The Project Gutenberg eBook ofAffairs of StateThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: Affairs of StateAuthor: Burton Egbert StevensonRelease date: December 1, 2003 [eBook #10397]Most recently updated: December 19, 2020Language: EnglishCredits: E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, L. Barber, and Project Gutenberg Distributed Proofreaders*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AFFAIRS OF STATE ***
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
Title: Affairs of StateAuthor: Burton Egbert StevensonRelease date: December 1, 2003 [eBook #10397]Most recently updated: December 19, 2020Language: EnglishCredits: E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, L. Barber, and Project Gutenberg Distributed Proofreaders
Title: Affairs of State
Author: Burton Egbert Stevenson
Author: Burton Egbert Stevenson
Release date: December 1, 2003 [eBook #10397]Most recently updated: December 19, 2020
Language: English
Credits: E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, L. Barber, and Project Gutenberg Distributed Proofreaders
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AFFAIRS OF STATE ***
E-text prepared by Juliet Sutherland, L. Barber, and Project Gutenberg
Distributed Proofreaders
Being an Account of Certain Surprising Adventures Which
Befell an American Family in the Land of Windmills
With Illustrations by F. VAUX WILSON
1906
The Wiles of Womankind
Archibald Rushford, tall, lean, the embodiment of energy, stood at the window, hands in pockets, and stared disgustedly out at the dreary vista of sand-dunes and bathing-machines, closed in the distance by a stretch of gray sea mounting toward a horizon scarcely discernible through the drifting mist which hung above the water.
"Though why you wanted to come here at all," he continued, presumably addressing two young ladies in the room behind him, "or why you want to stay, now youarehere, passes my comprehension. One might as well be buried alive, and be done with it. The sensations, I should imagine, are about the same."
"Oh, come, dad!" protested one of the girls, laughing, "you know it isn't so bad as that! There's plenty of life—not just at this hour of the morning, perhaps,"—with a fleeting glance at the empty landscape,—"but the hour is unfashionable."
"As everything seasonable and sensible seems to be here," put in her father, grimly.
"And such interesting life, too," added the other girl.
"Interesting! Bah! When I want to see monkeys and peacocks, I'll go to a menagerie."
"But you never do go to the menagerie, at home, you know, dad."
"No—because I don't care for monkeys or peacocks—in fact, I particularly detest them!"
"But lions, dad! There are lions—"
"In the menagerie at home, perhaps."
"Yes, and in this one—bigger lions than you ever dreamed of, dad!—perfect monsters of lions!"
"Oh, no, there aren't, Susie," dissented Rushford. "You don't know the species. You've mistaken a bray for a roar, just as a lot of people always do, if the bray is only loud enough. Come, now, let me know the worst. How much longer do you propose to stay here?"
"Well, dad, you see the season won't be at its height for fully a month yet—"
"A month!" echoed Rushford, in dismay. "Well, Susie, you and Nell may be able to stand it for a month, but long ere that I'll be dead—ossified, fossilised, dried up, and blown away! Maybe you girls enjoy it, though I didn't think it of you—but what canIdo? I'm tired of reading day-before-yesterday's newspaper and of being two days behind the market. Two days! Think what may have happened to steel since I've heard from it! It's enough to drive a man mad!"
He got out a cigar, lighted it, and stood puffing it nervously, appalled at the vision his own words had conjured up.
"But, dad," Sue pointed out, coming to his side and taking his arm coaxingly, "you know it was just to get away from all that worry—from those horrid stocks and things—that you consented to come with us."
"Don't call the stocks hard names, Susie. Don't go back on your best friends!" protested Rushford. "Don't forget what they've done for you!"
"But, dear, you remember how strongly Doctor Samuels insisted on your taking a rest; how necessary he said it was?"
"Oh, perfectly!" responded Rushford, drily. "I've suspected right along that Samuels took his orders from you."
"From me, dad!" cried Sue, indignantly, but her eyes were shining in a most suspicious manner. "A man of his standing—"
"It doesn't matter," broke in her father, with a wave of his arm. "I'm willing to grant, for the sake of argument, that Samuels was perfectly sincere. But I still protest that there is no reason why we should conceal ourselves here. We haven't done anything—the police aren't after us—I can speak for myself, at least."
"This seemed to be such a nice, quiet place for you, dad," explained Nell, perching herself upon a table near the window and gazing pensively out at the shimmering water, which told that the sun was winning a decisive victory over the mist, and that the day would be a fine one.
"For me!" repeated her father, turning and staring at her. "You don't mean to say you chose this place onmyaccount!"
Nell nodded, but she winked at Susie.
"And then, you know," she added, "we have always wanted to get a glimpse of a real Dutch watering-place."
"I don't believe thisisa real Dutch watering-place. Nobody here speaks anything but French. Why, it's even got a French name!"
"Only two-thirds French, dad," Sue corrected.
"And everything is priced in francs."
"That is true of all Europe," asserted Nell, with superb aplomb.
"Well, Dutch, French, or Hindoo, you've had your glimpse, haven't you?Suppose we move on and get a glimpse or two of something worth seeing."
"Oh, but we've seen it all only from the outside! We've been like the audience at a show—we haven't had any part in it. And it's so much more interesting behind the scenes!"
"It's dull enough from in front, heaven knows!" agreed Rushford. "If Ihad my way, I'd ring down the curtain and close the show up this minute.It's the worst I ever saw! And I very much doubt if a respectableAmerican family has any business behind the scenes!"
"You're jaundiced, dad," laughed Sue. "You're looking at the place through a yellow film of prejudice. One must enter into the spirit of the thing!"
Rushford groaned.
"I'm afraid I'm too set in my ways, Susie," he said, dismally. "I've lived in America too long. You might as well ask me to dance the can-can, and be done with it!"
"Besides," continued Sue, "it's just as Nell says. We're on the outside—we haven't got a foothold. There's something the matter."
"Maybe they think I'm that Chicago cashier who got away with a million, not long ago. On second thought, though, I don't believe that would make any difference. That fellow would find a very congenial circle here. He wouldn't have any difficulty in getting behind the scenes!"
"Sue and I have been thinking it over," said Nell, "and we've concluded that it must be something about the hotel. We seem to have picked out the wrong one."
"The placeisempty, and that's a fact," agreed Rushford.
"It's unnaturally so," said Sue. "Something's the matter with it. It's taboo for some reason."
"Well, it's good enough for me," remarked her father. "After all, there isn't much difference in prisons! But I want to repeat, as emphatically as possible, that I can't keep on loafing here for a month and preserve my sanity. Don't you see how much whiter my hair's getting? I'm willing to do anything in reason to oblige you, and I fully realise the importance of your sociological and ethnological studies—"
Sue's hand on his mouth stopped him.
"Take a breath, dad," she cautioned him. "Take a breath. Those were mighty long words."
"As I was about to remark," continued Rushford, calmly, taking the hand away, "I am, of course, a doting parent—who would not be with two such children? But, candidly, I don't just see where I come in. I tell you, girls, I've got to have some excitement."
"There's plenty of excitement at the Casino, dad."
"Oh, yes—faro excitement; roulette excitement. I never cared for that kind. I've always had the sense to keep out of sure-thing games, even on Wall Street."
"But the people—"
"The people! French apes in fancy waistcoats; Dutch dandies in corsets; women with painted cheeks and pencilled eyebrows whom you're ashamed to look at!"
"Some of them are respectable, dad," laughed Sue.
"One would never suspect it!"
"Oh, yes, dad; some of them belong to the nobility."
"That's no certificate of character—rather the reverse, if one may believe the papers."
"Gossip, dad; nothing but gossip. And you know how you've always hated gossip. You've told us never to believe it."
"It may be; but one could believe anything of most of the women one sees around here. My only chance for amusement is to get up a flirtation with some of them. I don't think it would be difficult—they don't seem a bit shy. Only," he added, with a sigh, "I'm getting too old."
"Yes, dad; I'm afraid you are," agreed Susie. "You wouldn't really enjoy it."
"'My days are in the yellow leaf;The flowers and fruits of love are gone;The worm, the canker, and the griefAre mine alone!'"
quoted Nell, in a solemn voice.
"Don't you be too sure!" retorted her father, threateningly, wheeling around upon her. "There's no telling what I may be driven to, if I'm kept imprisoned here much longer! 'Though I look old,'—"
"'Yet I am strong and lusty,'" finished Sue. "Of course you are, dad, and you don't look old, either. Why," gazing up at him critically, "you don't look a day over forty!"
"Don't try to bamboozle your Pa, Susie," laughed Rushford. "I can see through you! You'll be trying to make me believe next that you want a stepmother."
"I would if it would make you any happier, dad."
Her father gazed down for an instant into her pseudo-serious face, then caught her in his arms and squeezed her.
"What're you up to?" he demanded. "Trying to make a fool of your old dad? Why, Susie, own up,—you'd scratch out the eyes of the best woman in the world if she dared to look twice at me!"
"Of course I would!" admitted Susie, instantly. "You know as well as I do, dad, that even the best woman in the world isn't good enough for you."
"Let's go across to the other hotel, dad," suggested Nell, with a nonchalance intended to conceal the fact that this was the point she and Susie had been aiming at from the very first.
Her father released Susie and stared at his other daughter in amazement.
"What on earth for?" he demanded.
"Oh, everybody seems to be over there—you've noticed—"
"Yes, I've noticed that it's running over with the rag-tag and bob-tail of all Europe! If you think I'll butt into that Bedlam, my dear child, you're badly mistaken. I'd rather live with the freaks in a museum."
"But it's so quiet here."
"I'm glad of it! Besides, I thought you wanted quiet?"
"Only for your sake—don't you see, we're trying our best to please you.A moment ago, you said you wanted excitement."
"I do; but it must be excitement with an object. I haven't got any use for the infernal, purposeless chattering I hear all around me every time I go out on the dyke. Damn a man, anyhow, who can't find anything better to do than to run around to summer-resorts and flirt with other men's wives! I tell you, girls, I want to get back to New York!"
"Give us another month, dad!" pleaded Sue, catching his arm again, as he stamped up and down. "You know that you promised to stay with us two months, at the very least. We can't go around without a chaperon."
Her father's face relaxed as he looked down at her, and he smiled grimly.
"So we get down to the real reason, at last, do we?" he queried. "I thought all this solicitude for my health was a trifle unnatural. I'm useful as a chaperon, am I? See here, girls, I can put in my time more profitably at the stock exchange, and have a heap more fun. I'll hire a chaperon for you, or half a dozen, if you want them, and pull out for New York. What do you say? I don't know the first principles of the business, anyway."
"Oh, yes, you do, dad!" protested Susie. "You're a perfectly ideal chaperon."
"I am? The ideal chaperon, then, must be one who never does any chaperoning!"
"That's it, exactly!" cried Nell, clapping her hands delightedly. "How quickly you see things, dad!"
"So that's it!" and he stood for a moment looking darkly at his offspring. "Well, you girls are old enough to take care of yourselves. If you can't, it's high time you were learning how!"
"Oh, we're perfectly able to take care of ourselves," Sue assured him."You mustn't worry about us for a moment, dad."
"I'm not likely to. But, in that case, why do you want me along at all?"
"Why, don't you see, dad, it's you who give us the odour of respectability. By ourselves, we should be social outcasts, impossible, not to be spoken to—except by men. It isn't convenable."
"Oh, I see," said Rushford. "The first great principle of European society seems to be, 'Think the worst of every one.'"
"Not precisely, dad; but no unmarried woman may venture outside the circumference of the family circle. That's the great European convention—the basic principle of her social order."
"A sort of 'tag, you're it,' game, isn't it? The family circle is a kind of dead line—the ring of fire which keeps out the wild beasts. Step over, and you're lost!"
"Of course," said Nell, "it is only to unmarried women that the rule applies."
"Oh, certainly," assented her father. "Married women are allowed more latitude—in fact, from such French novels as I've read, I should infer that they usually swing clear around the circle! It's a reaction, I suppose; a sort of compensation for the privations of their youth. I don't like it. Let's go home!"
"But your promise, dad!" pleaded Sue, permitting the faintest suspicion of moisture to appear in her dark eyes. "And you know you really do need a vacation."
Her father looked down at her, saw the moisture, and surrendered.
"You're a humbug," he said; "and this vacation business is another. A man spends two or three months loafing around because somebody tells him he's looking badly and ought to take a rest; and before he knows it, he's accumulated so much rust in his system that he never gets it all out again. His machinery creaks more or less for the rest of his life. The wise man postpones his vacation to the next world."
"Well, let's call it a jaunt," suggested Susie. "A jaunt somehow implies hurry and bustle, with plenty of exercise."
"And I don't know which is the bigger fool," pursued her father, not heeding her; "the fellow who takes a vacation every year on his own hook, or the one who permits his daughters to drag him away from his comfortable home and his morning paper and the business which gives him his interest in life, and maroon him in a desert of a Dutch watering-place, where there's absolutely nothing for a self-respecting man to do but smoke himself to death and wait for a paper which never comes till day after to-morrow!"
"It sounds terribly involved, but I'll help you reason it out, dad, any time you like," said Susie, obligingly. "And you'll stay, won't you, dear?"
"Oh, I'll stay, since your heart's so set upon it. I'll try to bear up and find a diversion of some kind and not rust out any more than I can help. I might dig in the sand or make mud pies or play mumbly-peg. But I draw the line at plunging into that whirlpool across the street. My bed here is nearly as comfortable as the one at home, and the grub's first-rate."
"Very well, dad," agreed Susie, instantly seizing the concession, but speaking as though it were she who was making it, "we'll stay here, then. Only Idowish there were a few more people," she added, with a sigh. "I hate to sit down in that big, empty dining-room. I imagine I'm at an Egyptian banquet, and that there are horrid, rattly skeletons sitting in all those high, covered chairs."
"What you need is some fresh air," said her father. "You girls get your hats and go for a walk. You're growing morbid. If you think of skeletons again, I'll give you a liver pill."
"Won't you come, dad?"
"No; you know you don't want me. Besides, I see the panjandrum who brings the mail coming up the dyke down yonder."
He stood gazing down the Digue until his womenkind reappeared, bedight, ready for the walk.
"You'll do," he said, looking them over critically. "In fact, my dears, if I wasn't afraid of making you conceited, I'd say I'd never seen two handsomer girls in my life."
"Now it's you who are blarneying, dad!" cried Susie, but she dimpled with pleasure nevertheless, and so did Nell.
"No I'm not," retorted Rushford; "and I dare say there are plenty of other men, even in this Dutch limbo, who have an eye for beauty; let them break their hearts, if they have any, but keep your own hearts whole, my dears."
They were laughing in earnest, now, as they looked up in his face, which had grown suddenly serious.
"Why, dad, what ails you?" questioned Sue. "I think it is you who need the pill!"
Rushford's face cleared; they were heart-whole thus far—there could be no doubt of that.
"Perhaps I do," he agreed. "Or perhaps it's only that I'm beginning to feel the responsibilities of my position."
"Your position?"
"As chaperon," he explained.
"Dear dad!" cried Susie, and squeezed his arm. "Do you suppose that as long as we have you, either of us will ever think of another man?"
"I don't know," said her father, dubiously. "I scarcely believe I'm so fascinating as all that. But I just wanted to remind you, girls, that there's plenty of nice boys at home—boys whom you can trust, through and through—boys who are clean, and honest, and worth loving. If youmustlose your hearts—and I suppose it's inevitable, some day—please do me the favour of choosing two of them. I'll sleep better at night and breathe easier by day!"
The Rôle of Good Angel
Rushford waved them good-bye from the door as they sallied forth into the bright sunlight, paused a moment to look after them admiringly, and then turned slowly back into the hotel, smiling softly to himself. He sauntered through the deserted vestibule, and its emptiness struck him as it had never done before.
"Really," he said to himself, "we seem to be the only patrons the house has got. I'll have to look over my bill."
He went on to the desk and demanded his letters of the boy in resplendent uniform who presided there.
"There are none, monsieur," answered that individual, blandly.
"What!" cried Rushford, his smile vanished in an instant. "Are you sure?"
The boy answered with a shrug and a significant gesture toward the letter-rack on the wall. It was visibly, incontestably empty.
Rushford turned away in disgust.
"Those fellows at the office are assuming altogether too much responsibility," he muttered savagely, as he wandered on into the smoking-room. "I told them I didn't want to be bothered with little things, but I certainly expected to hear from them once in a while. If I don't look out, they'll reduce me to the status of a rubber stamp! I'll have to stir them up," and he gloomily extracted from the rack the newly-arrived, two-days-old London paper, brought by the little rickety train which struggled through at uncertain and infrequent intervals from Zunderburg to Weet-sur-Mer, lighted a fresh cigar, and sat down to a perusal of the news.
He proceeded in the most leisurely manner, for he knew that he had plenty of time. Indeed, the paper once finished, the remainder of the day would stretch before him an empty wilderness—a waste as monotonous and bare as the beach he had grown so weary of gazing at. So he gave careful and minute attention to every item. He was in the midst of a long and wholly uninteresting account of a charity bazaar, which the Princess of Wales had opened, and where the Duchess of Blank-Blank had made a tremendous hit and much money for a worthy cause, by selling her kisses for a guinea each, when his attention was attracted by a discreet shuffling of feet on the floor beside his chair. He looked up to see standing there the little fat Alsatian-German-French proprietor of the hotel.
"Why, hello, Pelletan," he said. "Want to speak to me?"
"Eef monsieur please," and Pelletan rubbed his chubby hands together in visible embarrassment.
"All right; sit down."
Monsieur Pelletan coughed deprecatingly and deposited his plump body on the extreme edge of a chair. It was easy to see that he was much depressed—his usually rosy cheeks hung flaccid, his mustachios drooped limply, his little black eyes were suffused and needed frequent wiping—a service performed by a hand that was none too steady.
"Eet iss a matter of pusiness, monsieur," he began, falteringly. "You haf perhaps perceive' t'at our custom hass fallen off."
Rushford glanced about the deserted smoking-room.
"No," he said; "I haven't seen any to fall off. I've been wondering how you managed to pay out."
"Ah, monsieur," cried Pelletan, wringing his hands, "t'at iss eet—I haf been paying out unt paying out until t'e las' franc iss gone. I wass at no time reech, monsieur; at t'is moment I am in ruins!"
And, indeed, he looked the part.
"You mean you'll have to shut up shop?" inquired Rushford.
"Eet preaks my heart to say eet, monsieur; but I fear eet will come to t'at, unless—"
"Unless what?" asked Rushford, eyeing him as he hesitated.
"Unless I shall pe able to interes' monsieur—"
Rushford grunted and stared out of the window at the dunes, puffing his cigar meditatively. He thought of the comfortable bed, of the admirable cuisine—he would hate to give them up. It would mean going to the other hotel, and the mere idea made him shiver. Anything but that!
His host watched him in an agony of apprehension.
"What does it cost a day to run this shebang?" asked the American at last.
Monsieur Pelletan, with feverish haste, produced a paper from his pocket.
"I haf anticipate' monsieur's question; t'is statement will show heem."
Rushford took it and glanced at the total.
"Hmmmm. Four hundred and eighty francs—say a hundred dollars."
"T'at, monsieur," explained Pelletan, "iss based upon our present custom. As pusiness increase', so do t'e expense increase."
"Of course."
"But not in t'e same ratio as t'e receipts. A full house wins so much as six hundret francs t'e tay."
"Yes," assented Rushford, "a full house is a mighty nice thing. But now you seem to be holding only a bob-tail."
"A pop-tail?"
"No matter—go ahead with the story. You say it costs you a hundred dollars a day to keep your doors open. What's the heaviest item?"
"T'e greates' item at present iss t'e chef. He iss a fery goot one—I haf feared to let heem go."
"That was right. You'd better not let him go if you want to keep us here. How many rooms have you?"
Pelletan produced a second slip of paper.
"For t'at, also, I wass prepared, my tear Monsieur Rushford," he said."T'e tariff of charges iss also t'ere."
Rushford looked it over with some care. Then he stared out across the sands again, the corners of his mouth twitching. Evidently the proposal appealed to his sense of humour.
"See here, Pelletan," he said, abruptly, turning back, "is there a hoodoo on the house, or what's the matter?"
"A—I peg monsieur's pardon," stammered Pelletan.
"How does it happen that the hotel over there is full and this one's empty?"
"Eet iss t'is way, monsieur," explained the Frenchman, eagerly. "For many year, long pefore t'is new part off t'e house wass puilt, we enjoyed t'e confidence unt patronage of Hiss Highness, t'e Prince of Zeit-Zeit, who spent at least two month in efery season here. While t'e Prince wass here, we were crowded—oh, to t'e smalles' room!—efen at ot'er times, we tid well, for he gafe t'e house a prestige. But last vinter he die, unt hiss heir, hiss son, despite t'e care of heem which we haf taken, t'e anxieties he hass cause' us, yet which we haf cheerfully porne—t'at ingrate hass t'e pad taste to prefer t'e ot'er house! Our ot'er customers haf followed heem—like sheep! Eet iss as t'ough we had lost our star!"
"Your star?"
"In t'e guide-book off Monsieur Karl," Pelletan explained.
"Is that such a tragedy?"
"I haf always t'ought it t'e fery worst t'at could happen," saidPelletan, "but t'is iss as pad."
It was only by a supreme effort that Rushford managed to choke back the chuckle which rose in his throat.
"Is Zeit-Zeit the little purblind, monkey-faced fellow who is wheeled around in a big red chair every day?"
"T'e fery same, monsieur—a great Highness."
Rushford made a grimace of disgust.
"What's the matter with him?" he asked. "Does he only need a bath, or is it more than skin deep?"
"Eet iss an hereditary trait, monsieur."
"Hereditary taint, you mean! You're better off without him; why, he'd infect the whole house, Pelletan."
Pelletan gazed at him aghast.
"Monsieur is choking!" he said.
"I'm in deadly earnest, but I don't expect you to understand, for you've got an hereditary taint, too, Pelletan, which shows itself principally in your spine."
Pelletan turned pale.
"I assure you, monsieur," he stammered, "I am fery—"
"No matter," broke in Rushford. "All European inn-keepers have it, and it has never been known to result fatally, so don't worry. But why did you think I'd take hold of this thing?"
"I haf heard so much," explained Pelletan, "of t'e enterprise of t'eAmericans, t'at I t'ought perhaps you might—"
"Win back Zeit-Zeit? Not on your life! If he comes, I go! But I tell you what I'll do, Pelletan. I'll make you a proposition."
"Proceed, monsieur," and the other's face began to beam anticipatively.
"For one month I'll pay all the expenses of this hostelry, rent included, and allow you one hundred francs a day for your services. I take all the receipts. At the end of that time, I withdraw and leave you to your own devices. What do you say?"
Monsieur Pelletan reflected. At least, it was postponing the inevitable for a month, and in a month what may not happen? Besides, at the end of the month, he would be richer by three thousand francs.
"I accept, monsieur," he said, with fervour. "I am t'ankful a t'ousand time!"
"All right; I take possession at once. We can have a notary draw up a formal agreement. Now let's run over this schedule of prices," and he turned to Pelletan's carefully prepared statement.
"Fery well, monsieur."
"I see you have two apartments de luxe at one hundred francs a day.Hereafter they will be two hundred francs."
Pelletan gasped.
"From t'at, off course, t'ere will be a tiscount?" he stammered.
"Not a cent; not the tenth of a cent. Two hundred francs net."
"But, monsieur, efen at t'e old price, we haf always gif a tiscount! It iss only Americans who pay t'e full price. Ot'er people expec'—"
Rushford waved his hand.
"I don't care what they expect. Besides, there's going to be one hotel in Europe where Americans get a square deal. If your compatriots don't want to patronise my house, they can go to that low-down lunatic asylum across the street. By the way, what's its name?"
"T'e Grand Hôtel Splendide," answered Pelletan, glowing with delight at his companion's power of invective.
"H—m," said the latter; "the worse a hotel is, the bigger name it seems to have. But about the discount. Let me repeat for you, Pelletan, a business axiom. To give a discount is to admit that your goods are not worth the price you ask for them, and that you're willing to cheat anybody who doesn't know enough to beat you down. All the business of Europe seems to be run in just that way, but ours won't be. Our goods are worth the price!"
"But," began Pelletan, humbly, "efen at Ostend—"
"This is not Ostend. This is Weet-sur-Mer—a place more home-like, more comfortable, preferable in every way, and with greater natural advantages than Ostend ever had or ever will have. Only a fool would go to Ostend when he could come to Weet-sur-Mer and stop at the Grand Hôtel Royal."
Pelletan rubbed his hands in delight.
"You really t'ink so, monsieur?" he murmured.
"No matter what I think. Besides, you can go back to your old schedule, if you want to, at the end of the month. But I'm fixing this new schedule to suit myself, and I don't want to be interrupted. These ordinary apartments will be thirty to forty francs, according to size. Single rooms will be ten francs. Breakfast will be four francs, dinner ten francs—in a word, we double our income without increasing our expenses. That's the secret of all high finance, my friend."
"But, monsieur," stammered Pelletan, more and more astounded, "eef t'ere iss no one to pay, what does it matter?"
"Therewillbe some one to pay—leave that to me. You don't understand American enterprise, Pelletan. I'm going to astonish you. Now mind one thing—if Zeit-Zeit comes over here and wants an apartment, you're to shut him out—I won't have him in the house—not at any price!"
Pelletan grew pale at the thought.
"Refuse t'e Prince of Zeit-Zeit!" he stammered.
"Yes—if you let him in, I'll kick him out. And another thing—the service has got to be first-class—the best in Europe—nothing gaudy, you understand, but a quiet elegance that will make us talked about. Do you think you can accomplish it?"
"I vill do my pest, monsieur," promised Pelletan.
"The place, of course, I'll have to take as I find it," went on Rushford, with a glance around, "though it's littered up with gewgaws and dinkey furniture which ought to be made into a bonfire. If I had a little more time, I'd re-decorate the whole house. Those imitation marble pillars over there are an insult to the intelligence."
"T'ey haf peen t'ought fery beautiful, monsieur," murmured Pelletan, humbly.
"Yes—I've noticed that Europeans have a weakness for imitations. It's a defect of character, I suppose. But there's one thing youcando—and right away. Send that boy at the desk up to his room and tell him to rip all that gold braid off his coat. To look at him, you'd think he was a major-general."
Pelletan stared at his partner to see if he was in earnest.
"Oh, I know it will be a deprivation," said the American, a glint of humour in his eyes. "You can raise his wages a franc a day to make up for it."
"Fery well, monsieur," and Pelletan crossed over to the desk and gave the boy his commands. The latter dragged away up the stair with a countenance in which grief and joy struggled for the mastery. "Anyt'ing else, monsieur?" asked the Frenchman, coming back.
"No, I don't think of anything just at this moment. But you do your part and I'll do mine. Now suppose you go out and get the notary, while I work my brain a bit."
Pelletan staggered rather than walked to the door, his head in his hands, fairly overwhelmed. A moment later, Rushford saw him hurrying down the street. He got out a third cigar and settled back in his chair with a chuckle of satisfaction.
"Maybe I'll get some fun out of this thing, after all," he said. "It'll offer a little diversion, anyway. Now, how shall we begin to advertise?"
"M. le Propriétaire, is he here?" inquired a voice, and Rushford looked around to see a man in resplendent uniform standing at the door.
"That's me, I reckon," he said.
"This is my first day," explained the man; "I will know monsieur hereafter. I have a telegram," and he produced it. "Monsieur will make acknowledgment here," he added, and held out a narrow white slip of paper.
Rushford signed his name mechanically, dropped a franc into the itching palm, and waited till the messenger went out. Then he looked at the address on the envelope. It was:
Proprietor Grand Hôtel Royal, Weet-sur-Mer.
"Well," he said, "it's mine—I guess there's no question of that—I'm the proprietor—pro tem," and he tore the envelope open. A low whistle escaped him as he read the message. Then he slapped his leg and laughed. "It's a freak of the market," he cried. "A freak of the market! And it's just my luck to be in on the ground floor!"
He folded the telegram and placed it carefully in his pocket. Then he fell again into a meditation punctuated by frequent chuckles. But at the end of a very few minutes, Monsieur Pelletan was back again, with a thin little notary in tow, and the necessary papers were soon drawn up.
"You have only to sign, monsieur," said the notary, after he had finished reading them aloud, and he handed his formidable pen to Rushford.
Monsieur Pelletan rubbed his hands together nervously as the American hesitated and looked at him.
"It's not too late to draw out," remarked Rushford. "If you're not satisfied—"
"I haf no tesire to traw out, monsieur," protested Pelletan, quickly. "I am entirely satisfied!"
"I have one other condition to make," added the American.
"What iss eet, monsieur?" questioned Pelletan, looking at him apprehensively.
"You understand I'm to be a silent partner in this thing."
"A silent partner—in other words, nobody's to know I'm backing you unless I choose to tell them—absolutely no one. Do you agree?"
"Oh, gladly, monsieur!" cried Pelletan, with a deep breath of relief.After all, is not glory the next best thing to riches?
"And your friend?"
The notary nodded a solemn promise of secrecy.
"All right," and Rushford signed. Pelletan hastily affixed his signature, and the thing was done. "Now, my friend," continued the American, "which is the swellest suite of rooms you've got in the house?"
"De luxe A," responded Pelletan. "Monsieur wishes—"
"I wish you to get it ready at once—"
"Monsieur will occupy it himself, no toubt?"
"No, I won't; I'll stay right where I am. But between seven and eight o'clock to-morrow morning, there will arrive an English ship of war—"
"A sheep-of-t'e-war!" echoed Pelletan, growing pale.
"Certainly, a ship of war, and from it there will disembark a man namedVernon and his suite of four or five people. You will give him apartmentA."
Pelletan caught his breath.
"Monsieur Vernon iss, I suppose, a friend?" he stammered.
"No," said Rushford, "I've never seen him. But we'll have to treat him well. He's the head of the British foreign office, Pelletan; and one of the high nobility. Beside him, Zeit-Zeit will look like thirty cents!"
Distinguished arrivals at Weet-sur-Mer
Even at this unaccustomed hour of the morning, the beach was black with people. It was not to bathe that they had come, for a chill north wind was blowing; nor was it to promenade, for they were not promenading; indeed, it was the fashionable hour for neither of these things, and no one ever dreamed of doing them at any hour other than the fashionable one. It was rather the fashionable hour to turn painfully over in one's bed, and ring the bell, and signify that coffee and rolls would be acceptable.
This morning there had been scant time for such refreshment, or for that preliminary stretching which is so grateful to bodies wearied by late hours and too-rapid living. Instead, nearly all the sojourners at Weet-sur-Mer had arisen aching from their beds, had hurried forth to the beach, and stood there now, facing unanimously seawards, staring toward the dim horizon, only moving convulsively from time to time in the effort to keep warm. Those who had glasses used them; those who had none, strained nature's binoculars to the limit of vision. From all of which it will be seen that the notary had done his work well, and that neither had Monsieur Pelletan been backward in spreading the great news of the unparalleled occurrence which was about to happen.
"He iss to arrive between t'e hours of seven unt eight," he had announced. "Hiss Highness, pe it understood, Lord Vernon, t'e great Englishman. He comes in a special vessel—a sheep-of-t'e-war," he added with a triumphant flourish. "He could pring mit' him t'e whole nafy of England, if he wish'!" Ah, what an honour for Weet-sur-Mer! And what a blow for the Grand Hôtel Splendide across the way!
Yet Monsieur Pelletan did not in the least understand how it had come to pass; he suspected his partner of some sort of clairvoyance, of some supernatural power of compelling events, and his admiration for him had deepened to awe. But into this question he did not permit himself to enter deeply; he was content to know that fame and prosperity were returning with a rush to the Grand Hôtel Royal. Already there had been a score of applicants for rooms; the corridors were again assuming that air of liveliness and gaiety which had characterised them in those golden days when the August Prince of Zeit-Zeit had been his annual guest. He was no longer ashamed to meet the proprietor of the Grand Hôtel Splendide face to face in the full day; he was a different person from the despairing individual of the day before; in a word, he was no longer in ruins! He had been restored, as so many ruins are, by the hand of an American!
At this moment he held the centre of the stage, and it was easy to read in his bearing the consciousness that he deserved the limelight. A strip of crimson carpet had been stretched across the sand to the very water's edge; on either side of it a dozen decorous footmen were aligned, and between them Monsieur Pelletan proudly marched, his head in air, his back very straight, preceding a big, hooded invalid's chair.
Immediately a murmur arose.
"He is ill then!"
"Why the chair?"
"He is coming to take the baths."
The murmur no doubt penetrated to the ears of the little Alsatian, but he made no sign. He was aware that the envious eyes of the proprietor of the Grand Hôtel Splendide were upon him; he would show him that here was a guest more majestic, more worthy of honour than even the Prince of Zeit-Zeit!—a Highness, in short, so extraordinary as to cause that August personage to resemble, in some incomprehensible way, the sum of one franc fifty centimes! Otherwise there would have been no carpet, for the sand was hard and dry. Otherwise, too, perhaps, Monsieur Pelletan would have been content to permit his major-domo to represent him at the water's edge, for he was not accustomed to exposing himself thus to the sharp airs of the morning. His fat red cheeks and plump nose were turning a dull purple—ah, how good would a glass of cognac taste!—but he bore this discomfort with the greatest fortitude, for, after all, an occasion such as this was worth some sacrifice.
And, be it said, his was not the only purple nose in evidence. There were many men who stared straight before them, daring to look neither to the right nor left; and many women who were thankful for the heavy veils they had had the forethought to put on. Even rouge, however cunningly applied, cannot hide certain ugly lines in the face in the clear, cruel light of the morning!
Strange how the same breeze will give to some cheeks a dull repulsiveness and to others an entrancing glow! A word to lovers: Would you test your mistress's blood and spirit, persuade her to a walk some sharp day in winter; or, if she will not be persuaded, use a little artifice. Then, after wind and frost have had their will of her for half an hour, take a look at her. Are her cheeks glowing, are her eyes bright, is she having a good time? If not, take heed!
There were four cheeks upon the beach at Weet-sur-Mer that morning glowing as I would have your true love's glow; drawing men's eyes and women's, too—the one in admiration, the other in envy. Yes, envy! though more than one shivering fair spoke a low, slurring word about "those coarse Americans!"
Both Pelletan and the notary had been careful to respect Rushford's wish that his connection with the hotel be kept to themselves; in all their boastings, rejoicings, explanations, his name had not been whispered; and not even to his daughters had that gentleman confided the secret of his plan to get the excitement he had craved so badly. He had feared, perhaps, that they would not enter thoroughly into the spirit of the thing—women, even American women, are sometimes strangely deficient in the sense of humour. But they had both been struck by their host's impressive obsequiousness—a very orgasm of servility, which Pelletan had hitherto reserved for personages of the blood royal.
"What ails the man?" Susie had asked at dinner the night before, her eyes on Monsieur Pelletan's writhing form. "He seems to have the stomach-ache."
"He is probably fishing for a tip," said Nell. "It seems to me thatI've seen those symptoms before in a less violent form."
"Don't you tip him," commanded their father. "I'll attend to all that," and he beckoned to Pelletan with his finger and whispered a rapid sentence in his ear.
"What did you say to him, dad?" inquired Sue, gazing in some astonishment after their host's retreating coat-tails.
"I told him to go 'way back and sit down," answered Rushford, going calmly on with his meal.
"Dad, is it true that Lord Vernon is to arrive to-morrow morning?"
"I suppose so."
"In a ship of war?"
"Yes—I've heard that, too."
"You'll take us down to the beach, won't you, dad?"
"What! A free-born American citizen go toadying after the English aristocracy!"
"But we'll need a cicérone, dad."
"What for, I'd like to know?"
"Oh, what are cicérones always for? To get us a good place, to be sure!"
So here he was, in the forefront of the crowd, with his womenkind beside him, and no doubt the discerning reader has already guessed that it was to their cheeks I referred some pages back. There were many grandes dames upon the beach that morning—some the real thing, a little plain, a little faded, rather touching to look upon—others, for the most part articles de Paris, very tall and plump and even handsome, if one likes the gorgeous type, with gowns created by the great costumers and paid for heaven knows how! But I always think with a little warmth of pride and admiration of those two American girls standing there, wind-blown and radiant. Coarse, madame! Ah, what would you not give for a little of that coarseness! After all, freshness is a woman's greatest charm, as you very well know, madame, though you try your best to think otherwise; and, alas, you are fast losing yours! For, as you have found—as untold thousands have found before you, and will yet find—one can't squander one's youth and keep it, too! Aye, more than that. The sins of the night stare at one from one's glass on the morrow, and will not be massaged away. Take your baths, madame, in milk, or wine, or perfumed water; summon your masseuse, your beauty-doctor. Let them rub you and knead you and pinch you, coat you with cold cream or grease you with oil of olives. Redden cheeks and lips, whiten hands and shoulders, polish nails, pencil eyebrows, squeeze in the waist, pad out the hips—swallow, at the last, that little tablet which you slip from the jewelled case at your wrist. It is all in vain. You deceive no man nor woman. They look into your eyes and smile, but behind the smile there is a shudder!
Nell and Susie Rushford, with the wind playing in their hair and kissing their cheeks, that morning, were miracles of freshness; two divine messages, two phantoms of delight, sent from the New World to the Old.
And one was dark, with tints of violetIn hair and eyes, and one was blond as sheWho rose—a second daybreak—from the sea,Gold-tressed and azure-eyed.
Nell, the elder, was tall and fair, like her father, rather sedate, with not quite the sparkle of Susie, two years her junior, the counterpart of the little mother whom she had never seen. And both were erect and bright-eyed as only American girls seem to know completely how to be; visibly healthy, happy, and pure-minded. I should like to pause and look at them a moment longer, for I have always been a little in love with them myself; I should like to add to the verses of our own dear poet certain lines of Wordsworth, of Burns, of Byron—but you, dear reader, will recall them readily, especially if you belong, as I hope you do, to the great and glorious fraternity of true lovers; if your heart burns and your pulses leap at mention of a certain name, at sight of a dear face—
There came a sudden hum of excitement from the crowd.
"Look, look!" cried Susie. "There it is!" and she clapped her glasses to her eyes again.
Far out against the horizon appeared a smudge of smoke, which grew and spread until those with glasses could perceive beneath it the low, dark lines of a man-of-war. It was true then! Some had permitted themselves to doubt the story spread so industriously by Monsieur Pelletan and his friend, the notary—the proprietor of the Grand Hôtel Splendide had counselled scepticism. Now they could doubt no longer, and they drew a deep breath. A ship of war at Weet-sur-Mer!
Straight toward the beach she steamed, looming larger and ever larger; then her speed slackened, slackened, until at last she lay rolling quietly a quarter of a mile off-shore. A shrill piping came over the water as the crew was mustered amidships and the boarding-stairs lowered.
"Well, hemustbe a swell!" said Sue, "or they wouldn't take all that trouble. There goes the boat."
And splash it went into the water, the crew tumbled in, and two men slowly helped another down the stairs, while the crew stood at attention. Some baggage was lowered, then the oars dipped together and a little spurt of foam appeared under the bow.
"Why, it's like a moving-picture machine!" cried Susie, with a little gasp of enjoyment. "Or a comic opera!" she added, wrestling with her glasses to get them focussed on the moving boat. "The hero's sitting in the stern," she announced. "He's all wrapped up and there's another man holding him. I can't see anything of him but his eyes, for he's got a handkerchief or something over the lower part of his face. He must be awfully ill, poor fellow!"
"Probably got the grip," observed her father, practically. "Wants to keep out the damp air. I think he'd be better off at home in bed."
"Oh, but then," protested Nell—
"Then we shouldn't have this show," said her father, and laughed grimly at the thought that neither would fortune have smiled so promptly on the Grand Hôtel Royal.
The oars flashed suddenly upright; two men sprang from the bow, with a fine disregard of a wetting, and pulled the boat far in. Then the bemuffled figure was lifted tenderly and carried to the waiting chair, where Monsieur Pelletan was bowing with his head almost touching the carpet. The invalid was started toward the hotel without delay, three men accompanying him, under the leadership of Pelletan; the baggage was heaped on the beach and taken in charge by the hotel porters. A moment later the boat shoved off.
A few waited to watch it make its way back to the ship, which immediately steamed away toward the horizon; others followed the procession headed by the invalid's chair; still others hurried ahead to confer their patronage upon the Grand Hôtel Royal; but the greater part hastened back to their rooms to get something hot and bracing. From one end to the other, the place was a-buzz with wagging tongues. Why should the foreign secretary of the British Empire have chosen Weet-sur-Mer as his abiding place? Merely because he was ill and wished to rest? Bah! To believe that would be to show a mind the most credulous, would be to evince an ignorance of high diplomacy the most profound. Again, why should he have made the journey from England in a ship of war? Depend upon it, there was a mystery here; a mystery not to be solved in a moment even by such eminent amateurs as those assembled at Weet-sur-Mer. It would take time—it would take study. But it was worth it! There was something behind all this-something more than appeared on the surface —in a word, a Plot! And the best place to study it,—the only place, indeed,—was the Grand Hôtel Royal.
So, instantly, there was a great packing of luggage, a despatching of couriers, an engaging of rooms, a settling of bills which drove the proprietor of the Splendide half mad with chagrin. He protested, he swore, he offered concessions the most unheard of—all in vain. His day was over!
Rushford, his work as cicérone des dames accomplished, returned leisurely to the hotel, while the girls started for their accustomed walk. He smiled grimly to himself as he entered the office, the scene was so different from that of yesterday. For the moment, all was excitement. Monsieur Pelletan and his assistants were busy attending to the wants of their distinguished guest; down in the kitchen, the chef was cursing the stupidity of the unfortunate menials under him and striving madly to prove himself worthy the occasion—the greatest of his life! Every moment, a porter toiled up to the door with a load of luggage; every moment some one arrived demanding a room—and not one murmured at the tariff! The lift groaned and creaked under the unaccustomed weights put upon it and moved more slowly than ever. Pelletan, as he hurried past, mopping his perspiring brow, had time only for a single glance at his good angel—but what a glance! Such a glance, no doubt, Columbus caught from his lieutenants at the cry of "Land Ho!"
Rushford, leaning over the desk, watching the confusion with an amusement which had banished every trace of ennui, felt his arm touched. He turned and recognised the be-gilt messenger of the day before.
"A second telegram for monsieur," said that functionary, with an amiable grin, and produced the message.
There was no time for hesitation. Rushford took it, signed the blank, and fished up the expected tip.
"Oh, what a tangled web we weave!" he murmured, and looked at the address on the little white envelope. It read:
_M. le Propriétaire,
Grand Hôtel Royal,
Weet-sur-Mer._
"The plot thickens!" he murmured. "Well, it's really for me. Let's see," and he tore it open. He whistled again as he read the message; then he called the nearest boy. "Tell Monsieur Pelletan to come here at once," he said. "Tell him I must speak to him on a matter of importance."
At the end of a moment, the little man puffed down the stair, exhausted, radiant!
"Iss eet not grand!" he cried. "What a change from yesterday! T'ough how you haf accomplishe' eet, monsieur—"
"No matter," interrupted Rushford. "Which is the next best of your apartments, Pelletan?"
"T'e nex' best? Why, apartment B, monsieur. Eet iss t'e counterpart of apartment A, only on t'e nort' side of t'e house instead of t'e sout'."
"And it is still empty?"
"At two hundret francs t'e tay? Oh, yess, monsieur; only a Prince can afford eet now."
"Well, you will prepare it at once—"
"Ah, monsieur himself will take eet! T'at iss just! I shall pe too happy—"
"No, no; you've just said that only a Prince can afford it and it's my business to produce him! Let's see—it's nearly nine—well, at ten o'clock, there will arrive in a special train—"
Monsieur Pelletan had turned pale.
"Een a special train?" he faltered. "What! Some one else?"
"Yes—at ten o'clock—"
"Who iss eet will arrive, monsieur?" questioned Pelletan faintly.
"His Highness, Prince Frederick of Markeld, ambassador from the court of Schloshold-Markheim," answered Rushford, dwelling upon every word. "We will give him apartment B."