Sir Paul Verdayne reached Lucerne on the afternoon of the next day. He was as eager as a boy for the reunion with his son. How he loved the Boy—his Boy—the living embodiment of a love that seemed to him greater than any other love the world had ever known.
The storm had ceased and in the brilliancy of the afternoon sunshine little trace of the fury of the night could be seen. Nature smiled radiantly through the tear-drops still glistening on tree and shrub and flower, like some capricious coquette defying the world to prove that she had ever been sad.
To Sir Paul, the place was hallowed with memories of his Queen, and his heart and soul were full of her as he left the train. At the station Vasili awaited him with the news of the double tragedy that had horrified Lucerne.
In that moment, Sir Paul's heart broke. He grasped at the faithful servitor for a support the old man was scarce able to give. He looked up into the pitying face, grown old and worn in the service of the young King and his heart thrilled, as it ever thrilled, at the sight of the long, cruel scar he remembered so well—the scar which the Kalmuck had received in the service of his Queen, long years before.
Sir Paul loved Vasili for that—loved him even more for the service he had done the world when he choked to death the royal murderer of his Queen, on the fatal night of that tragedy so cruelly alive in his memory. He looked again at the scar on the swarthy face, and yet he knew it was as nothing to the scar made in the old man's heart that day.
In some way—they never knew how—they managed to reach the scene of the tragedy, and Sir Paul, at his urgent request, was left alone with the body of his son.
Oh, God! Could he bear this last blow—and live?
After a time, when reason began to re-assert itself, he searched and found the letters that had told the Boy-king the story of his birth. Was there no word at all for him—his father?—save the brief telegram he had received the night before?
Ah, yes! here was a note. His Boy had thought of him, then, even at the last. He read it eagerly.
"Father—dear Father—you who alone of all the world can understand—forgive and pity your son who has found the cross too heavy—the crown too thorny—to bear! I go to join my unhappy mother across the river that men call death—and there together we shall await the coming of the husband and father we could neither of us claim in this miserable, gray old world. Father Paul—dearest and best and truest of fathers, your Boy has learned with you the cost of love, and has gladly paid the price—'sorrow and death!'"
"Father—dear Father—you who alone of all the world can understand—forgive and pity your son who has found the cross too heavy—the crown too thorny—to bear! I go to join my unhappy mother across the river that men call death—and there together we shall await the coming of the husband and father we could neither of us claim in this miserable, gray old world. Father Paul—dearest and best and truest of fathers, your Boy has learned with you the cost of love, and has gladly paid the price—'sorrow and death!'"
He bent again over the cold form, he pushed aside the clustering curls, and kissed again and again, with all the fervor and pain of a lifetime's repression, the white marble face of his son.
And a few words of that little note rang in his ears unceasingly—"dearest, and best, andtruestof fathers!"Truest of fathers! Ah, yes! The Boy—his Boy—had understood!
And the scalding tears came that were his one salvation, for they washed away for a time some of the deadly ache from his bereaved heart.
When the force of his outburst was spent, Sir Paul Verdayne mastered himself resolutely. There was much to be done. It was indeed a double torture to find such an affliction here, of all places under Heaven, but he told himself that his Queen would have him brave and strong, and master his grief as an English gentleman should. And her wishes were still, as they had ever been, the guide of his every thought and action.
One thing he was determined upon. The world must never know the truth.
To be sure, Sir Paul himself did not know the secret of that one day. He could only surmise. Even Vasili did not know. The Boy had cleverly managed to have the day, as he had the preceding one, "all to himself," as he had informed Vasili, and Opal had been equally skillful in escaping the attendance of her maid. They had left the hotel separately at night, in different directions, returning separately at night. Who was there to suspect that they had passed the day together, or had even met each other at all? Surely—no one!
And what was there for the world to know, in the mystery of their death? Nothing! They were each found alone, stabbed to the heart, and the dagger that had done the deed had not even been withdrawn from the body of the Boy, when they found him. Sir Paul and Vasili had recognized it, but who would dare to insinuate that the same dagger had drunk the blood of the young American lady, or to say whose hand had struck either blow? It was all a mystery, and Sir Paul was determined that it should remain so.
Money can accomplish anything, and though all Europe rang with the story, no scandal—nor hint of it—besmirched the fair fame of the unhappy Boy and girl who had loved "not wisely, but too well!"
There had, indeed, been for them, as they had playfully said—"No to-morrow!"
And Sir Paul Verdayne, kneeling by the bier, with its trappings of a kingdom's mourning, which hid beneath its rich adornment all the joy that life for twenty years had held for him, felt for the first time a sense of guilt, as he looked back upon his past.
He did not regret his love. He could never do that! Truly, a man and a woman had a right to love and mate as they would, if the consequences of their deeds rested only upon their own heads. But to bring children into the world, the fruit of such a union, to suffer and die, "for the sins of the fathers," as his son had suffered and died—there was the sin—a selfish, unpardonable sin! "And the wages of sin is death."
He had never felt the truth before. He had been so happy in his Boy, and so proud of his future, that there had never been a question in his mind. But now he was face to face with the terrible consequences.
"Oh, God!" he cried, "truly my punishment is just—but it is greater than I can bear!"
And Paul Verdayne—what of him? Of course you want to know. Read the sequel
HIGH NOON
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TO-DAY
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THE INDISCRETION OF LADY USHER: a Sequel to "The Diary of My Honeymoon"
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