends looked at her helplessly.

Little Billee said: 'Tell me, Trilby--what made you cut me dead when I bowed to you in the Place de la Concorde, and you were riding with Svengali in that swell carriage?'

'I never rode in a swell carriage with Svengali! Omnibuses were more in our line! You're dreaming, dear Little Billee--you're taking me for somebody else; and as for my cutting you--why, I'd sooner cut myself---into little pieces!'

'Where were you staying with Svengali in Paris?'

'I really forget. Were we in Paris? Oh yes, of course. Hotel Bertrand, Place Notre Dame des Victoires.'

'How long have you been going about with Svengali?'

'Oh, months, years--I forget. I was very ill. He cured me.'

'Ill! What was the matter?'

'Oh! I was mad with grief, and pain in my eyes, and wanted to kill myself, when I lost my dear little Jeannot, at Vibraye. I fancied I hadn't been careful enough with him. I was crazed! Don't you remember writing to me there, Taffy--through Angele Boisse? Such a sweet letter you wrote! I know it by heart! And you too, Sandy'; and she kissed him. 'I wonder where they are, your letters? I've got nothing of my own in the world--not even your dear letters--nor Little Billee's-- such lots of them!

'Well, Svengali used to write to me too--and then he got my address from Angele. .. .

'When Jeannot died, I felt I must kill myself or get away from Vibraye--get away from the people there; so when he was buried I cut my hair short and got a workman's cap and blouse and trousers and walked all the way to Paris without saying anything to anybody. I didn't want anybody to know; I wanted to escape from Svengali, who wrote that he was coming there to fetch me. I wanted to hide in Paris. When I got there at last it was two o'clock in the morning, and I was in dreadful pain--and I'd lost all my money--thirty francs--through a hole in my trousers' pocket. Besides, I had a row with a carter in the Halle. He thought I was a man, and hit me and gave me a black eye, just because I patted his horse and fed it with a carrot I'd been trying to eat myself. He was tipsy, I think. Well, I looked over the bridge at the river--just by the Morgue--and wanted to jump in. But the Morgue sickened me, so I hadn't the pluck. Svengali used to be always talking about the Morgue, and my going there some day. He used to say he'd come and look at me there, and the idea made me so sick I couldn't. I got bewildered and quite stupid.