“Dear Boy,” it ran, “Did you think me awfully mean this afternoon? This is to make up. I have told Sadie that I am just not going to thefêtesTuesday, but I haven’t told her that I am coming riding with you instead. I am, if you ask me nicely.—Yours,Félicia.”
“Dear Boy,” it ran, “Did you think me awfully mean this afternoon? This is to make up. I have told Sadie that I am just not going to thefêtesTuesday, but I haven’t told her that I am coming riding with you instead. I am, if you ask me nicely.—Yours,
Félicia.”
Naturally, the only thing to do on receiving such a letter was to hasten to secure the smartest possible vehicle for a long country drive. But Usk found to his dismay that not a single proprietor would let out a carriage of any description on the day mentioned save for use at the Carnival, and he was obliged to invite himself to tea at the villa instead. Félicia pouted when he told her of the change, and kept him for some time in anxiety as to whether she would allow him to come or not, averring that the ideal lover would have purchased a complete turn-out rather than disappoint his mistress of the drive on which she had set her heart. Usk pleaded that he had not the money, whereupon she retorted that an American would have made the purchase on credit, and resold the cart and horse at a profit immediately afterwards, thus combining business with pleasure. However, she was at last induced to promise to be at home, and Usk felt his self-respect restored. He would have Félicia to himself, without the intervention of Maimie, or Mrs van Zyl, or the King, and his uncle would be forced to see that his suspicions were unfounded.
But when the Tuesday afternoon arrived, a note was brought to Usk as he sat in Nicholson’s room reading to the invalid, who had got as far as the Jardin Publique in the morning, and there discovered that his strength was at an end. This note was written with crimson ink upon rose-scented pink paper, and Usk found that it came from Mrs van Zyl. It was very short.
“Dear Lord Usk,—Félicia is real sorry to disappoint you, but she thinks it her duty not to miss such an excellent opportunity of seeing the Carnival. I wish we could have you come with us, but our carriage is full.—Yours truly,Sadie van Zyl.”
“Dear Lord Usk,—Félicia is real sorry to disappoint you, but she thinks it her duty not to miss such an excellent opportunity of seeing the Carnival. I wish we could have you come with us, but our carriage is full.—Yours truly,
Sadie van Zyl.”
Usk crushed the note angrily in his hand when he had glanced at it. Of course it might mean no more than that Félicia was to view the Carnival procession from a window, but he felt almost certain that she would don fancy dress and join in all the gaiety that offered itself. And who was to occupy the fourth seat in the carriage? Only one answer suggested itself—King Michael. Usk fought against the conviction in vain. At last he stood up, and spoke hurriedly to Nicholson, who had been watching him curiously.
“I’m off. I shall go and see what all the foolery is like, anyhow.”
“Disappointed of your tea-party?” laughed the invalid, his worn face elfish, almost malicious. “But you can’t go down into the thick of the fun in those things. You’ll be mobbed. Look here, you wear the togs I ordered for myself—we’re about the same height. Ring for Jenkins, and he’ll bring them. I was going as the typical Englishman of French caricature. Now then, there you are. Don’t forget the whiskers, mind.”
“They aren’t the right colour for me,” said Usk, tossing down the long Dundreary whiskers which had been selected to match Nicholson’s sandy hair. “I’m sure I shall look enough of an ass without them. Where in the world did you get such checks?”
“Horse-blanket,” responded Nicholson, breathlessly but proudly. “Tasty, isn’t it? I thought when I chose it I should make a sensation, but now I know what the French believe about us, I’m certain it will fall flat. People will only say, ‘That English fellow has no business to come in his ordinary clothes.’”
“Ordinary!” gasped Usk, from the adjoining room, where he was arraying himself rapidly in the scarlet and yellow checked knickerbockers, the orange tawny Norfolk jacket, the golf-stockings combining all the colours of the rainbow, and the aggressive sun-helmet, surrounded by a white puggaree striped with red and blue, which Nicholson considered would enable the French populace to identify the typical Englishman so dear to their hearts. Football boots and an alpenstock completed the costume, and when Usk had donned the orthodox velvet mask, Nicholson lay back upon his pillows, and laughed and coughed until the tears ran down his cheeks.
“I wouldn’t have missed it for anything,” he gasped. “I shouldn’t have realised the effect half as well on myself. You might have stepped out of ‘Le Rire,’ except for your modest air of uneasiness. Swagger a bit, and grind your teeth. Walk as if the whole earth belonged to you. And do put on the whiskers. They’ll look all the funnier with your dark moustache.”
But this last sacrifice to appearances Usk declined to make, and after Nicholson had reminded him to provide himself with a good bag of confetti and a tin scoop, he crept downstairs, hoping fervently not to meet any one he knew, and went out by the side door of the hotel, whence he found his way easily to the Old Town and into the main stream of gaiety. His sole idea had been to look for Félicia, to convince himself that she had deliberately broken her promise to him, or perhaps to have the delight of finding that Mrs van Zyl and Maimie were joining in the fun without her. But once in the whirling, ever-changing throng, he soon recognised that there was little hope of finding any one. Strangers accosted him, rallied him on his loneliness, invited him to join them. Confetti flew about in showers, small hard bouquets hurtled through the air from the decorated carriages as they passed, and the phantasmagoria of sound and colour fleeted and shifted every moment. Overhead, against the glowing blue of the sky, were strings of fluttering flags and wreaths of evergreen; a little lower, windows and shop-fronts were garlanded and decked with bright-hued stuffs; the lofty cars which lurched past vied with one another in the richness of their colour-schemes and thebizarrerieof their mechanical devices; small foot-soldiers and dragoons on prancing steeds were pressed hither and thither in valiant attempts to keep a line. There were people in the road, people on the pavement, people in every door and window, people on the roofs. Bands blared, maskers hissed, cackled, hooted, neighed, yelled; imperious policemen forced their way along with the word “circulez” on their lips, although to obey was obviously impossible. People entangled each other in long paper streamers, banged each other with bladders, knocked off each other’s headgear, poked confetti down each other’s collars, all in high good-humour, and amid shrieks of laughter. Dominos of every possible colour and shade of colour, Pierrots and Pierrettes of every degree of inanity, debased national and historical costumes of every country and every era, eddied round Usk, but he tried in vain to distinguish any figure that he knew. Anxious and troubled as he was, he had soon had enough of the scene, but he kept his temper, and flung his confetti with the best, until they were exhausted. By this time he had managed to traverse almost the entire route of the procession, and he turned to retrace his steps. As he did so, he noticed a band of men with false noses, who seemed to be chaffing some one in their midst. As Usk was carried close to them by the crowd, he saw that the centre of attraction was a girl in German peasant costume. Her hair hung in two thick plaits below her waist, and in her short skirts she looked little more than a child. Her stiff little round cap had been tweaked off by one of the group surrounding her, two more had possessed themselves of the ribbons from her hair, and were announcing that they would wear them next their hearts for ever after, and another had pulled the knitting from her apron-pocket and was drawing out the pins. The girl herself was clinging with both hands to her mask, in evident though unnecessary terror that it would be the next thing torn from her, and gazing round like a hunted hare for a way of escape. With an inarticulate exclamation, Usk pushed his way into the circle. Whoever the girl might be, her terror and distress were obvious, and he could not see her tormented by this rabble. To his utter astonishment, as soon as her eyes fell on him, she darted forward and seized his arm.
“Oh, you have come at last!” she cried in English. “It has seemed so long!”
“The fair Gretchen has found a cavalier!” laughed one of the tormentors.
“May they be happy!” cried another, and in the shower of confetti which followed, Usk made his escape, the girl still clinging to his arm. She was shaking from head to foot, and he managed to drag her into a doorway, while he stood before her to protect her from the crowd. Presently a small meek voice said—
“Please forgive me. I ought not to have pretended I knew you, but I was so frightened.” The tears were raining down.
“Oh, never mind,” said Usk cheerfully, wondering how this child had been allowed out by herself. “They wouldn’t have hurt you really, you know. Shall we wait here and watch for your people?”
“I don’t know where they are, and papa will be so angry.”
“Why? Did you come out without his knowing?”
“Oh no. I was with him, and I wanted to hold his arm, and he wouldn’t let me. He said I made him look absurd,” a sob. “But I knew we could not keep together if I let go, and we were separated in a moment.”
“All right. Don’t cry. I’ll take you home at once if you like. Your father will guess you’ve gone back. Where are you staying?”
“At the Hôtel des Rois. But please don’t allow me to trouble you.”
“It’s no trouble at all. I’m staying there too.”
“Oh, are you? But I didn’t see you at breakfast. It was so nice seeing all the people, and trying to guess who they were.”
“I am with my uncle and aunt, and they prefer to have their meals upstairs.”
“So do papa and mamma. How droll! But it is my birthday to-day, and mamma allowed me to breakfast on the terrace, for a treat. You are English, aren’t you? When those horrid men all came round me, I thought, ‘Oh, if only I could see a German or an Englishman!’”
“You ought to be careful,” said Usk sagely. They were walking through a quiet street by this time, on their way back to the hotel. “There are a good many shady characters about.”
“Shady? I don’t know that word. But it means dark, dangerous—is it not so? But I could see you were not like that, of course.”
“I’m glad I was labelled English and harmless to the foreign eye,” said Usk. “I shouldn’t have thought myself that this get-up would have inspired confidence.”
“What strange words you use. One judges people by their faces, not by their get-ups—is that the word?”
“There isn’t very much of my face visible to judge by.”
“Ah, one can judge a good deal by the general outline,” said the girl confidently. “Oh, is your uncle the poor sick Englishman I met in the gardens this morning?”
“No; that’s a friend of mine.”
“I was so sorry for him, because I have been ill so much myself. When I was a little girl I almost died every winter.”
“But you look all right now.”
“I am quite well, thank you, but mamma lived up in the mountains with me for two whole years, that I might become strong. I was her baby, you see.” Usk smiled involuntarily, the remark sounded so naïve. “Franz, my next brother, was ten years old when I was born, and all the rest are much older. I am even younger than two of my nephews, the Princes of Schreckingen.”
“Surely you must be the Princess of Schwarzwald-Molzau?” asked Usk diffidently.
“The little Princess they call me, or Princess Lenchen. At least they used to do that, but now papa says I am always to be called the Princess Helene. I am grown-up, you see, but I don’t feel as if I were. When I was confirmed I thought there would surely be a difference, that I should feel grown-up, but I don’t, and it displeases papa. He used to laugh at the things I said, and say, ‘How does the child get such things into her head?’ but now he is angry, and says, ‘Will that child never grow up?’”
She spoke so dolorously that Usk laughed. “You’ll be grown-up quite soon enough,” he said. “I don’t know what to call you—your Grand-Ducal Highness?”
“I do not know yet who you are,” she replied, with a quaint little air of dignity.
“Probably you’ll know my uncle’s name better than mine—Count Mortimer.”
“Oh, then we are cousins!” she exclaimed in delight. “At least we have the same aunt. She was married first to my uncle, you know.”
“And now she is married to mine. Does that make her more my aunt or yours?”
“Ah, but she is my mother’s cousin as well.”
“That gives you the advantage, certainly.”
“But does it make Count Mortimer my uncle? I am so anxious to know that, and I am afraid to ask papa. He—he doesn’t——”
“Care for the connection? None of you do, I suppose. But I think you’ll like it better when you know my uncle.”
“Like it? I wish him to be my uncle!” she cried. “You do not know; but since he came to Molzau for my sister Theudelinde’s wedding, four years ago, and I heard all about him, I have—oh, I do not know the English word—geschwärmtfor him. What is it that you do to a great poet, or painter, or any great man?”
“Admire him?” suggested Usk.
“Oh no, no! You admire a horse. Have you no sisters? Did they not set up some hero’s photograph and place flowers in front of it, and watch for any mention of his name, and long to obtain his autograph?”
“Now you mention it, I believe Phil—that’s my sister—did have a severe attack of hero-worship some years ago. It was about the time Lord Williams came home from Africa.”
“Lord Williams? Oh, I know—Bills!”
“And you pretend not to understand slang!”
“I am sorry. I have heard my English cousins speak of him so much, and they told me it was considered quite wrong in England to call him anything else. Then what is the word?”
“Adore, I should think. Or I know a girl, an American”—Usk’s face clouded again as he thought of Félicia—“who would say she enthused over him.”
“Enthused? That is a good word. Well, then, I enthused over Count Mortimer. I found a portrait of him in an illustrated paper—one of my English cousins was staying with us, and her lady had brought it—and I cut it out, and had it framed. I put it up in my room, and made a wreath of green leaves for it on the dear Count’s birthday, and no one was allowed to dust it but myself. Mamma laughed at me, but when the trouble came, and your uncle left Thracia, you know, she told me I had better take it down, lest papa should see it and be angry. So I took it down, and laid it in a drawer, and looked at it every day; but when the Count married Aunt Ernestine, I thought papa could not mind, and I put it up again. But when he saw it he was—oh, I cannot tell you how angry! and he broke the glass and tore up the portrait. But do you know what I shall do now? I shall ask Aunt Ernestine to give me a photograph of him and write my name on it herself. Papa couldn’t tear that up, could he?”
“Far be it from me to say what papa couldn’t or wouldn’t do!” returned Usk, almost helpless with laughter, as they mounted the steps of the Hôtel des Rois. The girl turned to look at him reproachfully, so that Usk saw before she did an elderly gentleman, in a high state of excitement, standing in the middle of the hall, and apparently giving orders to the whole staff of the hotel in an imperious style, which contrasted ludicrously with his peasant dress and the mask which was pushed up on his forehead.
“Communicate with the police instantly!” he was saying, with a strong German accent. “They could do nothing, you say? But I insist upon it. What! is my daughter to be torn from my side and kidnapped with impunity?”
“I am here, dear papa,” said the Princess Helene meekly. “I lost my way, and this—this kind English gentleman brought me home.”
Still spluttering and choking, the Grand-Duke turned round, and glared at his daughter as if he was angry with her for being brought back. Then he turned again to wave his hand majestically, and when the waiters had fled, allowed his gaze to rest upon Usk, who became once more painfully conscious of his attire. “I am obliged to you, sir,” said the Grand-Duke coldly.
“Papa,” whispered his daughter, anxious to improve matters, “it is Aunt Ernestine’s nephew.” She shrank from the look she received as if from a blow.
“You are the nephew of Count Mortimer, sir, I understand? The Count is a worthy man, and at one time did good service to my house. I am glad you follow in his footsteps.” And the Grand-Duke led his daughter away.
TheGrand-Duke and Duchess of Schwarzwald-Molzau were entertaining a strictly family party at dinner in theirappartementat the Hôtel des Rois. King Michael and his mother were naturally the chief guests, and the Queen’s presence involved Cyril’s. Usk had also the honour of being invited, owing to the service he had rendered to the Princess Helene, and there was a vacant place at the table, no explanation of which was at first offered. Usk felt supremely uncomfortable, and was very conscious of being an outsider, though reflection, or policy, or his wife’s influence, had induced the Grand-Duke to show himself gracious, if not cordial. Cyril’s help was desirable, even indispensable, in solving the problems which lay before King Michael’s relations at this moment, and there was a widespread belief that it was not wise to show any discourtesy to “the Mortimer,” however defenceless he might appear. Not that Cyril displayed any disposition to insist upon his rights. With the tact which always distinguished him, he claimed nothing that his hosts might not be willing to concede, and in spite of his delicate position exerted such a genial influence that before the end of the meal the Grand-Duke was addressing him with absolute friendliness. It was Queen Ernestine who was nervously on the look-out for slights offered to her husband, so that throughout the evening she was clearly ready, as he told her afterwards, to sail magnificently out of the room at a moment’s notice, sweeping Usk and himself in her train. Her vigilance was not without its effect upon the Grand-Duke, beside whom she sat, and as he hoped much from her influence over the King, he took pains, in a rough and somewhat tactless fashion, to show her that her fears were unnecessary.
King Michael sat next to the Grand-Duchess, a stout, comfortable-looking lady whose sole anxiety seemed to be her husband’s temper. When she had satisfied herself that he was desirous of pleasing the Queen, and exhibited no active antipathy to Cyril, she settled down to enjoy the King’s society. Usk, judging by her occasional exclamations and generally shocked expression, thought that he was probably entertaining her with the recital of some of the escapades with which he daily edified the population of Nice, and that she, regarding him as a possible son-in-law, was listening indulgently, if with a certain amount of gratifying horror.
Sitting solitary, since the empty place happened to be next him, Usk had plenty of opportunity of observing his fellow-diners, and he took a special delight in watching the pair opposite him. The Princess Helene was looking very small and shy, and as young as ever, in her simple white gown, with her hair coiled round and round the small head, which seemed overweighted by the heavy plaits. She was not pretty, thought Usk, looking at her dispassionately, she was too thin and pale, but the over-abundant hair was of a warm brown, and the large eyes a deep hazel. If she was with people who were kind to her, and was not in constant fear of being snubbed or called to order, she would be a jolly little girl. To this conclusion he was led by observing her demeanour to Cyril, which reminded him of the way she had talked to himself under the protection of her mask two days before. At first she was almost too shy to speak, on finding herself in the actual presence of her idol, but the barrier was soon removed. There were few people that Cyril could not set at ease, and this little romantic girl was no exception to the rule.
“He talked to me about interesting things, as if I was quite old,” she said to Usk in the drawing-room afterwards; and when Usk hinted that this would not generally be considered a compliment, she was almost angry. “People always will think that girls want compliments, and simply to talk about balls and stupid things of that kind,” she cried, “instead of books, and politics, andlife; but the dear Count is not like that. I have often thought that some day I might see him and listen to him, but I never, never dreamed that he would talk to me, and let me talk to him. And I should have lost it all ifhehad not been so rude and come in too late for dinner.”
She was sitting at the piano, which was isolated from the rest of the room in a recess, and Usk was standing beside her to turn over the pages of her music. As she spoke she threw a little scornful glance in the direction of the defaulting guest, who had made his appearance, with profuse apologies, when the meal was just over. A man of uncertain age, looking young in a dim light, but considerably older when the glare of the electric lamps fell upon him, he was presented to the Queen as the Grand-Duke Ivan Petrovitch of Scythia. At first he had appeared to think it his duty to hover round Helene with talk of the very kind she despised, but when the four elders of the party drew together for conversation, he seemed to find a more congenial companion in King Michael, who had taken no notice of his little cousin save to tease her with reminiscences of their childhood which made her blush painfully. Usk, whose Welsh blood had boiled under the calmly inquiring glance turned upon him by the new-comer, was glad enough to follow Helene to the piano, where she tried over the accompaniments of various songs, and played now and then a few bars of one musical composition or another, “just to encourage conversation,” as she put it.
“Don’t you hate him?” she inquired presently, under cover of the music, with a turn of her head in the direction of the visitor.
“I don’t much like his looks,” Usk agreed.
“He may say that he lost his train from Monte Carlo, but I am quite certain that he stayed at the tables too long on purpose.”
“But that seems rather aimless, doesn’t it?”
“Oh, he wished to be rude. I don’t know why, but I am certain it was that. He makes me—I forget the word—quake? quiver?—all over when he comes near.”
“He grues you, does he? So he does me.”
“I am so glad, because it shows it is not a fancy of mine. Do you know what I think it is? Look at him through the leaves of that palm; see how smooth he is, how well-brushed—is not that the phrase? Then think of him as he would look without his beard. I have seen a picture of him when he was much younger in his cousin Sonya’s album, and oh! it was such a cruel face. I call him the Tartar—you know the saying,Grattez le Scythe, et vous trouverez——? It amuses mamma very much, but she told me not to tell papa. He would be displeased.”
“I don’t think I would tell the Grand-Duke either,” suggested Usk, half-pityingly. Could the child be so blind as not to see what the presence of the Scythian Prince at this family gathering portended?
“Oh no, I should not think of it. And besides, when he comes near me, I can never talk at all. I feel like a mouse in a trap, and I can only say yes and no. You know that he married one of my cousins? She died before they had been married a year, and I believe”—her voice dropped, and her eyes sought Usk’s with a haunting horror in them—“that he killed her.”
“Oh no!” Usk felt compelled to say. “Why should he?”
“I don’t mean that he murdered her with a dagger or with poison. I should think it would be enough to kill any one to see that face and that sneer always opposite them. And they wanted her to enter the Orthodox Church, and she refused; and I don’t think he would be very kind if his wishes were opposed, would he? Oh, it was brave of her, poor Leopoldine! I should have surrendered, I know. I should be too frightened to hold out.”
“I say, you know,” said Usk awkwardly, “perhaps you’re misjudging him. He mayn’t be as bad as he looks.”
Helene shook her head. “It is the feeling his presence gives me,” she said. “Now, there is Michael. I dislike him, but I am not afraid of him. He is like a big boy who tortures flies for sport, not thinking. The Grand-Duke Ivan would do it for the sake of cruelty. And there is the Emperor Sigismund. Every one says how hard he is, but he is not cruel. He is always kind to me. He used to call me his little kitten, and I could always persuade him to do what I wanted. That was when I was a little girl, of course.”
Usk was silent, lost in amazement at this new light upon the character of the Hercynian ruler. Helene was looking through a pile of music.
“Ah!” she said. “This is what you in England call the Wedding March; is it not so? Shall I startle them all by playing it in Michael’s honour? It seems quite certain that he is to marry Sonya Eugenova. Cousin Ottilie was calling on mamma to-day, and told us so much about them both.”
“No doubt the Princess of Dardania would know more about it than any one else,” said Usk drily, “but,” he added, unhappy recollections of his own coming to the surface again, “it would be a pity to congratulate the King too soon.”
“Then shall I play it for you?” she asked suddenly. “Cousin Ottilie told us you were betrothed to a beautiful American girl. I hope I shall see her. Michael knows her family, does he not? Mamma said he was a good deal at their villa.”
“No, please don’t,” said Usk hurriedly, laying his hand upon hers as she was about to begin. “As you have heard so much, I can explain things to you which I couldn’t to any one else. We are not exactly engaged—at least, you know, I would give anything to be, but she won’t have it. It’s—it’s just that she doesn’t like to be bound, you know. Of course she thinks I should try to monopolise her, and she would find it awfully dull.”
Helene’s face, as she sat at the piano, wore an expression of disapproval. “I don’t understand,” she said. “She has not refused you—no? And yet she will not bind herself? But this is not treating you honourably.”
“Oh, I don’t mind,” Usk assured her, with involuntary mendacity. “She’s—she’s an American, you know, and American girls like to be free above all things. I don’t want her to refuse me at all. I’m quite content to wait until she is willing——”
“To be betrothed? But why should she prefer freedom to becoming your bride?” Usk felt some astonishment, until he remembered that she was using the word in the German sense. “Surely she would receive far greater consideration, besides having the right to your escort everywhere, and all the respect you would naturally show her?”
“Oh, it’s not that.” Usk felt helpless to explain the points involved. “An American girl gets all the consideration she wants anyhow, and that’s all there is going, or she’ll know the reason why. And you see she would much rather have different men to take her about than me always.”
“I do not understand,” said Helene coldly, rising as she spoke. “It seems to me that you ought not to allow her to treat you with such insult. She cannot be a high-minded girl.”
“What next?” thought Usk in amazement, as he put out the piano-lights before following her. The party was breaking up by this time, and Helene bade him good-night with freezing coldness. He was at a loss to know how he had offended her, especially when he noticed that in saying farewell to his uncle she handed him, with a deep blush and a look of entreaty, a morocco-bound book. The Grand-Duchess laughed pleasantly.
“What, Lenchen, that absurd album of yours again?” she said. “Don’t give yourself any trouble about it, Count, I beg of you. Every one spoils this child by being too kind to her.”
“What is it, Cyril?” asked the Queen curiously, when they had reached their ownappartement. Cyril flung the book on the table with a groan, and his wife and Usk laughed when they saw that it was lettered “Confession Album.”
“What is there about me that impels romantic little girls to let me in for things of this sort?” he demanded. “I thought Philippa said that these wretched books had gone out years ago, but it seems some malignant cousin brought your niece this one from England, and my feelings are to be butchered to make a holiday for her.”
“Poor little Lenchen!” sighed the Queen. “I am glad you were kind to her, Cyril.”
“Ah, poor little girl! If Michael was her last chance of escape from Ivan Petrovitch, I’m afraid it’s a bad look-out.”
“He took pains to show that he was not at all attracted to her,” said the Queen, in a low voice. “I suppose it was as well to make it plain, but——”
“The unfortunate parents were doubly snubbed,” said Cyril. “It was quite clear that Ivan Petrovitch saw he would only be welcomed as a son-in-law if Michael disappointed them, and he showed his resentment by arriving late. I don’t envy his future relations-in-law, I must say.”
“The poor little girl herself hates him,” said Usk.
Cyril looked up quickly. “Did she confide that to you? Confidences of that sort are dangerous. It is discreet to forget them at once.”
“I’m not likely to hand it on to the Grand-Duke Ivan, at any rate. And talking of confidences, the Princess of Dardania seems to have been indulging in a good many this afternoon.”
“On matrimonial matters? So we heard. Perhaps you don’t know that she was asked to join the family dinner-party, and refused on account of the company she would meet—otherwise you and me?”
“No,” said the Queen calmly; “she could not bring herself to meet me.”
“My dear Ernestine—your own cousin! Ah, I see. Because you had degraded yourself by stooping to me—was that it?”
The Queen looked at him searchingly. “Raised myself, rather,” she said. “Yes, that is no doubt the reason, Cyril.”
“I see the book Nicholson wanted has come. I think I’ll take it in to him and see how he is,” said Usk, who felt himself slightlyde trop. From his brother-in-law Mansfield he had gathered the idea that the Princess Dowager of Dardania would at one time not have scorned to marry Cyril herself, but he knew his uncle well enough to be certain that no word would ever pass his lips on the subject.
“Ottilie is determined that Michael shall marry Sonya,” said the Queen, when he had gone out.
“Yes; it was considerate of her to call and quench any hopes that the poor Schwarzwald-Molzaus might be cherishing. I shall be curious to see if she tries anything of the kind upon Félicia.”
“I don’t think she would regard her as a serious rival to Sonya.”
“Then she would be very much mistaken. The Grand-Duke took the hint I managed to give him far better than I expected. If his own daughter had married Michael, it would not have solved our difficulties at all, for there would still be the money to be found. Little Helene won’t have more than a few thousands, at the outside, and her father sees the difficulty. He will make Michael introduce him to Félicia, and will watch her for a day or two before he takes any decided step. And Félicia is the kind of girl who will appeal to him by her very audacity. She will surprise and amuse him, and calmly ignore his prejudices when that unfortunate little Helene would be cowering in terror.”
“Cyril, did it strike you? If we could get rid of Ivan Petrovitch, there is Usk. Of course, I mean if Michael insists on marrying Félicia.”
“Usk marry Helene? My dear Ernestine, may I ask you to keep that idea to yourself? If it came to pass, I should never leave Europe alive.”
“Cyril, what do you mean? What difference could it make?”
“Simply that I should have become too powerful. You know me as I really am, dearest, a broken-down cobbler, patching things clumsily together. But to Scythia, which means Soudaroff, I am a plotter of the most dangerous type, at the head of a widespread conspiracy for establishing myself as ruler of Palestine, and bent on strengthening my position by royal alliances. You know, and I know, that when we quit Europe it will be to return to Sitt Zeynab and not leave it again, but end our days there in peace, away from the politics which nowadays I can’t touch without spoiling. But Soudaroff thinks, and very naturally too, after all the pains that have been taken to impress it upon him, that my leaving will be the sign for a desperate attempt—which he, knowing me as I was, believes will be successful—to oust the Scythian garrison from Jerusalem. If I have the additional support of the Schwarzwald-Molzau influence behind me, as he would infer if Usk was allowed to marry Helene, surely it is clear that his only chance is to put me out of the way?”
“Cyril, you terrify me. Let us leave things to settle themselves, and go back to the desert at once.”
“No, no; we’ll see the young folks out of the wood if we can. Though how we are to get things settled if Usk refuses to bring Félicia to book, I don’t know.”
Usk, in the meantime, had gone to Nicholson’s rooms, and found the invalid sitting up in bed, his bright eyes looking ghastly by contrast with his hollow cheeks.
“Thought you’d be coming in,” he said, “and I wouldn’t lie down, for fear I should go to sleep, though Jenkins has been at me incessantly. Look here; I wanted to show you this.”
He held out the page of a newspaper, which had the unfamiliar look peculiar to English printed with French type. It was one of the ephemeral society sheets which spring up once or twice a season in the larger health resorts, and after enjoying a briefsuccès de scandale, suddenly sink out of existence. Usk looked at the passage to which he pointed:—
“Tuesday’s Carnival procession was quite the best and most fashionably attended of late years, and bearers of nearly every well-known name in Europe took part in it or were among the spectators. Observed of all observers were the ‘Famille Pierrot en deuil,’ comprising two ladies and two gentlemen attired in Pierrot costumes with deep black borders. The idea was most cleverly carried out, down to the black pompons which adorned the white sugar-loaf hats of the two Pierrettes; and universal admiration was attracted by theabandonwith which the wearers threw themselves into all the fun of the occasion. It is whispered that one of the Pierrots was the youthful monarch of a Balkan State, whose whole-hearted gaiety has given great delight to Nice this season; and that the ladies were the fascinating American tenants of one of the florally-named villas in the Croix de Marbre, whom he honours with a good deal of his society.”
“Rather suggestive of your friends of the Villa Bougainvillea,” chuckled Nicholson, coughing as he spoke.
“This thing ought to be prosecuted,” said Usk wrathfully. “Or who edits it, do you know?”
“How can I tell? But you can’t horsewhip a man for telling the truth.”
“It’s not true! Why——” Usk was happy again—“if they went, they were to go in mauve dominos. She—one of them—showed me the stuff.”
“Of course she did! And what was to be under the dominos? They were only for driving. It was when your friends left their carriage that they would come out as full-blown Pierrettes.”
“It’s not true,” repeated Usk, doggedly but hopelessly. “There’s the book you wanted. Good-night.”
Once more his mind was made up to force an explanation with Félicia. He had not been near the Villa Bougainvillea since receiving Mrs van Zyl’s note on the day of the Carnival, for he had determined that Félicia owed him an apology, and that he would not move without it. Now, however, he felt he could rest no longer under this uncertainty. If Félicia had the smallest regard for him or his wishes, she would not have taken part in the Carnival at all; and if she had no regard for him, what prospect was there of their living happily together? It was with these thoughts in his mind that he made his way to the villa the next morning, as early as he thought Félicia would be likely to be up. To his astonishment he was ushered into thesalon, where Mrs van Zyl greeted him with a severe expression of countenance.
“I don’t know whether Félicia will receive you,” she said coldly, when he had explained that he came to see Miss Steinherz, “but I will send and ask her, any way.”
An awkward pause ensued, during which Usk endeavoured vainly to make conversation, wondering the while what was the reason for this treatment, and Mrs van Zyl eyed him as if he had been a convicted criminal. Presently, however, she was summoned to the door, and a whispered colloquy followed, which appeared to have a satisfactory result, for she went out, and Félicia entered the room. She seemed the embodiment of injured rectitude as she halted opposite Usk, and looked him over sternly.
“I guess you’re come to apologise,” she said at last.
“Nothing of the sort. I want an apology from you,” broke out Usk.
“Do tell! You’re the person to ask for apologies, aren’t you?”
“Exactly, and I mean to have one.”
“Am I to apologise because you broke your appointment, and haven’t been around for two whole days?”
“Considering that you broke the appointment through Mrs van Zyl, and went to the Carnival, which you had promised you wouldn’t do, I scarcely thought you would care to see me.”
“And if I told you that Sadie wrote you just to test you, and that I was waiting for you here all of Tuesday afternoon, what then?”
“I should ask who the two American ladies were from this house who were at the Carnival with King Michael.”
“I guess Sadie and Maimie are just as good Americans as I am,” said Félicia languidly. “Well!” she cried, with sudden fire, “if I told you all that what would you do?”
“I should accept your word, of course.”
“Oh, how kind! how condescending! Well, then, I just won’t tell you anything of the sort. You won’t have any word to accept, do you see? and you can just do as you like.”
“Félicia, you are not treating me fairly!” cried Usk, torn asunder with doubts. “Tell me you were not at the Carnival, and I will make any apology you please. You had no right to test me as you say, for I think I have passed the stage for that sort of thing, but if it was a test, I failed; I acknowledge that.”
“This is a test, too,” said Félicia calmly. “You promised to trust me, and I mean to see what your trust is worth. I have suggested an explanation, and if you don’t choose to accept it, you can just go.”
“Only tell me that you were not at the Carnival.”
“I won’t say a word. And you make out to love me!”
“And I do. If I leave off loving you, it will be because you have killed my love with your own hands. You know I love you, Fay. Could I bear the way you treat me if I didn’t? Am I to stand all the tests and you none? Give me just that one assurance, and you won’t repent it. I shall be bowed down with shame.”
“I don’t see but I’d better ring for Jacques to show you out,” remarked Félicia conversationally, moving towards the bell.
“You don’t care for me! You can’t care for me!” cried Usk.
Félicia turned towards him again. “Solemnly, Usk, if I care for any one, I care for you, but I won’t be treated that way. I must be trusted all in all, or not at all. If you can do it, say so, and stay.”
Her hand was on the bell-rope. Her beautiful eyes looked sadly, entreatingly at him. There were tears ready to fall.
“I can! I do!” he cried. “Oh, Fay, you are cruel to me!”
“Cruel only to be kind,” said Mrs van Zyl, entering the room just as Usk’s arms were round Félicia. “I guess you’re in again, Fay? You’ll stay lunch, Lord Usk? We receive this afternoon.”
The last piece of information was not particularly delightful to Usk, but he stayed, and was rewarded for abandoning his private judgment by many tender looks and caressing words from Félicia. A certain amount of triumph over Maimie was visible in her glance, and Usk guessed miserably that Maimie had prophesied he would not allow himself to be cajoled. Even now he felt horribly conscious that he did not believe in Félicia’s explanation. He had yielded because at the moment the fear of losing her seemed intolerable, but his submission degraded him in his own eyes. All Félicia’s endeavours to hide his chain with flowers were useless; she did not love him, and he did not trust her.
Matters were no better when Mrs van Zyl’s guests arrived, and he had no longer to keep up the dreary pretence which Félicia insisted on treating as solid reality. He did his duty in helping to hand round tea and cake, finding seats for elderly ladies, and making up sets for croquet, but the company was not to his taste, although it was evident that Félicia found it very much to hers. Once more he noticed the change in her. At Llandiarmid she had been merely the shadow of her real self, perversely critical or genuinely languid, but now she had recovered the health and good spirits which had been so noticeable before her father’s death. The well preserved, tightly buttoned, barons and counts who owed allegiance to the other American women present crowded round her, and competed for her smiles with rival sallies of wit, and the weary cosmopolitans forgot to talk of such an one’s score and some one else’s bad luck. She held her court among them, listening to their deftly turned compliments with an indifference which was almost contemptuous, until the splendid eyes would all at once be lifted lazily, and a comment be uttered—sometimes only a single word—which set all her hearers laughing. She could hold her own with ease even when her indifference piqued them all to unite against her. Still reclining with half-veiled eyes in her hammock, she would annihilate half her assailants at once with a single sally, and then dispose of the rest by a few crisp sentences in succession. It was perfect, Usk saw. No wonder these fellows were attracted and amused, and yet—and yet—what was to be the outcome of it all? Was it possible for Félicia—even if she ever intended to marry him—to be happy as his wife? Morbidly awake now to her methods and aims, he found no pleasure in the fact that King Michael had not put in an appearance all day, but rather a reason for her restoration of himself to favour. In spite of his protestations to his uncle, he was occupying now the most degraded of all positions, that of a stalking-horse employed to pique the other man into renewing his attentions.
“Wereally ought to buy something at the refreshment-stall,” said the Grand-Duchess; “but what is one to do with cakes in a hotel?”
“We might have tea here instead,” said Queen Ernestine. “Usk, perhaps you can find us a table in a quiet corner?”
A bazaar was being held on behalf of some object connected with the English church, and the Queen, escorted by Usk, had met the Grand-Duchess of Schwarzwald-Molzau and her daughter making the round of the stalls. One of the lady members of the committee, who was hovering at the Queen’s heels with the view of directing her attention to the most desirable, and expensive, articles on each stall, heard the remark about tea, and appeared suddenly in front of the party, her whole aspect eloquent of a desire to be addressed.
“Perhaps you can help us, Miss Waverley?” said the Queen, with a smile. “We should like to find a table a little more private than this one.”
“I can show you the very place, Ma’am,” replied Miss Waverley breathlessly. “There is a little nook here where your Majesty can see all that goes on without being seen, if your—if the gentleman will just help me to move this table.”
“Which of us is anxious to see all that is to be seen?” asked the Queen, as Miss Waverley hurried away to order the tea. “I think it must be you, Helene. Sit here, dear, where you can watch the people. Do put those parcels on the floor, Usk, and sit down.”
“I’m trying to decide whether Miss Waverley takes me for your equerry or your footman,” said Usk. “In either case she will be very much scandalised if she catches me sitting down. I think I had better receive the things from her and present them. Does your Majesty wish to be served on the knee?”
“I wish you to sit down in the place that is left for you, and to amuse the Princess Helene while her mother and I have a talk.”
“Ma’am, I obey,” and Usk took the seat pointed out to him. “How will your Grand-Ducal Highness please to be amused?” he asked of Helene.
“Why are you talking in this way? It is not at all like you,” she said wearily, and he noticed that the pale little face looked thinner, and that the eyes were heavy. “Why should you make this pretence?”
“Because the world is full of pretence, and we can’t get away from it,” he answered, bitterly enough. Her eyes sought his face in a moment.
“Oh, I am sorry,” she said quickly. “I ought to have known that there was something wrong. I see it in your eyes.”
“I had rather not talk about it, if you don’t mind. But I might say the same thing to you. Something has gone wrong, hasn’t it?”
“Ivan Petrovitch has found out that I call him the Tartar, and papa is so angry. He made me apologise to him.”
“And how did he take it?”
“Oh, as one would expect. He only said smoothly, ‘I hope the Princess Helene will think better of me when she has more opportunity of judging,’ but his voice made me shiver. What did he mean?”
“Well, you know,” said Usk, as her eyes met his again with that look of horror in them, “I told you——”
“Don’t say you told me it was a foolish thing to do. I know it, but I am quite unhappy enough without that.” She sat looking out between the draperies which shaded their corner, but her eyes seemed to see nothing of the gay room and the busy people. Then she turned suddenly to Usk again. “I am very rude and absent of mind,” she said. “You must forgive me, please. I wanted to tell you that I saw your beautiful lady yesterday.”
“Miss Steinherz?” growled Usk.
“Who else could it be? She is very, very beautiful, and her beauty is uncommon—original—how shall I say it?—witchlike?—oh no, that has a bad meaning in English, has it not? Spirit-like? ah, that is it. She is an Undine—before she had found her soul, of course.”
“Why do you say ‘of course’?” asked Usk. Helene started.
“Oh, I beg your pardon. What could I have been thinking of? Please forgive me, I ought not to have said such a thing. It was merely a silly thought of mine. Do forget it, please.”
“I think it was the truth,” said Usk bitterly. “At least, if she has a soul, I have not found it, but I don’t think she has.”
“Oh, don’t say that. She is so beautiful.”
“Judge for yourself. I have fought against it a long time, but now it is forced upon me. She does not love me, and only tolerates me near her to make another man jealous.”
“Oh no, no!” Her tone was sharp with pain. “You love her, and yet you can say this to me—almost a stranger!”
“I have not dared to say it to myself before, but it’s better to face it,” was the stubborn reply. “I oughtn’t to sadden you with it, I know, but I can’t talk to my uncle and aunt about it.”
“It will not sadden me, if I can help you. See, you have misunderstood Miss Steinherz, have you not? She conceals her love, perhaps, she is shy and proud? Perhaps even she coquets with you; she shows kindness to another suitor for the sake of teasing you? That is foolish, it is even wrong; but the heart is there, and loves you. You do not understand women very much, perhaps? So often they think it undignified, unwise, to let the love they truly have be seen. That is it, is it not? not—not what you say. A good woman could not act in that way, and she must be a good woman if you have chosen her to love out of all the world.”
“I wish I could think so!” said Usk, in a tone of such misery that Helene’s eyes filled with tears.
“Oh, if only I could help you!” she said. “I can only pray—pray that the good God will show you her heart full of love for you, that you may learn how you have misjudged her. Think how you will be obliged to humble yourself before her when you discover the truth!”
“I shouldn’t mind that,” said Usk, with the ghost of a smile.
“I’m afraid our tea-party won’t add very largely to the profits of the refreshment-stall,” said the Grand-Duchess. “I think we have eaten one cake of five centimes between us. Lenchen, darling, you are over-tired. Eat one of these cream-cakes, to please me.”
“I can’t, mamma. I am not hungry.”
“I can give them a five-franc piece, if you like, madame,” suggested Usk, “and ask them to add the change to their profits.”
“Ah, that is a good idea. And if you see ourchasseur, Lord Usk, perhaps you will kindly tell him to call up the carriage.”
Neither Queen Ernestine nor Usk spoke much as they returned to the hotel, for both were thinking of the conversation at the tea-table; but as soon as Usk had put down his parcels, and betaken himself to Nicholson’s rooms, the Queen turned impulsively to her husband.
“Oh, Cyril,” she said, “they are going to sacrifice that poor child!”
“Little Helene? Is it all settled?”
“They have not told her yet, but I can’t help thinking that she begins to perceive the truth. There is a look in her eyes——”
“But why doesn’t the Grand-Duchess break it to her, and let her have time to get accustomed to the idea?”
“She is afraid. The child has such a horror of Ivan Petrovitch that Adelheid thinks it would nearly kill her. She has always been so delicate, you know.”
“But it will be much worse, surely, if it comes upon her suddenly?”
“So I should think, but I can see that Adelheid is afraid both of Ivan Petrovitch and her husband. Ludwig is bent upon the marriage. He has never cared very much for Helene; she has always been her mother’s child. And he thinks he sees the romantic strain coming out in her.”
“No doubt of that, I should say. It is really curious how it reappears once or twice in a generation.”
“Yes; and Ludwig can never forget his cousin Ernest Albrecht, who died long ago. He was originally intended to marry Adelheid, you know, but they allowed him, after years of waiting, to resign his rank and betroth himself to dear Sister Chriemhild at Brutli. Ludwig is determined never to allow anything of the kind while he is head of the family.”
“Still, he might find the girl a more attractive husband of her own rank than that unspeakable Scythian. Has the Grand-Duchess pointed that out to him?”
“Ah, but Ivan Petrovitch is also determined upon the match. I hope I don’t misjudge him, Cyril—or rather I hope I do, for Helene’s sake—but it seems to me that he sees the child’s horror of him, and enjoys it. It gives him actual pleasure to play upon her sensitive nature, and watch the torture it inflicts upon her.”
“Pah! it makes one sick!” said Cyril, rising hastily, and walking up and down the room. “But what can we do, Ernestine? We can’t interfere to prevent a marriage which the girl’s own parents have arranged.”
“I thought you might be able to think of something.”
“Nothing would be any good, except to provide a more eligible suitor, and where is he to be found? You could hardly wish me to make definite proposals on Usk’s behalf when he has no eyes for any one but Félicia?”
“No, certainly not. Besides, Ludwig would not think him at all eligible. I only wish he might. It is wonderful how Helene has taken to him. She seems to open out like a flower in the sunshine. Adelheid was quite delighted at first, but to-day she asked me to arrange that they should not meet much. She is afraid that Ludwig might think they were falling in love.”
“Really these complications seem hopeless. I suppose Usk will see before long that Félicia is simply fooling him, but I don’t in the least think he will turn to Helene for consolation. He will be very hard hit.”
“And the woman who treats him in this way will marry Michael!”
“Well, if she jilts Usk for him, we must infer that she loves Michael,” said Cyril drily.
“Loves his crown, perhaps. But that is uncharitable. Still, what hope can there be of her exercising a good influence over him? Oh, Cyril, isn’t it terrible to see everything going wrong around one, and not to be able to put it right?”
“I thought you believed that, after all, things were better managed than you could arrange them yourself?”
“I know. I am wrong to be so faithless. But one cannot see how all this is to end.”
Usk walked away from the Villa Bougainvillea with bent head and compressed lips, and crossing the Avénue de la Gare, took the direction of the Cornice Road. Félicia had befooled him once more. It was arranged that he should come to the Villa at a certain time in the afternoon, as he had done each day since their reconciliation, more with the object of asserting his rights than because he felt any special pleasure in Félicia’s society. To-day, as he approached the house, he had caught a distant glimpse of a motor-car dashing off in the opposite direction, and it was hardly with surprise that he heard the servant say that madame and mademoiselle were not at home. There was a meaning look in the man’s eyes, and for a moment Usk thought of asking him where the ladies were. But he rejected with disgust the idea of bribing a servant to spy upon Félicia, and moreover, there in the drive were the marks of the wheels of the automobile, conclusive evidence. Conscious that the man was watching his face with malicious interest, he remarked merely that he would look in again later, and walked slowly down the steps with head erect. But when he was out of sight of the door, he gave up the pretence, and his pace quickened insensibly. He must walk on and on until he was away from every one, and could think over this last treachery and all that it implied. Crowded streets and close-set houses, villas in gardens, desolate building-land with straggling beginnings of avenues and terraces here and there—they were all passed at last, and he was breasting the slope of the mountain. Past the Observatory, up a farther ascent, and he came upon a quiet spot enough, though four roads met there. He left the road and plunged into the wilderness of low scented bushes, hating the perfume they gave out as he crashed through them. Mounting a hillock, he found a spot bare of bushes, and flung himself on the turf, invisible to any one passing along the road. For a time he could only lie there writhing in impotent passion, digging his feet into the ground, and tearing up handfuls of grass and tiny flowers and flinging them away. The instinct of destruction was strong upon him. He loathed the beauties round him and the beauty outspread in front—the long slopes clad in every shade of green, grey-green of olives, light-green of carob, dark-green of orange and lemon-trees, bright-green of pistachio, stretching down to the almost painful blue of the sea, from which the eye sought relief gladly in the white of the town opposite and the grey of the castle crowning the hill above the harbour. It gave him no pleasure, even when the breeze ruffled the olives suddenly into silver, and revealed gleams of gold among the orange-groves. He hated the whole prospect for its very beauty. It was like Félicia, beautiful, changeful, cruel.
After a time the keenness of the pain which possessed him became a little dulled, and he found himself resolving upon his future course. To depart at once from Nice, leaving a scathing letter of farewell for Félicia, was the plan which suggested itself first, but it was obviously incomplete. He had realised now that he had nothing to hope for from her in the way either of justice or tenderness, and it would be a mistake to allow her to declare that he had gone away in a fit of jealousy without giving her a chance of explaining matters. No, he must see her again, distasteful as the thought was. She would try, no doubt, to entangle him again in her sophistries, to wind him round with that net of cajolery into which he had walked with his eyes open, but this time it would be in vain. Never in his life had he felt so miserable, so degraded, as during the past week, when Félicia had been everything that was tender and affectionate. He had deteriorated morally since he had condoned her faithlessness for the sake of her beauty and her fascinations, but he was not the man to regard such deterioration with equanimity. He would free himself from the toils and turn his back upon Félicia for ever, returning to England wiser, if poorer, robbed, as it seemed, of one whole side of his life. He had no doubt as to his own course, but he must make it clear to Félicia that he was leaving her finally—must place the issues before her so plainly that she could not evade them or wriggle out of her responsibility.
How this was to be done was the question. The moral agony through which he had passed seemed to have blunted his mental powers. His reasonings ended abruptly, as though he had come suddenly to a blank wall or fallen from a height; and though he struggled with himself, he could not arrive at any decision. He was still lying on the turf, utterly spent, his hands gripping the clods he had torn up, when a voice behind him said, “Lord Usk!”
He turned angrily and sprang to his feet, enraged that any one should have observed him in this dark hour. Behind him stood a tall lady very elaborately dressed in black. Her face, with its strongly marked features and dark eyes, was handsome, though worn, and her abundant black hair was still without a thread of grey. Usk knew her well. She was the Princess Dowager of Dardania, who had shown a good deal of interest in his sister Philippa and himself two years since at Ludwigsbad.
“I must apologise for intruding upon you,” said the Princess, as he stood speechless, “but I saw you from my windows—with a telescope,”—she pointed to a house just discernible among the trees on one of the upper slopes,—“and I ventured to follow you. Perhaps you would not mind coming a little lower down the hill? There is a spot where we can be quite sheltered from observation, and I should not like the dear young friend for whose sake I am here to know what I had done.”
Usk obeyed in silence. Speech seemed to have forsaken him, and he could only follow the Princess, and sit down on the turf opposite her, as her gesture invited him to do.
“We need not beat about the bush,” she said. “You, like me, have a particular interest just now in King Michael of Thracia,—I because his fickleness is breaking the heart of the dear girl who is my one comfort, you because he has chosen for the time being to set his affections upon yourfiancée.”
Usk bowed, and opened his lips to speak, but the Princess held up her hand.
“Wait, if you please. I sympathise with you sincerely, but chiefly for reasons with which you are not at present acquainted. Bad as his conduct is, Michael is not wholly to blame. He is inspired by others, who have taken advantage of his weakness of character to serve their own ends. Don’t interrupt me,” as Usk, who began to see whither this was tending, raised his head again, “but listen. The whole affair is the work of your uncle, Count Mortimer. I don’t say that he is working for his own aggrandisement in any vulgar sense, but with his incurable instinct of intrigue, he has seen how to reap advantage from Michael’s inconstancy.”
“Before you go any further, madame,” said Usk firmly, “I may as well tell you that nothing you can say will make me doubt my uncle’s good faith.”
An angry shadow crossed the Princess’s face. “Perhaps you will at least have the politeness to hear what I have to say before you decline to believe it,” she said. “I am doing Count Mortimer all possible justice, and distinguishing him absolutely from the common herd of adventurers, when I say that the prospect of securing Miss Steinherz’s millions in his own family had no charms for him. It was much too simple and obvious. But when the preposterous claim which the young lady has chosen to put forward came to his knowledge, then he saw an opening for his peculiar talents. You do not need me to tell you that Miss Steinherz’s claim is utterly hopeless, judged by the family laws of the houses both of Albret and Hohenstaufen. The marriage in London is invalid on the face of it, and of the asserted marriage at Vindobona not a single witness has come forward. Even if it could be proved to have taken place, it was invalid without the sanction of the Emperor and the King of Cantabria, as well as of the Pope. But strange things are sometimes done in the name of expediency, and your uncle thinks that for the sake of her millions Miss Steinherz might possibly be admitted into a family which is in chronic want of money, to settle a difficulty which demands large sums. Here, then, is the state of the case. Michael, engaged to my dear Sonya, whose dowry would put an end to all his difficulties, is deliberately exposed to the charms of Miss Steinherz, who is betrothed to you, and he succumbs, but cannot marry her since she is not of royal blood. Now steps in Count Mortimer. To provide Michael with a bride of German descent, and furnish the needed money without expense to the Three Powers, will give him a claim on their gratitude, which is just what he needs for the furtherance of his private ends. Your love, your interests, have no part in his scheme. He does not broach his idea until Miss Steinherz’s claim has been definitely rejected by the house of Albret, and then he approaches the Emperor, his constant patron in the past. The Grand-Duke of Schwarzwald-Molzau is sent to report on the affair. You have wondered, perhaps, why King Michael has absented himself for nearly a week from the Villa Bougainvillea, while you have been received there. It was simply because the Grand-Duke was sending his report to Vindobona, and waiting for the answer. To-day it has arrived, and he is authorised to see Miss Steinherz and find out what extent of recognition will satisfy her. You have still time, but only just time, to put an end to the affair. If Miss Steinherz is satisfied with the acknowledgment that her father was morganatically married, she will receive no more, naturally, and Michael cannot marry her. If she stood alone she would not get that; but in view of her betrothal to you, I think it might be conceded. But the idea is that the marriage shall be retrospectively recognised as fully legal, and the girl raised by letters-patent to the status of a Princess of Arragon; and things have gone so far now that you can only prevent this through your uncle.”
“And how is that to be worked, madame?”
“Go straight to Count Mortimer, and tell him”—her nostrils dilated, and there was something tigerish about her mouth—“that every detail of his plot for establishing himself in Palestine is in my hands. I know of everything, down to the penny subscription among the poorest of those he has deluded to purchase a crown and royal robes for the ‘Prince of the Captivity,’ as they call him. The whole proceedings at every meeting of the conspirators are reported to me, their agents are known and followed everywhere. If he renounces this marriage project of his I will take no further steps. When Michael marries Sonya I can afford to laugh at Count Mortimer and his puny tricks in the East. But if he goes on I will hand over all my information immediately to Prince Soudaroff, and he may guess how much hope he has of success, even of safety, after that. There is my message, which will restore happiness to you, and also to the poor girl who is breaking her heart for Michael. Will you deliver it?”
“I will deliver it to Count Mortimer, madame.”
“You exhibit no superabundant gratitude, Lord Usk. Surely if I restore you your bride and her fortune, and also give you the opportunity of saving your uncle from the consequences of his own imprudence, I deserve thanks, at least?”
Usk smiled involuntarily. It did not seem to strike the Princess that he could have any hesitation in marrying Félicia, although Félicia was moving heaven and earth to enable her to marry King Michael. Probably her fortune was expected to obviate any distaste he might feel.
“Surely, madame, success and the applause of your own conscience would be reward enough?”
“Your uncle has been speaking against me!” she cried angrily.
“Indeed, madame, I have never heard him express anything but the highest possible admiration for your talents.”
“You are too polite. It would be well not to imitate your uncle too closely in his cleverness, lest you should do so also in his fate. Is it allowable to ask what you intend to do about Miss Steinherz?”
“I have not made up my mind, madame. But I shall not forget to deliver your message. May I have the honour of escorting you home?”
She declined the offer with a gesture, and, descending into the road, walked slowly towards the house in the trees, while Usk turned his steps again towards Nice. This new information gave him the crowning test of which he had vaguely felt the need. After all, it was just possible that Félicia might even now care for him enough to decide in his favour rather than lose him altogether, and she should determine matters for herself. The hour of struggle on the hill-top had not been wasted, for he had made his decision. He would not be her slave any longer.
Félicia gave a little scream when he was suddenly announced at the Villa. She was in a small upstairs sitting-room, which was sacred to her and Maimie, and she was wearing a black gown with white ruffles, which gave her a most incongruously Puritan look. Usk’s lip curled in spite of himself as he saw that her hair was dressed to correspond with the gown, for it was evident that she was ready to receive the Grand-Duke. Maimie, no doubt, had suggested the pose, so well carried out, of the daughter only lately bereaved, turning wistfully for consolation to her dead father’s family. Usk himself knew too much to be anything but an intruder at this moment.
“I wasn’t just expecting you,” Félicia gasped.
“I won’t stay unless you wish it,” he returned. “If you will just tell me whether you intend to marry King Michael or me, I shall know whether to go or not.”
“But I can’t tell you right now,” objected Félicia, taken aback, “because—why——”
“Because you don’t know. You’ll marry Michael if you can get him, and if not, then you’ll put up with me. But I don’t care for being put up with, and if you mean to think of Michael still, I will go.”
“Well, then, you’re just horrid!” cried Félicia angrily. “I guess I’ve told you ’most a dozen times that I like you best, but if I’m a princess I must marry according to my rank.”
“Won’t do, Fay. If you stick to me I’ll stick to you, princess or no princess; but if not, I prefer to depart now rather than later.”
There were genuine tears in Félicia’s eyes. “You won’t understand, Usk,” she said, “and I don’t see but it must seem strange to you. I don’t pretend to be romantic—American girls aren’t generally that, I guess—but I like you, really. If they reject my claim after all, I’ll just settle down real happily with you, and you’ll forget all of this.”
“And if they acknowledge it, you’ll settle down happily with me all the same?”
Félicia looked down. “I guess I won’t just have things in my own hands then,” she said.
“Oh yes, you will, if you choose. If you’re engaged to me, I’ll take good care that you don’t marry any one else.”
“You don’t know the temptation of a crown, Usk,” said Félicia softly.
“I know my father tried it, and was jolly glad to give it up.”
“Oh, your father!” The tone was eloquent. “But for me, Usk!”
“Very well; if you prefer your crown, say so, and I’ll go.”
“You’re real tiresome, fussing me like this. Do just wait a little.”
“Not another hour,” said Usk.
“Say, Fay!” Maimie burst into the room, “come right down; the Grand-Duke’s here. Don’t stop to prink. That gown is just distracting already.”
“Now, Fay, decide,” said Usk. “If you make up your mind to stick to me, it’s natural for me to be with you when you receive the Grand-Duke, and to explain to him that we are engaged. If you tell me you don’t want me to be there, I shall know you are giving me up.”