Paths of Glory Read online

  “I’ll take all of them,” said George.

  The assistant looked uncertain, but when George handed over the cash, he shrugged his shoulders and deposited the money in the till.

  George was admiring a piece of jewelry in the display cabinet when the assistant handed back his change. “How much is that?” he asked, pointing to one of the velvet stands.

  “Which currency, sir?”

  “Pounds,” replied George, taking out his checkbook.

  The young man ran his finger down a line of figures on a card attached to the back wall. “Thirty-two pounds, sir.”

  George wrote out a check for next month’s salary, while the assistant wrapped the tiny gift.

  George made his way back to the dining car with the papers under one arm, having put the gift in his jacket pocket. As he entered the next carriage, he glanced up and down the corridor again. Still no one around. He slipped into the nearest lavatory and spent the next few minutes tearing off the front page of every paper, except one, and considerably longer flushing them down the lavatory. The moment he’d seen the last headline disappear, he unlocked the door and stepped back into the corridor. As George continued on toward the dining car, he dropped a copy of the morning paper on the floor outside each stateroom.

  “But, sir, I can explain how that happened,” protested George as the object ball bounced off the table and ran along the floor.

  “Another foul,” said Turner, picking up the ball and placing it back on the baize. “I don’t require an explanation, Mallory, but what are your prospects?”

  “As you know, sir, I’m on the teaching staff at Charterhouse, where my current salary is three hundred and seventy-five pounds a year.”

  “That’s certainly not enough to keep one of my daughters in the style they’ve grown accustomed to,” said Turner. “Do you by any chance have a private income?”

  “No, sir, I do not. My father is a parish priest who had four children to bring up.”

  “Then I shall settle seven hundred and fifty pounds a year on Ruth, and give her a house as a wedding present. Should there be any offspring, I shall pay for their education.”

  “I could never marry a girl who had a private income,” said George haughtily.

  “You couldn’t marry Ruth if she didn’t have one,” said Turner as he cannoned successfully off the red.

  George sat alone and sipped his coffee while he waited for Ruth to join him. Was there really a beautiful woman asleep in compartment B11, or was he about to wake from his dream and find himself locked up in an Italian jail, with no Mr. Irving to rescue him?

  Several other passengers had appeared and were enjoying their breakfast, although the waiters were unable to explain why their morning papers didn’t have a front page. When Ruth walked into the dining car, George had only one thought: I’m going to have breakfast with this woman every morning for the rest of my life.

  “Good morning, Mrs. Mallory,” he said as he rose from his side of the table and took her in his arms. “Do you begin to know how much I love you?” he added before kissing her.

  Ruth blushed at the disapproving stares from a few of the older passengers.

  “Perhaps we shouldn’t kiss in public, George.”

  “You were happy enough to kiss me yesterday in front of a policeman,” George reminded her as he sat back down.

  “But only because I was trying to stop you being arrested.”

  The waiter joined them and smiled ingratiatingly. After all, they were used to honeymoon couples on the Orient Express.

  After the two of them had given their breakfast orders, George slid the front page of the morning paper across the table.

  “Nice photograph, Mr. Mallory,” Ruth whispered once she’d read the headline. “And if it isn’t bad enough for a girl to be compromised on her first date, I now seem to be harboring a fugitive. So the first thing my father will want to know is whether your intentions are honorable, or can I only hope to be a criminal’s moll?”

  “I’m surprised you need to ask, Mrs. Mallory.”

  “It’s just that my father told me that you already have a mistress who resides in very high places.”

  “Your father is correct, and I explained to him that I have been promised to the lady in question since my coming of age, and several people have already borne witness to the engagement. It’s what they call in Tibet an arranged marriage—where neither party sees the other before the wedding day.”

  “Then you must visit this little hussy as soon as possible,” said Ruth, “and tell her in no uncertain terms that you are spoken for.”

  “I fear she’s not that little,” said George with a grin. “But once the diplomatic niceties have been sorted out, I hope to pay her a visit early in the new year, when I will explain why it’s no longer possible for us to go on seeing each other.”

  “No woman ever wants to be told that,” said Ruth, sounding serious for the first time. “You can tell her that I’ll agree to a compromise.”

  George smiled. “A compromise?”

  “It’s possible,” said Ruth, “that this goddess may not agree to see you when you make your first approach, because like any woman, she will want to confirm that you are constant and will return to woo her again. All I ask, George, is that once you have seduced your goddess, you will return to me, and never court her again.”

  “Why so serious, my darling?” asked George, taking her hand.

  “Because when I saw you climb St. Mark’s you convinced me of your love, but I also saw the risks you’re willing to take if you believe in something passionately enough—whatever dangers are placed in your path. I want you to promise me that once you’ve stood on the summit of that infernal mountain, it will be for the first and last time.”

  “I agree, and shall now prove it,” said George, letting go of her hand. He took the little package out of his pocket, removed the wrapping, and placed the small leather box in front of her. Ruth opened the lid to reveal a slim gold ring set with a single diamond.

  “Will you marry me, my darling?”

  Ruth smiled. “I thought we’d agreed on that yesterday,” she said as she slipped on the ring, leaned across the table and gave her fiancé a kiss.

  “But I thought we also agreed that…”

  George considered Mr. Turner’s offer for a moment before he said, “Thank you, sir.” After managing to score three points, his first of the evening, he added, “That’s most generous of you.”

  “It’s no more, and certainly no less, than I decided when you came to see Ruth in Venice.” George laughed for the first time that evening. “Despite the fact,” added Turner, “that you only escaped being thrown in jail by a matter of minutes.”

  “By a matter of minutes?”

  “Yes,” Turner replied after he’d potted another red. “I had a visit from the Italian police later that afternoon. They wanted to know if I’d come across an Englishman called Mallory who had at some time in the past been arrested in Paris for climbing the Eiffel Tower.”

  “That wasn’t me, sir,” said George.

  “The description of this vagabond bore a striking resemblance to you, Mallory.”

  “It’s still not true, sir. I had at least a hundred feet to go when they arrested me.”

  Turner burst out laughing. “All I can say, Mallory, is that you’d better not plan to spend your honeymoon in France or Italy, unless you wish to spend your first night of married life in a prison cell. Mind you, when I looked into your criminal activities in Venice, it seems that you only broke a by-law.”

  “A by-law?”

  “Failure to pay an entrance fee when entering a public monument.” Turner paused, “Maximum fine one thousand lire.” He smiled at his future son-in-law. “On a more serious matter, dear boy—my game, I think.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  TUESDAY, JUNE 2ND, 1914

  “DO YOU THINK we’ll have to go to war, sir?” asked Wainwright on the first day of term.

&