The Tiger's Eye
By Pearl Norton Swet
A strange curse followed the killing of a tiger with a blue eye—a weird story of Bengal and a disastrous tiger-hunt
The first time that Wynne Carson saw Marie Pilotte, the singer, on the terraces at Monte Carlo, pink and white under a lacy hat, he mentally called her a professional beauty, and dismissed the thought of her frivolous daintiness.
The second time that Carson saw the singer was at the Lido, a year later. At that time she was more beautiful than ever, and Carson's eyes strayed to her more than once, as she sat on the sundrenched sands in her green and gold bathing-suit, her black hair spread over her shoulders, rippling and uncut. By chance he was introduced to her; began to find her company very pleasant; learned that she was English, not French, as he had supposed. She said the season being over, she was going out to India, where her brother was stationed at a place called Judhpore.
Then, being a pawn on the great chessboard of the press, the master-finger pushed Carson into Delhi, the very next year, and so he saw Marie Pilotte again.
It happened this way. Carson was at a table in the shady courtyard of the Hotel Metropole, sipping cold drinks and watching the kaleidoscopic effect of the passing crowds, when he saw a native slowly approaching, wheeling an invalid's chair. And pacing, with the erect, easy carriage of the king's men in India, a man in the uniform of an English officer strolled beside the chair.
As they came opposite Carson, the officer's face lighted with recognition. He stopped and motioned the native to bring the chair up to Carson's table.
Carson arose and held out his hand. Captain Rawlins was known to journalists from Siam to Finland. Many a story of Rawlins' travels and explorations had secured for the men fortunate enough to get them, that particularly genial expression of editorial pleasure for which the correspondent is ever striving. So Carson was brought out of his lazy contemplation of the crowds, into an attitude of animated greeting.
The captain turned to the occupant of the wheel-chair: "My sister, Carson." And to the invalid: "Marie, this is Wynne Carson—the Wynne Carson, you know, of the News-Eagle, New York City. He can make celebrities go through their paces for the public."
Carson saw a woman apparently years older than the captain—shriveled, wrinkled, her graying hair drawn smoothly over her ears. When she looked up in greeting, Carson saw that her eyes were wondrously, beautifully blue and youthful, yet filled with a strange, hunted expression. Carson experienced a shock of surprize. The woman was Marie Pilotte! And yet he had seen her but a year before, radiantly beautiful and young and in glowing, perfect health.
She extended a claw-like hand, the hand of an old woman, and spoke in the soft contralto voice that Carson knew as that of Marie Pilotte, the sweet singer.
"Oh, but we've met before, haven't we, Mr. Carson? The Lido?"
