Lou was sitting on the arm of the couch; her ivorywhite, long crooked fingers groping the dark girl's hair. Somehow or other I felt nauseated; I was uneasy, embarrassed. For the first time in my life I didn't know how to behave.
A thought popped into my mind: it was simply fatigue-I needn't bother about that.
As if in answer to my thought, Lou took a small cut-glass bottle with a gold-chased top from her pocket, unscrewed it and shook out some cocaine on the back of her hand. She flashed a provocative glance in my direction.
The studio suddenly filled with the reverberation of her chant :
" O Thou naked virgin of love, that art caught in a net of wild roses ! I adore Thee, Evoe ! I adore Thee, I A O! "
"Quite so," agreed King Lamus cheerfully. " You'll excuse me, I know, if I ask whether you have any great experience of the effects of cocaine."
Lou glowered at him. I preferred to meet him frankly. I deliberately put a large dose on the back of my hand and sniffed it up. Before I had finished, the effect had occurred. I felt myself any man's master.
" Well, as a matter of fact," I said superciliously, to-night's the first time I ever took it, and it strikes me as pretty good stuff."
Lamus smiled enigmatically.
" Ah, yes, what does the old poet say ? Milton, is it ?"
"Stab your demoniac smile to my brain, Soak me in cognac, love, and cocaine."
"How silly you are," cried Lou. " Cocaine wasn't invented in the time of Milton."
" Was that Milton's fault ? " retorted King Lamus. The inaptitude, the disconnectedness, of his thought was somehow disconcerting.
He turned his back on her and looked me straight in the face.
" It strikes you as pretty good stuff, Sir Peter," he said, " and so it is. I'll have a dose myself to show there's no ill-feeling."
He suited the action to the words.
I had to admit that the man began to intrigue me. What was his game ?
" I hear you're one of our best flying men, Sir Peter," he went on.
" I have flown a bit now and then," I admitted.
" Well, an aeroplane's a pretty good means of travel, but unless you're an expert, you're likely to make a pretty sticky finish."
"Thank you very much," I said, nettled at his tone. " As it happens, I'm a medical student."
" Oh, that's all right, then, of course."
He agreed with a courtesy which somehow cut deeper into my self-esteem than if lie had openly challenged my competence.
" In that case," he continued, " I hope to arouse your professional interest in a case of what I think you will agree is something approaching indiscretion. My little friend here arrived to-night, or rather last night, full up to the neck with morphia. Dissatisfied with results, she swallowed a large dose of Anbalonium Lewinii, reckless of the pharmaceutical incompatability. Presumably to pass away the time, she has drunk an entire bottle of Grand Marnier Cordon Rouge ; and now, feeling herself slightly indisposed, for some reason at which it would be presumptuous to guess, she is setting things right by an occasional indulgence in this pretty good stuff of yours."
He had turned away from me and was watching the girl intently. My glance followed his. I saw her deep blue skin fade to a dreadful pallor. She had lost her healthy colour ; she suggested a piece of raw meat which is just beginning to go bad.
I jumped to my feet. I knew instinctively that the girl was about to collapse. The owner of the studio was bending over her. He looked at me over his shoulder out of the corners of his eyes.
"A case of indiscretion," he observed, with bitter irony.
For the next quarter of an hour he fought for the girl's life. King Lamus was a very skilled physician, though he had never studied medicine officially.
But I was not aware of what was going on. Cocaine was singing in my veins. I cared for nothing. Lou came over impulsively and flung herself across my knees. She held the goblet of Benedictine to my mouth, chanting ecstatically :
" O Thou sparkling wine-cup of light, whose foaming is the heart's blood of the stars ! I adore Thee, Evoe! I adore Thee, I A O ! "
We swooned into a deep, deep trance. Lamus interrupted us.
" You mustn't think me inhospitable," he said. " She's come round all right ; but I ought to drive her home. Make yourselves at home while I'm away, or let me take you where you want to go."
Another interruption occurred. The bell rang. Lamus sprang to the door. A tall old man was standing on the steps.
" Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law," said Lamus.
" Love is the law, love under will," replied the other. It was like a challenge and countersign.
" I've got to talk to you for an hour."
" Of course, I'm at your service," replied our host. The only thing is-" He broke off.
My brain was extraordinarily clear. My selfconfidence was boundless. I felt inspired. I saw the way out.
A little devil laughed in my heart: " What an excellent scheme to be alone with Lou I "
" Look here, Mr. Lamus," I said, speaking very quickly, " I can drive any kind of car. Let me take Miss Hallaj home."
The Arab girl was on her feet behind me.
" Yes, yes," she said, in a faint, yet excited voice. "That will be much the best thing. Thanks awfully."
They were the first words she had spoken.
" Yes, yes," chimed in Lou. " I want to drive in the moonlight."
The little group was huddled in the open doorway. On one side the dark crimson tides of electricity on the other, the stainless splendour of our satellite.
" O Thou frail bluebell of moonlight, that art lost in the gardens of the stars ! I adore Thee, Evoe ! I adore Thee, I A O ! "
The scene progressed with the vivid rapidity of a dream. We were in the garage-out of it-into the streets-at the Egyptian girl's hotel-and then
Chapter III.
Phaeton
Lou clung to me as I gripped the wheel. There was no need for us to speak. The trembling torrent of our passion swept us away. I had forgotten all about Lamus and his car. We were driving like the devil to Nowhere. A mad thought crossed mv mind. It was thrown up by my " Unconscious," by the essential self of my being. Then some familiar object in the streets reminded me that I was not driving back to the studio. Some force in myself, of which I was not aware, had turned my face towards Kent. I was interpreting myself to myself. I knew what I was going to do. We were bound for Barley Grange; and then, eh, the wild moonlight ride to Paris.
The idea had been determined in me without any intervention of my own. It had been, in a way, the of an equation of which the terms were firstly, a sort of mad identification of Lou with all one's romantic ideas of moonlight ; then my physical habit as a flying man ; and thirdly, the traditional connection of Paris with extravagant gaiety and luxuriant love.
I was quite aware at the time that my moral sense and my mental sense had been thrown overboard for the moment but my attitude was simply: " Goodbye, Jonah ! "
For the first time in my life I was being absolutely myself, freed from all the inhibitions of body, intellect, and training which keep us, normally, in what we call sane courses of action.
I seem to remember asking myself if I was insane, and answering, " Of course I am-sanity is a compromise. Sanity is the thing that keeps one