The Forbidden Territory Read Online Free Page B

where there is not Jewish blood.”
    Simon looked round the big lounge-hall. “Well then we’re in good company tonight,” he said. He smiled and waved a greeting as he caught sight of his friend, Richard Eaton, who was one of the Christian minority.
    “I would like champagne,” declared Madame Karkoff, suddenly—throwing back her dark head, and exhaling a cloud of cigarette-smoke. “Lots and lots of champagne!”
    “All right.” Simon stood up. “It’ll be in the billiard-room, I expect.”
    She made no attempt to rise. “Bring it to me “ere,” she said with a little shrug of the shoulders.
    “Ner.” He shook his head rapidly as he uttered the curious negative which he often used. It came of his saying “no” without troubling to close the lips of his full mouth. “Ner—you come with me, it’s so crowded here.”
    For a moment her mouth went sullen as she looked at the slim figure, with its narrow stooping shoulders, that stood before her, then she rose languidly.
    He piloted her through the crush to the buffer in the billiards-room. An obsequious waiter proffered two glasses; they might have held a fair-sized cocktail, but they were not Simon’s idea of glasses for champagne. He waved them aside quickly with one word—“tumblers!”
    Two small tumblers were produced and filled by the waiter. As Simon handed one to Madame Valeria Petrovna Karkoff she smiled approval.
    “They are meeserable—those little glasses for champagne, no good at all—all the same, chin-chin!”
    Simon laughed, they finished another tumbler apiece before they left the billiards-room. “Come on,” he said. “I think Maliperi is going to sing.”
    “Maliperi?” she exclaimed, opening wide her eyes. “Come then, why do we stay ’ere?” and gripping him impulsively by the hand she ran him down the long passage to the music-room at the back of the house.
    They stood together in a corner while Maliperi sang, and marvelled at her art, although the magnificent voice that had filled so many opera houses was too great for the moderate-sized room, and a certain portion of its beauty lost.
    “Let us ’ave more champagne,” said Valeria Petrovna, when it was over. “I feel I will enjoy myself tonight.”
    Simon led the way back to the buffet, and very shortly two more tumblers stood before them. As they were about to drink, a big red-headed man put his hand familiarly on her shoulder, and spoke thickly, in what Simon could only imagine to be Russian.
    She shook his hand off with an impatient gesture, and answered him sharply in the same tongue.
    He brought his rather flabby, white face, with its short, flat nose, and small, hot eyes, down to the level of hers for a moment with a wicked look, and spoke again.
    Her eyes lit with a sudden fire, and she almost spat the words back at him—so that her melodious, husky voice became quite harsh for a moment. He turned, and stared angrily in Simon’s face. With his great, broad shoulders, powerful jaw, and receding forehead, he reminded Simon of a gorilla; then with a sudden scowl he swung upon his heel and turned away.
    “Who—er—is that?” Simon asked, curiously, although he knew already who the man must be.
    She shrugged—smiling again in a moment. “Oh, that—that ees Nicolai Alexis—Kommissar Leshkin. We travel together, you know—’e is a little drunk tonight, I think.”
    After that they heard Capello play; the Maestro was in form and drew marvellous music from his cherished violin.
    “Oh, it ’ees tears ’e makes me cry,” Valeria Petrovna exclaimed passionately after he had played one aria, and the gallant Simon found it difficult not to cry out with pain, as she unconsciously dug her sharp nails into his hand which she held between her own.
    They returned to the buffet and drank more tumblers of champagne, then Simon suggested that she might like to powder her nose. She seemed surprised at the suggestion, but accepted it; actually it was Simon’s way of