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Title: To Win the Love He Sought
The Great Awakening: Volume 3
Author: E. Phillips Oppenheim
Release Date: September 23, 2010 [eBook #33988]
Language: English
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TO WIN THE LOVE HE SOUGHT
The Great Awakening
by
E. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM
Author of "The Mischief-Maker" "Berenice" "Havoc"
"The Lost Leader" "The Malefactor"
VOLUME THREE
P F Collier & Son Company
Publishers New York
Copyright 1910
By C. H. Doscher & C
Copyright 1912
By P. F. Collier & Son
[Illustration: ADRIENNE CARTUCCIO]
CONTENTS
I. THE MEETING
II. "SHE IS A SINGER"
III. "BETTER THOU WERT DEAD BEFORE ME"
IV. "DOWN INTO HELL TO WIN THE LOVE HE SOUGHT"
V. TREACHERY
VI. "THE BITTER SPRINGS OF ANGER AND FEAR"
VII. COMFORT! COMFORT SCORNED OF DEVILS
VIII. "DEATH IN THE FACE, AND MURDER IN THE HEART"
IX. 'AH! WHY SHOULD LOVE,' ETC.
X. A MARIONI'S OATH
XI. A MEETING OF THE ORDER
XII. "A FIGURE FROM A WORLD GONE BY"
XIII. BETWEEN LIFE AND DEATH
XIV. AN EVERLASTING HATE
XV. THE COUNT'S SECOND VISITOR
XVI. A NEW MEMBER FOR THE ORDER
XVII. THE RETURN TO REASON
XVIII. "I HAVE A FEAR--A FOOLISH FEAR"
XIX. THE NEW GOVERNESS
XX. LORD LUMLEY AND MARGHARITA
XXI. A LAND THAT IS LONELIER THAN RUIN
XXII. LORD LUMLEY'S CONFESSION
XXIII. MARGHARITA'S DIARY--A CORRESPONDENCE
XXIV. "WHITE HYACINTHS"
XXV. AMONG THE PINE TREES
XXVI. STORMS
XXVII. A LIFE IN THE BALANCE
XXVIII. ONE DAY'S RESPITE
XXIX. THERE IS DEATH BEFORE US
XXX. THE DAWN OF A NEW LIFE
XXXI. AN OLD MAN'S HATE
XXXII. THE KEEPING OF THE OATH
TO WIN THE LOVE HE SOUGHT
CHAPTER I
THE MEETING
The soft mantle of a southern twilight had fallen upon land and sea, and
the heart of the Palermitans was glad. Out they trooped into the scented
darkness, strolling along the promenade in little groups, listening to
the band, drinking in the cool night breeze from the sea, singling out
friends, laughing, talking, flirting, and passing on. A long line of
carriages was drawn up along the Marina, and many of the old Sicilian
aristocracy were mingling with the crowd.
Palermo is like a night blossom which opens only with the first breath
of evening. By day, it is parched and sleepy and stupid; by night, it is
alive and joyous--the place itself becomes an _al fresco_ paradise. It
is night which draws the sweetness from the flowers. The air is heavy
with the faint perfume of hyacinths and wild violets, and a breeze
stirring among the orange groves wafts a delicious aromatic odor across
the bay. Long rays of light from the little semi-circle of white-fronted
villas flash across the slumbering waters of the harbor. Out of door
restaurants are crowded; all is light and life and bustle; every one is
glad to have seen the last of the broiling sun; every one is happy and
light-hearted. The inborn gaiety of the south asserts itself. Women in
graceful toilettes pass backward and forward along the broad parade,
making the air sweeter still with the perfume of their floating
draperies, and the light revelry of their musical laughter.
'Tis a motley throng, and there is no respecting of persons.
Townspeople, a sprinkling of the old nobility, and a few curious
visitors follow in each other's footsteps. By day, those who can, sleep;
by night, they awake and don their daintiest clothing, and Palermo is
gay.
The terrace of the Hotel de l'Europe extends to the very verge of the
promenade, and, night by night, is crowded with men of all conditions
and nations, who sit before little marble tables facing the sea, smoking
and drinking coffee and liqueurs. At one of these, so close to the
promenade that the dresses of the passers-by almost touched them, two
men were seated.
One was of an order and race easily to be distinguished in any quarter
of the globe--an English country gentleman. There was no possibility of
any mistake about him. Saxon was written in his face, in the cut of his
clothes; even his attitude betrayed it. He was tall and handsome, and
young enough not to have outlived enthusiasm, for he was looking out
upon the gay scene with keen interest. His features were well cut, his
eyes were blue, and his bronze face was smooth, save for a slight,
well-formed moustache. He wore a brown tweed coat and waistcoat, flannel
trousers, a straw hat tilted over his eyes, and he was smoking a briar
pipe, with his hands in his pockets, and his feet resting upon the stone
work.
His companion was of a different type. He was of medium height only, and
thin; his complexion was sallow, and his eyes and hair were black. His
features, though not altogether pleasing, were regular, and almost
classical in outline. His clothes displayed him to the worst possible
advantage. He wore black trousers and a dark frock coat, tightly
fitting, which accentuated the narrowness of his shoulders. The only
relief to the sombreness of his attire consisted in a white flower
carefully fastened in his button-hole. He, too, had been smoking, but
his cigarette had gone out, and he was watching the stream of people
pass and repass, with a fixed, searching gaze. Though young, his face
was worn and troubled. He had none of the _sang froid_ or the
pleasure-seeking carelessness of the Englishman who sat by his side. His
whole appearance was that of a man with a steadfast definite purpose in
life--of a man who had tasted early the sweets and bitters of existence,
joy and sorrow, passion and grief.
They were only acquaintances, these two men; chance had brought them
together for some evil purpose of her own. When the Englishman, who,
unlike most of his compatriots, was a young man of a sociable turn of
mind, and detested solitude, had come across him a few minutes ago in
the long, low dining-room of the hotel, and had proposed their sharing a
table and their coffee outside, the other would have refused if he could
have done so with courtesy. As that had been impossible, he had yielded,
however, and they had become for a while companions, albeit silent ones.
The Englishman was in far too good a humor with himself, the place, and
his surroundings, to hold his peace for long. He exchanged his pipe for
a Havana, and commenced to talk.
"I say, this is an awfully jolly place! No idea it was anything like it.
I'm glad I came!"
His _vis-à-vis_ bowed in a courteous but abstracted manner. He had no
wish to encourage the conversation, so he made no reply. But the
Englishman, having made up his mind to talk, was not easily repulsed.
"You don't live here, do you?" he asked.
The Sicilian shook his head.
"No! It happens that I was born here, but my home was on the other side
of the island. It is many years since I visited it."
He had made a longer speech than he had intended, and he paid the
penalty for it. The Englishman drew his chair a little nearer, and
continued with an air of increasing familiarity.
"It's very stupid of me, but, do you know, I've quite forgotten your
name for the moment. I remember my cousin, Cis Davenport, introducing us
at Rome, and I knew you again directly I saw you. But I'm hanged if I
can think of your name! I always had a precious bad memory."
The Sicilian looked none too well pleased at the implied request. He
glanced uneasily around, and then bent forward, leaning his elbow upon
the table so that the heads of the two men almost touched. When they had
come into the place, he had carefully chosen a position as far away from
the flaming lights as possible, but they were still within hearing of
many of the chattering groups around.
"I do not object to telling you my name," he said in a low tone, sunk
almost to a whisper, "but you will pardon me if I make a request which
may appear somewhat singular to you. I do not wish you to address me by
it here, or to mention it. To be frank, there are reasons for wishing my
presence in this neighborhood not to be known. You are a gentleman, and
you will understand."
"Oh, perfectly," the Englishman answered him, in a tone of blank
bewilderment.
What did it all mean? Had he run off with some one else's wife, or was
he in debt? One of the two seemed to be the natural conclusion. Anyhow,
he did not want to know the fellow's name. He had only asked out of
politeness, and if he were in any sort of scrape, perhaps it would be
better not to know it.
"I tell you what," the Englishman explained, in the midst of the other's
hesitating pause, "don't tell it me! I can call you anything you like
for this evening. I daresay we I sha'n't meet afterwards, and if you
want to keep it dark about your being here, why, then, I sha'n't be able
to give you away--by accident, of course. Come, I'll call you anything
you like. Choose your name for the night!"
The Sicilian shook his head slowly.
"You have been told my name when I had the honor of being presented to
you at Rome," he said, "and at any chance mention you might recall it. I
prefer to tell it to you, and rely upon your honor."
"As you like."
"My name is Leonardo di Marioni!"
"By Jove! of course it is!" the Englishman exclaimed. "I should have
thought of it in a moment. I remember Davenport made me laugh when he
introduced us. His pronunciation's so queer, you know, and he's only
been at Rome about a month, so he hasn't had time to pick it up. Good
old Cis! he was always a dunce! I suppose his uncle got him in at the
Embassy."
"No doubt," the Sicilian answered politely. "I have only had the
pleasure of meeting your cousin once or twice, and I know him but
slightly. You will not forget my request, and if you have occasion to
address me, perhaps you will be so good as to do so by the name of
'Cortegi.' It is the name by which I am known here, and to which I have
some right."
The Englishman nodded.
"All right. I'll remember. By the bye," he went on, "I had the pleasure
of meeting your sister in Naples, I believe. She is engaged to marry
Martin Briscoe, isn't she?"
The Sicilian's face darkened into a scowl; the thin lips were tightly
compressed, and his eyes flashed with angry light.
"I was not aware of it," he answered haughtily.
The other raised his eyebrows.
"Fact, I assure you," he continued suavely, not noticing the Sicilian's
change of countenance. "Martin told me about it himself. I should have
thought that you would have known all about it. Briscoe isn't half a bad
fellow," he went on meditatively. "Of course, it isn't altogether
pleasant to have a father who makes pickles, and who won't leave off,
although he must have made a fine pot of money. But Martin stands it
very well. He isn't half a bad fellow."
The Sicilian rose from his chair with a sudden impetuous movement. The
moonlight fell upon his white, furious face and black eyes, ablaze with
passion. He was in a towering rage.
"I repeat, sir, that I know of no such engagement!" he exclaimed, in a
voice necessarily subdued, but none the less fierce and angry. "I do not
understand your nation, which admits into the society of nobles such
men. It is infamous! In Sicily we do not do these things. For such a man
to think of an alliance with a Marioni is more than presumption--it is
blasphemy!"
"That's all very well, but I only know what I was told," the Englishman
answered bluntly.
"It's no affair of mine. I'm sorry I mentioned it."
The Sicilian stood quite still for a moment; a shade of sadness stole
into his marble face, and his tone, when he spoke again, was more
mournful than angry.
"It may be as you say, Signor. I have been traveling, and for many
months I have seen nothing of my sister. I have heard such rumors as you
allude to, but I have not heeded them. The affair is between us two. I
will say no more. Only this. While I am alive, that marriage will not
take place!"
He resumed his seat, and conversation languished between the two men.
The Englishman sat with knitted eyebrows, watching the people pass
backward and forward, with an absent, puzzled look in his blue eyes. He
had an indistinct recollection of having been told something interesting
about this man at the time of their introduction. He was notorious for
something. What was it? His memory seemed utterly to fail him. He could
only remember that, for some reason or other, Leonardo di Marioni had
been considered a very interesting figure in Roman society during his
brief stay at the capital, and that he had vanished from it quite
suddenly.
The Sicilian, too, was watching the people pass to and fro, but more
with the intent gaze of one who awaits an expected arrival than with the
idle regard of his companion. Once the latter caught his anxious,
expectant look, and at the same time noticed that the slim fingers which
held his cigarette were trembling nervously.
"Evidently looking out for some one," he thought. "Seems a queer fish
anyhow. Is it a man or a woman, I wonder?"
Soon he knew.
CHAPTER II
"SHE IS A SINGER"
There was a brief lull in the stream of promenaders. The Englishman
turned round with a yawn, and ordered another cup of coffee. From his
altered position he had a full view of the Sicilian's face, and became
suddenly aware of an extraordinary change in it. The restlessness was
gone; the watching seemed to be at an end. The fire of a deep passion
was blazing in his dark eyes, and the light of a great wistful joy shone
in his face. The Englishman, almost involuntarily, turned in his chair,
and glanced round to see what had wrought the change.
He looked into the eyes of the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. A
flood of silver moonlight lay upon the Marina, glancing away across the
dark blue waters of the bay, and the soft dazzling light gently touched
her hair, and gleamed in her dark, sweet eyes. She was tall, and clad in
white flowing draperies clinging softly around her slim, girlish figure,
and giving to her appearance an inexpressible daintiness, as though they
were indeed emblematic of the spotless purity of that fair young being.
Was it the chastened light, or was there indeed something spiritual,
something more than humanly beautiful in the delicate oval face--perfect
in its outline, perfect in its faint coloring and stately poise? She was
walking slowly, her every movement full of a distinctive and deliberate
grace, and her head a little upturned, as though her thoughts were far
away among the softly burning stars, rather than concerned with the
fashionable and picturesque crowd which thronged around her. A remark
from her companion, a girl of somewhat slighter stature and darker
complexion, caused her to lower her eyes, and in doing so they fell upon
the eager, impassioned gaze of the young Englishman.
Afterwards he was never ashamed to confess that that moment brought with
it a peculiar lingering sweetness which never altogether died away. It
was the birth of a new sensation, the most poignant of all sensations,
although philosophers deny and materialists scoff at it. After all,
there is something more than refined sensuality in love which has so
sudden a dawning; there is a certain innate spirituality which
sublimates and purifies it, so that the flame burns softly but brightly
still through joy and grief, mocking at satiety, surviving the sorrow of
gray hairs, triumphing over the desolation of old age, and sweetening
the passage to the grave. He was a headstrong, chivalrous young man,
passionate, loyal, and faithful, among all his faults. That first love
of his never grew cold, never lessened. It lasted forever. For some men
it is not possible to give the better part of themselves up to the
worship of a pure woman; selfishness forbids it. But this young
Englishman who sat there spellbound, absorbed in the consciousness of
this new and sweet emotion, was not one of these.
Suddenly she withdrew her eyes with a faint, conscious blush, and as she
did so she saw for the first time the Sicilian. Her whole aspect swiftly
changed. A terrified shudder swept across her features, and her lips
parted with fear. She looked into a face but a moment before, at her
first appearance, all aglow with passionate love, now black with
suppressed anger and fierce jealousy. His eyes fascinated her, but it
was the fascination of dread; and, indeed, his appearance was not
pleasant to look upon. His thin form seemed dilated with nervous
passion, and his eyes were on fire. Suddenly he conquered himself, and,
with the swiftness of lightning across the water, the fierceness died
out of his face, leaving it pale almost to ghastliness in the moonlight.
He half rose from his seat, and, lifting his hat, bowed low.
She answered his salutation timidly, and touched her companion on the
arm. She, too, started as she saw that dark, thin figure gazing so
steadfastly upon them, and her first impulse seemed to be to approach
him. She stopped short on the promenade, and though there was a certain
amount of apprehension in her dark eyes, there was also some pleasure,
and her lips were parted in a half-welcoming, half-inviting smile. But
he did not make any advance toward her; on the contrary, with a slight
and almost imperceptible gesture, he motioned them to proceed. With a
little wave of the hand, she obeyed him, and he resumed his seat,
drawing his hat over his eyes, and no longer watching the stream of
promenaders.
The Englishman, absorbed in his own sudden passion, had seen nothing out
of the common in the brief interchange of glances between the trio. All
that he noticed was that his companion had saluted the taller of the two
girls, and that she had acknowledged the salutation. It was quite enough
for him.
He leaned over the low palisade, watching her until she disappeared
among the crowd, scarcely daring to hope that she might look back, and
yet determined to lose no opportunity of a farewell glance should she do
so. When she was finally out of sight, he drew a long breath and turned
toward his companion.
"Who is she?" he asked abruptly.
"I fear that I do not quite understand you," he said quietly, although
his voice and limbs were trembling with passion; "to whom do you
allude?"
"The girl in white who passed just now. You knew her! Tell me her name!"
"Why should I?"
"I wish to know it."
The Sicilian lit his cigarette. He was growing calmer, but the fingers
which held the match were still shaking.
"Possibly. But that is no reason why I should tell it to you. That lady
is a friend of mine, certainly, but it is not the custom in my country,
however it may be in yours, to bandy a lady's name about a public
place."
"But I am not asking out of curiosity," the other persisted, "nor am I a
stranger to you."
"What is your motive, if it be not curiosity?" the Sicilian asked, with
a dark shade stealing into his face. "You had better be careful, Signor;
there is danger at hand for any man who so much as directs an
impertinent glance at either of those ladies."
The Englishman was far too deeply in earnest to be angry.
"You won't tell me, then?" he said simply.
"I will not."
"Certain?"
"Quite certain."
"Very good. I shall find out."
The Sicilian laid his hand upon the other's arm. His black eyes were
flashing angrily, and his tone was threatening.
"Signor! a word of warning! I constitute myself the protector of those
ladies. I have a very good right to do so. Any idle and public inquiries
concerning them, or any attempt to obtrude an acquaintance upon them, I
shall--punish! You understand!"
"Certainly," he answered. "You have only to prove the offense and the
right of protectorship, and I shall be at your service. You probably
know little concerning the men of my country. Let me tell you that we
are not in the habit of forcing ourselves upon unknown ladies, nor in
our respect for them are we second to the men of any nation in the
world. I wish you good-evening, Signor."
He walked away with his head in the air, an object of much curiosity to
the many scattered little groups of dusky foreigners and Jews through
which he passed. At the door of the hotel he paused for a moment, and
then, instead of joining the stream of promenaders, he entered and
slowly ascended the broad marble staircase toward his room. Just as he
reached the first landing, however, he felt a light touch on his arm,
and a guttural voice In his ear. He turned sharply round, and found
before him one of the waiters--the one who had served him with his
coffee outside.
"Well! what do you want?" he asked.
The man answered in a low tone, with his eyes glancing suspiciously
around all the time.
"The Signor was inquiring the name of the lady who passed by," he said
apologetically. "The Signor spoke loudly, and I could not choose but
hear."
The Englishman came to a sudden standstill, and looked down into the
ferretlike face and black eyes of the man who had followed him.
"Well?"
"I can tell it to the Signor."
"Look sharp then!"
"The Signor is generous," he remarked, with a cunning look. "I have
risked my place by leaving the terrace without permission to bring him
this news, and I am poor--very, very poor!" he added, with a sudden drop
in his voice which resembled a whine.
The Englishman threw a piece of gold into the brown, greedy palm.
"Tell it me, and be off," he said shortly.
The waiter--half Greek, half native, and a thorough rascal--bowed low,
and his beadlike eyes glistened.
"The Signor is noble. The beautiful lady's name is Signorina Adrienne
Cartuccio."
"The singer?"
"The same, Signor. The divine singer."
"Ah!"
The Englishman turned toward the wide, open window, and gazed
steadfastly at the place in the crowd where she had vanished.
"She sings to-night, does she not?" he asked.
"Truly, Signor. Palermo is full of visitors from all parts of the island
on purpose to hear her."
"At what time?"
"At nine o'clock, Signor, in the concert hall. If the Signor desires to
hear her he should go early, for to-night is the only chance. She sings
but once, and it is for the poor. They say that she has come to the
Villa Fiolesse on the hill, to be away from the world, to rest."
The Englishman descended the stairs and went slowly back to his seat. He
had only one thought. In a few hours' time he would see her again. It
would be Paradise!
He reached his table and sat down. The seat opposite to him was empty.
The Sicilian had gone.
CHAPTER III
"BETTER THOU WERT DEAD BEFORE ME"
On the brow of the Hill Fiolesse, at a sharp angle in the white dusty
road, a man and woman stood talking. On one side of them was a grove of
flowering magnolias, and on the other a high, closely-trimmed hedge
skirted the grounds of the Villa Fiolesse. There was not another soul in
sight, but, as though the place were not secure enough from
interruption, the girl, every now and then, glanced half fearfully
around her, and more than once paused in the middle of a sentence to
listen. At last her fears escaped from her lips.
"Leonardo, I wish that you had not come!" she cried. "What is the good
of it? I shall have no rest till I know that you are beyond the sea
again."
His face darkened, and his tone was gloomy and sad.
"Beyond the seas, while my heart is chained forever here, Margharita!"
he answered. "Ah! I have tried, and I know the bitterness of it. You
cannot tell what exile has been like to me. I could bear it no longer.
Tell me, child! I watched you climb this hill together. You looked back
and saw me, and waited. Did she see me, too? Quick! answer me! I will
know! She saw me on the Marina. Did she know that I was following her?"
"I think she saw you. She said nothing when I lingered behind. It was as
though she knew."
The Sicilian clasped his hands, and looked away over the sea. The
moonlight fell upon his weary pallid face, and glistened in his dark sad
eyes. He spoke more to himself than her.
"She knew! And yet she would not wait to speak a single word to me! Ah!
it is cruel! If only she could know how night by night, in those
far-distant countries, I have lain on the mountain tops, and wandered
through the valleys, thinking and dreaming of her--always of her! It has
been an evil time with me, my sister, a time of dreary days and
sleepless nights. And this the end of it! My heart is faint and sick
with longing, and I hastened here before it should break. I must see
her, Margharita! Let us hasten on to the villa!"
She laid her hand upon his arm. Her eyes were soft with coming tears.
"Leonardo, listen," she cried. "It is best to tell you. She will not see
you. She is quite firm. She is angry with you for coming."
"Angry with me! Angry because I love her, so that I risk my life just to
see her, to hear her speak! Ah! but that is cruel! Let me go in and
speak to her! Let me plead with her in my own fashion!"
She shook her head.
"Leonardo, the truth is best," she said softly. "Adrienne does not love
you. She is quite determined not to see you again. Even I, pleading with
tears in my eyes, could not persuade her. She has locked herself in her
room while she prepares for the concert. You could not see her unless
you forced yourself upon her, and that would not do."
"No, I would not do that," he answered wearily. "Margharita, there is a
question; I must ask it, though the answer kill me. Is there--any one
else?"
She shook her head.
"There is no one else, Leonardo, yet. But what matter is that, since it
cannot be you? Some day it will come. All that a sister could do, I have
done. She pities you, Leonardo, but she does not love you. She never
will!"
He moved from the open space, where the moonlight fell upon his marble
face, to the shadow of the magnolia grove. He stood there quite silent
for a moment. Then he spoke in a strained, hard voice, which she
scarcely recognized.
"Margharita, you have done your best for me. You do not know what a
man's love is, or you would not wonder that I suffer so much. Yet, if it
must be, it must. I will give her up. I will go back to my exile and
forget her. Yet since I am here, grant me a last favor. Let me see her
to say farewell."
She looked up at him in distress.
"Leonardo, how can I? She has given orders that under no circumstances
whatever are you to be admitted."
"But to say farewell!"
"She would not believe it. It has been so before, Leonardo, and then you
have been passionate, and pleaded your cause all over again. I have
promised that I will never ask her to see you again."
"Then let me see her without asking. You can find an opportunity, if you
will. For my sake, Margharita!"
She laid her troubled, tear-stained face upon his shoulder.
"It is wrong of me, Leonardo. Yet, if you will promise me to say
farewell, and farewell only----"
"Be it so! I promise!"
"Well, then, each night we have walked past the Marina, and home by the
mountain road. It is a long way round and it is lonely; but we have
Pietro with us, and on these moonlight nights the view is like
fairy-land."
"And will you come that way home to-night, after the concert?"
"Yes."
"It is good."
"You will remember your promise, Leonardo," she said anxiously.
"I will remember," he answered. "And, Margharita, since this is to be
our farewell, I have something to say to you also, before I pass away
from your life into my exile. In Rome I was told a thing which for a
moment troubled me. I say for a moment, because it was for a moment only
that I believed it. The man who told me was my friend, or he would have
answered to me for it, as for an insult. Shall I tell you, Margharita,
what this thing was?"
Her face was troubled, and her eyes were downcast. The Sicilian watched
her confusion with darkening brows. Since she made no answer, he
continued:
"They told me, Margharita, that you, a Marioni, daughter of one of
Europe's grandest families, daughter of a race from which princes have
sprung, and with whom, in the old days, kings have sought alliance, they
told me that you were betrothed to some low American, a trader, a man
without family or honor. They told me this, Margharita, and I answered
them that they lied. Forgive me for the shadow of a doubt which crossed
my mind, sister. Forgive me that I beg for a denial from your own lips."
She lifted her head. She was pale, but her dark eyes had an indignant
sparkle in them.
"They did lie, Leonardo," she answered firmly, "but not in the fact
itself. It is true that I am engaged to be married."
"Betrothed! Without my sanction! Margharita, how is that? Am I not your
guardian?"
"Yes, but, Leonardo, you have been away, and no one knew when you would
return, or where you were."
"It is enough. Tell me of the man to whom you are betrothed. I would
know his name and family."
"Leonardo, his name is Martin Briscoe, and his family--he has no family
that you would know of. It is true that he is an American, but he is a
gentleman."
"An American! It is perhaps also true that he is a trader?"
His coolness alarmed her. She looked into his face and trembled.
"I do not know; it may be so. His father----"
The Sicilian interrupted her. His face was marble white, but his eyes
were afire.
"His father! Spare me the pedigree! I know it! Margharita, stand there,
where the moonlight touches your face. Let me look at you. Is it you, a
daughter of the Marionis, who can speak so calmly of bringing this
disgrace upon our name? You, my little sister Margharita, the
proud-spirited girl who used to share in my ambitions, and to whom our
name was as dear as to myself?"
"Leonardo, spare me!"
"Spare you? Yes, when you have told me that this is some nightmare, some
phantasm--a lie! Spare you! Yes, when you tell me that this presumptuous
upstart has gone back to his upstart country."
She dropped her hands from before her face, and stood before him, pale
and desperate.
"Leonardo, I cannot give him up, I love him!"
"And do you owe me no love? Do you owe no duty to the grandeur of our
race? _Noblesse oblige_, Margharita! We bear a great name, and with the
honor which it brings, it brings also responsibilities. I do not believe
that you can truly love this man; but if you do, your duty is still
plain. You must crush your love as you would a poisonous weed under your
feet. You must sacrifice yourself for the honor of our name."
"Leonardo, you do not understand. I love him, and cannot give him up. My
word is given; I cannot break it."
He drew a step further away from her, and his voice became harder.
"You must choose, then, between him and me; between your honor and your
unworthy lover. There is no other course. As my sister, you are the
dearest thing on earth to me; as that man's wife, you will be an utter
stranger. I will never willingly look upon your face, nor hear you
speak. I will write your name out of my heart, and my curse shall follow
you over the seas to your new home, and ring in your ears by day and by
night. I will never forgive; I swear it!"
He ceased and bent forward, as though for her answer. She did not speak.
The deep silence was broken only by the far-off murmur of the sea, and
the sound of faint sobbing from between her clasped hands. The sound of
her distress softened him for a moment; he hesitated, and then spoke
again more quietly.
"Margharita, ponder this over. Be brave, and remember that you are a
Marioni. Till to-morrow, farewell!"
CHAPTER IV
"DOWN INTO HELL TO WIN THE LOVE HE SOUGHT"
It was two hours later, and the Marina was almost deserted. The streets
and squares, too, of the southern city were silent and empty. It seemed
as though all Palermo had gathered together in that sprawling,
whitewashed building, called in courtesy a concert hall. Flashes of
light from its many windows gleamed upon the pavements below, and from
the upper one the heads of a solid phalanx of men and women, wedged in
together, threw quaint shadows across the narrow street. The
tradespeople, aristocracy, and visitors of the place had flocked
together to the concert, frantically desirous of hearing the great
singer who although so young, had been made welcome at every court in
Europe. It was an honor to their island city that she should have
visited it at all; much more that she should choose to sing there; and
the quick Palermitans, fired with enthusiasm, rushed to welcome her. The
heavy slumberous air was still vibrating with the shout which had
greeted her first appearance, and the echoes from across the scarcely
rippled surface of the bay were lingering among the rocky hills on the
other side of the harbor.
The Sicilian heard it as he threaded his way toward the poorer part of
the city, and a dull red glow burned for a moment in his sallow cheeks.
It maddened him that he, too, was not there to join in it, to feast his
eyes upon her, and listen to the matchless music of her voice. Was she
not more to him than to any of them? So long he had carried her image in
his heart that a curious sense of possession had crept into all his
thoughts of her. He was frantically jealous, heedless of the fact that
he had no right to be. He would have felt toward the man on whom
Adrienne Cartuccio had smiled, as toward a robber. She was his, and his
only she should be. Years of faithful homage and unabated longing had
made her so. His was a narrow but a strong nature, and the desire of her
had become the mainspring of his life. His she should surely be! No
other man had the right to lift his eyes to her. As he hurried through
those silent streets, he forgot her many kindly but firm repulses.
Jesuitical in his love, any means by which he might win her seemed fair
and honorable. And to-night, though he was stooping to treachery to
possess himself of this long coveted jewel, he felt no shame; only his
heart beat strong and fast with passionate hope. The moment had come at
length for him to play his last card, and at the very prospect of
success heaven itself seemed open before his eyes.
He had been threading his way swiftly, and with the air of one well
acquainted with the neighborhood, through a network of narrow streets
and courts, filthy and poverty stricken. At last he came to a sudden
pause before a flight of steps leading down to the door of a small wine
shop, which was little more than a cellar.
From the street one could see into the bar, and the Sicilian paused for
a moment, and peered downward. Behind the counter, a stout,
swarthy-looking native woman was exchanging coarse badinage with a man
in a loose jersey and baggy trousers. There seemed to be no one else in
the place, save another man who sat in the darkest corner, with his head
buried upon his arms.
The Sicilian only hesitated for a moment. Then he pulled his soft hat
lower over his eyes, and lighting a cigarette, to dispel as far as
possible the rank stale odor of the place, stepped down and entered the
wine shop.
Evidently he was not known there. The woman stared curiously at him as
she passed the glass of curaçao for which he asked, and the man scowled.
He took no notice of either, but, with his glass in his hand, made his
way across the sawdust-covered floor to the most remote of the small
tables.
A few feet only from him was the man who slept, or who seemed to sleep,
and all around quaint shadows of the tall buildings outside stealing in
through the open window almost shut the two men off from the rest of the
wine shop where the gas jets hung. The Sicilian smoked on in silence;
his neighbor commenced to move. Presently the woman and her admirer
resumed their talk, with their heads a little closer together and their
voices lowered. They were absorbed in themselves and their coarse
flirtation. The man sipped more liquor, and the woman filled his glass
with no sparing hand. The strong brandy ran through his veins quicker
and quicker. He tried to embrace the woman, and failed, owing to the
barrier between them. He tried again, and this time partially succeeded.
Then he tried to clamber over the counter, but missed his footing and
fell in a heap on the floor, where he lay, to all appearance, too drunk
to get up--helpless and stupefied.
The woman peered over at him with a sneer on her face. Then she arranged
the bottles in their places, and called out a noisy greeting to the
Sicilian who was smoking silently among the shadows with only the red
tip of his cigarette visible in the darkness. He made no reply. She
yawned, and looked downward at the drunken man once more. There was no
sign of life in his coarse face. He was wrapped deep in a drunken sleep,
and he still had money in his pockets. Ah, well! It should be hers when
these two strangers had gone.
She turned to a little recess behind the bar, and, approaching the wall,
looked at herself in a cracked looking-glass which hung there. Something
in her hair needed rearrangement, and she remained there straightening
it with her fingers. From where she stood she was within hearing
distance if any one descended the steps and entered the wine shop, so
she did not hurry. The contemplation of her coarse features and small
black eyes seemed to inspire her with a strange pleasure. She remained
at the glass, turning her head from side to side with a curiously
grotesque satisfaction. Then one of her large glass earrings was dull.
She took it out, and rubbed it vigorously on her skirt, humming a
popular tune to herself the while. The whole thing took time; but what
matter? There was no one in the vault save two drunken men, and another
who chose to sit in the darkness without making any response to her
advances. If a fresh customer had descended the greasy stone steps, and
pushed open the rickety swing door, he would have found her in her
place, ready with the usual coarse greeting or jest, should he chance to
be a neighbor or an acquaintance. Meanwhile, she was happy where she
was.
In the wine shop itself things were not exactly as she supposed. No
sooner had her back been turned, than the man near whom the Sicilian had
seated himself slowly raised his head, and looked around. Assured of her
departure, and after a moment's contemplation of the man who lay upon
the floor to all appearance so hopelessly drunk, he turned toward the
Sicilian.
"My orders, Signor," he whispered. "It is to be to-night?"
"Yes."
"The Signorina will not listen to reason, then?"
In the darkness the Sicilian felt the deep flush which stole into his
olive cheeks. He was not there without an effort. In all his deeds and
thoughts he had always reckoned himself as others had reckoned him, an
honorable man. His presence in this place, and the means he was stooping
to use, filled him with the most intense humiliation. Only one thing was
stronger--his passionate love for Adrienne Cartuccio.
"Do not breathe the Signorina's name," he muttered. "Receive your
instructions, but make no comments."
"Command, Signor; I am ready," was the whispered answer.
"First; have you succeeded as you expected? The carriage and mules and
men?"
"In ten minutes I could have them all here, Signor. The task was not
easy, but it is accomplished. They are at the Signor's disposal. All
that remains is for you to give the orders."
The Sicilian was perfectly silent for a moment. The darkness hid his
face--hid the shame which for a moment lowered it, the shame which an
honorable gentleman feels when he stoops to dishonor. It passed away
before the stronger feeling, and when he spoke his tone was firm though
low.
"It is well. Listen, Pietro. The attempt is to be made to-night, in
three hours' time. You will be prepared? The notice is sufficient?"
"More than sufficient, Signor. The sooner the better. The mouths of my
men are closed with gold, and they are carefully chosen; but, one and
all, they love the wine, and wine, in its way, is as powerful as gold.
See that animal yonder, Signor. My men love the drink as well as he, and
before he reached that state he might have chattered away a dozen
secrets."
The Sicilian watched the man who was lying on the sawdust-strewn floor.
Something in his breathing attracted him, and he leaned forward.
"Is he asleep, do you think?" he whispered. "I thought I saw his eyes
open."
Pietro rose, and crawling like a cat, drew close to the drunken man. He
passed his hand lightly over him, and listened to his breathing. Finally
he crept back to his seat.
"That is no spy!" he whispered; "he is only a common fisherman, and he
is stupefied with drink. I watched him when he came in. Proceed, Signor.
Let me know your plans."
The Sicilian continued, speaking as rapidly as possible. He had
conspired before, but honorably, and with men of his own rank. But
here--in this low den, with such a companion--it made his heart sick. He
was only anxious to get away as speedily as possible.
"To-night the Signorina sings at the Town Hall. She leaves there at ten
o'clock, on foot, accompanied only by another lady and a manservant who
is in my pay. She will dismiss her carriage, and walk. The road to the
Villa Fiolesse, you know. They will pursue it past the turn, thinking to
follow a winding path which leads from it into the grounds of the villa
about half a mile further on. The road is quite deserted there, and
sheltered by pine groves. At the entrance to the first grove the cart
and mules must be in waiting--also your men. There will be no
resistance; but, above everything, Pietro, remember this--no discourtesy
or roughness to either of the ladies. Let them be treated firmly, but
with the utmost respect. Remember that one will be my wife, and the
other is my sister!"
"But you yourself, Signor! Shall you not be there?"
"No! If all goes well, I shall follow, and join you at Ajalito. At that
place more mules must be purchased, as we shall take the mountain road
to the Castle of Marioni, and the cart will be useless. Is all clear to
you, Pietro?"
"It is clear, Signor!"
"It may be that you will require more money. Here are a hundred francs.
Use what you will."
"I shall use all of them, Signor. To be well served requires good pay.
The Signor shall be well served."
"Spend it as you will, and come to me afterwards for your own reward. I
will go now to make my own preparations. Be faithful this night, Pietro,
and your fortune is secured. I am not one to forget a service!"
"The Signor is a prince," Pietro answered, bowing. "See, the moon is
behind a cloud. It is a propitious moment to leave this place without
being observed. I, too, must go, but outside our ways lie apart."
"Come, then," the Sicilian answered, rising quickly. "But one last
caution, Pietro. See that your men understand perfectly that, for any
rudeness or ill-usage to either of the Signorinas, they will answer to
me with their lives. It may be that I shall not join you before
daybreak. If so, remember that the man who offends those whom you guard,
by so much as a look, shall die. His corpse shall whiten on the
mountains for carrion crows to peck at!"
"It is well, Signor. There is no fear."
They crept out of the door, opening and closing it noiselessly, ascended
into the street, and separated. The sound of their footsteps died away
upon the rude stone pavements. For a minute or two unbroken silence
reigned in the wine shop.
"Diabolo!"
The exclamation came from the man who had fallen while endeavoring to
embrace the hostess, and who since, to all appearance, had been in a
drunken sleep. A very remarkable change had come over him. He was
sitting bolt upright on the floor, shaking the sawdust from his hair,
and his dark eyes were no longer vacant, but bright and full of
excitement. He peered cautiously over the counter. The woman who had
repelled his advances was still loitering near the looking-glass. Then
he stole softly on to his feet, and walking on tip-toe, and without the
slightest difficulty, left the place. Outside he simulated once more the
walk of a drunken man, and staggered down the street and out of sight.
Presently the hostess of the place, having arranged her head-dress to
her own satisfaction, came out behind the counter. She leaned over and
looked for her drunken admirer. After all, he had money in his pocket,
and he was not such a bad fellow. She would take him into her little
room behind, and let him sleep for a while more comfortably. But--but
where was he? He was not there. She turned the light higher and looked
around. There was no one in the room at all. Two hopelessly drunken men
and the stranger had left the place without making the slightest sound,
or without calling for more drink. It was incredible. But it was true.
The wine-shop keeper had never been so surprised in her life. Not only
was she surprised, but she was frightened. The thing was beyond belief.
The sweat broke out upon her forehead, and she crossed herself. The
devil himself must have come and fetched them away, and, if so, why
should he not fetch her. She was wicked enough. What a horrible thought.
Half a dozen men, the crew of a fishing boat, suddenly entered the
court, filling the air with their voices, and descended the steps. She
came to herself while serving them, and commenced to forget her fright.
But she did not mention that little occurrence, and the very thought of
a drunken man for days afterwards made her shudder.
CHAPTER V
TREACHERY
It was almost midnight, and Palermo lay sleeping in the moonlight. The
concert was over, and the people who had shouted themselves hoarse with
enthusiasm had dispersed at last to their homes. The last of the
broad-wheeled, heavily-built carriages had rolled away through the white
streets of the town. One by one the promenaders had left the Marina, and
all sound had died away. There was a faint, sighing breeze in the orange
groves around the bay, but scarcely a ripple upon the water. One man
alone lingered drinking in the sweetness of the night. The Englishman
sat on the last seat of the Marina, in the shadow of a cluster of orange
trees.
He had seen her again--nay, more, he had heard her sing--this
girl-nightingale, who had taken the world by storm. Chance had favored
him, insomuch that he had been able to secure almost a front seat in the
concert room, and the wonderful music of her voice rang still in his
ears. He had stolen out here to try and think it all over, and to calm
the passion which had suddenly leaped up within him. It was quite a new
experience through which he was passing; he scarcely knew himself. He
was happy and miserable, sanguine and despondent, all in a moment. One
question was always before him--one end, one aim. How was he to know
her? How could he endure to live here, seeing her day by day for a brief
while, without making her acquaintance? There was nothing to be hoped
for from the Sicilian, who would not even tell him her name. Possibly,
though, she would visit, or be visited by, some of the nobility of the
place. This was almost his only hope. He had letters to most of them,
and he made up his mind to present them all on the morrow.
He sat there dreaming, with a burned-out cigar between his teeth, and
his eyes idly wandering over the blue Mediterranean. Suddenly the
stillness was broken by the sound of a soft gliding footstep close at
hand. He had heard no one approach, yet when he looked up quickly he
found he was no longer alone. A man in the garb of a native peasant was
standing by his side.
Naturally the Englishman was a little surprised. He half rose from his
seat, and then resumed it as he recognized the dark, swarthy face and
black eyes of the waiter who had told him Adrienne Cartuccio's name.
"Hullo! What are you doing here?" he demanded.
"I was in search of the Signor!" was the hasty response. "For an hour I
have sought him everywhere, and now it is by chance that I am
successful."
The Englishman looked at him with suspicion. This change of dress was
doubtless for the purpose of disguise. What was the meaning of it?
"Well, and now you've found me, what do you want?" he asked, watching
him closely.
"I will tell the Signor. Is it not that he has an admiration for
Mademoiselle Cartuccio, the singer? Well, she is in danger! It is for
the Signor to rescue her."
The Englishman sprang up with sparkling eyes, and pitched his dead cigar
into the sea.
"In danger!" he repeated breathlessly. "Quick! Tell me where!"
The man pointed inland.
"Do you see that belt of white road there, leading up into the hills?"
"Yes; what about it?"
"Have you noticed anything pass along it?"
"There was a heavy cart or carriage and some mules, I think, went by
half an hour ago."
The native shrugged his shoulders.
"It was an hour, Signor, but no matter! Step back with me into the
shadow of those olive trees. That is better. Now we cannot be seen, and
I will explain."
The Englishman beat the ground with his foot.
"Explanations be damned!" he exclaimed. "Where is Mademoiselle
Cartuccio? Quick!"
The man held up his hands, and spoke more rapidly.
"This evening I heard by accident of a plot to carry off Signorina
Cartuccio by a rejected suitor. I hasten to inform the police, but on
the way I pause. I say to myself, what shall I get for my pains, and for
the risk I run? Nothing! Then I think of the Signor. I watched his face
when the Signorina pass by, and I say to myself he has the passion of
her. If I show him the way to save her he will be generous. He will win
the lady, and he will reward poor Andrea."
"That's all right. Tell me what to do, and I will give you fifty
pounds--anything you like. Don't waste time. Speak up!"
The man's eyes shone with cupidity. He went on rapidly:
"The Signor is a prince. Listen! Along yonder road, before many minutes
have passed, will come the Signorina Cartuccio with her friend, attended
only by an aged servant. Men are waiting for them in the grove of orange
trees above the Villa Fiolesse. Their orders are to carry off the two
ladies to the other side of the island, where a place has been prepared
for them. For an hour I have searched for the Signor, that he might
procure aid, and so encounter these brigands, but in vain. I was in
despair."
"I want no help! How many of the black-guards are there?"
"Four, Signor!"
"Natives?"
"Yes, Signor."
"And cowards, I suppose?"
The man smiled.
"They have not much bravery, Signor. I know the men."
"I wouldn't have anyone else here for the world," the Englishman said,
shaking his fist.
"Does the Signor want a knife?" asked the man, thrusting his hand into
his inner pocket.
"Not I. We don't understand that sort of thing in our country, my brave
Andrea. Fisticuffs will settle this little matter, you'll see!"
The man looked up admiringly at the Englishman's commanding figure and
broad shoulders.
"I think they will run away from the Signor when they see him," he
whispered. "But let the Signor remember this: if one of them thrusts his
hand inside his coat, so, do not wait one moment--knock him down or get
out of his way. He will have the knife, and they know how to use it,
these brigands."
"Tell me the name of their leader--I mean the fellow who is trying to
carry off the Signorina. Will he be there?"
The man shook his head.
"I cannot tell the Signor his name. I dare not. I was once in his
service, and he has powers--hush!"
The two men held their breath, keeping well in the shadow of the orange
grove. They had reached the road, and in the distance they could hear
the sound of approaching voices.
"I leave you now, Signor," whispered his companion to the Englishman. "I
dare not be seen. To-morrow, at the hotel."
He glided noiselessly away. The Englishman scarcely heard him, he was
listening intently. Light footsteps were coming along the winding road
toward him, and soon a laughing voice rang out upon the night air.
"My dear Adrienne, don't you think we were a little foolish to walk home
so late as this? See, there is not a soul upon the promenade."
"_Tant mieux!_" was the light answer. "Is it not to escape from them
all, that we came this way? The stillness is exquisite, and the night
breeze from the sea, after that hot room, is divine. What a view we
shall have of the bay when we get to the top of the hill."
"They say that this place is infested with robbers, and it is terribly
lonely," was the somewhat fearful answer. "Why would you not let poor
Leonardo come with us?"
"Because I did not want Leonardo, _cherie_. Leonardo is very good, but
he wearies me by persisting to dwell upon a forbidden subject; and as
for protection--well, I fancy Giovanni is sufficient."
They were passing him now so close that he felt impelled to hold his
breath. He had only a momentary glimpse of them, but it was sufficient.
A few yards behind, a sullen-looking servant was trudging along, looking
carefully around. In the white moonlight their faces, even their
expressions, were perfectly visible to him; Adrienne's rapt and absorbed
by the still restful beauty of the dreaming night, and indifferent to
all fear; her companion, whose dark eyes were glancing somewhat
anxiously around her, and Giovanni's, whose furtive looks, more
expectant than apprehensive, marked him out to the Englishman as an
accomplice in whatever devilry was afoot. Unseen himself, he watched
them pass, and listened to their voices growing fainter and fainter in
the distance. They were out of sight and out of hearing.
He was preparing to follow them, when suddenly another sound broke the
stillness. He held his breath, and crouched down, watching. In a minute,
two dark forms, keeping carefully in the shadows by the side of the
road, crept stealthily past.
He waited till they, too, were out of sight, and then stood up with
tingling pulses, but quite cool. Moving on tip-toe, he stepped lightly
over the low stone wall into the road, and gazed after them.
The ascent was steep, and the road curved round and round in zig-zag
fashion. On one side it was bordered by a thickly-growing orange grove,
whose delicate perfume was sweetening the still languid air. On the
other was a stretch of waste open country, separated from the road by a
low wall. He chose the seaward side, and keeping under the shadow of the
trees, followed them, his footsteps sinking noiselessly into the thick
dust.
Once the two ladies paused to look back. He stopped too; and the two
bending figures between them drew closer into the shadows, and waited.
He was some distance away, but the sound of her voice floated clearly
down to him on a breath of that faint night air.
"Ah, how beautiful it is," she cried, pointing downward; "just a few
steps, and we shall see the sea glistening through the leaves of the
orange trees."
"I am sure that it is not prudent, Adrienne. We have come past the
footpath down to the villa, and this upper road is so lonely. Listen! I
fancied that I heard footsteps."
There was a moment's silence, then a low musical laugh which sounded to
him like the sweetest music.
"It was the echo of our own, you foolish child. There is nothing to
fear, and have we not Giovanni?"
Again they turned, and again he followed. Suddenly his heart gave a
great bound. About fifty yards in front of the two girls was a
rudely-built country carriage, drawn by a pair of mules and with a
single man on the box. They had paused at such an unexpected sight, and
seemed to be deliberating in whispers whether or no they should proceed.
Before they had come to any decision, the two men had crept out from the
shadow of the wall and trees into the road, and with bent bodies hurried
toward them.
He did not shout out or make any noise; he simply lessened the distance
between him and them by increasing his pace. The two stooping forms,
casting long, oblique shadows across the white, hard road, were almost
level with their intended victims. Now the shadow of one of them crept a
little in advance of the ladies, and Adrienne Cartuccio, seeing it,
stepped suddenly back with a cry of alarm.
"Giovanni! Giovanni! There are robbers! Ah!"
The cry became a shriek, but it was instantly stifled by a coarse hand
thrust upon her mouth. At the same moment her companion felt herself
treated in a similar manner. They could only gaze into the dark
ruffianly faces of their captors in mute terror. The whole thing had
been too sudden for them to make any resistance, and Giovanni, their
trusted escort, seemed suddenly to have disappeared. As a matter of
fact, he was watching the proceedings from behind a convenient bowlder.
The man who was holding Adrienne pointed to the carriage, the door of
which the driver had thrown open.
"This way, Signorina," he said "It is useless to struggle. We shall not
harm you."
She shook her head violently, and with a sudden effort thrust his hand
away from her mouth.
"What do you want?" she cried. "Who are you? You can have my jewels, but
I will never step inside that carriage. Help! help!"
He wound his arms around her, and, without a word, commenced dragging
her across the road.
"You may shout as much as you like," he muttered. "There will only be
echoes to answer you."
A sudden warning cry rang out from his companion, and, with a start, he
released his victim. The Englishman had stepped into the middle of the
group, and, before he could spring back, a swinging left-hander sent him
down into the dust with a dull, heavy thud.
"You blackguard!" he thundered out Then turning quickly round he faced
the other man, who had sprung across the road with bent body, and with
his right hand in his breast. There was a gleam of cold steel, but
before he could use the knife which he had drawn, his arm was grasped
and held as though by a vice, and slowly bent backward. He dropped the
weapon, with a shriek of pain, upon the road, and fell on his knees
before his captor.
The Englishman's grasp relaxed, and taking advantage of it, the man
suddenly jumped up, leaped over the wall, and disappeared in the
plantation. Pursuit would have been impossible, but none of them thought
of it.
The two ladies looked at their preserver standing in the middle of the
road--fair and straight and tall, like a Greek god, but with a terrible
fury blazing in his dark blue eyes.
"You are not hurt, I trust?" he asked, his breath coming quickly, for he
was in a towering passion. He was not speaking to the darker of the two
girls at all; in fact, he was unconscious of her presence. He was
standing by Adrienne Cartuccio's side, watching the faint color steal
again into her cheeks, and the terror dying out of her eyes, to be
replaced by a far softer light. Her black lace wrap, which she had been
wearing in Spanish fashion, had fallen a little back from her head, and
the moonlight was gleaming upon her ruddy golden hair, all wavy and
disarranged, throwing into soft relief the outline of her slim, girlish
figure, her heaving bosom, and the exquisite transparency of her
complexion. She stood there like an offended young queen, passionately
wrathful with the men who had dared to lay their coarse hands upon her,
yet feeling all a woman's gratitude to their preserver. Her eyes were
flashing like stars, and her brows were bent, but as she looked into his
face her expression softened. Of the two sensations gratitude was the
stronger.
"You are not hurt?" he repeated "I am sorry that I did not get here
sooner, before that fellow touched you."
She held out her hand to him with a little impetuous movement.
"Thanks to you. No, Signor," she said, her eyes suddenly filling with
tears. "Oh, how grateful we are, are we not, Margharita?"
"Indeed, indeed we are. The Signor has saved us from a terrible danger."
He laughed a little awkwardly. Where is the Englishman who likes to be
thanked?
"It is nothing. The fellows were arrant cowards. But what was the
carriage doing here?"
He pointed along the road. Already the clumsy vehicle had become a black
speck in the distance, swaying heavily from side to side from the pace
at which it was being driven, and almost enveloped in a cloud of dust.
Adrienne shook her head. Margharita had turned away, with her face
buried in her hands.
"I cannot imagine. Perhaps they were brigands, and intended to carry us
off for a ransom."
The Englishman shrugged his shoulders.
"Odd sort of bandits," he remarked. "Why, they hadn't the pluck of a
chicken between them, especially this one."
He touched the prostrate figure with his foot, and the two girls
shuddered.
"He is--is not dead, is he?" Margharita asked.
"Not he. I shouldn't say that he was very badly hurt either," the
Englishman declared, bending down and listening to his breathing. "More
frightened than anything. He'll get up and be off directly we leave. You
will let me see you home?" he continued, speaking to Adrienne.
She looked up at him with a gleam of humor in her wet eyes.
"You don't imagine that we should let you go and leave us here?" she
said. "Come, Margharita."
The Englishman looked at the other girl, almost for the first time, as
she came up and joined them. Her dark eyes were full of tears and her
face was troubled. There was very little relief or thankfulness for her
escape in her expression. The Englishman was no physiognomist, but he
was a little puzzled.
"There is no danger now, Signorina," he said reassuringly. "To-morrow I
will go to the police, and I dare say that we shall get to the bottom of
the whole affair."
She shuddered, but made no reply, walking on by their side, but a little
distance apart. As for the Englishman, he was in paradise. To all
intents and purposes, he was alone with Adrienne Cartuccio, listening to
her low voice, and every now and then stealing a glance downward into
those wonderful eyes, just then very soft and sweet. That walk through
the scented darkness, with the far-off murmur of the sea always in their
ears, was like the dawning of a new era in his life.
It was she who talked most, and he who listened. Yet he was very happy;
and when they reached her villa, and he left them at the door, she gave
him a white flower which he had found courage to beg for.
"May I call on you to-morrow?" he asked, trembling for the answer.
"If you would like to, yes," she answered readily. "Come early if you
have nothing to do, and we will give you afternoon tea _à l'Anglaise_.
By the bye," she added, a little shyly, "is there not something which
you have forgotten?"
He divined her meaning at once.
"Of course, I ought to have told you my name!" he exclaimed hastily.
"How stupid of me. It is St. Maurice--Lord St Maurice."
"Lord St Maurice! Then are you not the fortunate possessor of that
delightful little yacht in the harbor?"
"Yes, if you mean the _Pandora_, she's mine. Do you like sailing? Will
you come for a sail?" he asked eagerly.
"We'll talk about it to-morrow," she laughed, holding out her hand.
"Good-night."
He let her hand go. If he held it a moment longer, and a little more
firmly than was absolutely necessary, was he much to blame?
"Good-night," he said. "Good-night, Signorina," he added, bowing to
Margharita. "I shall come to-morrow afternoon."
Then he turned away, and walked with long swinging steps back to the
hotel.
CHAPTER VI
"THE BITTER SPRINGS OF ANGER AND FEAR"
"Margharita!"
She had found her way into a lonely corner of the villa grounds, and,
with her head resting upon her hands, she was gazing across the blue
sunlit waters of the bay. Below, hidden by the thickly-growing shrubs,
was the white, dusty road, and the voice which disturbed her thoughts
seemed to come from it. She pushed the white flowering rhododendrons on
one side, and peered through.
"Leonardo!" she exclaimed. "Leonardo!"
She seemed surprised to see him standing there, pale, dusty, and with a
great weariness shining out of his black eyes, and it did not occur to
her to offer him any greeting. She could not say that she was glad to
see him, and yet her heart ached when she looked into his pale,
sorrowful face. So she was silent.
"Are you alone?" he asked.
"Yes. Adrienne is in the house, I believe."
"Then I am coming in."
She looked troubled, but she could not send him away. He clambered over
the low paling, and, pushing back the boughs of the shrubs which grew
between them, made his way up the bank to her side.
"Have you been away?" she asked.
"Yes, I have been home. Home," he repeated bitterly. "I have wandered
through the woods, and I have climbed the hills where we spent our
childhood. I have looked upon the old scenes, and my heart is broken."
Her eyes filled with tears. For a moment her thoughts, too, went back to
the days when they had been children together, and he had been her hero
brother. How time had changed them both, and how far apart they had
drifted. They could never be the same again. She knew it quite well.
There had grown up a great barrier between them. She could not even
pretend to sympathize with him, although her heart was still full of
pity.
"Leonardo, I am sorry," she whispered. "How is it, I wonder, that all
through life you seem to have set your heart upon things which are
impossible."
"It is fate!"
"Fate! But you are a man, and man should control fate."
"Have I not tried?" he answered bitterly. "Tell me, do I so easily
relinquish my great desire? Why am I here? Because I have said to myself
that I will not be denied. Adrienne shall be mine!"
She looked at him steadily.
"We have not met, Leonardo, since the night after the concert. Do you
know that we had an adventure on the way home?"
"Tell me about it," he answered, looking away.
"Is there any need, Leonardo?"
A faint tinge of color stole into his olive cheek.
"You guessed then," he said. "Tell me, does she know? Has she any idea?"
"None."
"She does not suspect me at all?"
"No; she thinks that it was an ordinary attack by robbers, and that the
carriage was to take us a little way into the interior, so that they
might hold us and demand a ransom. It was her own idea; I said nothing.
I feel as though I were deceiving her, but I cannot tell her. She would
never look upon your face again, Leonardo."
"You must not tell her," he muttered. "Swear that you will not!"
She shook her head.
"There is no need. I am not anxious to denounce my own brother as a
would-be abductor."
"Margharita, I was desperate," he cried passionately. "And that cursed
Englishman, he has become my evil genius. It was a miserable chance that
enabled him to become your preserver."
"It was a very fortunate one for you, Leonardo."
"What do you mean?" he cried sharply. "Tell me, has he been here?"
"Yes."
He seemed to calm himself with a great effort. He was on the threshold
of what he had come to know. He must keep cool, or she would tell him
nothing.
"Margharita," he said slowly, "the time is fast coming when I shall have
no more favors to ask you. Will you remember that you are my sister, and
grant me a great one now?"
"If I can, Leonardo."
"It is good. I shall not ask you anything impossible or unreasonable.
Tell me the truth about Adrienne and this Englishman, Tell me how you
have spent your days since this affair, and how often he has been here.
Then tell me what you yourself think. Tell me whether she cares for him;
and he for her. Let me hear the whole truth, so that I may know how to
act."
There was a moment's silence. A yellow-breasted bird flew between them,
and a shower of rhododendron blossoms fell at their feet. The lazy
murmur of insects floated upon the heavy afternoon air, so faint and
breathless that the leaves which grew thick around them scarcely
rustled. A clump of pink and white hyacinths grew out of the wall, the
waxy heads bent with the weight of their heavy, bell-shaped petals. She
snapped off a white blossom, and toyed with it in her fingers for a
moment. The lazy joy of the hot afternoon seemed to grate upon her when
she looked into that white, strained face, deep lined and suffering.
What right had nature to put forth all her sweet sights and perfumes, to
be so peaceful and joyous, while man, her master, could feel such agony?
It was mockery, it was not right or fair.
She thrust the flower into his hand.
"Leonardo," she whispered, "remember our watchword, 'Endurance.' I will
tell you everything. Lord St. Maurice came on the day after our
adventure. He stayed till evening, and we walked with him on the Marina.
The next day we went yachting with him. Yesterday and to-day he has
spent nearly the whole of his time here. I believe that he is in love
with Adrienne, and as for her, if she does not love him already, I
believe that she soon will. You have asked for the truth, my brother,
and it is best that you should have it. Forgive me for the pain it must
cause you."
He passed his arm round the gnarled branch of a small chestnut tree, and
then, turning round, hid his face. There was a great lump rising in her
throat, but she dared not attempt to console him. She knew that he was
angry with her--that he blamed her for his fruitless love, and despised
her for the lover she had chosen. In the days of their youth they had
both been dreamers. He had been faithful to the proud, romantic
patriotism which had been the keynote of their idealism; she, in his
eyes at any rate, had been utterly faithless. Only her affection had
remained steadfast, and even that he had commenced to doubt.
Presently he turned and faced her. His face was ghastly white, but his
eyes were hot and red.
"Where is she?" he asked. "I am going to her. I am going to see with my
own eyes, and hear with my own ears, whether this story of yours be
true. Where is she?"
She looked at him doubtfully.
"Leonardo," she said, "forgive me; but you will frighten her if you go
as you are now. Your clothes are all dusty and ragged, and you look as
though you were on the threshold of a fever. Besides, she is asleep. Go
down to the hotel and change your clothes, and then ride up here to
call. Somehow or other I will manage that she shall see you then."
He looked down at himself and smiled bitterly.
"It is true," he said, "I look but a sorry lover. Remember, Margharita,
that I hold you to your promise. In an hour I shall return."
He left the grounds, and walked down the hill, with bent shoulders, and
never a glance to the right or the left.
CHAPTER VII
COMFORT! COMFORT SCORNED OF DEVILS
"Adrienne, I am the happiest man in the world."
"For how long, sir?"
"_Pour la vie_," he answered solemnly.
Her hand stole softly into his, and there was a long silence between
them. What need had they of words? It is only the lighter form of love,
fancy touched by sentiment, which seeks for expressions by such means.
Their love was different; a silent consciousness of each other's
presence sufficed for them. And so they sat there, side by side, steeped
in the deep, subtle joy of that perfect love which upon the nature of
both the man and the woman had so chastening and spiritualizing an
influence. There was a new music in their lives, a sweeter harmony than
either of them had ever been conscious of before. The world had grown
more beautiful--and it was for them. The love which widens and deepens
also narrows. Humanity was a forgotten factor in their thoughts. All
that they saw and dreamed of was theirs to taste, to admire and to enjoy
together. It was for them that the silvery moon and the softly burning
stars cast upon the sleeping earth a strange new beauty. It was for them
the air hung heavy with the faint perfume of spices, and the mingled
scents of heliotrope and violets. It was for them that the dark pine
trees waved softly backward and forward against the violet sky; for them
that the far-away sea made melancholy music against the pebbly beach,
and the soft night wind rustled among the tree tops in the orange
groves. All nature was fair for their sakes. It is the grand selfishness
of love--a noble vice.
"Adrienne!"
They both started and looked round. The voice was harsh and agitated,
and it broke in like a jarring note upon their sweet, absorbed
silence. It was Leonardo di Marioni who stood before them on the
balcony--Leonardo, with white face and darkly-gleaming eyes. To Lord St.
Maurice, that stifled cry had sounded like the hiss of the snake in
paradise, and when he looked up the simile seemed completed.
"Is it you, Leonardo?" Adrienne said, letting go her lover's hand, and
leaning back in her chair. "Your entrance is a little unceremonious, is
it not? Were there no servants to announce you, or to bring me word of
your presence? I dislike surprises."
"And I, too, Adrienne--I, too, dislike surprises," he answered, his
voice quivering with passion. "I find one awaiting me here."
She rose and stood facing him, cold but angry.
"You are forgetting yourself, Count di Marioni, and your speech is a
presumption. We have been friends, but, if you wish our friendship to
continue, you will alter your tone. You have no right to speak to me in
that tone, and I expect an apology."
His lips quivered, and he spoke with a strange bitterness.
"No right! Ay, you say well 'no right,' Adrienne. Will you spare me a
few moments alone? I have a thing to say to you."
She frowned and hesitated for a moment. After all, she had a woman's
heart, and she could not choose but pity him.
"Will not another time do, Leonardo?" she asked almost gently. "You see
I have a visitor."
Yes, he saw it. He had looked up into the handsome, debonair face, with
that proud, happy smile upon the parted lips, from the garden path
below. How he hated it.
"I may be summoned away from Palermo at any moment," he said. "Cannot
you spare me a short five minutes? I will go away then."
She looked down at her lover. He rose to his feet promptly.
"I'll have a cigar among the magnolias," he exclaimed. "Call me when I
may come up."
A look passed between them which sent a swift, keen pain through the
Sicilian's heart. Then Lord St. Maurice vaulted over the balcony,
alighting in the garden below, and they were alone.
"Adrienne!" Leonardo cried, and his voice was low and bitter, "I dare
not ask, and yet I must know. Tell me quickly. Don't torture me. You
care for this Englishman?"
"Yes."
"You love him?"
"Dearly. With all my heart."
"You are going to marry him?"
"Yes."
And not all her pity could keep the joy from her tone as she uttered the
last monosyllable.
"My God! My God!"
The suffering in his white face was awful to see. Her eyes filled with
tears. She knew that she had done this man no wrong, that he had never
had a single word of definite encouragement from her, that, time after
time, she had told him that his love was hopeless. Yet her heart was
heavy as she watched his anguish.
"Leonardo!" she said softly, "I am sorry. But surely you do not blame
me? Is it my fault that I love him, and not you? Have I not begged you
often to accept the only answer I could ever give you? Be generous,
Leonardo, and let us be friends."
It was several moments before he spoke, and then it seemed as though
there had been a conflict in the man, and the worse half had conquered.
The dumb grief in his eyes, which had been so piteous to witness, had
changed suddenly into a furious, passionate anger. He shook with the
violence of his emotions, and though she was used to his stormy,
impetuous nature, she was frightened.
"Friends! A curse upon such folly! Is it for friendship's sake that I
have followed you here at the risk of my life, just to breathe the same
air, to look but now and then into your face? Ah! Adrienne! Adrienne!
listen once more to me. Do you think that he can love as I do? Never!
never! I know that sluggish English temperament. Their wives are their
servants or their dolls. Their passion is the passion of animals, and
they have not even constancy."
She held out her hand. He had destroyed her pity. Henceforth he was
obnoxious to her.
"Leave me," she commanded. "You are talking of what you do not
understand. You are insulting me. I detest you!"
"Detest me!" he laughed hysterically, and the fire in his eyes grew
brighter. "Since when? Since this cursed Englishman whispered his lies
into your ears and stole you from me. Nay, do not shake your head. Mine
you would have been some day, as surely as now you have made my life a
hell. My love would have conquered in the end. It would have worn away
your coldness and your resistance drop by drop. Mother of God! it shall
conquer! Do I come of a race who are content to stand calmly by and see
the woman they love stolen away by strangers? No!"
He stopped short, and there was a strange look in his face. Adrienne saw
it, and trembled.
"Leonardo," she said, "I call a man who cannot bear a disappointment a
coward. I do not love you; and under no circumstances whatever would it
have been possible for me ever to have married you. Never! never!"
He turned on his heel and walked away.
"We shall see!" he said. "_Au revoir_, my cousin."
The emphasis in his tone, and a certain fixed look in his face chilled
her. She held up her hands, and he stayed.
"Listen!" she said, speaking slowly, and with her eyes fixed steadily
upon him. "I do not wish to think ill of you; I do not wish to think
that you could harm the man I love; but, if you did--if you did, I
say--you should taste a woman's vengeance! You think me weak, but there
are things which will fire the blood and steel the nerve of a weaker
woman than I am. Remember, Leonardo! Lift but your little finger against
Lord St. Maurice, and all ties of kindred and country are forgotten.
Those means which lie ready to my hand, I will use! I have warned you!
Remember!"
Her tone had passed from earnestness to solemnity; her attitude, her
final gesture, were full of dramatic grace. Beside her, he appeared mean
and insignificant.
"I thank you for your candor, cousin," he said slowly. "If I harm your
lover----"
"If you harm him," she interrupted fiercely, "you will win my undying
hate, even while you are undergoing my vengeance. You know my power,
Leonardo; you know the means which lie ready to my hand. Never doubt but
that I shall use them."
He turned round and walked out of the house, passing Lord St. Maurice in
the garden without even glancing toward him. In the road he paused for a
moment, watching the long shadows pass quivering across the dark hills,
and the gleam of the moonlight upon the water far away below.
"She would never dare!" he murmured to himself. "She is a woman, and she
would forget."
CHAPTER VIII
"DEATH IN THE FACE, AND MURDER IN THE HEART"
Lord St. Maurice was in a good humor with himself and the entire world
that night. He had spent nearly the whole of the day with the woman he
loved, and whom he was shortly to marry, and with the prospect of
another such day on the morrow, even his temporary exile from paradise
was not a very severe trial. He was an ardent suitor, and deeply in
love, but an hour or two alone with a case of excellent cigars, with
delightful thoughts to keep him company, the softest air in Europe to
breathe, and one of the most picturesque sights to look upon, could
scarcely be esteemed a hardship. Above him, among the woods, twinkled
the bright lights of the Villa Fiolesse which he had just quitted, and
below was the gay little Marina, still dotted about with groups of men
in soft hats and light clothes, and bright-eyed, laughing women, whose
musical voices rang out on the still night air with strange
distinctness.
Through the clinging magnolia bushes and rhododendron shrubs he pushed
his way downward, the red end of his cigar shining out like a signal
light in the semi-purple darkness. Every now and then he stopped to take
a breath of air perfumed by a clump of hyacinth, or some star-shaped
flower which had yielded up its sweetness to the softly-falling night.
Now and then, too, he took a lover's look at the stars, and downward to
the softly-heaving bosom of the Mediterranean. All these things seemed
to mean so much more to him now! Adrienne had changed the world, and he
was looking out upon it with different eyes. Sentiment, which before he
had scoffed at a little, as became a sturdy young Briton but lately
escaped from public school and college, had suddenly become for him
something akin to a holy thing. He was almost a poet that night--he who
had scarcely read a line of what the world calls poetry since his school
days. There was a man whom he had hated all his life. Just then he began
to think of him without a particle of anger or resentment. If he could
have met him there, among those drooping, white-flowering shrubs, he
felt that he could have shaken his hand, have asked him heartily after
his health, and doubtless have fixed a day to dine with him. The world
was a capital place, and Palermo was on the threshold of heaven. His
big, boyish heart was full to over-flowing. Oh! it is a fine thing to be
in love!
From the present he began to think a little of the future. He was right
in the clouds, and he began to dream. At twenty-five years old
imagination is the master of the man; at forty the situations are
reversed; but in losing the upper hand imagination often loses its power
and freshness. Lord St. Maurice was in his twenty-sixth year, and he
began to dream. He was his own master, and he was rich. There was a fine
estate in Eastshire, a shooting lodge in Scotland, and a box in
Leicestershire. Which would Adrienne prefer? How delightful it would be
to take her to them in the proper seasons, and find out which one
pleased her most. When they reached England, after a cruise as far as
Cairo and back along the Mediterranean, July would be on the wane. It
was just the best time. They would go straight to Scotland and have a
few days alone upon those glorious moors before the shooting commenced.
He remembered, with a little laugh, the bachelor invitations which he
had given, and which must now be rescinded. Bother bachelor invitations!
Adrienne was sure to like Scotland. This southern land with its
profusion of flowers, its deep, intense coloring, and its softly-blowing
winds, was beautiful enough in its way, but the purple covered moors and
cloud-topped hills of Scotland had their own charm. Adrienne had never
seen heather; and his long, low cottage was set in a very sea of it. How
pleasant the evening would be, out on the balcony, with the red sun
sinking down behind Bathness Hill. Ah! how happy they would be. Life had
never seemed so fair a thing!
He was on the Marina by this time, elbowing his way among the people who
were still lazily walking backward and forward, or standing in little
knots talking. The open-air restaurant, too, was crowded, but there were
a few vacant seats, and among them the little iron chair in which he had
been lounging on that evening when Adrienne Cartuccio had passed by
among the crowd. He stopped short, and stepping lightly over the
railing, drew it to him, and sat down. The busy waiter was by his side
in a moment with coffee and liqueurs, and taking a cigar from his case
he began meditatively to smoke.
Since sundown the hot air had grown closer and more sulphurous, and away
westward over the waters the heavens seemed to be continually opening
and closing, belching out great sheets of yellow light. A few detached
masses of black clouds were slowly floating across the starlit sky. Now
one had reached the moon, and a sudden darkness fell upon the earth.
With such a lamp in the sky illuminations in the hotel gardens were a
thing unheard of, and the effect was singular. Only the red lights of
the smokers were visible, dotted here and there like glow-worms.
Conversation, too, dropped. Men lowered their voices, the women ceased
to make the air alive with the music of their laughter. It was the
southern nature. When the sky was fair, their hearts were light and
their voices gay. Now there was a momentary gloom, and every one
shivered.
The Englishman looked up at the cloud, wondered whether there would be a
storm, and calmly went on smoking. The sudden hush and darkness meant
nothing to him. In his state of mind they were rather welcome than
otherwise. But in the midst of the darkness a strange thing happened.
He was neither superstitious nor impressionable. From either weakness he
would contemptuously, and with perfect truth, have declared himself
altogether free. But suddenly the sweet, swiftly-flowing current of his
thoughts came to a full stop. He was conscious of a cold chill, which he
could not in any way explain. There had been no sound of footsteps,
nothing to warn him of it, but he fancied himself abruptly encountered
by some nameless danger. The perspiration broke out upon his forehead,
and the cigar dropped from his fingers. Was it a nightmare, the prelude
to a fever? Was he going mad? Oh! it was horrible!
By a great effort of will he contrived to raise his eyes to the cloud.
It had almost passed away from the face of the moon. The main body of it
was already floating northward, only one long jagged edge remained.
There could be only a second or two more of this unnatural gloom. His
heart was thankful for it. Ah! what was that? He bit his tongue hard, or
he would have called out. Either he was dreaming, or that was the warm
panting breath of a human being upon his cheek.
He sprang up, with his arm stretched out as though to defend himself,
and holding his breath; but there was no sound, save the dull murmur of
whispered conversation around. One glance more at the cloud. How slowly
it moved. Ah! thank God! the light was coming. Already the shadows were
moving away. Voices were being raised; figures were becoming distinct;
in a moment the moon would be free.
It was all over. Laughing voices once more filled the air. The waiters
were running about more busily than ever; people rubbed their eyes and
joked about the darkness. But the Englishman sat quite still, holding in
his hand a long, curiously-shaped dagger, which the first gleam of
moonlight had shown him lying at his feet.
He was no coward, but he gave a little shudder as he examined the thing,
and felt its blueish steel edge with his finger. It was by no means a
toy weapon; it had been fashioned and meant for use. What use? Somehow
he felt that he had escaped a very great danger, as he put the thing
thoughtfully into his pocket, and leaned back in his chair. The shrill
voices and clatter of glasses around him sounded curiously unreal in his
ears.
By degrees he came to himself, and leaning forward took a match from the
little marble table, and re-lit his cigar. Then, for the first time, he
noticed with a start, that the chair opposite to him was occupied,
occupied, too, by a figure which was perfectly familiar. It was the
Sicilian who sat there, quietly smoking a long cigarette, and with his
face shaded by the open palm of his hand.
Lord St. Maurice made no sign of recognition. On the contrary, he turned
his head away, preferring not to be seen. His nerves were already highly
strung, and there seemed to him to be something ominous in this second
meeting with the Sicilian. If he could have been sure of being able to
do so unnoticed, he would have got up and gone into the hotel.
"Good-evening, Signor!"
Lord St. Maurice turned and looked into the white, corpse-like face of
the Sicilian. It told its own story. There was trouble to come.
"Good-evening, Signor," he answered quietly.
The Sicilian leaned over the table. There were gray rims under his eyes,
and even his lips had lost their color.
"A week ago, Signor," he remarked, "we occupied these same seats here."
"I remember it," Lord St. Maurice replied quietly.
"It is well. It is of the events which have followed that night that I
desire to speak, if you, Signor, will grant me a few moments of your
time?"
"Certainly," the Englishman replied courteously. After all, perhaps the
fellow did not mean to quarrel.
"I regret exceedingly having to trouble you, Signor, with a little
personal history," the Sicilian continued. "I must tell you, at the
commencement, that for five years I have been a suitor for the hand of
the Signorina Adrienne Cartuccio, my cousin."
"Second cousin, I believe," Lord St. Maurice interposed.
The Sicilian waved his hand. It was of no consequence.
"Certain political differences with the Imperial party at Rome," he
continued, "culminated two years ago in my banishment from Italy and
Sicily. You, I believe, Lord St. Maurice, are of ancient family, and it
is possible that you may understand to some extent the bitterness of
exile from a country and a home which has been the seat of my family for
nearly a thousand years. Such a sentence is not banishment as the world
understands it; it is a living death! But, Signor, it was not all. It
was not even the worst. Alas, that I, a Marioni, should live to confess
it! But to be parted from the woman I love was even a sorer trial. Yet I
endured it. I endured it; hoping against hope for a recall. My sister
and I were orphans. She made her home with the Signorina Cartuccio. Thus
I had news of her continually. Sometimes my cousin herself wrote to me.
It was these letters which preserved my reason, and consciously or
unconsciously, they breathed to me ever of hope.
"Not Adrienne's, I'll swear," the Englishman muttered to himself. He was
a true Briton, and there was plenty of dormant jealousy not very far
from the surface.
The Sicilian heard the words, and his eyes flashed.
"The Signorina Cartuccio, if you please, Signor," he remarked coldly.
"We are in a public place."
Lord St. Maurice felt that he could afford to accept the rebuke, and he
bowed his head.
"My remark was not intended to be audible!" he declared.
"For two years I bore with my wretched life," the Sicilian continued,
"but at last my endurance came to an end. I determined to risk my
liberty, that I might hear my fate from her own lips. I crossed the Alps
without molestation, and even entered Rome. There I was watched, but not
interfered with. The conclusion I came to was, that as long as I lived
the life of an ordinary citizen, and showed no interest in politics, I
was safe. I crossed to Palermo unharmed. I have seen the Signorina, and
I have made my appeal."
The Englishman dropped his eyes and knocked the ash from his cigar. The
fellow was coming to the point at last.
"You, Signor," the Sicilian continued, in a tone which, although it was
no louder, seemed to gain in intensity from the smoldering passion
underneath, "you, Signor, know what my answer was, for you were the
cause. I have not told you this much of my story to win your pity; I
simply tell it that I may reason with you. I have tried to make you
understand something of the strength of my love for the Signorina. Do
you think that, after what I have risked, after what I have suffered,
that I shall stand aside, and see another man, an alien, take her from
me? I come of a race, Signor, who are not used to see the women they
love chosen for other men's wives. Have you ever heard of Count Hubert
di Marioni, who, with seven hundred men, carried off a princess of
Austria from her father's court, and brought her safely through Italy
here to be one of the mothers of my race? It was five hundred years ago,
and, among the ruins of ancient kingdoms, the Marionis have also fallen
in estate. But the old spirit lingers. Lord St. Maurice, I am not a
blood-thirsty man. I do not wish your life. Go back to your country, and
choose for a bride one of her own daughters. Give up all thought of the
Signorina di Cartuccio, or, as surely as the moon yonder looks down upon
you and me, I shall kill you."
Lord St. Maurice threw his cigar away and shrugged his shoulders. The
affair was going to be serious, then.
"You must forgive me, Signor, if I do not quite follow you," he said
slowly. "The custom in our countries doubtless differs. In England it is
the lady who chooses, and it is considered--pardon me--ill-mannered for
a rejected suitor to have anything more to say."
"As you remark, the ideas and customs of our countries differ," the
Sicilian rejoined. "Here a nobleman of my descent would consider it an
everlasting shame to stand quietly on one side, and see the woman whom
he worshiped become the bride of another man, and that man an alien. He
would be esteemed, and justly, a coward. Let us waste no more words,
Signor. I have sought you to-night to put this matter plainly before
you. Unless you leave this island, and give up your pretensions to the
hand of the Signorina Cartuccio, you die. You have climbed for the last
time to the Villa Fiolesse. Swear to go there no more; swear to leave
this island before day breaks to-morrow, or your blood shall stain its
shores. By the unbroken and sacred oath of a Marioni, I swear it!"
To Lord St. Maurice, the Sicilian's words and gestures seemed only
grotesque. He looked at him a little contemptuously--a thin, shrunken-up
figure, ghastly pale, and seeming all the thinner on account of his
somber black attire. What a husband for Adrienne! How had he dared to
love so magnificent a creature. The very idea of such a man threatening
him seemed absurd to Lord St. Maurice, an athlete of public school and
college renown, with muscles like iron, and the stature of a guardsman.
He was not angry, and he had not a particle of fear, but his stock of
patience was getting exhausted.
"How are you going to do the killing?" he asked. "Pardon my ignorance,
but it is evidently one of the customs of the country which has not been
explained to me. How do you manage it?"
"I should kill you in a duel!" the Sicilian answered. "It would be
easily done."
The Englishman burst out laughing. It was too grotesque, almost like a
huge joke.
"Damn you and your duels!" he said, rising to his feet, and towering
over his companion. "Look here, Mr. di Marioni, I've listened to you
seriously because I felt heartily sorry for you; but I've had enough of
it. I don't know whether you understand the slang of my country. If you
do, you'll understand what I mean when I tell you that you've been
talking 'bally rot.' We may be a rough lot, we Englishmen, but we're not
cowards, and no one but a coward would dream of giving a girl up for
such a tissue of whimperings. Be a man, sir, and get over it, and look
here--none of this sort of business!"
He drew the dagger from his breast pocket, and patted it. The Sicilian
was speechless and livid with rage.
"You are a coward!" he hissed. "You shall fight with me!"
"That I won't," Lord St Maurice answered good-humoredly. "Just take my
advice. Make up your mind that we both can't have her, and she's chosen
me, and come and give me your hand like a man. Think it over, now,
before the morning. Good-night!"
The Sicilian sprang up, and looked rapidly around. At an adjoining table
he recognized two men, and touched one on the shoulder.
"Signors!" he cried, "and you, Signor le Capitaine, pardon me if I ask
you for your hearing for an instant. This--gentleman here has insulted
me, and declines to give me satisfaction. I have called him a coward and
a rascal, and I repeat it! His name is Lord St Maurice. If he forfeits
his right to be considered a gentleman, I demand that his name be struck
off the visitors' club."
The three men had risen to their feet. Two of them were gentlemen of the
neighborhood with whom Lord St Maurice had a bowing acquaintance. The
third was a French officer. They looked inquiringly at Lord St. Maurice.
"It's quite true, gentlemen," he said with easy self-possession. "He's
been calling me all the bad names under the sun, and I have declined to
give him what he calls satisfaction. I haven't the least objection to
your knowing it."
The two Palermitans looked at one another doubtfully. The officer,
giving his moustache a twist, stepped forward and bowed.
"Might we inquire your reasons for declining the duel?" he asked.
The Englishman shrugged his shoulders.
"Certainly," he answered. "In the first place, I am an officer in the
service of Her Majesty the Queen, and duelling is strictly forbidden; in
the second, Signor di Marioni is too excited to know what he is talking
about."
"In England, Signor, your first objection is valid; here, it is scarcely
so. As to the latter, Monsieur le Count seems now to be perfectly
composed. I am on the committee of the club, and I fear that I must
erase your name if you persist in your refusal."
"I don't care two straws about your club," Lord St. Maurice answered
carelessly. "As for the duel, I decline it, once and for all. We
Englishmen have a code of honor of our own, and it is more to us than
the custom of the countries which we chance to visit. I wish you
good-night, gentlemen."
They fell back, impressed in spite of themselves by the coolness and
hauteur of his words. Suddenly, with the swiftness of a tiger-cat, the
Sicilian leaped forward and struck the Englishman on the cheek.
"Perhaps you will tell us all, Signor, how the men of your country
resent an insult such as that," he cried.
Every one turned round at the sound of the scuffle. The eyes of all were
upon the Englishman, who stood there, head and shoulders above all the
crowd, with blazing eyes and pale cheeks. He was in a towering passion,
but his voice never shook or faltered.
"You shall see for yourself, Signor!" he cried.
The Sicilian struggled, but he was like a child in the Englishman's
arms. He had caught him up in a vice-like grasp, and held him high over
the heads of the astonished onlookers. For a moment he seemed as though
he were going to throw him right out of the restaurant on to the Marina,
but at the last moment he changed his mind, and with a contemptuous
gesture set him down in the midst of them, breathless and choking.
"You can send your seconds as soon as you like," he said shortly.
"Good-evening, gentlemen."
They fell back before him like sheep, leaving a broad way right into the
hotel, through which he passed, stern and self-possessed. The Sicilian
watched him curiously, with twitching lips.
"There goes a brave man," whispered one of the Palermitans to the French
officer. "But his days are numbered."
The Frenchman gazed at the Sicilian and nodded. There was death in his
face.
CHAPTER IX
'Ah! why should love, like men in drinking songs,
Spice his fair banquet with the dust of earth?'
Lord St. Maurice walked straight into his room without perceiving that
it was already occupied. He flung his hat into a corner, and himself
into an easy-chair, with an exclamation which was decidedly
unparliamentary.
"D--n!" he muttered.
"That's a lively greeting," remarked a voice from the other end of the
room.
He looked quickly up. A tall figure loomed out of the shadows of the
apartment, and presently resolved itself into the figure of a man with
his hands in his pockets, and a huge meerschaum pipe in his mouth.
"Briscoe, by Jove! How long have you been here?"
"About two hours. I've been resting. Anything wrong downstairs? Thought
I heard a row."
"Strike a light, there's a good fellow, and I'll tell you."
The new-comer moved to the window, and pulled aside the curtain.
"Moon's good enough," he remarked. "I hate those sickly candles. Great
Scott! what's the matter with you? You look as black as thunder."
Lord St. Maurice told him the whole story. Martin Briscoe listened
without remark until he had finished. Then he pushed the tobacco firmly
down into the bowl of his pipe and re-lit it, smoking for a few minutes
in silence.
"I tell you what, Maurice," he said at length, "of all the blood-thirsty
little devils that ever were hatched, that Marioni takes the cake. Why,
I'm going to fight him myself to-morrow morning."
"What!" cried St. Maurice, starting up in his chair.
"Fact, I assure you. Margharita told me that he was going to be
troublesome, but I'd no idea that he was such a little spitfire. I
landed two hours ago, and came straight here. I'd scarcely had a tub,
and made myself decent, when in the little beggar walks, and kicks up no
end of a row. I listened for a bit, and then told him to go to hell. In
five minutes he'd got the whole thing arranged, seconds and all.
To-morrow morning, at 6.30, on the sands, 'll see me a dead man, if he
can use his tools as well as he can talk, little beast."
"Briscoe, this is a horrible mess," Lord St. Maurice declared
emphatically. "I don't know what you think of duels; I hate them."
"It isn't duels I hate, it's the being spitted," Briscoe answered
gloomily. "I can fence a bit, but it's always been with foils. I'm not
used to swords, and I expect that fellow is a regular 'don' at it.
There's a sort of corpse-like look about him, anyway. Got any 'baccy,
St. Maurice? Mine's so beastly dry."
"Help yourself, old fellow. Who the devil's that?"
There was a knock at the door, and one of the servants of the hotel
appeared. With some difficulty, for he was a native, and spoke French
execrably, he explained that there were some gentlemen below who desired
to speak with Lord St. Maurice.
The two men exchanged glances.
"My time has come, you see," Lord St Maurice remarked grimly. "Wait for
me."
In the deserted _salle à manger_ the French officer and one of the
Palermitan gentlemen were talking together. The latter approached Lord
St. Maurice and drew him on one side.
"I do not know how you may be situated here for friends, Lord St.
Maurice," he said, "but I felt that you would only consider it courteous
of me to offer my services to you in case you are without a second in
this affair. My father wrote to me from Rome of your visit here, and I
went to your yacht to call this afternoon. My name is Pruccio--Signor
Adriano Pruccio."
Lord Maurice bowed.
"I remember your father quite well," he said, "and I am glad to commence
our acquaintance by accepting the favor you offer. Will you be so good
as to make all the necessary arrangements with the Count Marioni's
second, and let me know the result."
The Palermitan withdrew into a corner of the room with the Frenchman,
and a few minutes' whispered conversation took place between them. Then
he rejoined Lord St. Maurice, who was standing at the window.
"I am sorry to say that Count Marioni, who is the insulted person in
this affair, chooses swords."
Lord St. Maurice nodded.
"When, and where?"
"At a place below the cliffs to which I shall conduct you at six o'clock
to-morrow morning."
"At six o'clock! But he has another affair on at half-past."
"So I understand," the Palermitan answered, "I pointed out that we
should prefer an interval of at least a day; but Monsieur le Capitaine
there explains that the Count de Marioni, having dispensed with his
incognito, is hourly in danger of arrest on account of some political
trouble, and is therefore anxious to have both affairs settled. I have
agreed, therefore, with your permission, to waive all etiquette in the
matter."
"I don't know that it makes any difference to me," Lord St. Maurice
answered. "To-night, by moonlight, would have suited me best."
Signor Pruccio laughed.
"You are in a great hurry, Lord St. Maurice. May I ask whether you are
proficient with your weapon?"
"I never fenced since I was at school," he answered coolly. "I suppose
Marioni is dangerous?"
The Palermitan looked very grave. He began to see that it would be more
like a murder than a duel.
"Count Marioni is one of the finest swordsmen in Italy," he answered.
"Perhaps, if I were to explain that you are not accustomed to the
rapier----"
"Pray don't," Lord St. Maurice interrupted. "He'd be just as likely to
shoot me."
"That is true," Signor Pruccio assented. "I have seen him do wonderful
things with the pistol. If you can spare an hour or two, Signor, I
should be happy to give you a little advice as to the management of your
weapon. There is a large room at the top of my house where we fence."
Lord St. Maurice shook his head.
"Thank you, I'll take my chance," he answered.
"At five o'clock, Signor. Will you not come to my house for the night?"
"I'm much obliged, but I must write some letters. Good-night, Signor."
"Good-night, Signor. Sleep well!"
* * * * *
The golden light died out of the waning moon, and afar off in the east a
long line of red clouds seemed to rise out of the sea. The air was still
and calm and breathless. Even the sea seemed hushed as the yellow stars
faded from the sky. Behind that bank of glowing clouds was the promise
of the richer and fuller day. Amber was becoming golden, and pink
purple, till through a very rainbow of coloring the sun's first rays
shot across the chilled waters.
Lord St. Maurice had fallen asleep, with his head resting upon his arms,
close to the open window. By his side, with the ink scarcely dry upon
either, were his will, and his farewell letter to Adrienne. No one but
himself would ever know the agony, the hopeless grief, which had rent
his heart, as word after word, sentence after sentence of passionate
leave-taking had found their way on to those closely-written sheets of
paper. But it was over now--over and done with. When some faint sound
from below, or a breath of the morning breeze from the bosom of the sea
awoke him, and he commenced making a few preparations for the start, he
was surprised to find how calm he was. The passion of his grief had
spent itself. He thought of those hours before sleep had fallen upon him
with horror, but they seemed to him very far away. He was face to face
with death, but he felt only that he was about to make a journey into an
undiscovered land. His imagination was dulled. He remembered only that
he was going out to meet death, and it behoved him to meet it as an
honorable English gentleman.
He plunged his head into a basin of cold water and made a careful
toilette, not forgetting even the button-hole which Adrienne had fetched
for him with her own fingers on the evening before. Then he quietly left
the hotel, and walked slowly up and down the Marina until Signor Pruccio
arrived.
CHAPTER X
A MARIONI'S OATH
Two men stood facing one another on a narrow belt of sand, stripped to
the shirt, and with rapiers in their hands. One was the Sicilian,
Leonardo di Marioni, the other the Englishman, Lord St. Maurice. Their
attitude spoke for itself. They were about to fight for each other's
life.
It was a fair spot which their two seconds had chosen to stain with
bloodshed. Close almost to their feet, the blue waters of the
Mediterranean, glistening in the early morning sunlight, broke in tiny,
rippling waves upon the firm white sand. Inland was a semi-circle of
steep cliffs, at the base of which there were great bowlders of rock,
fern-covered and with hyacinths of many colors growing out of the
crevices, and lending a sweet fragrance to the fresh morning air. It was
a spot shut off from the world, for the towering cliffs ran out into the
sea on either side, completely enclosing the little cove. There was only
one possible approach to it, save by boat, and that a difficult and
tedious one, and, looking upward from the shore, hard to discover. But
on the northward side the cliffs suddenly dropped, and in the deft was a
thick plantation of aloes, through which a winding path led down to the
beach.
Perhaps of all the little group gathered down there to witness and take
part in the coming tragedy, Signor Pruccio, Lord St. Maurice's second,
was looking the most disturbed and anxious. His man, he knew, must fall,
and an ugly sickening dread was in his heart. It was so like a murder.
He pictured to himself that fair boyish face--and in the clear morning
sunlight the young Englishman's face showed marvelously few signs of the
night of agony through which he had passed--ghastly and livid, with the
stamp of death upon the forehead, and the deep blue eyes glazed and
dull. It was an awful thing, yet what could he do? What hope was there?
Leonardo di Marioni he knew to be a famous swordsman; Lord St. Maurice
had never fenced since he had left Eton, and scarcely remembered the
positions. It was doubtful even whether he had ever held a rapier. But
what Signor Pruccio feared most was the pale, unflinching hate in the
Sicilian's white face. He loathed it, and yet it fascinated him. He
knew, alas! how easily, by one swift turn of the wrist, he would be able
to pass his sword through the Englishman's body, mocking at his
unskilled defense. He fancied that he could see the arms thrown up to
heaven, the fixed, wild eyes, the red blood spurting out from the wound
and staining the virgin earth; almost he fancied that he could hear the
death-cry break from those agonized white lips. Horrible effort of the
imagination! What evil chance had made him offer his services to this
young English lord, and dragged him into assisting at a duel which could
be but a farce--worse than a farce, a murder? He would have given half
his fortune for an earthquake to have come and swallowed up that
merciless Sicilian.
A few yards away Martin Briscoe was standing with his second. He and
Lord St. Maurice, at this tragical moment of their lives, had been
nearer a quarrel than ever before. Briscoe, with some justice, had
claimed priority with the Sicilian, and had maintained his right in the
face of Lord St. Maurice's opposition. But the Sicilian had stepped in,
and insisted upon his privilege to decide for himself whom he should
first meet. The times had been distinctly stated, he reminded them, six
o'clock by Lord St. Maurice's second, and half-past six by Mr.
Briscoe's. He had arranged it so with a definite purpose, and he claimed
that it should be carried out. There was no appeal from his decision. He
was in the right, and Martin Briscoe, with a dull red glow of anger in
his homely rugged cheeks, had been forced to retire and become a most
unwilling spectator of what he feared could only be a butchery.
Signor Pruccio had delayed the duel as long as he could, under the
pretext of waiting for the doctor who had been instructed to follow
them, but who had not yet arrived. Twice the Sicilian had urged that
they should commence, and each time he had pleaded that they might wait
for a few minutes longer. To enter upon a duel _à l'outrance_, save in
the presence of a medical man, was a thing unheard of, he declared. But
at last this respite was exhausted, for the opposing second, with a
pleasant smile, had remarked that he himself was skilled in surgery, and
would be happy to officiate should any necessity arise. There was no
longer any excuse. Lord St. Maurice himself insisted upon the signal
being given. Sadly therefore he prepared to give it. Already both men
had fallen into position. The word trembled upon his lips.
A flock of sea-birds flew screaming over their heads, and he waited a
moment until they should have passed. Then he raised his hand.
"Stop!"
The cry was a woman's. They all looked round. Only a few yards away from
them stood Adrienne, her fair hair streaming loose in the morning
breeze, and her gown torn and soiled. She had just issued from the
sloping aloe plantation, and was trembling in every limb from the speed
of her descent.
The cloud on the Sicilian's face grew black as night.
"This is no sight for you to look upon!" he cried, between his teeth.
"You will not save your lover by waiting. You had better go, or I will
kill him before your eyes!"
She walked calmly between them, and looked from one to the other.
"Lord St. Maurice, I need not ask you, I know! This duel is not of your
seeking?"
"It is not!" he answered, lowering his sword. "This fellow insulted me,
and I punished him publicly in the restaurant of the Hotel de l'Europe
last night. In my opinion, that squared matters, but he demanded
satisfaction, and from his point of view, I suppose he has a right to
it. I am quite ready to give it to him."
The seconds had fallen back. They three were alone. She went up to the
Sicilian and laid her hand upon his arm.
"Leonardo, we have been friends, have we not? Why should you seek to do
that which will make us enemies for ever? I have broken no faith with
you; I never gave you one word of hope. I never loved you; I never could
have loved you! Why should you seek to murder the man whom I do love,
and make me miserable for ever?"
His face was ghastly, but he showed no sign of being moved by her words.
"Bah! You talk as you feel--just now!" he said quickly. "I tell you that
I do not believe one word. If he had not come between us, you would have
been mine some day. Love like mine would have conquered in the end.
Away! away!" he cried, pushing her back in growing excitement, and
stamping on the ground with his feet. "The sight of you only maddens me,
and nerves my arm to kill! Though you beg on your knees for his life,
that man shall die!"
"I shall not beg upon my knees," she answered proudly. "Yet, Leonardo,
for your own sake, for the sake of your own happiness, I bid you once
more consider. You would stain your hand with the blood of the man who
is more to me than you can ever be. Is this what you call love?
Leonardo, beware! I am not a woman to be lightly robbed of what is dear
to me. Put up your sword, or you will repent it to your dying day."
Her voice rang out clear and threatening upon the morning stillness, and
her eyes were flashing with anger. It was a wonderful tableau which had
grouped itself upon that little strip of sand.
The Sicilian was unmoved. The sight of the woman he loved championing
his foe seemed to madden him.
"Out of my way!" he cried, grasping his sword firmly. "Lord St. Maurice,
are you not weary of skulking behind a woman's petticoats? On guard! I
say. On guard!"
She suddenly flung her hands above her head, and there was what seemed
to be a miraculous increase in the little group. Three men in plain,
dark clothes sprang from behind a gigantic bowlder, and, in an instant,
the Sicilian was seized from behind.
He looked around at his captors, pale and furious. They were strangers
to him. As yet, he did not realize what had happened.
"What does this mean?" he cried furiously. "Who dares to lay hands upon
me? We are on free ground!"
She shook her head.
"Leonardo, you have brought this upon yourself," she said, firmly but
compassionately. "You plotted to murder the man I love. I warned you
that, to protect him, there was nothing which I would not dare. Only a
moment ago I gave you another chance. One word from you and I would have
thrown these papers into the sea," producing a packet from her bosom,
"rather than have placed them where I do now!"
A fourth man had strolled out of the aloe grove, smoking a long
cigarette. Into his hands Adrienne had placed the little packet of
letters, which he accepted with a low bow.
Even now the Sicilian felt bewildered; but as his eyes fell upon the
fourth man he started and trembled violently, gazing at him as though
fascinated.
"I do not understand!" he faltered.
The fourth man removed his cigarette from his teeth and produced a
paper.
"Permit me to explain," he said politely. "I have here a warrant for
your arrest, Count di Marioni, alias Leonardo di Cortegi, on two counts:
first, that you, being an exile, have returned to Italian soil; and
secondly, on a further and separate charge of conspiracy against the
Italian Government, in collusion with a secret society, calling
themselves 'Members of the Order of the White Hyacinth.' The proofs of
the latter conspiracy, which were wanting at your first trial, have now
been furnished."
He touched the little roll of papers which he had just received, and,
with a low bow, fell back. There was an ominous silence.
At the mention of his first name a deathlike pallor had swept in upon
the Sicilian's face. His manner suddenly became quite quiet and free
from excitement. But there was a look in his dark eyes more awful than
had been his previous fury.
"You have done a brave thing indeed, Adrienne!" he said slowly. "You
have saved your lover. You have betrayed the man who would have given
his life to serve you. Listen to me! As I loved you before so do I hate
you now! As my love for you in the past has governed my life, and
brought me always to your side, so in the days to come shall my undying
hate for you and for that man shape my actions and mold my life, and
bring me over sea and land to the farthest corners of the earth to wreak
my vengeance upon you. Be it ten, or twenty, or thirty years, they keep
me rotting in their prisons, the time will come when I shall be free
again; and then, beware! Search your memory for the legends of our race!
Was ever a hate forgotten, or an oath broken? Hear me swear," he cried,
raising his clasped hands above his head with a sudden passionate
gesture, "by the sun, and the sky, and the sea, and the earth, I swear
that, as they continue unchanged and unchanging, so shall my hate for
you remain! Ah! you can take your lover's hand, traitress, and think to
find protection there. But in your heart I read your fear. The day shall
come when you shall kneel at my feet for mercy, and there shall be no
mercy. Gentlemen, my sword. I am at your service."
CHAPTER XI
A MEETING OF THE ORDER
A man in a fur-lined overcoat--thin, shrunken, and worn--stood on the
pavement in a little street in Camberwell, looking about him in evident
disgust. Before him stretched a long row of six-roomed houses,
smoke-begrimed, hideously similar, hideously commonplace. The street was
empty save for the four-wheeled cab from which he had just alighted, and
which was now vanishing in a slight fog, a milkman and a greengrocer's
boy in amicable converse, and a few dirty children playing in the
gutter. Nothing could be more depressing, or more calculated to
unfavorably impress a stranger from a southern land visiting the great
city for the first time. It was a picture of suburban desolation, the
home of poverty-stricken philistinism, uncaring and uncared for. In
Swinburne's words, though with a different meaning, one saw there,
without the necessity of further travel, "a land that was lonelier than
ruin."
The little old man who had alighted from the cab, stood for a moment or
two looking helplessly around, half surprised at what he saw, half
disgusted. Such monotonous and undeviating ugliness was a thing which he
had never dreamed of--certainly he had never encountered anything like
it. Was it possible that he had made a mistake in the address? He drew a
scrap of paper from his pocket and consulted it again. The address was
written there plainly enough--85, Eden Street, Camberwell. He was
certainly in Eden Street, Camberwell, and the figures on the gate-post
opposite him, worn and black with dirt, were unmistakably an eight and a
five. With a little shudder he pushed open the gate, and walked through
the narrow strip of untidy garden to the front door. The bell he found
broken and useless, so he knocked softly at first, and then louder
against the worn panels.
It was some time before an answer came. Several of the neighbors
appeared upon their doorsteps, and took bold and somewhat ribald stock
of the visitor. A young person of eighty-one, who was considered the wit
of the neighborhood, made several very audible remarks, which produced a
chorus of gigglings, on the subject of his clothes and foreign
appearance. But he stood there as though he had been deaf, his hands
thrust down into the loose pockets of his overcoat and his deep-sunken
eyes fixed wistfully but not impatiently upon the closed door. He was a
mute picture of resignation.
At last, after his third summons, the door was slowly and cautiously
opened, and the astonished visitor beheld, for the first time in his
life, a London maid-of-all-work. The astonishment seemed perfectly
mutual. He, with his parchment dried face, white hair and eyebrows, and
piercing black eyes only a little dimmed by time, muffled up to the
throat in furs, and unmistakably a foreigner, was as strange to her as
her appearance was to him. He looked at her black hands, her face
besmeared with dirt, and with her uncombed hair hanging loose around it,
at the tattered and soiled print gown looped up on one side and held
together on the other by pins, and at the white-stockinged feet showing
through the holes in her boots. What an object it was! It was fortunate
for him that the twilight and fog concealed, partially at any rate, the
disgust in his face.
"Is--Mr. Bartlezzi in?" he inquired, as soon as he could find words to
speak at all.
"Lawk-a-mussy! I dunno," the girl answered in blank bewilderment. "He
don't have no visitors, he don't. You ain't taxes, are you?"
"No!" he answered, somewhat at a venture, for he did not catch her
meaning.
"Nor water rate? No, you ain't the water rate," she continued,
meditatively. "I knows him. He wears a brown billycock and glasses, 'e
does, and I see him walking with Mary Ann Stubbins on a Sunday."
He admitted doubtfully that she was correct He was not the water rate.
It began to dawn upon her that it would be safe to admit him into the
house.
"Just yer come hinside, will yer," she said. "I dunno who yer are, but I
guess you ain't nothink to be afraid of. Come hinside."
She opened the door and admitted him into a dark, narrow passage. He had
to squeeze himself against the wall to allow her to pass him. Then she
surveyed him critically again, with her arms akimbo and her head a
little on one side.
"I reckon you've got a name," she surmised. "What is it?"
"You can tell Mr. Bartlezzi that a gentleman from abroad desires to
speak with him," he answered. "My name is immaterial. Will you accept
this?" he added, holding out a half-crown timidly toward her.
She grabbed it from him, and turned it over incredulously in the
semi-darkness. There was no deception about it; it was indeed a
half-crown--the first she had ever been given in her life.
She dropped a rude sort of curtsey, and, opening the door of a room,
half ushered, half pushed him in. Then she went to the foot of the
stairs, the coin tightly clinched in her hand, and he heard her call
out----
"Master! There's a gent here from furrin parts has wants you, which 'is
name his immaterial. 'E's in the parlor."
There was a growl in reply, and then silence. The handmaiden, her duty
discharged, shuffled off to the lower regions. The visitor was left
alone.
He looked around him in deep and increasing disgust. The walls of the
little room into which he had been shown were bare, save for a few cheap
chromos and glaring oleographs of the sort distributed by grocers and
petty tradespeople at Christmas. A cracked looking-glass, with a dirty
gilt frame, tottered upon the mantelpiece. The furniture was scanty, and
of the public-house pattern, and there was a strong nauseous odor of
stale tobacco smoke and beer. A small piano stood in one corner, the
cheapest of its kind, and maintaining an upright position only by means
of numerous props. One leg tilted in the air was supported by two old
and coverless volumes of a novel, and another was casterless. The carpet
was worn into shreds, and there was no attempt to conceal or mend the
huge ravages which time had made in it. The ceiling was cracked and
black with smoke, and the faded paper was hanging down from the top of
the wall. There was not a single article or spot in the room on which
the eye could rest with pleasure. It was an interior which matched the
exterior. Nothing worse could be said about it.
The visitor took it all in, and raising his hand to his head closed his
eyes. Ah! what a relief it was to blot it all out of sight, if only for
a moment. He had known evil times, but at their worst, such surroundings
as these he had never met with. A strange nervousness was creeping
slowly over him, the presage of disappointment. He dropped his hands,
and walked restlessly up and down, striving to banish his fears. Might
not all this be necessary--a form of disguise--a clever mode of
concealment? Poverty alone could not have brought things to this strait.
Poverty! There had been no poverty in his day. Yet he was full of
forebodings. He remembered the wonder, the evasions, almost the pity
with which his first inquiries in Rome had been met. He could not expect
to find things exactly the same. Twenty years is a long time, and there
must be many changes. Why had he not stayed in Rome a little longer, and
learned more. He could easily have obtained the knowledge which he
desired there. It would have been wiser, surely it would have been
wiser.
The door opened in the midst of his meditations, and he looked eagerly
up. Again his heart fell. It was not such a man as this that he had
expected to see. Ah! what a day of disappointments it was!
The figure which, after a moment's pause in the doorway, now advanced
somewhat hesitatingly toward him, was that of a man a little past middle
age. He was of medium height, but stout even to corpulency, and his
cheeks were fat and puffy. His hair was gray, and his thick, stubbly
mustaches, which had evidently once been black, were also changing
color. His dark, shiny coat was ridiculously short for him, and his
trousers terminated above his ankles. He wore no necktie, and his collar
was ragged and soiled. In short, his whole appearance was not only
untidy but dirty. His gait, too, was slouching and undignified.
"You wished to speak to me," he said in a thick tone and with a foreign
accent. "My name is Bartlezzi--Signor Alfonso Bartlezzi."
"Yes, I wished to speak with you."
Signor Bartlezzi began to feel uncomfortable under his visitor's fixed
gaze. Why should he look at him so intently? He had never set eyes upon
him before--and what an odd, shrunken little figure it was. He coughed
and shifted his position.
"Ah! yes. I am ready, as you see. Is it anything to do with my
profession?"
"I do not know what your profession is."
Signor Bartlezzi made an effort to draw himself up, and assumed a
military air.
"I am a master of fencing," he announced, "also a professor of
Italian--Professor Alfonso Bartlezzi, at your service. I am fairly
well-known in this neighborhood. If you have pupils to recommend, sir,
or if you are thinking of taking lessons yourself, I should be most
happy. My services are sometimes made use of as interpreter, both in the
police court and privately. I should be happy to serve you in that
capacity, sir."
Signor Bartlezzi, having declared himself, folded his arms and waited.
He felt certain that his visitor must now divulge his name and mission.
That, however, he seemed in no hurry to do.
"You are an Italian?" he asked presently.
"Certainly, sir."
"May I ask, have you still correspondents or friends in that country?"
The Professor was a little uneasy. He looked steadfastly at his visitor
for a moment, however, and seemed to regain his composure.
"I have neither," he answered sorrowfully. "The friends of former days
are silent; they have forgotten me."
"You have lived in England for long, then?"
"Since I was a boy, sir."
"And you are content?"
The Professor shrugged his shoulders and looked round. The gesture was
significant.
"Scarcely so," he answered. "But what would you have? May I now ask you
a question, sir?" he continued.
"Yes."
"Your name?"
His visitor looked around him mournfully.
"The day for secrecy is past, I suppose," he said sadly. "I am the Count
Leonardo di Marioni."
"What!" shrieked the Professor.
"Count Leonardo di Marioni--that is my name. I am better known as Signor
di Cortegi, perhaps, in the history of our society."
"My God!"
If a thunderbolt had burst through the ceiling of the little sitting
room, the Professor could not have been more agitated. He had sunk down
upon a chair, pale and shaking all over with the effect of the surprise.
"He was a young man?" he faltered.
His visitor sighed.
"It was five-and-twenty years ago," he answered slowly. "Five-and-twenty
years rotting in a Roman prison. That has been my fate. I was a young
man then. You see me now."
He held up his arms, and let them drop again heavily to his side. It was
a gesture full of sad dramatic pathos, but in that little room there was
no one to observe it, no one to pity him for those white hairs and
deep-drawn lines. But that was nothing. It was not pity that he wanted.
There was silence. Both men were absorbed in their own thoughts. Signor
Bartlezzi was thunderstruck and completely unnerved. The perspiration
stood out upon his forehead, and he could feel his hands and legs
shaking. This was a terrible and altogether unexpected blow to him. It
was not the thought of that twenty-five years' lonely captivity which
was oppressing him, so much as the fact that it was over--that the day
of release had come, and that it was indeed Count Marioni who stood
before him, alive and a free man. That was the serious part of it. Had
it not been proclaimed that the imprisonment was for life? That had
certainly been the sentence. A gleam of hope flashed in upon him.
Perhaps he had escaped from prison. If so, the sooner he was back there
the better.
"Was not the sentence for life?" he gasped.
The Count assented, shaking his head slowly.
"Yes, for life," he answered bitterly. "That was the sentence,
imprisonment for life."
"Then you have escaped?"
The same slow shake of the head. The Professor was bitterly
disappointed.
"No. At five-and-twenty years a prisoner with a good-conduct sheet is
restored to liberty. My time came at last. It was a weary while."
"What evil fate kept him alive all that time?" the Professor muttered
under his breath. "Men are buried deep who pass within the walls of an
Italian prison. What had kept this frail old man alive?" Before the
night was over, he knew!
The Professor sat on the edge of his chair, limp and dejected. He was
quite powerless to frame any speech of welcome or congratulation.
Fortunately, it was not expected. His visitor was deep in thought, and
some time passed before he appeared even to notice the presence of
Signor Bartlezzi. At last, however, he looked up and spoke.
"I fear that all things have not gone well with us!" he said sadly. "On
my release, I visited the old home of our society in the Piazza di
Spiola at Rome. It was broken up. I met with no one who could tell me
anything about it. It was doubtless because I knew not where to go; but
I had fancied--I had hoped--that there might have been some one whose
memory would not have been altogether dulled by time, who would have
come to meet me at the prison gates, and welcome me back into the living
world once more. But that is nothing. Doubtless the day of my release
was unknown. It was the hot season at Rome, and I wandered wearily
about, seeing no familiar face, and unable to hear anything of our
friends. I might have had patience and lingered, but it seemed to me
that I had been patient so long--it was all exhausted. From there I went
to Florence, with the same result. At last I came to London, and by
making cautious inquiries through my bank, I discovered your address. So
I have come here."
"Ah, yes, yes," answered the Professor, with blinking eyes, and still
completely bewildered. "You have come here. Just so. Just so."
"The numbers have fallen off, I suppose? Yet you still have meetings?"
"Oh, yes; certainly. We still have meetings," the Professor assented
spasmodically.
The little old man nodded his head gravely. He had never doubted it.
"When is the next?" he asked, with the first touch of eagerness creeping
into his voice.
Signor Bartlezzi felt a cold perspiration on his forehead, and slowly
mopped it with a red cotton handkerchief. The calmness of despair was
settling down upon him. "He must know," he thought. "Better get it
over."
"To-night," he answered, "in an hour--perhaps before. They'll be
dropping in directly."
"Ah!" It was a long-drawn and significant monosyllable. The Count rose
to his feet, and commenced pacing the room. Already its meanness was
forgotten, its narrow walls had expanded. The day of his desire had
come. "What are your numbers now?" he asked.
The Professor drew a long breath, and kept his eyes fixed upon his
visitor. The thing was narrowing down.
"Four," he answered; "four besides myself."
The Count started and appeared perplexed.
"Four on the acting committee, you mean, I suppose?" he suggested. "Four
is the old number."
The Professor shook his head doggedly.
"Four altogether," he repeated.
The old man's eyes flashed, but the angry light died almost immediately
away. After all, there might be grave reasons, of which he was ignorant,
for restricting the number.
"Four desperate and brave men may be much," he mused, half aloud. "One
will do enough for my purpose."
There was a ghastly humor in that speech which was nearly too much for
Signor Bartlezzi. He was within an ace of collapsing, but he saved
himself by a quick glance at that worn old man. His visitor was living
in the light of five-and-twenty years ago. The awakening would come. It
was at hand.
"Signor Bartlezzi," the Count said, pausing suddenly in his restless
walk, "I have a confession to make."
"So had he," Signor Bartlezzi mused, though his would keep.
"Proceed," he begged, with a wave of his hand and a touch of his old
bombast, which had collapsed so suddenly. "Proceed, I am all attention."
The Count stood in the middle of the room, with his left hand thrust
into the bosom of his coat, and the right stretched out toward the
Professor. It was his old attitude of bygone days into which he had
unconsciously fallen, but his expression was no longer threatening, and
his voice, though indeed it quivered, was free from the passion and fire
of his youth. He was apologetic now, rather than denunciatory. It was a
great change.
"You will doubtless imagine, Signor Bartlezzi," he said, "from my
presence here, from my seeking you out immediately upon my release, that
the old fires burn still in my heart; that my enthusiasm for the cause
still survives the chill of five-and-twenty years. Alas! that I should
confess it, but it is not so!"
"Then what the mischief does he want here?" mused the Professor. "An
account of his money, I suppose. Oh, damn those meddlesome Italians who
set him free."
"I am sorry, but it is natural," he remarked aloud, wagging his head
sagely. "Five-and-twenty years is a devil of a time!"
"You will not misunderstand me, Professor," he went on almost
pleadingly. "You will not imagine for one moment that the 'Order of the
White Hyacinth' and everything connected with it, is not still dear to
me, very dear. I am an old man, and my time for usefulness is past. Yet
there is one demand which I have to make of the association which I have
faithfully served and suffered for. Doubtless you know full well what I
mean. Will you hear it now, or shall I wait and lay it before the
meeting to-night?"
"The latter, by all means," begged the Professor hastily. "They wouldn't
like it if you told me first. They'd feel hurt, I'm sure."
The Count bowed his head.
"So be it, then," he said gravely.
There was a short silence. The Professor, with his thumbs in his
waistcoat, gazed fixedly down the street.
"I don't see why they shouldn't share the storm," he mused. "He's small,
but he looks as though he might be awkward. I would very much rather
Martello and the others were here; Martello is a strong man."
There was a knock at the outside door, and Signor Bartlezzi peered
through the window.
"There they are!" he exclaimed. "I'll go and let them in myself. It
would be better to prepare them for your presence. Excuse me."
His visitor bowed, and resumed his seat.
"I await the pleasure of the Council," he said with dignity.
CHAPTER XII
"A FIGURE FROM A WORLD GONE BY"
The Count was left to himself in the bare, untidy-looking parlor, and
for a minute or two he was content to sit quite still and recover
himself after the unaccustomed exertion of speech. He needed all his
strength for what lay before him, but, by degrees, his restlessness
grew. He rose from his chair and paced up and down in increasing
excitement--his misgivings were growing fainter--he worked himself up
into the firm belief that the day for which he had waited so long was at
hand.
"They dare not deny me!" he cried, lifting his hands high above his head
until they almost touched the smoke-begrimed ceiling; "it is my due, my
just reward!"
He was so absorbed that he did not hear the noises outside--the
shuffling of feet, and, after a while, a brief suppressed tittering.
Signor Bartlezzi, who had entered the room quietly, had to speak twice
before he was conscious of his presence.
"They are in the room behind, Signor Count, and I have informed them of
your presence," he announced.
The Count drew himself up, and stopped suddenly short in his restless
walk.
"Good!" he exclaimed. "Lead the way! I follow."
Together they passed into the narrow passage, and the Professor threw
open the door of another room. The Count entered.
The Professor had done what he could in the short time at his disposal.
Pens and ink had been placed upon the deal table, and the chairs had
been ranged along it instead of around the fire. The tobacco jar and
pipes were there, however, and some suspicious-looking jugs; and the
hasty current of fresh air, caused by the withdrawal of a sheet of brown
paper from the upper window frame, was altogether powerless to cope with
the close beer-house smell which hung about the place.
The company consisted of four men. The chair at the head of the table
had been left vacant for the Professor. On the right sat Andrew
Martello, an anglicized Italian, and a vendor of ice cream; on the left
was Pietro Muratti, the proprietor of an itinerant musical instrument.
These were the only two, besides the Professor, who had any pretense to
Italian blood. The other two were a French barber and a Jew pawnbroker.
The light was purposely dim, and the Count's eyes were bad. Besides, his
long confinement, and the great though suppressed excitement under which
he was laboring, had to a certain extent confused his judgment. He saw a
mean room, and four men only, when he had dreamed of a chamber in some
great house and an important assemblage; but, disappointing though this
was, it did not seem fatal to his hopes. Let but these four men be
faithful to their oaths, and he, who had served their cause so well,
could demand as a right the boon he craved. He strove earnestly to read
their faces, but the light was bad and his eyes were dim. He must wait.
Their voices would show him what manner of men they were. After all, why
should he doubt for a moment? Men who had remained faithful to a dying
and deserted cause, must needs be men of strength and honorable men. The
very fewness of their numbers proved it, else why should they too not
have fallen away. He would banish all doubt. He would speak when his
time came with all confidence.
The Professor introduced him with all solemnity, casting an appealing
glance at each in turn, as though begging them to accept this matter
seriously. There was just a slender thread of hope still, and he did not
intend to abandon it.
"Gentlemen," he said, "I have the honor to present to you the Count
Leonardo di Marioni, a martyr, as you all know, to our cause. Count
Marioni was, only last week, released from an imprisonment which has
lasted for five-and-twenty years."
They all looked at him curiously--a little compassionately, but none of
them were quite sure how to acknowledge the salutation. The Jew alone
stood up and made a shuffling little bow; the others remained silent
except the little French barber, who murmured something about pleasure
and acquaintance, which the Professor promptly frowned down. The Count,
who had remained standing, advanced to the bottom of the table, and,
laying his trembling hands upon it, spoke:
"Gentlemen and Brothers of the Order of the White Hyacinth," he said
solemnly, "I am glad to meet you."
The Frenchman and the Italian Muratti exchanged expressive winks. The
vendor of ice cream growled across the table for the bird's-eye, and
commenced leisurely filling his pipe, while the Jew ventured upon a
feeble "hear, hear."
"My name is doubtless known to you," the Count continued, "and the story
of my life, which, I am proud to remember, is closely interwoven with
the history of your Order. Your faces, alas! are strange to me. My old
comrades, whom, I had hoped to meet, and whose sympathy I had counted
on, are no more. I feel somewhat as though I had stepped out of the
shadows of a bygone life, and everything is a little strange to me. I
have grown unaccustomed even to speech itself. You must pardon me if I
do not make myself understood with ease. The past seems very, very far
away."
By this time all the pipes were lit, and the mugs were filled. The smoke
hung round the little assembly in a faint cloud, and the atmosphere was
growing dense. The Count looked a little puzzled, but he only hesitated
for a moment. He remembered that he was in England, and the habits of
foreigners were not easy to grow accustomed to. It was a small matter,
although he wished that the odor of the tobacco had not been quite so
rank. When he resumed speaking, however, it was forgotten in a moment.
"I must ask you to bear with me in a certain confession which I am about
to make," he continued. "I am not here to-night to inquire or in any way
to concern myself in the political prospects of our Order. Alas! that
the time should come when I should find myself calmly acknowledging that
my country's sorrows were mine no longer. But, comrades, I must claim
from you your generous consideration. Five-and-twenty years is a long
time. I have lost my touch of history. My memory--I must confess it--my
memory itself is weak. I do not doubt that, small though your numbers
be, you are nobly carrying on the work in which I, too, once bore a
part. I do not doubt but that you are laboring still in the glorious
cause of liberty. But I am with you no longer; my work on earth for
others, such as it has been, is accomplished. I do not come to aid or to
join you. Alas! that I should say it, I, Leonardo di Marioni, whose life
was once so closely bound up with your prosperity as the breath of a man
is to his body. But it is so. I am stranded upon the wreck of my past,
and I can only call upon you with a far-distant voice for my own
salvation."
There was a distinct air of relief. The vendor of ice cream spat upon
the floor, and, in response to a frown from the Professor, at once
covered it with his foot. The Professor drew his hand thoughtfully down
his chin. They were approaching the _crux_ of the whole matter.
"We regret it deeply, Count," he said solemnly. "In that case the small
trifle of money which the London agents of your bank have placed to our
credit yearly on your behalf for the cause, and which has regularly been
used for the--er--necessary expenses--er----"
The Count stretched out his hand.
"It is nothing," he answered. "Why should you mention it? That and more,
too, the Order is welcome to. I doubt not that it has been well used."
"It has!" they cried, with one voice.
"A drop more beer, and a bottle of bran----"
The ice vendor never finished his sentence. A furious kick from the
Professor, under the table, reminded him that he was on dangerous
grounds, and he desisted, rubbing his leg and growling.
The Count scarcely heeded the interruption. His whole form was shaking
with eagerness; his bony, white hands were outstretched toward his four
listeners. For five-and-twenty years he had dreamed of this.
"No, my appearance once more before you, comrades, brothers, has no such
petty object!" he cried. "I am here to demand my rights as a member of
the Order of the White Hyacinth. I am here to remind you of our great
principle--vengeance upon traitors! I am here to remind you of your
unchanging oaths, and to claim your fulfillment of them, even as
Francesco Dellia pleaded, and not in vain, before the council at Rome
thirty years ago. We are a society of peace, save alone where traitors
are concerned. I point out to you a traitor, and I cry--punishment!"
The Professor knitted his brows, and his hopes suddenly fell. They all
exchanged glances.
"Old buffer's dotty," whispered the Jew to his neighbor, tapping his
head significantly.
The musical gentleman nodded.
"Let's hear what it's all about, anyhow," muttered the ice-cream vendor,
tapping the table.
There was silence at once. They all turned toward the Count, and waited.
He had not been disappointed in their silence. It seemed to him like the
prudent reserve of true conspirators. They wished to hear his case, and,
as yet, he had only reached the preamble. Good! they should hear it.
"You all know that I was arrested and thrown into prison because I broke
what they choose to call my parole--because, after the sentence of
banishment had been passed upon me, I returned to my native country, and
took part once more in the counsels of our Order. But you have yet to
learn this, comrades; you have yet to learn that I was betrayed, foully,
wilfully--betrayed into the clutches of the Italian police. Before my
very eyes papers of our society incriminating me were placed in the hand
of our enemy, Signor Villesco, by one who had sworn our oaths in the
first degree and worn our flower. At your hands I call for vengeance
upon my betrayers--vengeance upon Adrienne di Cartuccio, calling herself
Lady St. Maurice, vengeance upon her husband, her family, and all
belonging to her. It is the first decree of our Order, which all of you
have sworn to, and I stand within my rights. Answer, comrades of the
Order of the White Hyacinth! For your sake I have languished
five-and-twenty years in a Roman prison. With you it rests to sweeten my
death. By your oaths, I charge you, give me vengeance!"
His eyes were flashing, and his features, for the first time, were
convulsed with anxiety. What meant this unsympathetic silence, this lack
of enthusiasm? He looked from one to another of their stolid, puzzled
faces. Where were the outstretched hands, the deep solemn oaths, the cry
for lots to be drawn, which he had confidently expected? Their silence
was driving him mad. Suddenly the ice-cream vendor spoke.
"What is it you want, gaffer?" he asked, without removing his pipe from
his mouth. "Cursed if I can see what you're driving at, or any of us,
for that matter."
"What is it I want?" he cried passionately. "The life of my betrayer, or
such a mark of my vengeance as will make her rue the day she sent one of
your Order to work out his life, a miserable captive, in a prison cell.
Is it not clear what I want? Speak, all of you! Do you grudge me this
thing? Do you hesitate?"
The vendor of ice cream constituted himself the spokesman of the little
party. He knocked the dead ashes from his pipe, and leisurely refilled
it. The little old man at the bottom of the table was shaking with
anxiety. The thunderbolt quivered in the air.
"That's all bally rot, you know, guv'nor," he said calmly. "We ain't
murderers here! This White Hyacinth crew as you're a-talking of must a
been a blood-thirsty lot o' chaps. We ain't on that track. We meets here
just for a drop and a smoke, sociable like, with our friend the
Professor, and forms a sort of a club like among hourselves. You've come
to the wrong shop!"
The man's words, blunt and unfeeling, answered their purpose well. They
left no possibility of doubt or misunderstanding. The Count, after a
moment's wild stare around, tottered, and sank into a chair. All that
had seemed strange to him was suddenly clear. His head fell upon his
arms, and he crouched there motionless. The hopes of five-and-twenty
years were wrecked. The spark which had left him alive had died out! The
Order of the White Hyacinth was no more!
There was a distinct and terrible pathos in the scene. Even those rough,
coarse men, casting uneasy glances at that white, bowed head and
crouching figure at the head of the table, and listening to his low
moaning, were conscious of a vague pity. They thought of him as of some
wandering lunatic who had strayed in upon them; and, indeed, none of
them, except the Professor, doubted but that he was mad.
He looked up at last, and the ice-cream vendor, who was not a bad sort
at heart, poured out a mugful of the unwholesome-looking beer, and
pushed it across the table toward him.
"Here, guv'nor, drink this," he said gruffly; "it'll do you good. Cheer
up, old buck! I should. What's done can't be undone, and what's dead
can't be brought to life again. Make the best of it, I say. You've got
some of the ready left, I'll go bail, and you ain't too old to get a bit
out o' life yet--if yer make haste. And about that blood-thirsty talk of
yours, about vengeance and such like, you just take my tip and chuck it.
We think more of life here than they does in furrin parts, and hangin'
ain't a pleasant death. Take my tip, guv'nor, you chuck it!"
The Count pushed the mug away, and rose to his feet. He had not heard a
word. There was a terrible buzzing in his head and ears.
"I am a foolish old man, I fear," he said unsteadily. "I ought to have
considered. Five-and-twenty-years! Ah, yes, it is a long time ago.
Professor, will you send your servant for a carriage? I will go away."
He stood quite still, talking softly to himself, with the tips of his
fingers still resting lightly upon the table, and a far-away look in his
eyes. Signor Bartlezzi himself ran hatless to the nearest cabstand, and
in a few minutes the rattle of a vehicle was heard outside, and the
Professor returned breathless. The Count rose at once.
"I wish you good-night, gentlemen," he said mildly. "You have been very
patient with me. Five-and-twenty years! It is a long while--a long
while! Five-and-twenty years! Good-evening, gentlemen. Professor, I will
take your arm to the door. My sight is a--little dim. Thank you. How
dark it is. The Hotel Continental, if you please. Thank you, Professor."
And so he went away.
CHAPTER XIII
BETWEEN LIFE AND DEATH
For three days Count Leonardo di Marioni abode in his sitting-room at
the Hotel Continental, living the life of a man in a dream. So far as
the outside world was concerned, it was a complete case of suspended
animation. Of all that passed around him he was only dimly conscious.
The faces of his fellow creatures were strange to him. He had lost touch
with the world, and the light of his reason was flickering; almost it
seemed as though it would go out indeed, and leave him groping in the
chaos of insanity. Mechanically he rose late in the morning, ate what
was brought to him, or ordered what was suggested. All day long he sat
in a sort of dreamless apathy, living still the life of the last
five-and-twenty years, and finding no change, save that the chair in
which he sat was softer, and the fire over which he stretched his
withered palms was a new experience to him. There were things even which
he missed in the freedom--if freedom it could be called. He missed the
warm dancing sunlight which, day by day, had filled the shabby
sitting-room of his confinement. He missed that patch of deep blue sky
seen through his high, barred window, and the fragrant scents of the
outside world which, day by day, had floated through it. He missed the
kindly greeting of his pitying gaoler, and the simple food--the
macaroni, the black coffee, and the fruit--which had been served to him;
and above all, there was something else which he missed.
For through all his apathy he was conscious of a great sickening
disappointment, something gone out of his life which had helped him, day
by day, through all that weary imprisonment. Dear to his heart had grown
that hope of standing one day before the masters of his Order, and
claiming, as his rightful due, vengeance upon those whose word had sent
him into captivity. Dear to his memory and treasured among his thoughts
had grown that hope. In his prison house he had grown narrower; other
thoughts and purposes had faded away. That one only remained, growing
stronger and stronger day by day, until it had seized hold of his whole
being. He lived only through it and with it.
Given some soul-absorbing purpose, some cherished end, however dimly
seen through the mists of futurity, and a man may preserve his reason
through the longest captivity; while, day by day, his narrowing life
contracts till all conscience, all hope, all sentiment, become the
slaves of that one passionate desire. Day by day, it looms larger before
him; day by day, all doubts concerning it grow weaker, and the justice
of it becomes clearer and more unquestioned. Right and wrong, justice
and injustice, according to other men's standards, have no power over it
in his own thoughts. His moral sense slumbers. So deeply has it become
grafted into his life, that he no more questions its right to exist than
he does the presence of the limbs upon his body. As surely as the night
follows day, so surely does his whole being gravitate toward the
accomplishment of his desire. It is a part of what is left of his life,
and if it is smitten, his life is smitten. They are at once sympathetic
and identical, so closely entwined that to sever them is death to both.
Thus it was with Count Marioni, and thus it was that, day by day, he sat
in his sitting-room slowly pining to death. Rude feet had trampled upon
the desire of his life, and the wound was open and bleeding. Only a
little while longer and he would have turned upon his side with a sigh,
and yielded up his last breath; and, so far as his numbed faculties
could have conceived a thought, death would have seemed very pleasant to
him. He was dying of loneliness, of disappointment and despair.
The people at the hotel had made several attempts to rouse him, but in
vain. He answered no questions, and in his quiet way resented intrusion.
He paid whatever was demanded, and he gave no trouble. The manager, who
knew his history from a short cutting in a newspaper which had
chronicled his arrival in London, was at his wits' end to know how to
save him. He had once endeavored to reason gently with his eccentric
visitor, and he had been bidden quietly to leave the room. On his
endeavoring to make one more appeal, the Count had risen quietly and
pointed to the door.
"I wish only to be left in peace," he said, with a touch of dignity in
his sad, calm manner. "If you cannot do that I will go away to another
hotel. Choose!"
The manager had bowed and withdrawn in silence. But he was a
kind-hearted man, and he was still troubled about the matter. Day by day
the Count was growing weaker; before long he would doubtless die from
sheer distaste of living as much as from any actual disease. Something
ought to be done toward communicating with his friends, if he had any.
With a certain amount of reluctance, the manager, as a last resource,
penned the following advertisement and sent it to the principal London
papers:
"If there are any friends or relatives still alive of Count
Leonardo di Marioni, who has recently been set free by the
Italian Government after a long term of imprisonment, they are
requested to communicate, personally, if possible, with the
manager of the Hotel Continental, where the Count is now lying
dangerously ill."
CHAPTER XIV
AN EVERLASTING HATE
At four o'clock on the afternoon of the following day, an open barouche,
drawn by a pair of magnificent bay horses, drove up to the door of the
Hotel Continental. The manager, who was standing at the window of his
private room, noticed two things--first, that there was a coronet upon
the carriage door; and secondly, that the lady who was alighting carried
in her hand a copy of the _Morning Post_ turned down, as though to mark
a certain place in it.
As she crossed the pavement he had a better view of her face, and
recognized her with a little start of surprise. In a moment he was
outside, and on the steps to receive her, an attention he very rarely
bestowed upon his guests.
The swing doors opened and closed, and the lady, with the paper still in
her hand, turned to the manager.
"Do you know anything about this paragraph?" she asked, touching it with
her delicately-gloved forefinger. "The one, I mean, which concerns the
Count di Marioni?"
"Certainly, your ladyship," he answered. "I inserted it myself."
"He is still here, I suppose?"
"He is, your ladyship. I do not know whether you will consider that I
acted wisely in taking such a step, but I could see no alternative. He
arrived here alone about a fortnight ago, and at that time there seemed
to be nothing singular about him excepting his clothing, and a certain
nervousness which the servants marked in his manner, and which we can
scarcely wonder at, considering his painful history and recent return
to--er--civilized ways. He left the hotel almost immediately after
engaging his room, and was away, I believe, for several hours. I chanced
to be in the hall on his return, and was struck by the change in his
appearance. Your ladyship, I never saw a man on whose face was written
such dumb and helpless agony. He went straight to his room, and since
then has never left it. He is simply pining to death there. He neither
eats, nor drinks, nor speaks. He sits there, with his eyes fixed upon
the fire, like a man waiting for his end. I ventured to visit him one
morning, but my attempts at remonstrance were cut short at once in a
most dignified fashion. I feel that it would be heartless to ask him to
leave the hotel; but, at the same time, if he remains, and continues in
the same way, he will certainly either die or go mad very shortly. What
he wants is the personal care of friends, and very kind treatment; and
as I could think of no other way of communication with them, I decided
to advertise his presence here. I trust that your ladyship does not
think my interference officious?"
He bowed his head, and turned away out of respect for the tears which he
could see in her eyes, and which she made scarcely an effort to conceal.
"No; you did quite right," she said after a moment's pause. "I was
waiting for my husband outside the club, and quite by chance I took up
the _Post_ and saw your paragraph. I drove here at once. Will you show
me to the Count's rooms, if you please?"
"Certainly, your ladyship. Will you come this way?"
She followed him up the fine marble staircase and down the first-floor
corridor. At the extreme end he paused outside a door.
"It is of no use knocking," he said; "he never answers. If I can be of
any further service, your ladyship will perhaps be so good as to ring
the bell."
He opened the door for her, and closed it quietly as she entered. Then
he retreated along the corridor, and returned to his room, wondering not
a little at the visitor whom his advertisement had brought.
The great room in which the Count Marioni was sitting was almost in
darkness, for the afternoon was dull and foggy, and the curtains were
partially closed. There was no lamp lit, and the only light came from
the brightly-burning fire near which the Count was sitting in an
armchair ludicrously too large for his frail body. The flames fell upon
his white, worn face, with its deep branding lines, and gleamed in his
great sad eyes, so bright and dry that they seemed like mirrors for the
firelight. His hair and short unkempt beard were as white as snow,
matching even the unnatural pallor of his skin, and his black frock coat
was buttoned across a chest which would have been narrow for a
consumptive boy. He did, indeed, look on the threshold of death.
He had not turned his head at the opening or closing of the door, but
presently another sound broke the silence. It was a woman's sob, and as
he slowly turned his head, a tall, graceful figure moved forward out of
the shadows, and he heard his name softly murmured.
"Leonardo!"
His hand went up to his forehead. Was it a dream; or was he indeed back
once more in the days of his youth, back among the pine woods which
topped his castle, walking side by side with her whose presence seemed
to make the long summer days one sweet dream of delight? The familiar
odor of violets and wild hyacinths seemed to fill the room. The
fog-bound city, with its ceaseless roar, existed for him no longer. The
sun of his own dear country warmed his heart, and the sea wind blew in
his eager face. And she was there--his queen--the great desire of his
weary life. All his pulses leaped with the joy of her presence.
Five-and-twenty years of lonely misery were blotted out. Ah! memory is a
wonderful magician!
"Leonardo! Will you not speak to me?"
Again that voice! Where was he now? Face to face with her on the sands
at Palermo, deceived, betrayed, given over to the enemies of his
country, and by her--the woman for whom his passionate love had been his
sole crime. Listen! The air is full of that cry of threatened vengeance.
Hark how the echoes ring back from the cliffs. "By the sun, and the sky,
and the sea, and the earth, I swear that, as they continue unchanged and
unchanging, so shall my hate for you remain!" Darkness--a prison cell.
Year by year, year by year, darkness, solitude, misery! See the blade
hair turn gray, the strength of manhood wasting away, the eye growing
dim, the body weak. Year by year, year by year, it goes on. What was
that scratched upon the whitewashed walls? What was the cry which rang
back from the towering cliff! "Hate unchanging and unchanged!" The
same--ever the same.
"Leonardo, have you no word for me?"
He rose slowly from his chair, and fixed his eyes upon her.
Before their fire she shrank back, appalled. Was it a storm about to
burst upon her? No! The words were slow and few.
"You have dared to come--here; dared to come and look upon your
handiwork! Away! Out of my sight! You have seen me. Go!"
Tears blinded her eyes. The sight of him was horrible to her. She
forgot, in her great pity, that justice had been upon her side. She sank
upon her knees before him on the velvet pile carpet.
"Leonardo, for the love of God, forgive me!" she sobbed. "Oh! it is
painful to see you thus, and to know the burden of hate which you carry
in your heart. Forgive me! Forgive us both!"
He stooped down until his ghastly face nearly touched hers.
"Curse you!" he muttered hoarsely. "You dare to look at me, and ask for
forgiveness. Never! never! Every morning and night I curse you. I curse
you when my mother taught me to pray. I live for nothing else. If I had
the strength I would strangle you where you stand. Hell's curses and
mine ring in your ears and sit in your heart day by day and night by
night! Away with you! Away, away!"
She was a brave woman, but she fled from the room like a hunted animal,
and passed out of the hotel with never a look to the right or to the
left.
The manager came out to speak to her, but he stood still, aghast, and
let her go without uttering a word or offering to assist her. As long as
he lived he remembered the look on the Countess of St. Maurice's face as
she came down those stairs, clutching hold of the banisters, and, with
hasty trembling steps, left the hotel. He was a great reader of fiction,
and he had heard of Irish banshees and Brahmin ghosts; but never a
living story-teller had painted such a face as he looked upon at that
moment.
CHAPTER XV
THE COUNT'S SECOND VISITOR
Two days more passed without any change in the Count's conduct or
health, save that his brow was a little darker, and he was heard
occasionally muttering to himself.
On the morning of the third, a four-wheeled cab deposited at the door of
the hotel a young lady, who demanded somewhat haughtily to see the
manager. She was shown into the waiting-room, and in a few minutes he
appeared.
He had been expecting a visit from an applicant for the post of
assistant bookkeeper, and he entered the room with a little less than
his usual ceremony, under the impression that this was she. He found
himself confronted with a tall, slim girl, elegantly but simply dressed
in plain black clothes. She carried herself with the dignity of a queen,
and before the quick glance of her flashing black eyes he felt himself
abashed into making a low bow. There was something foreign in her
appearance, but something eminently aristocratic.
"Good-morning, madam."
She disdained to notice the salutation, and, holding out a paper toward
him, pointed with her long slim finger to the advertisement column.
"I have come about this paragraph. Take me to him!"
"With the greatest pleasure, madam," he answered, bowing. "May I be
permitted to ask, are you a relation of the Count's?"
"Certainly, I am his niece," she answered, frowning. "Take me to him at
once. I don't choose to be kept waiting," she added impetuously.
The manager bit his lip, and bowed again to hide a smile. It seemed to
him that if this young lady failed to rouse his eccentric visitor the
task was hopeless indeed.
"Will you pardon me, madam, if I detain you one moment," he said
deferentially. "I should like, before you see the Count, to explain to
you the reasons which induced me to insert that notice in the _Times_."
She tapped the floor impatiently with her foot.
"Be quick, then!"
"The Count arrived here on the first of the month, almost a fortnight
ago. Immediately on his arrival he went out in a cab, and returned
somewhat late at night, looking dazed and ill. From that moment he has
not left his room, and we fear, madam, to be candid, that he is losing
his reason. He declines to go out to see a physician; to write to his
friends. It is pitiable to see him, especially when one considers his
long and painful imprisonment, from which he has only just been
released. He would not listen to any suggestions or advice from us, so
it occurred to me to put that advertisement in the paper unknown to him.
May I be pardoned if I beg of you not to mention the means by which you
became aware of his presence here, or to simply state that you saw his
arrival chronicled in the paper? He may regard our interference in the
light of a liberty, although it was solely for his good."
"It was a liberty to take!" she answered coldly. "I will not promise
anything. I dare say I shall not mention it."
"There is one thing more which I should tell you, madam," he continued.
"Two days ago a visitor came to see him, having noticed in the paper, as
you have done, the paragraph I inserted. I will not tell you her name,
but she was one of the most beautiful and distinguished Englishwomen of
our aristocracy, and from the manner of her departure, I could not help
coming to the conclusion that the Count, by some means or other, had
frightened her to death. She was nearly fainting as she came downstairs,
and she has not been here since. I have no reason, beyond what I have
told you, to doubt the Count's sanity, but I think that it is right for
you to know this."
"Very well. I am not afraid. Kindly take me to him at once, now!" she
directed.
He led her out of the apartment, and up the broad staircase. Outside the
door of the Count's sitting-room he paused.
"Shall I announce you, madam?" he asked.
"No! Go away!" she answered shortly. "I wish to enter alone."
CHAPTER XVI
A NEW MEMBER FOR THE ORDER
Count Marioni sat in his old attitude, brooding over the fire from the
depths of his armchair, with a sad, vacant look in his dull eyes. At
first he took no notice of the opening of the door, but as the light,
smooth footsteps crossed the floor toward him and hesitated at his side,
he glanced wearily up. In a moment his whole expression was changed. He
was like a numbed and torpid figure suddenly galvanized into acute life.
He passed his hand swiftly across his eyes, and his thin fingers grasped
the sides of his chair with nervous force. Ah! he must be dreaming
again! It was one of the faces of the past, tempting and mocking him!
Yet, no! she stood there; surely she stood there. Mother of God! Was
this madness come at last?
"Margharita!" he cried, stretching out his hands toward her.
"Margharita!"
It was no dream, then, nor was it madness. It was truth. There were
loving, clinging arms around his neck, a passionate, weeping face
pressed close against his. Hot tears, her tears, were tricking down his
hollow cheeks, kindling his stagnant blood by their warmth, and thawing
the apathetic chill whose icy hand had lain so heavy upon him. A sob
escaped him. His eager, trembling fingers pushed back the clustering
hair from her temples. He peered wonderingly into her face. It must be a
vision; it would surely fade away, and leave him once more in the outer
darkness. Five-and-twenty years had passed! She had been like this then!
A sense of bewilderment crept in upon him.
"Margharita!" he exclaimed feebly. "I do not understand! You are
Margharita; you have her hair, her eyes, her mouth! And yet, of course,
it cannot be. Ah, no! it cannot be!"
"You are thinking of my mother," she cried softly. "She loved you so
much. I am like her, am I not?"
"Married! Margharita married! Ah, of course! I had forgotten. And you
are her child. My sister's child. Ah, five-and-twenty years is a long
time."
"It is a shameful, cruel time," she cried passionately. "My mother used
to tell me of it, when I was a little girl, and her voice would shake
with anger and pity. Francesca, too, would talk to me about you. I
prayed for you every evening when I was little, that they might soon set
you free again. Oh, it was cruel!"
She threw her arms around his neck, and he rested his head upon her
shoulder. It was like an elixir of life for him.
"And your mother, Margharita?" he asked fearfully.
"She is dead," was the low reply.
"Ah! Margharita dead! She was so like you, child. Dead! Five-and-twenty
years is a weary while. Dead!"
He sighed, and his tearless eyes looked thoughtfully into the fire.
Memories of other days were rising up and passing before him in swift
procession. He saw himself and her, orphan brother and sister, wandering
hand in hand over their beautiful island home, with the sea wind blowing
in their faces, and the spirit of the mountains which towered around
them entering into their hearts. Dear to them had been that home, dear
that close and precious companionship. They had talked of the life which
lay before them--rose-colored and joyous, pregnant with glorious
opportunities and possibilities. For their island and the larger
continent close at hand were convulsed at that time in certain patriotic
efforts, the history of which has been written into the history of
Europe, and no one desired more ardently to bear a hand in the struggle
than young Leonardo di Marioni. Large hearted, romantic, and with an
imagination easily fired, he was from the first a dreamer, and
Margharita had ever been ready to share his dreams. The blood of kings
was in their veins, to lead him on to great things; and she, Margharita,
his sister, his beloved sister, should be the mistress of his destinies.
Thus they had talked, thus they had dreamed, and now from the other side
of the gulf he looked backward, and saw in his own life, in the place of
those great deeds which he had hoped to accomplish, one black miserable
chasm, and in hers, forgetfulness of her high descent--for she had
married this English merchant's son--and the grave. Ah! it was sad, very
sad!
Her soft breath upon his cheek brought him back to the present. He
looked down into her face with such a wistful fondness that it brought
the tears again into her eyes.
"Your mother, then, married Martin Briscoe?"
"Yes."
"And he----"
"My father, too, is dead," she answered sadly. "I am an orphan."
"Ah! And now you live--with whom do you live, child?" he asked, with
sudden eagerness. "Tell me, are you happy?"
"I am miserable," she cried passionately.
A quiet smile flitted across his face. There was hope. It was well.
"I am miserable. Often I wish that I were dead."
"Tell me all about it, child," he whispered. "I have a right to know."
She sank down upon the floor, and rested her head upon the side of the
chair. In a moment she began.
"I think that I was quite happy when I was a little girl. I do not
remember very much about that time, or about my mother, for she died
when I was six years old. Papa was very good to me, but he was stern and
cold always. I do not think that he ever smiled after mamma died, and he
had money troubles, too. A bank failed, and he lost a great deal; and
then he had a great many shares in a company which failed. I don't
understand much about it, but when he died three years ago nearly
everything he had went to pay people. I had to go and live with my
father's brother, and I hate it. I hate them all--my uncle, my aunt, and
my cousins. They are vulgar, common people. They are in business, and
they are fearfully rich, but their manners are dreadful, and they are
always talking of their money. They have no taste, no art, no
refinement. I was going to leave them, when I heard that you were here.
I was going to be a governess--yes, even earn my own bread--rather than
stay with them any longer. I hated them so, and their life, and
everything to do with them. Oh, uncle, uncle, let me live with you. Let
us go away from this wretched England. Let us go to some southern
country where the sun is warm, and the people do not talk of their
money, and there are beautiful things to see and admire. It is ugly and
cold here, and I am weary of it."
She broke off in a sudden fit of sobbing. He took her face gently in his
hands, and held it up to him. It was he, now, who was to play the part
of consoler.
"Margharita, I am a lonely old man whose life is well nigh spent. Yet,
if you will come to me, if you will really live with me, then you will
make my last days happy. When I die all that I have will be yours. It is
settled, is it not?"
Like summer lightning the tempest of her grief died away, and her face
was brilliant with smiles.
"I will never, never leave you, uncle," she cried joyously. "We will
live together always. Oh, how happy we shall be!"
Then she looked at him--looked at his shrunken limbs and worn, pinched
face, and a sudden darkening fire kindled in her face. She stamped her
foot, and her eyes flashed angrily. The sight of him reminded her that,
so far as he was concerned at least, their happiness could not be of
very long duration. The finger of death had laid its mark upon that
ashen gray face. It was written there.
"How I hate them!" she cried. "Those cruel, wicked people, who kept you
in prison all these years. I should like to kill them all--to see them
die here before us. I would not spare one--not one!"
He thrust her away, and started to his feet a changed man. The old fires
had leaped up anew; the old hate, the old desire, was as strong as ever
within him. She looked at him, startled and wondering. His very form
seemed dilated with passion.
"Child!" he cried, "have you ever heard the story of my seizure and
imprisonment? No, you have not. You shall hear it. You shall judge
between me and them. Listen! When I was a young man, Italy seemed
trembling on the verge of a revolution. The history of it all you know.
You know that the country was honeycombed with secret societies, more or
less dangerous. To one of these I belonged. We called our Order the
'Order of the White Hyacinth.' We were all young, ardent and impetuous,
and we imagined ourselves the apostles of the coming liberation. Yet we
never advocated bloodshed; we never really transgressed the law. We gave
lectures, we published pamphlets. We were a set of boy dreamers with
wild theories--communists, most of us. But there was not one who would
not have died to save our country the misery of civil war--not one, not
one! Even women wore our flower, and were admitted associates of our
Order. We pledged ourselves that our aims were bloodless. No society
that ever existed was more harmless than ours. I say it! I swear it!
Bear me witness, oh, my God, if what I say be not true!"
He was a strong man again. The apathy was gone; his reason was saved. He
stood before this dark, tall girl, who, with clasped hands, was drinking
in every word, and he spoke with all the swelling dignity of one who has
suffered unjustly.
"By some means or other our society fell under the suspicion of the
government. The edict went forth that we should be broken up. We heard
the mandate with indignation. We were young and hot-blooded, and we were
conscious that we had done no harm--that we were innocent of the things
ascribed to us. We swore that we would carry on our society, but in
secret. Before then, everything had been open; we had had a recognized
meeting place, the public had attended our lectures, ladies had worn the
white hyacinth openly at receptions and balls. Now, all was changed. We
met in secret and under a ban. Still our aim was harmless. One clause
alone was added to our rules of a different character, and we all
subscribed to--'Vengeance upon traitors!' We swore it solemnly one to
the other--'Vengeance upon traitors!"
"Ah! if I had lived in those days I would have worn your flower at the
court of the king," she cried, with glowing cheeks.
He pressed her hand in silence, and continued.
"As time went on, and things grew still more unsettled in the country, a
species of inquisition was established. The eyes of the law were
everywhere. They fell upon us. One night ten of us were arrested as we
left our meeting place. We were all noble, and the families of my
companions were powerful. I was looked upon as the ringleader; and upon
me fell the most severe sentence. I was banished from Italian soil for
ten years, with the solemn warning that death would be my lot if I
ventured to return."
"It was atrocious!"
He held up his hand.
"Margharita, in those days I loved. Her name was Adrienne. She, too, was
an orphan, and although she was of noble birth, she was poor, as we
Marionis were poor also. She had a great gift; she was a singer; and,
sooner than be dependent upon her relatives, she had sung at concerts
and operas, until all Europe knew of her fame. When I was exiled I was
given seven days in which to make my adieux. I went to her, and declared
my love. She did not absolutely reject me, nor did she accept me. She
asked for time for consideration. I could give her none! I begged her to
leave the country with me. Alas! she would not! Perhaps I was too
passionate, too precipitate! It may have been so; I cannot say. I went
away alone and left her. I plunged into gay life at Paris; I dwelt among
the loneliest mountains of Switzerland; I endured the dullness of this
cold gray London, and the dissipation of Vienna. It was all in vain! One
by one they palled upon me. No manner of life, no change of scene, could
cure me of my love. I fell ill, and I knew that my heart was breaking.
You and I, Margharita, come of a race whose love and hatred are
eternal!"
She crept into his arms; and he went on, holding her there.
"Back I came at the peril of my life; content to die, if it were only at
her feet. I found her cold and changed; blaming me even for my rashness,
desiring even my absence. Not a word of pity to sweeten those weary days
of exile; not a word of hope to repay me for all that I had risked to
see her again. Soon I knew the reason--another love had stolen away her
heart. There was an Englishman--one of those cursed Englishmen--visiting
her daily at Palermo; and she told me calmly one day that she loved him,
and intended to become his wife. She forgot my long years of devoted
service; she forgot her own unspoken, yet understood, promise; she
forgot all that I had suffered for her; she forgot that her words must
sound to me as the death warrant of all joy and happiness in this world.
And she forgot, too, that I was a Marioni! Was I wrong, I wonder,
Margharita, that I quarreled with him! You are a child, and yet my
instinct tells me that you have a woman's judgment! Tell me, should I
have stepped aside, and let him win her, without a blow?"
"You would have been a coward if you had!" she cried. "You fought him!
Tell me that you fought him?"
"Margharita, you are a true daughter of your country!" the old man
cried. "You are a Marioni! Listen! I insulted him! He declined to fight!
I struck him across the face in a public restaurant, and forced him to
accept my challenge. The thing was arranged. We stood face to face on
the sand, sword in hand. The word had been given! His life was at my
mercy; but mind, Margharita, I had no thought of taking it without
giving him a fair chance. I intended to wait until my sword was at his
throat and then I would have said to him, 'Give up the woman whom I have
loved all my life, and go unhurt!' He himself should have chosen. Was
not that fair?"
"Fair! It was generous! Go on! Go on!"
"The word had been given; our swords were crossed. And at that moment,
she, Adrienne, the woman whom I loved, stood before us. With her were
Italian police come to arrest me! There was one letter alone of mine,
written in a hasty moment, which could have been used in evidence
against me at my former trial, and which would have secured for me a
harsher sentence. That letter had fallen into her hands; and she had
given it over to my bitter enemy, the chief of the Italian police. I was
betrayed, betrayed by the woman whom I had braved all dangers to see! It
was she who had brought them; she who--without remorse or
hesitation--calmly handed me over to twenty-five years' captivity in a
prison cell!"
Margharita freed herself from his arms. She was very pale, and her limbs
were shaking. But what a fire in those dark, cruel eyes.
"Go on! Go on!" she cried. "Let me hear the rest."
"Then, as I stood there, Margharita, love shriveled up, and hate reigned
in its place. The memory of the oath of our Order flashed into my mind.
A curtain seemed raised before my eyes. I saw the long narrow room of
our meeting place. I saw the dark, faithful faces of my comrades. I
heard their firm voices--'Vengeance upon traitors, vengeance upon
traitors!' She, too, this woman who had betrayed me, had worn our flower
upon her bosom and in her hair! She had come under the ban of that oath.
Margharita, I threw my sword into the sea, and I raised my clasped hands
to the sky, and I swore that, were it the last day of my life, the day
of my release should see me avenged. Let them hide in the uttermost
corners of the earth, I cried, that false woman and her English lover,
still I would find them out, and they should taste of my vengeance! To
my trial I went, with that oath written in my heart. I carried it with
me into my prison cell, and day by day and year by year I repeated it to
myself. It kept me alive; the desire of it grew into my being. Even now
it burns in my heart!
"During my captivity I was allowed to see my lawyer, and I made over by
deed so much, to be paid every year to the funds of our Order at the
London Branch, for our headquarters had been moved there after my first
arrest. Day by day I dreamed of the time when I should stand, a martyr
in their cause, before my old comrades, and demand of them the vengeance
which was my due. I imagined them, one by one, grasping my hand, full of
deep, silent sympathy with my long sufferings. I heard again the oath
which we had sworn--'Vengeance upon traitors, vengeance upon traitors!'
It was the music which kept me alive, the hope which nourished my life!"
The dark eyes glowed upon him like stars, and her voice trembled with
eagerness.
"You have been to them? You will be avenged! Tell me that it is so?"
A little choking sob escaped from him. The numbness was passing away
from his heart and senses. His sorrows were becoming human, and
demanding human expression.
"Alas, Margharita, alas!" he cried, with drooping head, "the bitterest
disappointment of my life came upon me all unawares. While I have lain
rotting in prison history has turned over many pages. The age for secret
societies has gone by. The 'Order of the White Hyacinth' is no
more--worse than that, its very name has been dragged through the dust.
One by one the old members fell away; its sacred aims were forgotten.
The story of its downward path will never be written. A few coarse,
ignorant men meet in a pothouse, night by night, to spend the money I
sent in beer and foul tobacco. That is the end of the 'Order of the
White Hyacinth!'"
Margharita looked like a beautiful wild animal in her passion. Her hair
had fallen all over her face, and was streaming down her back. Her small
white hand was clenched and upraised, and her straight, supple figure,
panther-like in its grace, was distended until she towered over the
little shrunken form before her. Terrible was the gleam in her eyes, and
terrible the fixed rigidity of her features. Yet she was as beautiful as
a young goddess in her wrath.
"No!" she cried fiercely, "the Order shall not die! You belong to it
still; and I--I, too, swear the oath of vengeance! Together we will hunt
her down--this woman! She shall suffer!"
"She shall die!" he cried.
A slight shudder passed across the girl's face, but she repeated his
words.
"She shall die! But, uncle, you are ill. What is it?"
She chafed his hands and held him up. He had fainted.
CHAPTER XVII
THE RETURN TO REASON
"Where am I, Margharita?"
She leaned over him, and drew a long deep breath of relief. It was the
reward of many weary days and nights of constant watching and careful
nursing. His reason was saved.
"In your own room at the hotel," she whispered. "Don't you remember? You
were taken ill."
He looked at her, helpless and puzzled. Slowly the mists began to roll
away.
"Yes, you were with me," he murmured softly. "I remember now. I was
telling you the story of the past--my past. You are Margharita's child.
Yes, I remember. Was it this afternoon?"
She kissed his forehead, and then drew back suddenly, lest the warm tear
which was quivering on her eyelid should fall back upon his face.
"It was three weeks ago!"
"Three weeks ago!" He looked wonderingly around--at the little table at
his side, where a huge bowl of sweet-scented roses was surrounded by a
little army of empty medicine bottles, at Margharita's pale, wan face,
and at a couch drawn up to the bedside. "And you have been nursing me
all the time?" he whispered.
She smiled brightly through the tears which she could not hide.
"Of course I have. Who has a better right, I should like to know?"
He sighed and closed his eyes. In a few minutes he was asleep.
For a fortnight his life had hung upon a thread, and even when the
doctor had declared him out of danger, the question of his sanity or
insanity quivered upon the balance for another week. He would either
awake perfectly reasonable, in all respects his old self, or he would
open his eyes upon a world, the keynote to which he had lost forever. In
other words he would either awake a perfectly sane man, or hopelessly
and incurably insane. There would be no middle course. That was the
doctor's verdict.
And through all those long days and nights Margharita had watched over
him as though he had been her own father. All the passionate sympathy of
her warm southern nature had been kindled by the story of his wrongs.
Day by day the sight of his helpless suffering had increased her
indignation toward those whom she really believed to have bitterly
wronged him. Through those long quiet days and silent nights, she had
brooded upon them. She never for one moment repented of having allied
herself to that wild oath of vengeance, whose echoes often at dead of
night seemed still to ring in her ears. Her only fear was that he would
emerge from the fierce illness under which he was laboring, so weakened
and shaken, that the desire of his life should have passed from him. She
had grown to love this shrunken old man. In her girlhood she had heard
stories of him from her nurse, and many times the hot tears had stood in
her eyes as she conjured up to herself that pathetic figure, waiting and
waiting, year by year, for that liberty which was to come only with old
age. She had thought of him, sad-eyed and weary, pacing his lonely
prison cell, and ever watching through his barred window the little
segment of blue sky and sunlight which penetrated into the high-walled
court. How he must long for the scent of flowers, the fresh open air,
the rustle of leaves, and the hum of moving insects. How his heart must
ache for the sound of men's voices, the touch of their hands, some sense
of loving or friendly companionship to break the icy monotony of his
weary, stagnant existence. Her imagination had been touched, and she had
been all ready to welcome and to love him as a hero and a martyr, even
if he had appealed to her in no other way. But when she had seen him
stricken down and helpless, with that look of ineffable sadness in his
soft dark eyes, it was more than her sympathy which was aroused, more
than her imagination which was stirred. Her large pitying heart became
his absolutely. She was alone in the world, and she must needs love some
one. For good or for evil, fate had brought this strange old man to her,
and woven this tie between them.
That night she scarcely slept at all, and before daybreak she stole
softly over to the window and looked out. The roar of the great city was
hushed and silent. Below, the streets and squares were white and empty
in the gray light of the approaching dawn. The mists were rising from
the river, and the yellow light was dying out of the room. Away
eastward, there was a break in the sky, a long thin line of amber light
which widened even while she watched it. Below, the sky was red, a dull
brick red, as though the yellow fog had mingled with the fainter and
rosier coloring. Gradually the two came nearer together. In the distance
a cock crew, and a cab drove across the empty square at the end of the
street. A lamplighter came round the corner, whistling, and, one by one,
the row of gaslights beneath were extinguished. Even in that moment or
two a brighter shade had stolen into the eastern sky. That bank of dull
purple clouds was breaking away, and a few brilliant specks of cloudlets
were shot up toward St. Paul's. Then the sun showed a rim, and almost
its first pale beam quivered upon the great church dome, traveled across
a thousand slate roofs, and fell upon the girl's white, upturned face,
and across the white coverlet.
"Margharita!"
She turned round quickly. He was sitting up in bed, and the sunbeam was
traveling up toward him.
"Are you awake? Did I disturb you?" she asked tenderly.
He shook his head.
"I have been awake, thinking. I remember being taken ill. I remember
everything. Tell me. I must know. Did you--did you mean--everything you
said? You pitied me, and my story made you sad. I would not hold you to
your word."
She drew herself up; she was pale no longer; the color burned in her
cheeks.
"I am a Marioni!" she answered proudly. "Every word I said seems to me
now too weak. That is the only change."
He held out his hands; she grasped them fondly.
"Margharita, she came here!" he whispered.
"What, here? Here in this room?"
He nodded.
"It was two days before you came. I was sitting alone in the twilight.
The door opened. I thought I was dreaming. It was she, as beautiful as
ever, richly dressed, happy, comely. She came to pity, to sue for
pardon. I let her talk, and then, when I had gathered strength, I stood
up and cursed her. I thrust her away; I cursed her with the fiercest and
crudest words which my lips could utter. It drove the warm color from
her cheeks, and the light from her eyes. I cursed her till her heart
shook with fear. She staggered out of the room a stricken woman. I----"
"Tell me her name."
"It was Adrienne Cartuccio. It is now Lady Maurice."
"The Lady St. Maurice! She was my mother's friend then?"
"Yes."
Margharita's eyes were bright, and her voice trembled.
"Listen!" she cried. "When my mother was dying she gave me a letter. If
ever you need a friend or help," she whispered, "go to Lady St. Maurice.
This letter is to her. She will help you for my sake. Uncle, fate is on
our side. Just before I came to you I wrote to Lady St. Maurice. I told
her that I was unhappy in my life, and I wished for a situation as a
governess. I sent her my mother's letter."
"And she replied?"
"Yes. She offered me a home. If I wished I could teach her little girl."
Her voice was trembling, and her eyes, dry and brilliant, were fixed
upon his. He was sitting upright in bed, leaning a little forward toward
her, and the sunbeam which had stolen in through the parted curtains
fell upon his white corpse-like face. A strange look was in his eyes;
his fingers clutched the bedclothes nervously.
"You will--go?" he asked hoarsely. "You will go to Lady St. Maurice?"
An answering light shot back from her eyes. She was suddenly pale to the
lips. Her voice was hushed as though in fear, but it was firm.
"Yes, I shall go. To-night I shall accept her offer."
CHAPTER XVIII
"I HAVE A FEAR--A FOOLISH FEAR"
"Geoff, it's the most extraordinary thing in the world."
"What is it, dear?" he asked, throwing down his newspaper on the
breakfast table, and lighting a cigarette. "Tell me about it."
"Listen."
She read the letter, which was open in her hands, and he listened
thoughtfully, leaning back in the high-backed oak chair, and watching
the blue smoke from his cigarette curl upward to the ceiling.
"LONDON, _Thursday_.
"DEAR LADY ST. MAURICE: I have delayed answering your letter
for some time, longer than may seem courteous to you, owing to
the illness of a member of the family with whom I have been
living. I trust, however, that you will not consider it too
late for me to thank you heartily for your generous offer to
me, which, if we can agree upon one point, I shall be most
happy and grateful to accept. You have a little girl, you tell
me, and no governess. If you will allow me to fill the latter
position, which I believe that I am quite capable of doing, I
shall be glad to come. I could not feel myself at ease in
becoming one of your household on any other footing. Hoping to
hear from you soon, I am, yours sincerely,
"MARGHARITA BRISCOE."
"Did you ever hear of such a thing?" Lady St. Maurice exclaimed.
"Margharita's child, my governess. I call it very stupid pride."
Lord St. Maurice shook his head.
"I think you are wrong, dear. After all, you must remember that you are
a complete stranger to her."
"That has been her mother's fault. Margharita never exactly blamed me
for what I did at Palermo, but she always felt bitterly for her brother,
and she could not forget that it was my hand which had sent him to
prison. It was very unreasonable of her, but, after all, one can
understand her feeling. Still, this girl of hers can have no such
feeling toward me."
"Of course not; but, none the less, as I said before, you are a complete
stranger to her," Lord St. Maurice answered. "Her parentage is just the
sort to have given her those independent ideas, and I'm inclined to
think that she is quite right."
Lady St. Maurice sighed.
"I would have been only too happy to have welcomed her as a daughter,"
she said. "I dare say you are right, Geoff. I shall write and tell her
to come."
She walked away to the window, looking across the pine-bound cliffs to
the sea. Time had dealt with her very leniently, as indeed he needs must
with those whose life is like one long summer's day. Her brow was still
smooth, and her hair, rich and soft as ever, had not a single tinge of
gray. Her figure, too, was perfect; the lithe gracefulness of youth had
only ripened into the majesty of dignified womanhood. There was not a
society paper which did not sometimes allude to her as "the beautiful
Lady St. Maurice."
But just at that moment her eyes were sad, and her face was troubled.
Her husband, looking up suddenly, saw it, and throwing down his paper,
walked across the room to her side.
"Adrienne, what is it, little woman?" he asked fondly.
"I was thinking of poor Leonardo," she answered. "Geoffrey, it is very
foolish to let it trouble me, is it not?"
"Very, darling. Why should it?"
"Do you remember how terrible he looked when they arrested him on the
sands, and those fierce threatening words of his? Even now I can hear
them sometimes in my ears."
"Foolish little woman."
"I cannot help it. This girl's letter, with its note of proud
independence, brings it all back to me. Geoffrey, Leonardo di Marioni
comes of a race who pride themselves more than anything upon keeping
their word in love and in hate. You can scarcely understand their fierce
passionate nature. I have always felt that when the day of his release
came he would remember his oath, and strive to work some evil upon us."
Lord St. Maurice passed his arm around his wife's waist, with a
reassuring smile.
"It is five-and-twenty years ago, love. Is not that enough to set your
fears at rest?"
She looked at him without a smile, grave and serious.
"The five-and-twenty years are up, Geoffrey. Leonardo is free!"
"What of it?" he answered carelessly. "If he has not forgotten us
altogether, what harm could he do us?"
She clasped her hands around his neck, and looked into his face.
"Geoffrey, I have a confession to make," she whispered. "Will you
forgive me?"
"It's a rash promise, but I'll chance it," he answered, smoothing her
hair and smiling down into her upturned face.
"Geoffrey, he is in London. I have seen him."
He looked a little surprised, but he did not draw away.
"Seen him! Where? When?"
"Do you remember the day when I was to have called for you at the
'Travelers,' and you waited for me, and I did not come? Yes, I know that
you do. Well, I did come, really, but as I sat in the carriage waiting,
I took up the _Morning Post_ and I read an advertisement there, signed
by the manager of the Continental Hotel. It was inquiring for any friend
or relative of Count Leonardo di Marioni, who was lying there
dangerously ill and alone. Geoffrey, of course I ought to have waited
for you, but I am impulsive sometimes, and I was then. I thought that if
I could see him alone for the first time, that I might win his
forgiveness, and so I drove there at once. They showed me into his room;
he was sitting over the fire, a miserable, shrunken little figure,
wasted to a shadow. Ah, how my heart ached to see him. Geoffrey, I knelt
by his side; I spoke to him as tenderly as I could to one of my own
children; and then he turned a white corpse-like face upon me, and spoke
words which God grant I may some day forget. I do not believe that human
lips have ever framed such hideous curses. How I got down to the
carriage, I do not know. You are not angry with me, Geoffrey?"
"Angry? why no, love," he answered tenderly. "You did it for the best.
What a vindictive little beggar."
"Geoffrey, I can't help thinking that some day, if he recovers, he will
try to do you or me a mischief."
Lord St. Maurice laughed outright.
"We are not in Sicily," he answered lightly.
"What could he do to either of us? Am I not big enough to protect
myself, and take care of you? I tell you what, Adrienne, why shouldn't I
go and see him when I am in London next week?"
"You!" She shuddered and clasped him tightly. "Geoffrey, promise me at
once that you will not go near him," she begged. "Promise me!"
"On one condition."
"What is it?"
"That you will give up troubling about this nonsense."
"I will try," she promised.
"That's right. Now put on your hat, and come for a run on the cliff. I
can't have you looking so pale."
He walked to the door with her and opened it, kissing her forehead as
she passed through. She looked up at him fondly, and the quiet pleasure
which glowed for a moment in her cheeks and shone in her eyes made her
look once more like a girl of twenty. A woman's greatest happiness had
been hers. In middle age her husband was still her lover.
"Forgive me for being silly," she whispered. "I can't help it. Our life
has been so happy that I cannot bear to think of a cloud of any sort
coming over it, even for a very short while."
"The only cloud we have to fear is that big fellow yonder over Gorton
point," he laughed.
"Better bring your mackintosh down. I shall not shoot to-day until I
have seen some color in your cheeks."
CHAPTER XIX
THE NEW GOVERNESS
None of the little household at Mallory Grange, Lord St. Maurice's
Norfolk seat, ever forgot Margharita's first appearance among them. She
came late in the afternoon, and was shown into Lady St. Maurice's own
little sitting room, without the ceremony of an announcement. Lady St.
Maurice had many kind words ready to say, but the sight of the figure
who crossed the threshold, and came out of the dusk toward the center of
the room, struck her dumb. She stood up for a moment perfectly silent,
with her hand pressed to her side. Such a likeness was marvelous. In
this girl's proud, dark face she could recall Leonardo's features one by
one. The air seemed suddenly full of voices, sobbing and cursing and
threatening. Then she came to herself, and held out her hand--forced her
lips even to wear a kindly welcoming smile.
"I am so glad to have you here, Margharita," she said. "Do you know that
your likeness to your mother--and her family--has startled me. It is
wonderful."
"It is very nice to hear you say so," the girl answered, taking the
chair which, at Lady St. Maurice's motion, a servant had wheeled up to
the fire. "I like to think of myself as belonging altogether to my
mother and her people. I have been very unhappy with my father's
relations."
"I am only sorry that you remained with them so long," Lady St. Maurice
said. "Let me give you some tea, and then you must tell me why you never
wrote to me before."
"Because I made up my mind to bear it as long as I was able," she
answered. "I have done so. It was impossible for me to remain there any
longer, and I determined to take my life into my own hands, and, if
necessary, find a situation. I wrote first to you, and you have been
kind enough to engage me."
To Lady St. Maurice, who was a woman of genial manners and kindly
disposition, there seemed to be a curious hardness in the girl's tone
and mode of expressing herself. She had avoided the kiss with which she
had been prepared to greet her, and had shaken hands in the most
matter-of-fact way. This last phrase, too, was a little ungracious.
"Engage you! I hope you are not going to look upon our little
arrangement in that light," Lady St. Maurice said pleasantly. "For your
mother's sake, Margharita, I should have been only too glad to have
welcomed you here at any time as my daughter, and I hope that when we
know one another better, you will not be quite so independent. Don't be
afraid," she added, "you shall have your own way at first. Some day I
hope that you will come round to mine."
Margharita sipped her tea quietly, and made no reply; but in the
firelight her dark eyes glowed softly and brightly, and Lady St. Maurice
was quite satisfied with her silence. For a few moments neither of them
spoke. Then Lady St. Maurice leaned back in her chair, away from the
firelight, and asked a question.
"Did you know that the Count di Marioni, your uncle, was in London?"
"I knew that he had been there," Margharita answered in a low tone.
"Had been! Has he gone away?"
"I suppose so," the girl continued, looking steadily at her questioner.
"Yesterday I called to see him at a hotel in Piccadilly, and they told
me that he had left that morning for abroad. I was sorry to be too
late."
"Yes."
Lady St. Maurice asked no more. The dark eyes seemed to be trying to
pierce the dusk between them, and read her face. She turned the
conversation, and asked a few questions about the journey. Afterward
would be time enough to find out how much this girl knew.
Soon Lord St. Maurice came in from shooting, wet to the skin, and stood
by the fire, drinking his tea and talking pleasantly to Margharita and
his wife. She talked more readily to him than to Lady St. Maurice, but
in the middle of the conversation she checked herself and stood up.
"I am tired," she said abruptly. "May I go to my room?"
Lady St. Maurice took her away herself, and showed her the suite which
had been prepared for her. There was a bedroom, a daintily furnished
little sitting room, and a bath room, all looking out upon the sea. A
bright fire had been lit in both the rooms, and bowls of flowers and
many little feminine trifles helped to unite comfort to undoubted
luxury. Margharita went from one to the other without remark.
"These are far too nice," she said simply, when Lady St. Maurice turned
to go. "I have not been used to such luxury."
Lady St. Maurice left her with a sigh, and went downstairs. She had
hoped to see the cold proud face relax a little at the many signs of
thought in the preparations which had been made for her, and she was
disappointed. She entered her sitting room thoughtfully, and went up to
her husband.
"Geoffrey, she is horribly like him."
"If poor Marioni had had this girl's looks I should have felt more
jealous," he answered lightly. "I'm almost sorry Lumley is here."
She shook her head.
"She is beautiful, but I don't think Lumley will admire her. He places
expression before everything, and this girl has none. She must have been
very unhappy, I think, or else she is very heartless!"
He stood with his back to the fire, twisting his mustache and warming
himself.
"The fact is," he remarked, "you're disappointed because she didn't jump
into your arms and cry a little, and all that sort of thing. Now, I
respect the girl for it; for I think she was acting under constraint.
Give her time, Adrienne, and I think you'll find her sympathetic enough.
And as to the expression--well, I may be mistaken, but I should say that
she had a sweeter one than most women, although we haven't seen it yet.
Give her time, Adrienne. Don't hurry her."
It was two hours before they saw her again, and then she came into the
drawing room just as the dinner gong was going. Neither of them had seen
her save by the dim light of a single lamp, and even then she had been
wrapped in a long traveling coat; and so, although Lord St. Maurice had
called her beautiful, they were neither of them prepared to see her
quite as she was. She wore a plain black net dinner gown, curving only
slightly downward at the white throat, the somberness of which was
partially relieved by an amber foundation. She had no jewelry of any
sort, nor any flowers, and she carried only a tiny lace handkerchief in
her left hand. But she had no need of a toilet or of adornment. That
proud, exquisitely graceful carriage, which only race can give, was the
dowry of her descent from one of the ancient families of Southern
Europe; but the beauty of her face was nature's gift alone. It was
beauty of the best and purest French type--the beauty of the aristocrats
of the court of Louis the Fourteenth. The luxurious black hair was
parted in the middle, and raised slightly over the temples, showing a
high but delicately arched forehead. Her complexion was dazzling in its
purity, but colorless. There was none of the harshness of the Sicilian
type in her features, or in the lines of her figure. The severest critic
of feminine beauty could have asked only for a slightly relaxed mouth,
and a touch of humanity in her dark, still eyes; and even he, knowing
that the great joys of womanhood--the joys of loving and being
loved--were as yet untasted by her, would have held his peace,
murmuring, perhaps, that the days of miracles were not yet passed, and a
daughter of Diana had appeared upon the earth.
The little group, to whom her entrance was something like a thunderbolt,
consisted only of Lord and Lady St. Maurice, and their son, Lord Lumley.
He, although his surprise was the greatest, was the first to recover
from it.
"I am happy to meet you in proper form, Miss Briscoe," he said, bowing,
and then looking into her face with a humorous light in his eyes. "I was
afraid that I should never have the opportunity of telling you that
those fellows met with, at any rate, a part of what they deserved. I saw
them locked up."
She looked at him for a moment with slightly arched eyebrows, and then
suddenly smiled.
"Oh! is it really you?" she exclaimed, holding out her hand, which she
had not previously offered. "I am so glad. I was afraid that I should
never have the opportunity to thank you for your kindness."
"You have met Lumley before, then?" asked Lady St. Maurice, wondering.
"Scarcely so much as that," he answered, laughing. "Don't you remember
my telling you of my adventure in Piccadilly, mother?"
"Yes, I remember. Do you mean that the young lady was really
Margharita?"
She looked at him, and he colored slightly. For the first time he
remembered how enthusiastically he had spoken of the girl whom he had
assisted, and Lady St. Maurice remembered, too, that for several days
afterward he had been silent and distrait. She could not fail to
remember it, for it was the first time she had ever heard Lumley admire
a girl in such terms.
"Yes, it was Miss Briscoe," he answered, keeping his head turned away
from his mother.
"It was indeed I," she admitted. "I don't know what I should have done,
but for your help, Lord Lumley. I am afraid that I should have screamed
and made a scene."
"I can't imagine your doing it!" he remarked truthfully.
"Perhaps not! But I was so surprised, I could not understand it."
"May I remind you that I am completely in the dark as to this little
adventure," Lord St. Maurice remarked pleasantly. "What was it, Lumley?"
"A very simple affair after all. I was in Piccadilly, and Miss Briscoe
here was coming out of some milliner's shop and crossing the pavement to
her carriage."
"Cab!" she interrupted.
"Cab, then. Well, it was late in the afternoon, and two drunken little
cads tried to speak to her. Naturally, as I was the nearest decent
person, I interfered and assisted Miss Briscoe into her cab. That I was
passing was a piece of good fortune for which I have always been
thankful."
"Lord Lumley does not add that his interference consisted in knocking
one man down and holding the other until he almost choked with one hand,
while he helped me into the cab with the other."
"I only shook him a little," he laughed, giving his mother his arm, for
the butler had announced dinner while they had been talking. "If I had
been he I would rather have had the shaking than the look Miss Briscoe
flashed at him."
"I detest being touched," she said coldly, "especially by a stranger."
"How did the affair end?" Lord St. Maurice asked, sipping his soup. "I
hope you got them locked up, Lumley."
"Why, the termination of the affair was the part on which I do really
congratulate myself," he answered. "A policeman came up at once, but
before I could give them in charge--in which case I should, of course,
have been called upon to prosecute and got generally mixed up in the
affair--one of the fellows began thumping the policeman; so of course he
collared them and marched them off. I slipped away, and I noticed the
next morning that they got pretty heavily fined for assaulting a
policeman in the execution of his duty."
"A satisfactory ending to a most unpleasant affair," Lord St. Maurice
remarked.
During dinner Lord Lumley devoted himself to their guest, but for a long
time the burden of the conversation lay altogether upon his shoulders.
It was not until he chanced to mention the National Gallery, in
connection with the season's exhibition of pictures, that Margharita
abandoned her monosyllabic answers and generally reserved demeanor. He
saw at once that he had struck the right note, and he followed it up
with tact. He was fresh from a tour among the galleries of southern
Europe and Holland, and he himself was no mean artist. But Margharita,
he soon found, knew nothing of recent art. She was hopelessly out of
date. She knew nothing of the modern cant, of the nineteenth century
philistinism, at which it was so much the fashion to scoff. She had not
caught the froth of the afternoon talk at fashionable studios, and,
having jumbled it together in the popular fashion, she was not prepared
to set forth her views on art in somebody else's pet phrases. Lord
Lumley had met that sort of young lady, and had shunned her. Margharita
had simply acquired from a hurried visit to Italy, when she was quite
young, a dim but vast appreciation of the soul of the great masters. She
could not have defined art, nor could she have expressed in a few
nicely-rounded sentences her opinion of Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece,
or of the genius of Pico della Mirandola. But she felt that a great
world lay beyond a larger knowledge and understanding of these things,
and some day she hoped, after time, and thought, and study, to enter it.
And Lord Lumley, reading her thoughts with a keen and intuitive
sympathy, talked to her that night at dinner and afterward in a corner
of the perfumed rose-lit drawing room, as no man had ever talked to her
before--talked to her so earnestly, and with so much effect, that Lady
St. Maurice rose from her writing table at the other end of the room,
watched them with pale and troubled face, and more than once made some
faint effort to disturb them. He showed her the systems and manner of
thought by which the dimly-felt, wondering admiration of the uncultured,
yet sensitive, mind can develop into the large and soul-felt
appreciation of the artist. It was the keys of her promised land which
he held out to her with winning speech and a kindliness to which she was
unaccustomed. He was young himself, but he had all the advantages of
correct training, of travel, and of delicate artistic sensibilities. He
had taught himself much, and fresh from the task of learning, he had all
the best enthusiasm of the teacher. He had told himself that he, too,
like the Athenians, worshiped beauty, but never in his life had he seen
anything so beautiful as Margharita's face as she listened to him.
Spiritual life seemed to have been poured into a piece of beautiful
imagery. Her lips were parted and her dark eyes were softened. It was
the face of a St. Cecilia. How long before it would become the face of a
woman!
It was Lord St. Maurice's arrival which dissolved the spell. He had
missed his after-dinner cigar and chat with Lumley, and directly he
entered the drawing room he saw the cause. Adrienne's eyes and his met.
A little annoyed by his son's defection he did not hesitate to act.
"Miss Briscoe, are you too tired, or may we ask for a little music?" he
said, walking up to the pair.
She looked up, frowning a little at the interruption. Then a swift
recollection of her position came to her, and the light died out of her
face. She rose at once.
"I shall be pleased to do what I can. I sing a little, but I play
badly."
She affected not to notice Lord St Maurice's arm, but crossed the room
by his side toward the piano. He opened it, arranged the stool, and
remained standing there.
She struck a few minor chords, and suddenly the room seemed full of a
sad, plaintive music rising gradually to a higher pitch, and then dying
away as her voice took up the melody and carried it on. Lady St. Maurice
held her hand to her side for a moment, and her husband frowned. It was
a Sicilian love song which she was singing; the song of a peasant whose
bride lies dead by his side, the victim of another's jealousy. Adrienne
had heard it often in the old days, and the beautiful wild music which
rang in their ears was full of memories to her. It closed abruptly, and
only Lumley, with an unusual sparkle in his eyes, found words to thank
her.
"Are all your songs sad ones, Miss Briscoe?" Lord St. Maurice asked
abruptly. "Can't you offer us something in the shape of an antidote?"
She sat down at the piano again.
"I do not know anything gay," she said. "I can only sing what I feel. I
will play something."
She dashed off into a light Hungarian dance, full of _verve_ and
sparkle, and Lord St. Maurice kept time with his foot, smiling
approvingly. Directly it was over she closed the piano and turned to
Lady St. Maurice.
"If I may I should be glad to go to my room now," she said. "I had no
idea it was so late."
Lumley held the door open for her, and felt unreasonably disappointed
because she passed out with a slight inclination of the head, but
without looking at him. Then he turned back into the room, and they all
three looked at one another for a moment.
"She is marvelously handsome," Lord St. Maurice pronounced.
"Marvelously!" his son echoed softly.
But Lady St. Maurice said nothing.
CHAPTER XX
LORD LUMLEY AND MARGHARITA
"Geoffrey, come here for a moment!"
The Earl of St. Maurice, who was a most obedient husband, folded up his
paper and joined his wife at the window.
"Well, dear."
"Look there."
He followed her finger. It pointed to three figures; a man in shooting
clothes, with a gun under his arm, a girl and a child between them,
strolling along the cliffs outside the grounds. He glanced at them
carelessly, and back into his wife's face as though for an explanation.
"Well?"
"This is the third morning that Lumley has joined Margharita and Gracie
in their walk."
"Very good natured of him," the Earl replied carelessly. "He always was
fond of Gracie though, wasn't he?"
"I wish I could feel sure that it was entirely for Gracie's sake," she
answered anxiously.
Her husband whistled, and his brows contracted a little.
"You mean to suggest, I suppose, that Miss Briscoe is the attraction,"
he remarked thoughtfully.
"How can I help thinking so? Both yesterday and this morning he was in
the schoolroom until I heard her tell him quite severely that he must
go, as he was interrupting their work. Both mornings I have asked him to
drive with me, and each time he made an excuse. If Margharita's name is
mentioned before him, he is either unusually silent and reserved, or
very talkative. As a rule, you know, Lumley does not care for girls.
That makes me all the more anxious."
"Miss Briscoe is certainly wonderfully beautiful," he said. "Yet I think
that Lumley has common sense."
"He has peculiar ideas," his wife answered. "I have always been afraid
of his doing something _bizarre_, and as you say, Margharita is
wonderfully beautiful--far more so than her mother, I think. What would
you advise me to do, Geoffrey?"
He stroked his long gray mustache, and looked thoughtful.
"It's a delicate matter," he said. "To even hint at the girl going away
because Lumley admires her would be unjust, and, at the same time, if
Lumley got an inkling of the reason it would certainly make him think
more of her than he does now. You have no fault to find with her in any
way?"
"None! absolutely none! Her behavior is perfect. She is proud, but I do
not consider that a fault. Her manners are the manners of a
perfectly-bred lady."
"And Gracie likes her?"
"Gracie adores her!"
"She certainly doesn't attempt to encourage Lumley in any way," the Earl
continued thoughtfully.
"Her manners and behavior, in fact, her whole conduct, is perfectly
irreproachable," Lady St. Maurice acknowledged. "In certain ways she has
been a great disappointment to me, but I wish to be just to her, and I
feel bound to say so. It makes the situation all the more difficult."
"In that case we can do nothing," her husband said decidedly. "Things
must take their course. If they develop, as we will hope they may not, I
will speak to Lumley privately."
"You see she is coming back because Lumley has joined them," Lady St.
Maurice said. "Geoffrey, look at her now at the top of that hill. Does
she not remind you of him?"
He took up a pair of field glasses from the table and looked at her
steadily.
"Yes, she does," he admitted. "She is just like that poor fellow Marioni
sometimes. I never noticed it so clearly."
"She is horribly like him, and, Geoffrey, it is foolish of me, but
sometimes she looks at me with his eyes. It makes me shiver."
"Foolish little woman! Why, you are actually nursing your fears."
"They are scarcely fears; only a stupid sort of foreboding that comes on
sometimes, and which, afterward, I look upon as morbid. It is foolish of
me, I know, to connect them with Margharita, and yet I can't help it
sometimes. She is so like him."
"Why don't you ask her if she knows anything about him, or where he is?
Surely you might do that."
"I have made up my mind to more than once, but really, Geoffrey, absurd
though it may sound, I have never felt quite at ease in asking
Margharita personal questions. She so obviously insists upon our
relations remaining exactly those of employer and employed. It was not
at all what I intended; but what can I do? I wish to be a friend to her,
but her manner quite forbids it. She is far prouder than I am."
Lord St. Maurice shrugged his shoulders and kissed his wife's forehead.
"I shouldn't trouble about it, dear. They are a headstrong, intractable
race, those Marionis, and this girl takes after her mother. Treat her
kindly and she'll come round some day. Come and sit in the library if
you have nothing better to do for half an hour. I have some stupid
letters to write."
"I will come in one moment, Geoffrey," she answered. "I may as well
clear off some of my correspondence debts. There are some invitations to
answer, too."
Lord St. Maurice left the room and Adrienne remained by the window, her
eyes fixed upon the little group which had come to a standstill now on
the summit of the low line of cliffs. The field glasses were still on
the table by her side, and raising them to her eyes, she watched them
steadfastly for several minutes. When she put them down she was a shade
paler, and there were tears in her eyes.
"If I thought that it would wipe out the past," she murmured, "after all
it might be well. But how can it? He will never forgive! Never! never!"
She turned away, brushing the tears from her eyes, and went into her
husband's room smiling and comely. Such sorrows as she had were not for
him to share--not even for him to know of. The burden of them was for
her alone.
* * * * *
And, meanwhile, Lord Lumley, her only son, was leaning against the trunk
of a pine tree on the brow of the cliff, with something very much like a
frown upon his forehead; and a little distance away, Margharita was
calmly reading to Gracie out of a French picture book, brought, as Lord
Lumley had been quick to surmise, chiefly with a view of excluding him
from their company. It was quite true, as his father had remarked, that
he had received very little encouragement from Margharita; in fact, he
had been told somewhat plainly, a few minutes ago, that his presence was
interfering with the lesson. "As if there was any necessity to bring
lesson books out of doors," he had muttered _sotto voce_, withdrawing
himself a few yards, however, and relapsing into an irritated silence.
The book had been brought on his account altogether. There was no doubt
whatever about that, and, manlike, he felt aggrieved. Of course he ought
to have gone away at once, and he had started with that intention, but
the sound of Margharita's voice arrested him before he had gone half a
dozen yards. After all, it would be pleasanter to stay and listen.
So he stood there, crumpling up a sprig of heather in his hand, and
ostensibly waiting for a shot at a sea gull. He was quite aware that no
sea gull was likely to rise anywhere near, and that his gun was
unloaded, but the excuse was the only one that had occurred to him at a
minute's notice. His real object in remaining was that he might walk
home with Margharita when the lesson was over.
The Earl of St. Maurice had been a handsome man in his youth, but his
son was handsomer. To the fine Saxon physique of the St. Maurices, in
Lord Lumley had been added something of the more delicate beauty of his
mother. He had the long limbs and broad shoulders of which a gallery
full of St. Maurices boasted, but his features were more delicately
formed, and his forehead was higher and more intellectual than any of
them.
Yet it had not in any way spoiled him. He had not an atom of conceit or
pride of any sort. At college, where he had graduated early, he
presented the rare combination of a nobleman's son, a moderate athlete,
and a hard reading man. His had been the intellectual set of the whole
university, and having the rare gift of attaining an unsought influence
over most of those with whom he was brought into contact, he had
imparted a distinctly scholarly tone to the little circle which he had
formed. Men of all grades spoke well of him. He was reserved, and he was
not a prig; he was consistent to his own ideals, and yet not censorious.
He was possessed of an agreeable and even winning manner, and yet he had
rather avoided the society of women than otherwise. The consequence was
that, at twenty-four, he had the thoughtful intellectual air of a much
older man.
The lesson came to an end at last, and the three strolled down toward
the house together. Lord Lumley had joined them because there was
something which he was determined to say.
"Miss Briscoe," he began, during a momentary halt while they watched a
yacht tacking in the bay below, "may I ask you a question?"
"I suppose so," she answered carelessly, without looking at him.
"You are beginning to avoid me."
"Indeed!"
"You brought that wretched book out this morning as an excuse to get rid
of me."
"Well, if I did, you should certainly relieve me of the necessity,
should you not?"
"You know that you did. And, yesterday morning, if Gracie had not
pleaded to stay out a little longer, you would have cut your work short
because of my presence."
"Then, if you think so, Lord Lumley, it is clearly your duty to go away,
as I reminded you just now."
"Thanks. I wonder why the path of duty is always so disagreeable."
She did not answer him; but, taking Gracie by the hand, turned homeward.
He kept his place by her side, heedless of the angry glance which she
flashed upon him.
"I want to know why you object to my society so much, Miss Briscoe?" he
said presently.
"There are a great many things we want to know in this world which we
don't know," she answered. "Where we go to after we die, for instance.
We have to be patient, and wait till we find out."
"Then you won't tell me?"
"Why should I? But if you really want to know, the reason is simple
enough. I have been used to solitude. I prefer it. If I cannot have it
absolutely I can have it comparatively, at any rate."
"With Gracie?"
"Exactly."
"You are complimentary," he laughed.
She shrugged her shoulders.
"Why should I not tell the truth when there is nothing to be gained by
telling a falsehood?"
He looked at her gravely.
"That sounds cynical, Miss Briscoe."
"I am indifferent as to its sound," she answered. "Hadn't you better go
and shoot something?"
He did not notice her suggestion.
"Miss Briscoe, I do not like the way in which we are talking. I----"
"The remedy is obvious," she interrupted haughtily.
"Probably the fault is mine," he continued, calmly ignoring her speech.
"I have not been used to talking to girls much. My friends have all been
men, and I daresay that I have got into the habit, therefore, of
expressing myself clumsily. But what I want to say to you, if you will
give me the opportunity, is this: The first few evenings after your
arrival here were very pleasant ones indeed--for me. You talked to me,
and I found more pleasure in our conversation than I have ever done in
anything else in my life. There, that is being frank, is it not? I hoped
that we might be friends; indeed, it seemed to me that we were certainly
going to be so. I do not wish to offend you by any apparent
exaggeration, but I must say that it made a considerable difference to
my interest in life. That is putting it mildly. Where you have found the
time to read and think so much, of course, I cannot tell. It is not my
business. Only, I know that it makes your companionship very pleasant
for me. You see I am trying to be as matter-of-fact as possible--do
please give me credit for that. I just want to know why you have altered
your manner to me; why we cannot be friends? Will you tell me, please,
Miss Briscoe?"
His pleading tone had a manly musical ring in it which was very pleasant
to listen to, and in his anxiety for her answer he had stooped down
until his dark handsome head nearly touched hers. She drew away
impatiently.
"That is impossible," she said coldly.
"And why?"
"If for no other reason, surely the Countess of St. Maurice's governess
is no suitable friend for Lord Lumley."
He colored under the intense hauteur of her words.
"You will forgive my saying that that is the first remark which I have
heard from you, Miss Briscoe, which has not been in good taste.
Good-morning. Good-bye, Gracie."
He turned abruptly along a private path through the pine wood.
Margharita and her charge went on up to the house alone.
CHAPTER XXI
A LAND THAT IS LONELIER THAN RUIN
Late in the afternoon of the same day they met again, and this time
really by accident. Since morning a storm had been blowing, but just
before sunset the wind and rain had dropped, and an angry sun glared out
in its last moments upon the troubled sea. Lord Lumley, tired of
struggling with a pile of books and smoking cigarettes, had seen the
change from his study window, and seizing his cap and a stick had
hurried out to taste the strong salt wind and to watch the cloud effects
from the cliffs; and, as he had rounded the corner, he had come face to
face with Margharita.
She was standing on the highest point of the cliffs, her skirts blowing
wildly around her tall, slim figure, and making strange havoc with her
hair. Her face was turned seaward, but at the sound of his footsteps she
turned quickly round. His heart beat fast for a moment, and then he
remembered their parting earlier in the day.
"I am sorry to have disturbed you," he said coldly, raising his cap. "If
I had had the least idea that you were here I would have taken the other
path."
He was passing on, but as she made him no answer he glanced up at her
face. Then all thought of going vanished. There were glistening tears in
her dark eyes, and her lips were quivering.
"Forgive me, Miss Briscoe," he said, springing up to her side. "I was a
clumsy idiot, but I was afraid that you would think that I had followed
you. May I stay?"
She nodded, and turned her face away from him.
"Yes, stay," she answered softly; "stay and talk to me. Don't think me
silly, but I was feeling sad--lonely, perhaps--and you have always
spoken so kindly to me, that the change--it was a little too sudden."
"I was a brute," he whispered gently.
The change in her was wonderful. Her voice was soft, and, glancing up at
her face, he could see that it was stained with tears. At that moment he
felt that he would have given the world to have taken her into his arms
and held her there, but he thrust the thought resolutely from him. Now
was his opportunity to teach her to trust him. He would not even suffer
his voice to take too tender a note.
"The fresh air is glorious after a day cooped up in a little study," he
said lightly. "See the curlews there, flying round and round over the
marshes. Tennyson's old home lies that way, you know. Do you wonder that
this flat country, with its strange twilight effects, should have laid
hold of him so powerfully?"
"It is strange and weird," she murmured thoughtfully.
"Weird is the very word for it. Tennyson might have written that lovely
but hackneyed poem, 'Locksley Hall,' from this very spot. The place
seems born to evoke sentiment, and a stormy twilight like this seems to
fit in with it. It is not a fair-weather land. People come here in the
summer, and call the place flat and uninteresting. One can scarcely
wonder at it."
"It is a sad-looking country," she said. "It was its sadness which
brought me out this afternoon; _similia similibus curantur_, you know;
but in my case it has failed."
"And why should you be sad?" he asked softly. "Won't you give me a
little of your confidence?"
She smiled bitterly, and shook her head.
"No, you could never know. Ask me no questions; only leave me alone.
Talk to me of other things, if you will. My thoughts are bad companions
to-night. I do not want to be left alone with them. Do you know any of
Swinburne's 'Salt Marshes'?"
"A little."
"Say it to me. I want to escape from my thoughts."
He obeyed her, standing up by her side and watching the wild music of
the poetry kindle her imagination and work into her heart. He understood
the situation now. She was oppressed by some great trouble, and he must
help her to forget it. And so, when he had come to the last line, he
talked to her softly of it, pointing out the strange lights on the sea,
and the shadows lying across the desolate country. Soon he drifted into
verse again, striving, so far as he could, to avoid the poetry of
pessimism and despair, so beautiful and yet so noxious, and strike a
more joyous and hopeful note. Soon he found himself at "Maud," and here
he was fluent, but here she stopped him, warned perhaps by the light
which was creeping into his eyes.
"Let us go home now," she said. "You have been very kind to me. I shall
never forget it."
He gave her his hand, and they scrambled down on to the path. They
retraced their steps toward the house almost in silence. He was only
fearful of losing one particle of the advantage which he had gained. The
fear of not seeing her again, however, gave him courage.
"May I ask a favor?" he begged humbly.
She nodded.
"Make it a small one, please. I am almost afraid of having to refuse
it."
"Will you come down into the drawing room to-night?"
She shook her head.
"I cannot. I have a long letter to write."
His face fell.
"For just a short time, then."
She hesitated.
"Yes, if you wish it."
"We are friends now, are we not?" anxiously.
She flashed a brilliant look upon him, which made the color steal into
his cheeks, and his heart beat fast.
"Yes," she said softly, "if you will."
CHAPTER XXII
LORD LUMLEY'S CONFESSION
"Mother, don't you think that Miss Briscoe is a very strange girl?"
Lady St. Maurice looked up from her work quickly. Nine o'clock was just
striking, and her son only a moment before had replaced his watch in his
pocket with an impatient little gesture.
"Yes, I do think so," she answered quietly. "I think her very strange
indeed. Why do you ask me?"
He shrugged his shoulders.
"Oh, I don't know exactly. It seems odd that she should want to spend
all her evening alone, and that she should have so many long letters to
write. Do you think that she quite understands that you would like her
to come down with us?"
"I am quite sure that she does, Lumley. I even objected to having her
come here as a governess at all. Her mother was a dear friend of mine
many years ago, and I told Margharita from the first that I would rather
have her here as my daughter. She would have been very welcome to a home
with us. It was only her pride which made her insist upon coming as
Gracie's governess, and I suppose it is the same feeling which prompts
her to keep herself so much aloof from us. I am sorry, but I can do no
more than I have done toward making her see things differently."
Lord Lumley fidgeted about for a minute or two on the hearthrug. There
was a certain reserve in his mother's manner which made the task which
he had set himself more difficult even than it would have been under
ordinary circumstances. Besides, he felt that from her low seat she was
watching him intently, and the knowledge did not tend toward setting him
more at his ease.
"You loved her mother, then?"
"I did. She was my dearest friend."
"And yet--forgive me if I am wrong--but sometimes I fancy that you do
not even like Miss Briscoe."
"She will not let me like or dislike her, Lumley."
He shook his head.
"It isn't that exactly. I have seen you watching her sometimes--as for
instance when she sang that Sicilian song here--as though you
were--well, almost afraid of her; as though there was something about
her which almost repelled you."
The Countess laid down her work, and looked steadfastly into the fire.
There was a moment's silence.
"You have been a close watcher, Lumley."
"I admit it. But, tell me, have I not watched to some purpose. There is
no mistaking the look in your face sometimes, when she comes into the
room unexpectedly. If the thing were not absurd, I should say that you
were afraid of her."
Lady St. Maurice held her hand to her side for a moment, as though she
felt a sudden pain. She repeated her son's words without looking up at
him.
"Afraid of her! No, no, Lumley. I am afraid of something else, something
of which her face continually reminds me. It is the shadow of the past
which seems to follow her footsteps."
A tragic note had suddenly been struck in the conversation between
mother and son. Lord Lumley, who had been altogether unprepared for it,
was full of interest.
"The past!" he repeated. "Whose past? Tell me all about it, mother."
She looked up at him, and he saw that her face was unusually pale.
"Lumley, it is only a little while ago since your father and I told you
the story of our strange meeting and marriage. You remember it?"
"Every word! Every word, mother!"
"You remember the duel which the Count di Marioni sought to force upon
your father, but which I prevented? You remember the means which I was
driven to use to prevent it, and the oath of vengeance which
Leonardo--the Count di Marioni--swore against us both?"
"Yes."
"Lumley, twenty-five years have passed away, and he is free."
"But, Miss Briscoe?" he asked, bewildered. "How does all this concern
her?"
"She is his niece."
"His niece! his niece!"
Lord Lumley could say nothing. With all the swift selfishness of a man
his thoughts were centered round one point. Would this new development
hinder his purpose, or was it favorable to him?
"Leonardo's sister, Lumley, was my dear friend. She married a man named
Briscoe, and died very soon afterward. Margharita is their daughter,
and, Lumley, there is no English blood in her veins. She is a Marioni! I
can see his eyes and his forehead every time I look at hers. They seem
to tell me that that wild oath still lives; that some day he will
stretch out his hand and redeem that murderous threat. Lumley, there
have been times when it has terrified me to look at that girl."
His face was clearing. A smile even began to dawn upon his lips.
"Why, mother, don't you see that so far as Miss Briscoe is concerned
that is all fancy," he said. "You feel in that way toward her simply
because she happens to resemble the Count di Marioni. Isn't that a
little unfair to her? What can she know of an oath which was sworn
five-and-twenty years ago, long before she was born. Why, I don't
suppose that she ever heard of it."
She smiled a little sadly.
"Lumley, I do not attempt to defend my feeling. Of course it is absurd
to connect her with it, really."
"I was sure that you would say so, mother."
"But, Lumley, although I cannot defend it the feeling remains. Listen.
No woman has known greater happiness than I have. My life has been
sometimes almost too perfect, and yet I never altogether forgot those
passionate words of Leonardo's. They lay like a shadow across my life,
darkening and growing broader as the years of his confinement passed
away. The time of his release came at last--only a few months ago, and
only a few months ago, Lumley, I saw him."
"You saw him! Where?"
"In London, Lumley! Why did he come, almost on the day of his release,
here to England? It was a country which he hated in his younger days,
and yet, instead of visiting his old home, his love for which was almost
a passion, instead of lingering in those sunny southern towns where many
friends still remained who would have received him with open arms, he
came straight to London alone. I found him at a hotel there, broken
down, and almost, as it were, on the threshold of death! Yet, when he
saw me, when he heard my voice, the old passion blazed out. Lumley, I
prayed to him for forgiveness, and he scorned me. He had never
forgotten! He would never forgive! He pointed to his person, his white
hairs, to all the terrible evidences of his long imprisonment, and once
more, with the same passion which had trembled in his tone twenty-five
years ago, he cursed me! It was horrible! I fled from that place like a
haunted woman, and since then, Lumley, I have been haunted. Every
feature in the girl's magnificent face, and every movement of her
figure, reminds me that she is a Marioni!"
She had risen and was standing by his side, a beautiful, but a suffering
woman. He took her into his arms and kissed her forehead.
"Mother, you have too much imagination," he said gently. "Look at the
matter seriously. Granted that this old man still harbors a senseless
resentment against you. Yet what could he do? He forgets the days in
which he lives, and the country to which you belong! Vendettas and
romantic vengeances, such as he may have dreamt of five-and-twenty years
ago, are extinct even in his own land; here, they cannot be taken
seriously at all!"
She shivered a little, and looked into his face as though comforted in
some measure.
"That is what I say to myself, Lumley," she said; "but there are times
when the old dread is too strong for me wholly to crush it. I am not an
Englishwoman, you know; I come of a more superstitious race!"
"I am sorry that Miss Briscoe should be the means of bringing these
unpleasant thoughts to you," he remarked thoughtfully. "Mother!"
"Yes, Lumley."
"Would it be a great trouble to you if--some day--I asked you to receive
her as a daughter?"
She stood quite still and shivered. Her face was suddenly of a marble
pallor.
"You--you mean this, Lumley?"
"I mean that I care for her, mother."
"You have not--spoken to her?"
"No. I should not have said anything to you yet, only it pained me to
think that there was anything between you--any aversion, I mean. I
thought that if you knew, you would try and overcome it."
"I cannot!"
"Mother!"
"Lumley, I cannot! She looks at me out of his eyes; she speaks to me
with his voice; something tells me that she bears in her heart his hate
toward me. You do not know these Marionis! They are one in hate and one
in love; unchanging and hard as the rocks on which their castle frowns.
Even Margharita herself, in the old days, never forgave me for sending
Leonardo to prison, although I saved her lover's life as well as mine.
Lumley, you have said nothing to her?"
"Not yet."
"She would not marry you! I tell you that in her heart she hates us all!
Sometimes I fancy that she is here--only----"
"Mother!"
He laid his hand firmly upon her white trembling arm. She looked around,
following his eyes. Margharita, pale and proud, was standing upon the
threshold, with a great bunch of white hyacinths in the bosom of her
black dress.
"Am I intruding?" she asked quietly. "I will come down some other
evening."
Lord Lumley sprang forward to stop her; but his mother was the first to
recover herself.
"Pray don't go away, Margharita," she said, with perfect
self-possession. "Only a few minutes ago we were complaining that you
came down so seldom. Lumley, open the piano, and get Miss Briscoe's
songs."
He was by her side in a moment, but he found time for an admiring glance
toward his mother. She had taken up a paper knife, and was cutting the
pages of her book. It was the _savoir-faire_ of a great lady.
CHAPTER XXIII
MARGHARITA'S DIARY--A CORRESPONDENCE
_Letter from Count Leonardo di Marioni to Miss M. Briscoe, care of the
Earl of St. Maurice, Mallory Grange, Lincolnshire._
"HOTEL DE PARIS, TURIN.
"MY BELOVED NIECE: Alas! I have but another disappointment to recount. I
arrived here last night, and early this morning I visited the address
which I obtained at Florence with so much difficulty. The house was shut
up. From inquiries made with caution among the neighbors I learned that
Andrea Paschuli had left a few months before for Rome. Thither I go in
search of him.
"The delay is irksome, but it is necessary. Although my desire for the
day of my vengeance to come is as strong as ever, I would not have the
shadow of a suspicion rest upon you. Truly, yours will be no crime, but
the world and the courts of justice would have it otherwise. You will,
in verity, be but the instrument. Upon my head be the guilt, as mine
will be the exceeding joy, when the thing for which I crave is
accomplished. Bless you, my child, that you have elected to aid me in
carrying out this most just requital! Bless you, my child, that you have
chosen to bring peace into the heart of one who has known great
suffering!
"Your last letter was short; yet I do not wonder at it. What is there
you can find to say to me, while our great purpose remains thus in
abeyance? My health continues good, I am thankful to say, yet, were it
otherwise, I know that my strength would linger with me till my oath is
accomplished. Till that day shall come death itself has no power over
me. Even though its shadow lay across my path I could still defy it.
Think not that I am blaspheming, Margharita, or that I believe in no
God. I believe in a God of justice, and he will award me my right. Oh,
that the time may be short, for I am growing weary. Life is very
burdensome, save only for its end.
"Sometimes, my beloved Margharita, you have sought to lighten the deep
gloom through which I struggle, by picturing the happy days we may yet
spend together in some far-distant country, where the shadows of this
great selfish world barely reach, and its mighty roar and tumult sound
but as a faint, low murmur. I have listened, but I have answered not;
for in my heart I know that it will never be. Those days will never
come. I have shrunk from throwing a chill upon your warm, generous
heart; but of late I have wondered whether I do well in thus silently
deceiving you. For, Margharita, there is no such time of peaceful
happiness in store for me. I am dying! Nay, do not start! Do not pity
me! Do not fear! I know it so well; and I feel no pang, no sorrow. The
limit of my days is fixed--not in actual days or weeks, but by events. I
shall live to see my desire accomplished, and then I shall die. The
light may flicker, but, till then, it will not go out. You will ask me:
Who am I that I dare to fix a limit to an existence which God alone
controls? I cannot tell you, Margharita, why I know, or how, yet it is
surely so. The day which sees me free of my vow will also be the day of
my death.
"Trouble not, my child, at this thought, nor wonder why I can write of
the end of my days so calmly. Ask yourself rather what further life
could mean for me. There is no joy which I desire; my worn-out frame
could find no pleasure in dragging out a tasteless and profitless
existence. I look for death as one looks for his couch who has toiled
and labored through the heat of the day. I shall find there rest and
peace. I have no other desire.
"For yourself, Margharita, have no fear. I have made your fortune my
care, and God grant that it may be a happy one. Honest men have made
good profit out of my lands during my imprisonment. I have wealth to
leave, and it is yours. The Castle of the Marionis will be yours, and
well I know you will raise once more and uphold the mighty, though
fallen, traditions of our race. I leave all fearlessly in your hands, at
your entire disposal. Only one thing I beg of you, and that without fear
of refusal. Marry not an Englishman. Marry one of the nobility of our
own island, if you can find one worthy of you; if not, there are nobles
of Italy with whom your alliance would be an honor, and also a profit.
You will be rich as you are beautiful; and the first lady in Italy, our
distant kinswoman, Angela di Carlotti, will be your guardian and your
friend. May you be very, very happy, dearest; and all that comes to you
you will deserve, for you have lightened the heart of a weary old man,
whose blessing is yours, now and for ever.
"LEONARDO DI MARIONI."
* * * * *
_Letter from Margharita Briscoe to the Count Leonardo di Marioni, care
of the Princess di Carlotti, Palazzo Carlotti, Rome._
"MY DEAR, DEAR UNCLE: I am inclined to scold you for your letter, for it
made me very sad. Why should you be so sure of dying just as the
vengeance which is your due becomes yours? You are not very old, and I
can nurse you even as I did before. Think how lonely I should be without
you. No, you must not think of leaving me. I forbid it! It is morbid.
Banish that fancy for my sake, and try and think of a quiet happy life
together, away in some southern city, where the sea and the sky are
blue, and the sun is warm, and the breezes are soft and laden with the
perfume of sweet flowers. We would never live in this country, would we?
I do not like it. It is cold and damp, and it chills me, chills even my
heart. Oh! I know just the life we could live together, and be very,
very happy. Write to me no more of death.
"I am quite settled down here, waiting. My duties are light, and I do
not find them irksome. Every day I realize that I did well in coming
here as a governess, and not as one seeking a home. They think that it
is because of my pride that I have willed it so. They do not know.
"Lady St Maurice tries to be kind to me in her way; but when the honeyed
words are upon her lips, I think of you and my heart is steel. She must
have been a very beautiful woman--nay, she is beautiful now! You asked
me in your first letter to watch well and to tell you whether they were
happy together. You asked me, and I tell you the truth.
"Yes! I think that of all the women whom I have ever seen, her life
seems to have flown along the most calmly and peacefully. I have never
seen a cloud upon her brow; I hate her for it. She has no right to be
happy; she who by such treachery condemned you to a living death. Once
my anger rose up so fiercely that I nearly struck her, and I had to
hurry from the room lest I should betray myself before the time. Truly
she deserves punishment, and my hand shall not shrink from inflicting
it.
"Yet, after all, is death the most complete form of punishment.
Sometimes I doubt it. I would mar the beauty of her face for ever, and
laugh. I would strike her blind gladly; I would make her a cripple for
life, without remorse, without hesitation. To see her suffer would
please me. I should have no pity!
"But death, uncle! If anything of our religion be true, would death be
so terrible a thing? Against my will I see that her life is good. She
has made her home what it should be, and her husband happy. She is a
devoted Christian, and, wet or fine, every Sunday morning before
breakfast, she goes to the little church in the village and kneels
before the altar. She visits the sick and the poor, and they love her.
For me, religion has become something of a dream. I was brought up a
Roman Catholic. What I am now I do not know! When I vowed my life to its
present purpose I filled it with new thoughts; I put my religion away
from me. I could not kneel with hate in my heart; I could not confess,
with the desire to kill in my bosom.
"Yet let that pass. Supposing there be a heaven, if we kill her for her
treachery to you will not that sin be wiped out? May she not gain
heaven? And if so, what of our vengeance? Death is swift! What will she
suffer? It will be those who are left behind who will feel the pain; for
her, there will be a happiness beyond even the happiness of earth. She
will be shriven of her sin by our vengeance.
"Think of this, my dear uncle! Do not imagine that I am growing
faint-hearted; do not imagine that I am drawing back from the task which
I now claim as my right. Death, or some other sort of punishment, shall
surely fall upon her; she shall not escape! Only think what is best.
"Write to me all that is in your heart. Fear not to speak out! I would
know all. Farewell! Your loving
"MARGHARITA."
* * * * *
_Letter from the Count Leonardo di Marioni, the Palazzo Carlotti, Rome,
to Miss Margharita Briscoe, Mallory Grange, Lincolnshire._
"BELOVED MARGHARITA: I will confess that your letter troubles me. If
there be heaven for the woman who wrecked my life, there is no heaven
for me, no religion, no God. You say that she is a good woman. She is
then a good woman through fear. She seeks to atone, but she can never
atone. She won a boy's passionate love; she wore his heart upon her
sleeve; she cast it away at the moment of her pleasure. She broke the
vows of an order, which should have been as sacred to her as the face of
God to the angels; and she sent a Marioni to rot through a useless life
in a miserable prison. The boy whose heart she broke, and the man whose
life she severed, lives only to nurse his unchanging and unchangeable
hate for her. Away with all other thoughts, my vengeance knows but one
end, and that is death! Not sudden death, mind! but death--slow,
lingering, and painful. I would see the struggle against some mysterious
sickness, with my own eyes; I would stand by the bedside and mock, I
would watch the cheeks grow thin and pale, and the eyes grow dim. She
should know me in those last moments. She should see me, the wasted
shadow of a man, myself on the threshold of the grave, standing by her
bedside, cold and unpitying, and holding out toward her a white
hyacinth.
"That is how I would have it, though thus it may not be. Yet speak to me
not of any other vengeance save death. Let none other dwell for a moment
in your thoughts, I solemnly charge you, Margharita.
"As to my search, it has not yet, alas, been successful. Think not that
I have lost heart, or that I am discouraged. Never fear but that I shall
find the man whom I seek--if not, there are others. I give myself one
month longer; at the end of that time, if Paschuli be not found, another
must serve my purpose.
"The Princess is much interested in you, and sends her love. She is
impatient to take you under her care. I have told her that it will not
be long--nor will it.
"Farewell, my child. Soon I shall send you the good news.--Yours,
"LEONARDO DI MARIONI."
CHAPTER XXIV
"WHITE HYACINTHS"
I am driven to what is either the vehicle for the sentimental vaporings
of a school girl, or the last resource of a desperate, friendless woman.
I am going to set down on blank paper the record of events here just in
the way they occur to me. I am going to enjoy the luxury of being honest
to myself. I need not say in which of the above states I am. That is
soon shown.
I would to God that I had died before I had come here; before I had
sought out my uncle, Count Marioni, and listened to the pitiful story of
his wrongs. I am pledged to a purpose so awful that I dare not think of
it. Day by day I am expecting the time to arrive for the accomplishment
of my hideous vow. God keep it back! Keep me innocent a little longer!
I write this in a weak moment. There are times when my uncle's wistful
eyes seem turned upon me, full of mute pleading, and the old spirit of
my race stirs up a great passion of hate in my heart. Then the thing
seems easy; I long for a weapon that I may end the struggle, and avenge
the man who looks to me to strike. Her gentle manners and kind words
have no influence. I am adamant. I look across the sea, and I see the
figure of a man, pale and lonely, languishing year by year in a Roman
prison. Then, indeed, my heart is hard and my hand is ready!
But there are other times, such as these, when I loathe myself and the
part I am playing; when an unutterable horror comes upon me, and I see
myself and my purpose in hideous, ghastly colors. It is such a mood that
has driven me to make use of this dumb confidant, that I may confess
what this thing is which has dawned upon me. My cheeks are stained with
shame as I write it. Never could it have passed my lips. Oh! my love, my
love, cursed am I that I love you!
He shall never know it! He thinks me cold and capricious! Let him! It is
my purpose to make him suffer, and he shall suffer! In that I will be
true to my oath; I will make of this weakness a scourge! No one will
know what it costs me! No one will know how sweet to me are the words
which I train my lips to answer with scorn! Never a tender look or word
shall he gain from me; yet this much can I promise myself. No one else
shall ever be dear to me! No other lover will I have save his memory! He
thinks that I dislike him! He shall think so to the end! He shall never
know--never!
I took up a novel this morning, and tried to read, but could not. Ah!
those fools who write about a woman's love--what do they know about it?
Nothing! less than nothing! I, Margharita, am nineteen years old, and I
love! I would die this moment cheerfully, sooner than he should know it!
Yet, though I shall never hear one word of love from his lips, or rest
for one moment in his arms; though I live to be an old woman, I would
starve, beg, die, sooner than give myself to any other man. To have
loved, even though the love be unknown, and to have been loved, even
though it be silently, is sweet to a woman. She can crystallize the
memory in her heart and pass through life sad, perhaps, yet content,
cold and deaf to all other voices. They say that a man is not like this.
Perhaps! A woman's nature is finer than a man's--less passionate, but
more devoted.
To-night, as the dressing bell rang, and I was coming upstairs to change
my gown for dinner, he met me in the hall and offered me--a spray of
white hyacinths! How my fingers shook as I took them! White hyacinths!
If he had only known what he had been doing. White hyacinths! What was
that oath--"Vengeance upon traitors." Does she remember it, I wonder? I
think that she does, for I wore them in the bosom of my dress, and she
turned pale when she glanced at them. She looked at me as though she
were afraid. Does my face remind her of the past, I wonder? She told me
that my features are the features of the Marionis, and I know that I am
like my mother! I am glad of it! I would have my face bring a pang to
her heart every time she looks at it. That is justice!
She looked, as though fascinated, at the bunch of white flowers in my
bosom. I took care to let her know that Lord Lumley had given them to
me. I am never so gracious to him as in her presence.
"By the by, mother," he said, during a pause in the conversation, "I
have noticed that, while you use every other color of hyacinths for
table decorations, you never use any white ones. Why is it?"
She looked at her husband. I saw their eyes meet across the table, and
that look told me how near the past was to their thoughts.
"It is a flower I do not care for, Lumley," she said quietly. "The
perfume is too faint. Besides, they are so suggestive of funerals."
"Perhaps you would prefer my not wearing mine, then," I remarked
carelessly. "I will throw them away."
I saw him bite his lip and frown, and I laughed to myself. Lady St.
Maurice was hesitating.
"I should be sorry for you to do that," she said. "Groves can take them
away until after dinner, if you would not mind."
"They are scarcely worth keeping," I went on, drawing them from my
corsage. "I care nothing for them after all," and opening the window
just behind my chair, I threw them into the darkness.
Lord Lumley came to me in the drawing room afterward.
"It was scarcely kind of you to throw my flowers away," he said, bending
over my chair.
I turned back with my hands clasped behind my head and laughed up at
him.
"Why not? They were nothing to me. It was kind to your mother at any
rate."
Oh! hypocrite! hypocrite! If he could only have seen me a few minutes
before, stealing along in the shadow of the shrubs outside looking about
in the darkness till I had found them, and holding them passionately to
my lips. They were in my pocket then, wrapped in a lace handkerchief.
They are in a secret drawer of my desk now, and there will they remain
forever. I do not mind confessing that they are very precious to me. But
he does not know that.
He turned away offended and left me. But I went to the piano and sang a
wild Neapolitan love song, and when I had finished he was leaning over
me with a deep glow in his pale cheeks and his eyes fixed upon mine.
Does he know how handsome he is, I wonder? Whence did I get the strength
to look into those deep blue eyes, burning with passion, and mock at
him?
"You sing divinely of what you know nothing!" he said.
"Isn't that rather a rash assumption?" I answered lightly. "You are
paying me a poor compliment in taking it for granted that I never had a
lover, Lord Lumley."
"Have you?"
"Oh, yes, heaps!"
"Are you engaged, then?" he asked fiercely.
"How like a man you jump at conclusions!"
"But, are you?"
"Is it your business, Lord Lumley?"
"Yes!"
"Then if you make everybody's love affairs your concern, you must find
plenty to interest you."
"There is only one person in the world in whose love affairs I am
interested."
"Naturally!" I answered. "Whose else should be so interesting as your
own?"
"I did not mean that!" he exclaimed, almost angrily. "You are bandying
words with me."
"On the contrary, it is you who seem bent on mystifying me," I answered,
laughing.
"You shall hear me speak more plainly then."
"I would rather not. Enigmas are so much more interesting. Will you
allow me to pass?"
"Why," he asked, without moving an inch.
"Because, as your mother does not seem to be coming in again, I should
prefer going to my room."
"She is coming in again. I heard her order coffee here in ten minutes."
"I don't want any coffee, and I won't be kept here. Lord Lumley, be so
good as to allow me to pass."
"In one minute, Margharita. I----"
"Lord Lumley, I allow no man to call me by my Christian name without
permission."
"Then give me permission."
"Never!"
"You don't mean that?"
"I do! Lord Lumley, allow me to pass. I will not be kept here against my
will!"
He caught hold of my wrist, but I snatched my hand away.
"Margharita, listen! I love you. Why should you be angry? I want you to
be my wife."
I believe he thought that I was won. I had sunk down upon the music
stool and covered my face with my hands. My bosom was heaving with sobs.
With all my strength I was battling with a strange bewildering
succession of feelings. In reality I was more exquisitely and perfectly
happy than I had ever dreamed of.
I felt his strong hands close over my fingers and remove them one by
one. His head was quite close to mine, and suddenly I felt his mustache
brush my cheek.
I sprang to my feet, wildly, fiercely angry. My eyes were flashing, and
I had drawn myself up until I seemed almost as tall as he was. If he had
dared to kiss me. Oh! if he had dared!
"Let me pass!" I cried passionately. "Let me pass at once, I say."
He fell back immediately. He was half frightened, half puzzled.
"Lord Lumley, I never wish you to speak to me again," I cried, trembling
all over with passionate indignation, and dashing the tears from my
eyes. "I hate you. Do you hear! I hate you!"
He ought to have been abashed, but he was not.
"You have no cause to hate me!" he said proudly. "Surely a man does not
insult a woman by offering her his love, as I have offered you mine. I
scarcely see at least how I have deserved your anger."
Suddenly his voice broke down, and he went on in a very altered tone:
"Oh, Margharita, my love, my love! Give me one word of hope! Tell me at
least that you are not really angry with me."
And then, without a moment's warning, the fire of indignation which had
leaped up to help me suddenly died out. He was standing respectfully
away from me, pale and dignified. His face was full of emotion, and his
hands were trembling; but some instinct seemed to have told him how I
hated his touch, and he did not attempt even to hold my hand. Oh! that
moment, terrible as it was at the time, will be very sweet to think upon
in after days.
My strength had come to an end. I knew that I was in terrible risk of
undoing all that I had done, but I could not help it. That moment seemed
somehow sacred. Although my whole life was itself a lie, I could not
then have looked in his eyes and spoken falsely. If I had let him see my
face, though only for an instant, he would have known my secret; so I
buried it in my hands, and swept from the room before he could stop me.
Am I more happy or more miserable, I wonder, since he has spoken those
words which seem to be ever ringing in my ears? Both, I think! Life is
more intense; it has other depths now besides that well of hate and pity
which has brought me into this household. At any rate, I have felt
emotions to-night which I never dreamed of before.
If only he knew--knew all, how he would scorn, hate, despise me! How he
would hasten to drive me out of his memory, to crush every tender
thought of me, to purge his heart of love for me, to pluck it up by the
roots and cast it away forever! Would he find it an easy task, I wonder?
Perhaps. He loves his mother so much. Why should he not? So far as he is
concerned, she deserves it. She is a good mother, and a good wife. If it
were not for the past I would call her a good woman. Sometimes I wish
that she were not so, that she was still vain and heartless, the same
woman who, for the sake of an alien and a stranger, brought down a
living death upon the man who had trusted her with his most sacred
secrets; and that man the last of the Marionis, my uncle. I think of it,
and coldness steals once more into my heart. What she is now is of no
account. It is the past for which she must suffer.
CHAPTER XXV
AMONG THE PINE TREES
This morning I heard noises about the house quite early and heavy
footsteps in the drive. I was awake--it was only a few minutes since I
had been sitting at the window watching the day break over the sea, and
I had the curiosity to look out. I think that something must have told
me what it meant, for my heart sank even before I had any idea of what
was going on. There were two sailors from Lord Lumley's yacht in the
bay, carrying great hampers down from the house. I guessed it all in a
moment; he was going away.
I put on my dressing-gown and sat down in a low chair to watch. Through
a chink in the blind I could keep it lowered and still see quite
plainly. Presently I saw him appear in his yachting clothes, with
oilskins on his arm. Would he glance up at all, I wondered. Yes; at the
bend in the shrubbery he turned and looked for a full minute up at my
window. It was all I could do to keep from waving him to come back. How
pale he was, and how dejected his walk seemed. My eyes grew dim, and
there was a lump in my throat as he turned and walked away. Would it
have made any difference, I wonder, if he had known of my being there;
if he could have seen my poor, sad, tear-stained face? I think that it
would.
He has gone. I have seen the last of him. Am I glad or sorry, I wonder.
Glad that my task has become so much easier, or sorry for my own
unreasoning, selfish sake. Why should I be a hypocrite? These pages are
to be the mirror of my heart. To others my whole life is a lie. I write
here so that I may retain some faint knowledge of what truth really is.
I am sorry--desperately, foolishly sorry. I know that my cheeks are
leaden, and my heart is heavy. There is no light in the day; none of
that swift, keen struggling with myself which his presence always
imposed. He is gone, and I miss them; I should have laughed a few short
days ago to have believed this true. But it is true!
The first bell has gone, and I have drawn up my blind. The promise of
that blood-red sunrise has been fulfilled. I wish that he had waited
another day. I have an idea that there is going to be a storm. There is
a pale yellow light in the sky which I do not like, and, as far as one
can see, the waves are crested with white foam. It is an ugly sea and an
ugly sky. I wish that I were going with him, and that a storm might come
and we might die together. I would not mind his holding me in his arms
then. We would die like that, and death would be joy.
At breakfast I was able to take the news of his departure without making
any sign. I fancy that Lady St. Maurice was watching me when she made
the announcement. If she was expecting to read my thoughts and fears she
was disappointed. She could have seen nothing but the most utter
indifference. I felt that my mask was perfect.
But as the day wore on my task grew harder. The wind, which had been
blowing hard all the morning, became a hurricane, and even in the house,
with closed doors and windows, we could hear the far-off thunder of the
sea sweeping in against the cliffs. Every one in the household became
strangely restless and anxious. Lord St. Maurice, with a field glass
under his arm, went out upon the cliffs, and he returned hatless and
with his coat ripped up, shaking his head with ill-affected
cheerfulness. There was no sign of the _Stormy Petrel_.
"Lumley would make for Yarmouth harbor directly he saw this beast of a
gale blowing up," he declared, walking up and down the morning room with
troubled face. "He is a little careless, but he is an excellent sailor,
and he must have seen that there was dirty weather brewing. It isn't as
though it were a sudden squall, you know, or anything of that sort.
There was plenty of warning. All the same, I wish he hadn't started. It
was very foolish, and I don't like such whims. I didn't hear him say
anything about a cruise yesterday. Did you, Adrienne?"
Was it my fancy, or did Lady St. Maurice indeed glance at me as she
answered:
"No, I heard nothing. Late last night he came to my room and told me
that he had given Groves some orders, and that he should leave quite
early this morning."
Lord St. Maurice frowned.
"It is most extraordinary," he said. "He gave you no reason whatever,
then?"
"None!"
"Did he say where he was going to? We were shooting together all
yesterday afternoon, and he said not a word about going away. On the
contrary, he arranged to go to Norwich on Thursday to look at some
horses."
The Countess shook her head.
"I know no more than you do, Geoffrey. I asked him where he was going,
and he did not seem at all sure. He said that he would write if he
remained away more than a day or two. You know how uncertain he is."
"It is very inconsiderate of him," Lord St. Maurice declared, leaving
the room abruptly. "I am surprised at Lumley."
Lady St. Maurice and I were alone. She was pretending to read and I to
work. So far as she was concerned, I could see that it was a pretence,
for she held her book upside down, and for my part, I did not make a
correct stitch. I knew that I ought to have been calm, that I was
imperiling my secret every moment. When at last she spoke to me, I made
a great effort to control my tone.
"Lord Lumley said nothing to you, I suppose, Margharita, about going
away?"
"Nothing whatever," I answered quietly. "He would be scarcely likely to
mention his plans to me and not to you or Lord St. Maurice."
I was forced to look up, and I met her eyes fixed upon me with a look
which I had seen there once or twice before. It was almost a look of
fear, as though she saw in my face something which aroused a host of
sad, dimly-veiled memories. Was she wondering whether the presence of a
Marioni in her house boded ill-fortune to herself and those who were
dear to her? It may have been so.
She did not answer immediately, and I took advantage of the pause to
leave the room. I could not bear to talk to her.
Ought I not to have been glad at all this--to have watched her pale,
suffering face with satisfaction, and even with inward joy. Was she not
in trouble greater than any I could bring upon her, and, indeed, had I
not had a hand in it? Was it not I who had driven her son out into this
danger? Should I not have rejoiced? Alas! alas! how could I, when my own
heart was beating fast in a very agony of sickening fear.
My little pupil was away for the day--gone to play with the clergyman's
children down in the village, and my time was my own. I was thankful,
for I could not possibly have forced myself into the wearisome routine
of lesson hearing and teaching. Solitude was my only relief.
The day wore on. Servants had been sent to every point along the coast,
and the harbor master at Yarmouth had been telegraphed to every hour. I
stood by my window, looking out in the fast gathering twilight, until I
could bear it no longer. Dashing the tears from my face, I caught up a
thick cloak, and running softly down the back stairs, left the house
unobserved.
At first I could scarcely stand, and, indeed, as I turned the corner of
the avenue and faced the sea, a gust of wind carried me off from my
feet, and I had to cling to the low iron railings for support. The
thunder of the storm and the waves seemed to shake the air around me.
The sky was dark and riven with faint flashes of stormlight, which
slanted down to the sea. By hard struggling I managed to make my way on
to the cliffs, and stood there, looking downward, with my arm passed
round a tall fir sapling for support. What a night it was! The spray of
the waves breaking against the cliff leaped up into my face mingled with
the blinding rain, and dimmed my vision so that I could only catch a
faint view of the boiling, seething gulf below. Beyond, all was chaos;
for a gray haze floated upon the water and met the low hanging clouds.
And clear above the deep thunder of the sea came the shrill yelling of
the wind in the pine groves which fringed the cliffs, sounding like the
demoniacal laughter of an army of devils. Shall I ever forget the horror
of that day, I wonder! I think not! It is written upon a page of my
memory in characters over which time can have no power.
And in that moment of agony, when my thoughts were full of his peril, I
wrestled no longer with my secret; I knew that I loved him. I knew that
he was dear to me as no other man could be. I knew that I was face to
face with a misery unchanging and unending.
Were not the fates themselves fighting against me in my task? That it
should be, of all men upon this earth, he, the son of the woman whose
death would be at my door. A murderess! Should I be that! The wind
caught up the word which had burst from my pale lips, and I seemed to
hear it echoed with fiendish mirth among the bending tree tops of the
plantation. A murderess! and of his mother, the mother whom he loved so
fondly! If he should know it! If the day should come when my sin should
be laid bare, and he should know that he had given his love to such a
one. Sin! Was it a sin? Was my love turning the whole world upside down?
Had it seemed so to me before? Was it sin or justice! Oh! to whom should
I look for strength to hold me to my purpose. To pray would be
blasphemous. For me there was no God, no friend on earth, no heaven! I
could only think of that one shattered life, and hug it to my memory.
I wandered backward and forward in the storm, drenched and cold, yet all
unmindful of my state. I could have borne no roof over my head in those
hours of my agony. The thought of his danger maddened me. Even though I
knew so well that he could be nothing to me; that if he knew the truth,
he would loathe me; that soon the day would come when I should scarcely
dare to raise my eyes to his before we parted forever. All these things
seemed to make me long the more passionately to look once more into his
face, to know that he was safe. It was my fault that he was in this
danger. Horrible thought!
I was exhausted; worn out in body and mind by the sickening fears which
no effort of will seemed able to quell. Even my limbs at last gave way
beneath me, and I sank upon my knees, holding my face in my hands. Had
the edge of the cliff been a little nearer, could I have done it without
any physical effort, I had been content to close my eyes, and throw
myself into the sea. If there are no joys in death, at least there is
rest.
Then a voice came to me.
"Margharita!"
I leaped up from the wet ground with wildly-beating heart. Was it some
mocking trick of the storm--that voice in my ears, that dear, dear
voice? My eyes seemed dilated, and through the deep gloom I saw a tall
figure striding toward me. Then I know that I cried out and called to
him by his name; and alas! by the tone of my voice, and the light that
flashed into my face, my secret was gone! For evil or for good he knew
then that I loved him!
CHAPTER XXVI
STORMS
There came a time then of blessed and grateful unconsciousness. The
tumult of the storm was reduced to a mere singing in my ears, and
darkness seemed to have closed in around me. When I opened my eyes, I
was resting in his arms, and a delicious sense of happiness was stealing
through me. Sensation had overpowered memory, and I was happy. Ah! if
life could have ended then--that was how I felt. If only the future and
that shrunken relentless figure pointing me on to tragedy--if only they
could have melted away! Alas! alas!
He had become bold at my mute self-yielding, and at something which he
must have seen in my face. I felt him bending down over me, and suddenly
my lips partly opened to frame the feeblest of protests were closed in a
long passionate kiss, and his arms drew me toward him. Still I made no
effort to release myself. A desperate self-abandonment had crept in upon
me. The happiness of that moment should recompense me for the misery to
come. Time took to itself wings then; I had no power or will to measure
it. If hell itself had been yawning at my feet, I was content.
It was he who spoke at last, still clasping my hands, and looking
eagerly into my face.
"Margharita, my love, I have come back to you. How shall I bless this
storm!"
"Have you been in danger?" I asked softly.
"Nothing to speak of," he laughed. "We ran for Yarmouth harbor directly
we saw what was coming, and only lost a few spars. What a sea it was,
though. Wave after wave broke over our bows and swept the deck. It was a
miracle we lost no men."
"And how is it that you are home so quickly?"
"I took the first train from Yarmouth, and wired for a special from the
junction. I knew that my mother would be anxious, and they told me that
there was very little chance of telegrams being delivered safely; so
much damage had been done to the wires."
"You thought of no one but your mother?" I whispered, a little
reproachfully.
"My darling! how was I to know that any one else cared?"
"Ah!"
The sense of relief in my heart was over-powering, I seemed to have no
desire for speech. The sound of his voice was like music to me, and I
preferred to listen.
"It seems to me that I have had no thought save of you, Margharita," he
went on slowly. "In all that storm, when flying clouds and spray and
driving rain shut us in on every side, I thought of nothing else save of
you. No one knows the boat so well as I, and for the last four hours I
was lashed to a board, steering. Margharita, all that time, and all the
time I stood on the bridge, I seemed to see you always. Sometimes it was
the mist of rain and spray which opened to let you through; and
sometimes--sometimes I almost fancied that you were by my side. Think of
you, Margharita! Why, I was a haunted man. In all that thunder of sea
and wind, when I had to use a speaking trumpet to make my men hear me a
few yards away, I could only hear your voice in my ears as distinctly as
you hear me now. They say that when one is in danger, or near death,
that the imagination is quickened. It must have been so with me, for
your presence and the sound of your voice were very real to me."
"How did you find me here?" I asked.
"Well, as soon as I could decently get away from my people, I asked for
you. They sent to your room, and could not find you. Then one of the
servants thought that she had seen you leave the house and come this
way. So I started off in search."
"It was foolish of me to come out. I could not rest indoors."
"Why?" eagerly.
"The storm was so dreadful."
"And so you came out into it. A bad reason. Was there no other?"
"I was anxious, too, I think. I wanted to see what the sea looked like."
"Why were you anxious; what about?"
"Somebody was in danger."
"My darling!"
His lips met mine again. My strength seemed altogether gone. I made no
effort to escape.
"I didn't say who 'somebody' was," I protested weakly.
He laughed gaily.
"But I know."
"Sure?"
"Quite sure."
"I may have relatives who are sailors."
"You may have, but you haven't."
I considered for a moment.
"It was purely a matter of responsibility, you know. I felt that I had
something to do with your going away. I was disagreeable last night, and
you were offended. See?"
"Not a bit."
"You are very stupid."
"I am not now; I was last night."
"What do you mean?"
"I will answer you by asking a question. Will you promise to reply to
it?"
"_Cela dépend._ I won't be rash."
"Do you care for me--just a little?" he asked, tenderly but hopefully.
Oh, horrible! A vision seemed to float suddenly before my eyes. The
darkness faded away, to be replaced by a little whitewashed chamber in a
distant land. I saw an old man dying, with his eyes fixed upon me full
of mute reproach, his trembling fingers pointed at me with scorn, and
his lips framing a feeble curse. Suddenly his look changed, his arm
fell, his face grew suddenly bright and joyful, and the curse changed
into a fervent blessing. Then the room widened, and the little figure
under that spotless coverlet faded away. It was a chamber in a palace,
and I saw Lady St. Maurice, also on her death-bed. Her husband and her
son knelt by her side with bared heads, and the air was laden and heavy
with the sound of their sobs. She alone did not weep, and her pale,
spiritualized face glowed like the face of a martyred saint. And as I
watched I seemed to hear one word constantly escaping from those who
watched by her side, and caught up and echoed a thousand times by the
sad wailing wind until it rang in my ears unceasingly--and the word was
"Murderess!"
It passed away--vanished in a phantom of mist, like some weird morbid
fancy, but the joy of those last few minutes was quenched. I drew myself
from his arms, and pressed my hand to my side. There was a sharp pain
there.
"We must go back to the house," I said. "I have been a little mad, I
think, and I am very wet."
He looked at me, amazed.
"Won't you answer my question first?" he pleaded. "Margharita, make me
very happy. Be my wife."
His wife. Oh, the grim grotesque agony of it all. My strength would
never be sufficient to carry me through all this. My heart was faint,
and my speech was low; yet it was as cold and resolute as I could make
it.
"Never! never! I would sooner die than that. Let us go back at once--at
once!"
He caught me by the wrist, and forced me to look into his face. It was
unwise of him to touch me against my will, for the fire flashed into my
eyes, and my anger gave me strength.
"Margharita, what does this mean? You do care for a me a little, don't
you?"
"No!"
I lied, God knows, and all in vain.
"Perhaps not so very much now," he said, with a little sigh, "but you
will some day. I know that you will. Be generous, Margharita, give me a
little hope."
I laid my hand upon his arm. How could I convince him. Anger, lies,
reasoning, all seemed so weak and ineffective; and he was so
strong--strong in his own love, strong unconsciously in mine.
"Lord Lumley, I can only give you one answer, and that is--'No.' Nothing
can change me. I would sooner throw myself from these cliffs than become
your wife."
He considered for a moment, while I watched him anxiously.
"I have a right to know your reason for that speech," he said in a low
but firm tone. "Give me your hands for one moment, Margharita--so! Now,
look me in the eyes, and tell me that you do not care for me!"
I was a fool to try. I might have known that, after all I had passed
through that day, it was beyond my strength. I got as far as the first
three words, and then I burst into tears. His whole face lit up with joy
at my failure.
"I am satisfied!" he said, drawing my hand through his arm. "Come! we
will go back to the house. I must not have you catch cold!"
He spoke with an air of fond proprietorship which made my heart tremble,
but I had no more words left with which to fight my battle. My strength
was gone; I did not even try to withdraw my hand.
We walked away, and I did my best to choke the hysterical sobs which
threatened me. Directly we left the shelter of the pine grove, speech
became impossible. We had to fight our way along, step by step, with the
wind and rain beating in our faces. I was thankful for it, for the
physical effort seemed to stimulate and calm me.
When at last we reached the house and stood inside the hall, he turned
to me and spoke for the first time.
"That walk was quite an event, wasn't it? Let me feel how wet you are."
He ran his fingers down my arm and back, and then rang the hall bell
violently.
"You are wet through," he said gravely. "And it is my fault. Instead of
bringing you home at once, as I ought to have done, I kept you out there
talking. Run upstairs at once, Margharita, please, and change all your
things. I will send up hot water."
He had been hurrying me to the stairs all the time, and I began slowly
to ascend them. He stood down in the white stone hall, watching me
anxiously.
"You won't be long, will you?" he said, as I reached the corner. "I want
to talk to you before dinner."
I answered him mechanically, and turning away, went along the corridor
to my room, and flung myself upon the bed. I had scarcely been there
five minutes when there was a knock at the door.
"Who is there?" I asked, sitting up and hastily drying my eyes.
A servant's voice answered, and I recognized Cecile, the Countess's own
maid.
"Her ladyship has sent you a cup of tea, miss, and hopes you will be
sure to change all your clothes. There is a letter for you, too, miss."
I bade the girl come in and put the tea down. When she had gone, I
stretched out my hand, and took up the letter with trembling fingers. It
was from my uncle, and the postmark was Rome.
CHAPTER XXVII
A LIFE IN THE BALANCE
I suppose it is absurd to talk about presentiments, and yet I knew what
was in that letter. As plainly as though I saw it written up in
characters of fire, I knew its contents and my doom. The climax of all
things was at hand. The time was approaching when I must keep my vow, or
confess myself foresworn--an unworthy daughter of the Marionis. It was a
bitter choice, for there was a life in either balance; the life of this
traitress of five-and-twenty years ago, or of an old man sick to the
heart with disappointment; deceived by a woman in his youth, and a woman
again in his old age.
I bathed my eyes and face, and, throwing off my wet things, wrapped
myself in a dressing robe. Then I poured out a cup of tea and drank it
over the fire. All the while that letter lay before me on the tray, face
upward, and my eyes kept straying unwillingly toward it. It had a sort
of fascination for me, and in the end it conquered. I had meant to give
myself a few hours' more freedom--to have put it away until bedtime, but
a sudden impulse came to me, and I yielded. I caught it up with firm
fingers and tore it open.
* * * * *
"PALEZZO CARLOTTI, ROME.
"MARGHARITA,--Beloved. Success! success! My search is over, my purpose
is accomplished. I have found Paschuli. Enclosed in this letter you will
find a smaller envelope. It contains the powder.
"Can you wonder that my hand is shaking, and that there is a mist before
my eyes! I am an old man, and great joy is hard to bear; harder still
after a weary, wretched life such as mine. You will understand,
though--you will be able to decipher this faint, uncertain handwriting,
and you will forgive me if it tires you. Ay, you will do that,
Margharita, I know!
"Let me tell you how I found him. It was by the purest accident. I
turned aside into an old curio shop to buy some trifle for you which
took my fancy, and it was Paschuli himself who served me. Thus you see
how indirectly even your star always shines over mine and leads me
aright. If it had not been for you I should never have dreamed of
entering the place, but I thought of you and your taste for Roman
jewelry, and behold, I found myself in the presence of the man for whom
I was making vain search. My Margharita! my good angel! I have you to
thank even for the successful accomplishment of my part in that edict of
our Order which you and I are banded together to carry out.
"At first, Paschuli did not recognize me, and it was long before I could
make him believe that I was indeed that most unfortunate of men,
Leonardo di Marioni. But when he was convinced, he promised me what I
sought. That same evening he gave it to me.
"Margharita, there is no poison in the world like that which I send you
in this letter. The merest grain of it is sufficient, in wine or water,
or food of any sort. There is no art of medicine which could detect
it--no means by which the death, which will surely follow, can be
averted; so you run no risk, my child! Bide your time, and then--then!
"Margharita, I am coming to you. Nay, do not be alarmed, I run no risk.
I shall come disguised, and no one will know me, but I must see
something of the end with my own eyes, or half its sweetness would be
untasted. I would see her face and die! I would trace, day by day, the
workings of the poison; and in the last moments of her agony I would
reveal myself, and would point to my withered frame and the hand of
death upon my forehead, and cry out to her that the Order of the White
Hyacinth had kept its vow. I would have her eyes meet mine as the mists
of death closed in upon her. I would have her know that the oath of a
Marioni, in friendship or in hate, in protection or in vengeance, is one
with his honor. This may not be, Margharita! I cannot see all this! I
cannot even stand by her bedside for a moment and show her my face, that
she might know whose hand it is which has stricken her down. Yet, I must
be near! Fear not but that I shall manage it safely! I would not bring
danger or the shadow of danger upon you, my beloved.
"I leave Rome to-night, and I leave it with joy. You cannot imagine how
inexpressibly sad it has been for me to find myself in the place where
the greater part of my youth--my too ambitious youth was spent. All is
changed and strange to me. There are new streets and many innovations
which puzzle me; and although my friends are kind, twenty-five years
have crushed our sympathies. To them I am like a sad figure from a
bygone world, a Banquo at the feast, something to pity a little--no
more. I am nothing to anybody beyond that. I am a wearisome old man,
whose mind is a blank, and who only cumbers the way. Ah, well, it is not
for long. The day of my desire is at hand, and God has given me you,
Margharita, to accomplish it, and to close my eyes in peace. Bless you,
my dear, dear child! You have sweetened the end of a marred and wretched
life! Yours has been an angel's task, and you will have an angel's
reward."
"We shall meet before long, but of the manner of our meeting I cannot
tell you yet. Till then adieu!--Yours in hope,
"LEONARDO DI MARIONI.
"P. S.--I forgot to say that the whole of the poison, or even half a
teaspoonful, would produce sudden and abrupt death. Just a pinch,
administered twice, perhaps, in order to be quite secure, would be
sufficient."
* * * * *
Enclosed in the letter was the oblong envelope he spoke of, which I
carefully opened. It contained only a small quantity of pale pink
powder, which emitted a faint pungent odor. I locked it up in my desk,
and destroyed the letter.
All my strength had returned. I felt myself free from the madness of
this overmastering love. Another passion for the moment had taken its
place. The vision of that old man, wandering about the streets of Rome,
with a sad, weary heart and tottering limbs out of touch with the times,
a figure for a half-contemptuous pity; that is the picture which I saw
steadily before me to nerve my heart and purpose, and well it succeeded.
The second bell roused me from my thoughts. I hastily rose from my
chair, and attired myself in the plainest gown which I possessed. I
unlocked my desk, and thrust the little packet into my pocket. Then,
without jewelry or flowers, and with my hair plainly coiled upon my
head, I went downstairs.
They had commenced dinner when I arrived, and Lord Lumley glanced
reproachfully at me as I took my seat. From the sudden silence directly
I entered, I imagined they had been talking of me, and I made my excuses
with a momentary nervousness. There was something unusual in the air. It
seemed to me that Lady St. Maurice was regarding me with a new and
kindly interest. She said nothing, as I had dreaded she would, of my
long absence from the house, and Lord St. Maurice, with a courtesy
unusual even for him, rose when I entered, and motioning the butler
away, himself held my chair. What did it all mean? At another time I
might have wondered more, but just then there were other thoughts in my
mind. Should I have an opportunity to commit my crime that night? I
feared not.
I gave no one any chance for sentimental conversation during dinner
time, for I talked more than usual, and in a lighter vein. I wanted
nothing said which could bring back to my memory that wild scene on the
cliffs, or the hours of agony which I had been through. All such things
were of the past. I desired to be able to look back upon them as upon
some strange night-dream--fair enough of itself, but gone with the first
breath of morning. To my relief, the others, too, avoided the subject.
There was nothing said about Lord Lumley's escape which even bordered
upon the pathetic.
Dinner, which seemed to me to last longer than usual, came to an end at
last. I had planned to make some excuse to the Countess, and leave the
drawing-room before Lord Lumley could follow, but, as I had half
expected that he might, Lord Lumley accompanied us there without waiting
to smoke. To my surprise, Lady St. Maurice, before I could frame an
excuse to her for my own departure, left us alone. Lord Lumley held the
door open for her, and it seemed to me that a meaning glance passed
between them. It was beyond my understanding. I could only see that my
plans were frustrated, and that I must prepare for another struggle.
He shut the door carefully, and then came back and stood over me. I
looked at him calmly. How could he read the agony in my heart.
"I am waiting for my answer, Margharita!" he said simply.
"You have had the only answer which I can ever give you, Lord Lumley! I
answered--'No!'"
Then he did a thing which sounds very absurd, but which did not indeed
seem so. He sank on one knee and took possession of my hand. I was on a
low chair, and his face now was on a level with mine.
"Margharita, my love," he whispered, "'no' is an answer which I shall
never take. Yesterday I went away and left you, to-day I am wiser.
Nothing can undo those few minutes on the cliffs, dearest. You love me!
Ah! you cannot deny it! Have I not read it in your face, and in your
eyes? Take back your 'no,' Margharita. By the memory of those few
minutes, you are mine forever! You have not the power or the right to
deny yourself to me. You are mine! You belong to me!"
I shrank back. I began to be frightened at his earnestness--at the note
of triumph in his voice. How strong and masterful he was. Should I be
able to hold out against him? Only my will and the memory of a wasted
life against my heart and such pleading as this. It was a hard, unequal
battle.
"Margharita, I love you all the more that you are not lightly won!" he
continued, drawing me closer to him--almost into his arms. "Listen! I
believe that I have some idea as to the reason of your answer. You
think, perhaps, that my people might not be willing. You are proud--too
proud. Tell me, is this not so?"
"A governess is no fitting wife for you. You should choose one from
among the noble women of your country. I----"
He interrupted me. If I had not drawn back quickly he would have stopped
my lips with a kiss.
"No one in this world could be as fit as you, for it is you, and you
only, whom I love. But listen! I have spoken to my mother. I have told
her."
"You have told her what?" I cried.
"That I love you. That I have asked you to be my wife."
"What did she say?"
"What a true woman and good mother should say; that if you were indeed
my choice, then she was ready to welcome you as her daughter, and my
wife."
"You cannot mean it!" I cried. "She knows nothing of me, and I am
penniless."
"She knows that I love you, and that would be sufficient, dearest. But,
as it happens, she knew more about you than I did. From her I learned,
for the first time, that your mother came from a family which was great
and noble before ours was ever founded. She told me a sad story of your
uncle, Margharita, which you, too, doubtless know of, and she seemed
glad to think that our marriage would be, in a certain sense, an act of
poetic justice. She told me, too, Margharita, that if your uncle died
unmarried, you could, if you chose, take his name and call yourself the
Countess di Marioni. Why, sweetheart, I am not sure that I ought to
aspire to the hand of so great a lady."
"Your mother, the Countess of St. Maurice, told you all this? She
desires our marriage? She knows what you are asking me?" I repeated
breathlessly.
"Most certainly! Shall I call her? She will tell you so herself."
"Do not speak to me for a moment, please."
I was an idiot, but I could not help it. I buried my head in the sofa
cushion, and sobbed. Everything seemed fighting against me, to make my
purpose more difficult.
I think that tears have a softening effect. I had steeled my heart
against my lover, and yet he conquered. I felt his strong arms around
me, and his lips were pressed against my wet cheeks. Oh! for strength to
thrust him from me--to deny my love, but I could not.
Why should I try to recall his words? Nay! if I could, I would not set
them down here! I felt every fiber of my nature glowing with delight as
I listened; every chord seemed quivering with heart-stirring music. I
had given up all idea of resistance. A strange drowsy peace had stolen
in upon me. One of his arms was around my waist, and my hand was
imprisoned in his. So we sat, and the moments became golden.
Interruption came at last. The door opened, and Lady St. Maurice
entered. My lover rose at once, still holding my hand.
"Mother," he said, "Margharita has made me very happy. Will you speak to
her?"
She came to us, and bent over me, her face looking very soft and sweet
in the shaded light. In another moment she would have kissed me. I
sprang to my feet, pale with horror.
"No, no, it cannot be!" I cried. "I am not fit to be his wife--to be
anybody's wife! Lady St. Maurice, will you not tell him so for me? Let
me go away!"
She looked surprised at my agitation, but she little guessed its cause.
How was she to know anything of that little packet which seemed to be
burning a hole in my heart?
"No! I will not tell him that!" she said, smiling. "He loves you, and I
believe that you are worthy of his love. That is quite sufficient. I
shall be glad to have you for a daughter, Margharita."
Lord Lumley thanked her with a look, and took her hand. They stood
together on the hearthrug, and I was on the other side facing the
window. Suddenly my heart gave a great leap, and the color died out of
my face. Pressed against the dark pane I could see a pale, white face
watching us. It was the face of my uncle, Count di Marioni.
I stood swaying backward and forward for a moment, sick and dizzy with
the horror of it. My eyes grew dim, and a mist seemed to fill the room.
Then I felt myself sink back into my lover's arms, and memory became a
blank. I had fainted.
CHAPTER XXVIII
ONE DAY'S RESPITE
The sun has risen upon the last day which I shall spend on earth; and I
sit down calmly to write all that happened to me yesterday, and my
reason for the step which I am about to take.
It is a fair still morning, and the birds are singing gaily in the
grove. My window is open, and the early freshness of the autumnal air is
filling the room. For hours I have been on my bed there, hot and
restless, praying for the dawn, that I might carry out my purpose; and
as soon as the first faint gleam of light in the east broke through the
dark night clouds, I arose and bathed my eyes and sat down here to wait.
I have watched the sun rise up from the ocean, slowly gathering strength
until its first quivering beams glanced across the dull gray sea, and
even penetrated into my chamber. And with the dawn has come peace. I sit
here calm and prepared for the trial to come.
It was the evening before yesterday when I saw my uncle's face pressed
against the window pane, and fainted with the shock. Early on the
following morning a note from him was brought up to me, having been left
by a messenger from the village. Here it is:--
* * * * *
"MY BELOVED MARGHARITA,--Many a time have I reproached myself for my
imprudence last night, and the effects which I fear it had upon you. It
was thoughtless and rash of me to come near the house at all; but,
indeed, I meant only to watch from a safe distance; only, as I crouched
behind a shrub upon the lawn, I saw her face, and the sight drew me
nearer against my better judgment. I met your eyes, and I knew that you
were overcome with fright; but I feared to linger lest they might ask
what it was that alarmed you, and seek for me. And although I fancy that
I am altered past recognition, yet I would run no risks.
"I, too, had a great surprise, Margharita. You will not wonder what I
mean by that when I tell you that in the light which streamed from the
uncurtained window everything in the room was distinctly visible to me.
Was I dreaming, child, or were you indeed assenting to the embrace of
the man whose arms were surely around you? Him, I could not see, for his
back was turned to the window; but will you laugh at me, I wonder, if I
tell you that I felt strangely jealous of him. I am a foolish old man,
Margharita, but all the love of my heart is yours, and I had begun
almost to look upon you--in my thoughts--as my own child. I cannot bear
the thought of giving you up to any one. You will not think me very,
very selfish. I have only a few more months to live, and I know that you
will not grudge that much out of your future, that you will stay by me
to the end. Afterwards, I have no wish save for your happiness; and
although I must confess that I had hoped you might have married one of
the sons of our own country, still it is you who must choose, and I owe
you, or shall owe you soon, too great a debt to press upon you any
desire of mine which is not at one with your wishes. But tell me
this--Is he an Englishman? Alas! I fear so. Send me a word by the
bearer, and tell me; tell me, too, of what family he is, and whether he
is noble. But of that I feel already assured, if he be indeed the man to
whom your love is given.
"You must surely have sustained a shock at my sudden and rash
appearance. Doubtless you wonder at seeing me here at all. I could not
keep away. I must have news day by day, almost hour by hour. It is all
that keeps me alive. I must be near to feel that I am breathing the same
air as the woman on whom a long-delayed vengeance is about to fall.
"I have taken a furnished cottage on the outskirts of this village, and
a little more than a mile from Mallory Grange. But do not come to me.
Dearly as I would love to have you talk to me, and hear from your own
lips that all goes well, yet at present it were better not. I will
devise some means of communication, and let you know of it shortly. I am
living here as Mr. Angus.--Yours ever,
"L. M."
* * * * *
I folded up this letter with a shudder, and sitting down dashed off my
reply. It is here:--
* * * * *
"MY DEAR UNCLE,--I am a culprit--a miserable, pleading culprit. It is
true that I love an Englishman--the man who was standing by my side last
night; and it is true that he has asked me to marry him. But I have not
told him so, and I have not promised to marry him. That is not all of my
confession. Not only is he an Englishman, but his name is Lord Lumley
St. Maurice, and he is--her son.
"Now you know the terrible trouble I am in. Last night he was telling me
of his love, and assuring me of his mother's sanction and approval, when
your face appeared at the window. Can you wonder at my start, and that I
fainted? Can you wonder that I sit here, after a sleepless night, with
eyes that are dim and a heart that has become a stone? I dread to stir
from the room. My position is horrible. I have tried my utmost to avoid
him, to treat him with disdain, to send him away from me. I have steeled
my heart and clothed my face with frowns--in vain! The bald fact remains
that I love him. Do you despise me, uncle? Sometimes I feel that I
deserve it; but I have suffered, I am suffering now. I am punished. Do
not add your anger to my load!
"Immediately you get this, sit down and write to me. Write to me just
what is in your heart. Your words I shall set before me as my law. Do
not delay, and, if you blame, do not fail to pity me.--Yours ever
unchanged,
"MARGHARITA."
* * * * *
I sent this letter off with a certain sense of relief, and then, finding
by my watch that it was late, finished dressing hastily, and went down
into the schoolroom. Instead of my pupil, Lord Lumley was there lounging
in my low basket-chair, yawning over a German grammar. He sprang up as I
entered, and throwing the book into a corner of the room, advanced
toward me with outstretched hands.
"Margharita, you are better, dear? I have been waiting here more than an
hour for you."
Then, before I could prevent him, he had kissed me. Let me be honest,
though, here, at any rate. Did I really try to prevent him? I think not.
"Where is Gracie?" I asked, looking round. "And what have you done to my
_Ottos_?"
"Gracie has gone out with the nurse," he answered, laughing, "and as for
that wretched volume, well, I've got a good mind to send the rest after
it. You've a nasty brain-worrying lot of lesson books here. I've been
looking through them."
"One cannot teach without them. Elementary books always look tiresome,
but they are indispensable."
"Not for you any longer, I'm glad to say," he remarked.
"Why not?"
He looked at me, surprised.
"Surely you don't expect to go on teaching that child?" he asked. "You
are a visitor here now, and I am responsible for your entertainment. To
commence with, I have invited myself to breakfast with you. The tray is
here, as you perceive, and the kettle is boiling. Kindly make the tea."
I did as I was bid, with a meekness which astonished myself, and he sat
opposite to me. The servant brought in the remainder of the things, and
closed the door. Gracie was not coming.
"Well, how do you like the first item in my programme?" he asked, taking
my hand for a moment between his. "A _tête-à-tête_ breakfast was not a
bad idea, was it?"
"Does Lady St. Maurice know?" I asked, suddenly conscious of the utter
impropriety of what we were doing.
He laughed reassuringly.
"Of course she does, sweetheart. In fact, she as good as suggested it.
She thinks you feel a little strange about it all, and that a long,
quiet day alone with me would help you to realize matters. Accordingly,
I am having a luncheon basket packed, and after breakfast we are going
for a sail, just you and I. You see the sea is as calm as a duck pond
this morning. Shall you like it, do you think?"
Like it! Oh! how long was this mockery to go on! How long before I could
find strength to tell him the truth--that this thing could never be! I
tried to tell him then, but the words died away upon my lips. I would
give myself one more day. After that there must be action of some sort
or other. My uncle's reply would have come, and I should know exactly
what lay before me.
"I should like it, yes," I answered, looking into my lover's handsome,
glowing face. "You are sure that your mother will not mind--that she
approves?"
"Quite," he answered confidently. "We talked it over together for some
time. To-night I am going to speak to my father. He has an inkling of it
already, but he will expect me to tell him. Dearest, there is nothing to
be frightened about. Why should you tremble so? You are not well?"
"I shall be better out of doors," I answered faintly. "I will get my
hat, and we will start."
He rose up at once, and opened the door for me.
"Do. There must be a little pink coloring in those cheeks before we get
back," he said fondly.
"Let us meet at the boat-house in a quarter of an hour. Shall you be
ready by then?"
"Yes," I answered. "I will be there."
CHAPTER XXIX
THERE IS DEATH BEFORE US
I did not give myself time to think. I had made up my mind with a sort
of desperate determination that this day should be my very own, my own
to spend in paradise, without scruples or after thought. In a few
minutes my black dress was changed for a navy blue one and a straw hat,
and I was hurrying down to the beach. Our boat, a dainty little skiff,
only large enough for two, was ready when I got there, and Lord Lumley
was standing up unfurling the sail.
I settled myself down comfortably in the cushioned seat, and we were off
almost at once, gliding over the smooth surface of the water with a
scarcely perceptible motion. We were about a quarter of a mile from the
shore when we met Lord Lumley's yacht, rounding the point on her way
back from Yarmouth. Lord Lumley stood up in the bows and hailed her.
"All well, Dyson?" he cried, as she swept past.
"All well, my Lord!" was the prompt reply.
"Is the breeze stiffening, do you think? It's calm enough here, but I
see the white horses are showing their heads outside the bay."
"Ay! ay! my Lord, it's blowing hard round the headland. You'll have to
keep her well away. Shall we take you up?"
Lord Lumley shook his head.
"You would not prefer the yacht?" he asked, turning to me.
"I like this best," I answered. "It is more exciting."
"We'll stick to the skiff, Dyson," Lord Lumley called out.
The man looked doubtful; but while he hesitated, we shot far ahead, so
that his voice only reached us faintly.
"There's a heavy sea running, my Lord, and it'll blow great guns before
night."
"Are you nervous, Margharita?" he asked tenderly.
"Not in the least," I answered, carelessly wiping the spray from my
face. "I like it, and hope it will be rougher."
"Can't say that I do," he laughed. "What a plucky girl you are. Now that
we're in a quieter sea, I think that I may venture to come and talk to
you."
So he came and sat by my side. It is not my purpose to set down all that
passed between us that day. There are pages in our lives which we never
willingly open; which have for us a peculiar sacredness, and a sweetness
which never altogether fades away. There came a sort of abandon upon me,
the forerunner of a fit of nervous desperation which well-nigh sent us
both, hand in hand, into another world--closed the gates of my memory
upon the past, and withdrew my shuddering thoughts from the future, to
steep them in the delight of the present. My lover sat by my side, and
his words were filling my heart with music. The strong sea breeze blew
in our faces, and the salt spray leaped like glittering silver into the
sunlight. Over our heads the sea-gulls screamed, and the coast line grew
faint in the distance. So we sailed on, hand in hand, heart whispering
to heart in the golden silence, till the sun lay low in the west, and
our tiny craft pitched and tossed in the trough of the ocean waves.
Then my lover suddenly became conscious of time and place, and he sprang
up bewildered.
"A miracle!" he cried. "The sun is low, and it cannot yet be afternoon."
"Flatterer," I laughed, showing him my watch. "It is past five o'clock."
He looked round as he gathered in the sail, and a shade of anxiety crept
into his face. Especially he looked with bewildered eyes at the faint
blue line where land lay.
"What an idiot I have been," he said, knitting his brows. "Port,
Margharita! The left string! That's right! Now, sit firm, and when we go
down, lean to the other side. You mustn't mind if you get a little wet.
We are running in the teeth of the wind, and it will be roughish."
It was deliciously exhilarating. The breeze, without our noticing it,
had been gradually freshening, and now it was almost a gale. The sky
above was mackerel-hued and wind-swept. The sea seemed to be getting
rougher every minute. Lord Lumley had to pass his arm round the frail
mast which creaked and bent with the straining of the sail. Once we
heeled right over, and were within an ace of being capsized. I only
laughed, and the color came into my cheeks. Death would be a sweet and
welcome thing, I thought--death here on the ocean, with my lover's arms
around me. So I had no fear, and Lord Lumley found time to glance at me
admiringly.
"You're the pluckiest woman I ever knew in all my life!" he exclaimed
lightly. "Gad! that was a shave! It's no use, dear, we must tack. This
is too good to last."
Round we swept, first one way then another, but we made no headway. In
an hour's time we were no nearer land, and in the gathering twilight the
coast line was dim and blurred. Here and there we could see a few lights
burning from the villages along the shore, and away northward the
revolving light from Gorton headland shone out like a beacon.
"What will become of us?" I asked softly, for Lord Lumley had ceased his
exertions for a moment with a little gesture of despair. His face was
very pale, but it might have been from fatigue.
"Nothing very serious. Fortunately the sail is a new one, and very
strong. I think it will hold, and while it does, I can keep her in
position. We shall be tacking about most of the night, though, I am
afraid. It is such a provoking shifty wind. I can't depend upon it for a
moment."
"And supposing the sail went?"
"We have the oars. It would be uncommonly hard work, rowing, but it
would keep us afloat. It was just a chance that I put them in--a lucky
one as it happens."
"Supposing you had forgotten them, and that we had no oars?"
Lord Lumley shook his head.
"Don't add to the horrors," he said, smiling. "I'd rather not suppose
anything of the kind. It's bad enough as it is."
"There would be danger, then?"
"Yes."
"In what way?"
He shrugged his shoulders.
"Do you really want to know?"
"Yes, please."
"Well, we should drift out to sea, and the first heavy wave that caught
us broadside would probably swamp us. The great thing is, you see, to
keep our head to the waves. Are you cold, love?"
I shook my head. I had no thought of it
"Frightened?"
"Not a bit of it. Do I look it?"
"That you don't," he answered, smiling. "You are brave, dearest. I shall
never forgive myself for being so careless, though."
I think that it was then that the madness first came to me. I held my
hands up to my head, and strove to fight against that frantic impulse.
The air seemed full of voices whispering to me to end by one swift
stroke this hideous dilemma into which I had drifted of my own foolish
will. It was so simple; so easy a manner of escape. And she, too, would
be punished. In a manner, my oath would have been accomplished. What
vengeance could be sweeter to the heart of that desolate old man than
the death of her son--her only son? It could be done so easily, so
secretly. And as for me, should I not die in his arms with his dear face
pressed close to mine, his kisses upon my cold lips, and his voice the
last to fall upon my ears? What was life to me, a pledged murderess?
Would not such a death be a thousand times better? The wind rushing
across the waters seemed to bring mocking whispers to my ears. I seemed
to read it in the silent stars, and in the voices of the night. Death,
painless and sudden. Death, in my lover's arms. My heart yearned for it.
In the darkness I stretched down my hand, and felt for the oars. My
lover's back was turned to me, for he was on his knees in the bows,
gazing ahead with strained eyesight. One oar I raised and balanced on
the side of the boat. A quick push, and it was gone. The dull splash in
the water was lost in the rushing of the wind and the creaking of the
ropes. I watched it drift away from us with anxious eyes. It was gone,
irrevocably gone.
There was only the sail now. I had not meant to touch that; to leave so
much to chance, but the desire for death had grown. I was no longer
mistress of myself. A small pocket-knife was lying in the bottom of the
boat, and I stooped down cautiously and picked it up. Just as my fingers
closed upon it, Lord Lumley looked round. My eyes fell before his, and I
trembled, thankful for the darkness.
"Frightened yet, dearest?" he asked tenderly.
I laughed. There was no fear in my heart. If only he had known.
"No! I am not afraid! I am happy!"
He looked at me, wondering. Well he might!
"How your eyes are gleaming, love! After all, I don't think that we need
a lantern!"
"A lantern! What use would it have been to us?"
"To warn anything off from running us down. If the sail holds till
morning, and I think it will, we shall be all right if we escape
collisions."
"Is that what you are fearing?" I asked.
"Yes. I fancy that we must be getting in the track of the coal steamers.
If only the moon would rise! This darkness is our greatest danger! Even
if they had a smart lookout man, I am afraid that they would never see
us."
He turned round again, and remained gazing with fixed eyes into the
darkness. Then I held my breath, and stooping forward, with the penknife
in my hand, commenced steadily sawing at the bottom knot which bound the
sail to the mast. Directly it parted I cut a great slit in the sail
itself.
The knife was sharp, and my task was over in less than a minute. I
dropped it into the sea, and leaned back breathless. The wind was
coming.
"Lumley!" I faltered, "will you come to me? I am afraid!"
He turned round with a quick loving word. At that moment the catastrophe
happened. A sudden gust of wind filled out the sail. There was a crash
as it parted from the mast, a confused mass of canvass and limp rope.
The whole of the strain for a moment was upon the topmost portion of the
mast, and the result was inevitable. It snapped short, and the whole
tangled heap fell down, half in the bottom of the boat, half in the sea.
We heeled right over, and it seemed as if we must be capsized. But my
lover had presence of mind, and a strong desire to live. He leaned
heavily on the other side of the boat, and whipping a large sailor's
knife from his pocket, cut away the whole of the wreckage from the stump
of the mast with a few lightning-like strokes. It fell away overboard at
once, and though we shipped a lot of water, the boat righted itself
again. While it was yet trembling with the shock he leaned across to me,
pale, but with no fear in his set face or his clear, resolute tone.
"Courage, Margharita! The oars! Quick, dear!"
Then for the first time my heart smote me for what I had done; for the
passionate desire of life was alight in his eyes. What right had I to
make him share my fate? My deep joy was suddenly numbed. I was a
murderess!
I handed him the remaining one, and pretended to feel about in the
bottom of the boat. In that moment I recovered myself.
"There is only one here," I announced calmly.
"Impossible!" he cried. "I saw the pair laid out myself."
He dropped on his knee and felt anxiously around. Then he struck a
match; with the same result. The oar was gone.
He knew then that my words were true, and he came over to my side with a
great despair in his dark eyes.
"Margharita!" he cried, taking me into his arms, "there is death before
us, and it is I who have brought it upon you. Oh, my love, my love!"
His kisses fell upon my lips, and my head fell upon his shoulder. Then I
drew a sigh of deep content, and I felt that I had done well.
"I do not mind," I whispered softly. "Let us stay like this. I am
happy."
"My darling!"
CHAPTER XXX
THE DAWN OF A NEW LIFE
To desire death is to live, and to desire life is to die. It is the
mockery of human existence, the experience of all. I had willed to die
at that moment, without further speech or opportunity for thought, and
death seemed to have turned his back upon me.
We drifted on, tossed high and low by the tall waves which rose around
us like black shadows, threatening destruction at every moment. Often
when we had seen one towering above us we had thought that the end had
come, and I had felt my lover's arms tighten around me, and my lips had
clung close to his. But again and again a reprieve was granted to us.
Although every timber in our frail craft shivered, we survived the shock
and drifted into smoother water.
A little before midnight the wind dropped, although there was a heavy
sea still running. Through a dimly woven mist we could see the stars
faintly shining between the masses of black clouds rolling across the
wind-swept sky. But there was no moon; nothing to show us whither we
were drifting upon the waste of waters. There was something
inexpressibly weird in that darkness. It seemed less a blank darkness
than a darkness of moving shapes and figures--a living darkness, somehow
suggesting death. It will live in my memory forever.
"Do you mind dying, Lumley?" I asked him once.
"Yes," he answered solemnly, "I do. I am just learning how sweet it
would be to live."
I held him tighter, for at that moment a great wave had broken over us.
I dreaded nothing but separation.
"Supposing that, if we lived, something came between us?" I whispered.
"Suppose there was something between us which nothing could alter,
nothing could move--what then?"
"I cannot suppose it," he answered. "Nothing could come between us that
I would not overcome--nothing in life."
"Still, if it were so?" I persisted.
"Then I would sooner die like this if we are to die. We are in God's
hands."
I shuddered at that last sentence. If indeed we were on the threshold of
eternity, what had I to hope from God? Alas! at that moment my earthly
love was so strong that the fear of death was weak and faint.
We sat there silent and full of strange emotions, and expecting every
moment the end to come. All of a sudden, we both of us gave a great cry,
and my lover leaped up so that our boat rocked violently and nearly
capsized. For my part, I sat still, gazing, with distended eyes and
parted lips, upon the strangest sight which I had ever seen.
A great blaze of brilliant light seemed suddenly to flash into the
horizon, and falling into one long level ray, to travel slowly across
the surface of the water toward us. Everything which lay in its path was
revealed to us with minute and wonderful distinctness. So vivid was the
illumination that we could see the white foam on the top of the green
waves, and the floating seaweed rising and falling. Outside that one
level blaze, more brilliant even than the sunlight, the darkness seemed
blacker and more impenetrable than ever. It was a sight so marvelous
that I held my breath, awed and wondering. Then my lover gave a great
cry.
"Margharita, my love, my love, we are saved!"
"What is it?" I whispered.
"The electric search light. I had it fitted to the _Stormy Petrel_ by
the purest chance a few months ago. Here it comes. Put your hand before
your eyes, sweetheart. Oh, God, that they may see us!"
Swiftly it passed across the great desert of waters, and reached us. We
seemed suddenly bathed in a blinding glare of white light, and,
notwithstanding our anxiety, were forced to cover our eyes. There was a
moment's suspense. Then the sound of a cannon came booming across the
sea, and a rocket sped up into the air.
"Thank God! thank God!" my lover cried, "they have seen us. Look up,
Margharita! They are more than a mile away now, but they will be here in
a quarter of an hour. We are saved!"
He was right. In less than that time a boat from the _Stormy Petrel_ had
picked us up, and we were standing in for land, firing rockets all the
way to announce the news to Lord and Lady St. Maurice. So ended this,
the most eventful day of my life.
And with its close has ended that sworn purpose which has brought me
here. I, Margharita di Marioni, as one day I had hoped to call myself,
am about to disgrace the traditions and honor of my race. I am going to
break my faith with a suffering old man. I am going to tell my uncle
that my hand can work no harm upon any of this family.
Before me here lies his answer to my letter--my confession to him. How
he trusts me, when even now he never doubts.
* * * * *
"MARGHARITA,--I have received your letter, and I have pondered over it.
You are young to have such a sorrow, yet I do not doubt but that you
will act as becomes your race. You can never think of marriage with this
man; you a Marioni, he a St. Maurice! Yet I grieve that you have let
such a feeling steal into your heart. Pluck it out, Margharita, I charge
you; pluck it out by the roots! Think not of the wrong done to me, or,
if you do, think of me not as a man and your uncle, but as Count
Leonardo di Marioni, the head of my family, the head of your family. We
have been the victims, but the day of our vengeance is at hand. There is
no life without its sorrows, child! In the days to come, happiness will
teach you to forget this one.
"Farewell, my child. I shall send you no more notes. Write or come to me
the moment the deed is done! Come to me, if you can; I would hear your
own lips tell me the news. Yet do as seems best to you. In sympathy and
love,
"L. di M.
"One word more, child. Do not for a moment imagine that I blame you for
what has happened. Old man though I am, I too know something of the
marvels and the vagaries of this same love. Will can have little to do
with its course. I, who have suffered so deeply, Margharita, can and do
sympathize and feel for you."
* * * * *
This is the letter. I shall seal it up with the others, and this little
record of my life, on the last page of which I am now writing. When I
leave here they will go with me.
Yes, it is the dawn of a new day. Shall I ever see another, I wonder? I
think not! For me, no longer will the sun rise and set, the breezes
blow, and the earth be fair and sweet. All these things might have been
so much to me, for I have held in my hand the key to an everlasting
happiness--that deathless love which opens the gates to heaven; which
sanctifies life and hallows death. Oh! forgive me that I leave you, my
love! There was no other way. Only I pray that in that other world we
may meet again in the days to come, and that the music of our love may
ring once more through heart and soul. Farewell! Farewell!
CHAPTER XXXI
AN OLD MAN'S HATE
"Margharita! You have come at last. It is done, then. Say that it is
done!"
She stood quite still in the humble red-tiled sitting-room, and looked
at him with a great compassion shining out of her dark, clear eyes. He
was worn almost to a shadow, and his limbs were shaking with weakness,
as he half rose to greet her. Only his eyes were still alight and
burning. Save for them he might have been a corpse.
Something of the old passionate pity swept through her as she stood
there, but its fierceness had died away. Her heart leaped no longer in
quick response to the fire in those still undimmed eyes. She had been a
girl then, a girl with all the fierce untrained nature of her mother's
race; she was a woman now, a sad-faced, sorrowful woman. He was quick to
see the change.
"Margharita, my child, you have been ill."
Still she did not answer. Silently she knelt down by the side of his
armchair and took his withered, delicate hand in hers. A great bowl of
white hyacinths stood on a table by the window, and the air was faint
with their perfume.
"I am not ill," she said gently. "I was frightened on my way here, and
had to run. There was a fire last night at the lunatic asylum at
Fritton, and some of the mad people have escaped. I saw one of them in
the distance, and the keepers after him. They wanted me to go back, but
I would come."
He stooped down and kissed her forehead, with cold, dry lips.
"I knew that you would be here soon," he said. "My letters reached you
safely?"
"Yes."
She shuddered at the gathering strength in his tone, and the fierce
light which had swept into his face.
"It is done, child. Say that it is done!"
"No."
Something in her sad tone and subdued manner seemed to strike a note of
fear in his heart. He leaned forward, grasping the sides of his chair
with nervous, quivering fingers, and looked hurriedly into her face.
"No; you have had no chance, then? But you will have soon? Is it not so?
Soon, very soon?"
She threw her arms around his neck. He made no response, nor did he
thrust her away. He remained quite passive.
"It is not that, uncle. Oh, listen to me. Do not thrust me away. I
cannot do this thing."
He sat as still as marble. There was no change, no emotion in his face.
Yet her heart sank within her.
"Oh, listen to me," she pleaded passionately. "You do not know her as
she is now. She is good and kind--a gentle-hearted woman. It was so long
ago; and it was not out of malice to you, but to save the man she loved.
You hear me, do you not? You are listening. She has not forgotten you.
Often she sorrows for you. It was cruel--I know that it was cruel--but
she was a woman, and she loved him. Let us steal away together and bury
these dark dreams of the past. I will never leave you; I will wait upon
you always; I will be your slave. Forgiveness is more sweet than
vengeance. Oh, tell me that it shall be so. Why do you not speak to me?"
He sat quite still, like a man who is stunned by some sudden and
unexpected blow. He seemed dazed. She wondered, even, whether he had
heard her.
"Uncle, shall it not be so?" she whispered. "Let us go away from here
and leave her. I am not thinking about him. I will not see him again. I
will never dream of marrying him. Let us go this very day, this very
hour!"
Then he turned slowly toward her, thrust her hand from around his neck,
and stood up.
"You have been false to me, Margharita," he said, in a slow, quiet tone.
"After all, it is only natural. When you first came to me, I thought I
saw your mother's spirit blazing in your dark eyes, and I trusted you. I
was to blame. I forgot the tradesman's blood. I do not curse you. You do
not understand, that is all. Learn now that the oath of a Marioni is as
deathless and unchangeable as the hills of his native land. Will you go
away at once, please? I do not wish to see you again."
His speech so quiet, so self-contained, bewildered her. There was not a
single trace of passion or bitterness in it. She stretched out her hands
toward him, but she felt chilled.
"Uncle, you----"
"Will you go away, please?" he interrupted coldly.
She turned toward the door, weeping. She had not meant to go far--only
out on to the garden-seat, where she might sit and think. But he saw
another purpose in her departure, and a sudden passion fired him. She
heard his step as he rose hastily, and she felt his cold fingers upon
her wrist.
"You would go to warn her!" he cried, his voice trembling with anger; "I
read it in your face. You are as false as sin, but you shall not rob me
of the crown of my life! No one shall rob me of it! Vengeance belongs to
me, and by this symbol of my oath I will have it!"
He snatched a handful of white blossoms from the bowl, and crushed them
in his fingers. Then he threw them upon the ground and trampled upon
them.
"Thus did she betray the sacred bonds of our Order when, for her lover's
sake, she added treachery to cunning, and wrecked my life, made
Leonardo, Count of the Marionis, the lonely inmate of prison walls, the
scorn and pity of all men. Thus did she write her own fate upon a far
future page of the tablets of time. Talk to me not of forgiveness or
mercy, girl! My hate lives in me as the breath of my body, and with my
body alone will it die!"
His withered figure seemed to have gathered strength and dignity, and
his appearance and tone, as he gazed scornfully down at the girl at his
feet, was full of a strange dramatic force. Her heart sank as she
listened to him. This was no idle, vulgar passion, no morbid craving for
evil, which animated him. It was a purpose which had become hallowed to
him; something which he had come to look upon as his sacred right. She
understood how her drawing back must seem to him. As though a flash of
light had laid bare his mind, she saw how weak, how pitifully weak, any
words of hers must sound, so she was silent.
He had commenced walking up and down the room; and, watching him
fearfully, she saw that his manner was gradually changing. The unnatural
calm into which he had momentarily relapsed was leaving him, and he was
becoming every moment more and more excited. Fire flashed in his eyes,
and he was muttering broken words and sentences to himself. Once he
raised his clasped hands to the roof in a threatening gesture, and in
the act of doing so she saw the blue flash of a stiletto in his breast
pocket. It frightened her, and she moved toward the door.
It seemed almost as though he read her purpose in her terror-stricken
face, and it maddened him. He caught her by the wrist and thrust her
back.
"You shall not leave this room, girl!" he cried. "Wait, and soon I will
bring you news!"
She stood, still panting, overcome for a moment by the strength of his
grip. Before she could recover herself, he had caught up his hat and was
gone. Outside, she heard the sound of a key in the lock. She was a
prisoner!
Her first thought was the window. Alas! it was too small even for her to
get her head through. She cried out. No one answered; there was no one
to answer. She was alone in the cottage, and helpless, and away over the
cliffs, toward Mallory Grange, she could see a small, dark figure
walking steadily along, with bent head and swift steps. The cottage
stood by itself, a mile from the village, and was approached only by a
cliff path. She turned away from the window in despair. It seemed to her
then that the time for her final sacrifice had indeed come.
It was a warm, drowsy morning, and the air which floated in through the
open lattice window was heavy with the perfume of flowers, mingled with
the faint ozone of the sea. Outside, the placid silence was broken only
by the murmurous buzzing of insects and the soft lapping of the tide
upon the shingly sands. Within the room, a pale-faced girl knelt upon
the floor, with her long, slim fingers stretched upward, and the
passionate despair of death in her cold, white features. The sunshine
laughed upon her hair, and glanced around her, bathing her beautiful
face in its fresh, bright glory. Was it an answer to her prayer, she
wondered--her prayer for peace and forgiveness? Oh, that it might be so!
God grant it!
There was no fear in her face, though only a moment before she had taken
out and swallowed the contents of that little packet of poison which had
burned in her bosom for those last few days. But there had been just one
passing shade of bitterness. Her life had been so short, so joyless,
until there had come to her that brief taste of wonderful, amazing
happiness. She was young to die--to die with the delirium of that
passionate joy still burning in her veins.
"Yet, after all, it is best!" she whispered softly, at the end of that
unspoken prayer; and with those words of calm resignation, a change
crept softly in upon her face. It seemed almost as though, while yet on
earth, there had come to her a touch of that exquisite spiritual beauty
which follows only upon the extinction of all earthly passion, and the
uplifting into a purer, sweeter life. And her eyes closed upon the
sunlight, and darkness stole in upon her senses. She lay quite still
upon the floor; but the smile still lingered upon her lips, making her
face more lovely even in its cold repose than when the glow of youth and
life had shone in her dark, clear eyes, and lent expression to her
features. Saints like St. Francis of Assisi may die thus, but seldom
women.
CHAPTER XXXII
THE KEEPING OF THE OATH
"Help! For God's sake, help!"
A woman's cry of agony rang out upon the sweet morning stillness. Count
Marioni, who had been hurrying on with downcast head, stood still in the
cliff path and lifted his head. It was the woman whose memory he had
cursed who stood before him--the woman on whom his vengeance was to
fall.
Her face was as white as his own, and in the swiftness of her flight her
hat had fallen away and her hair was streaming in the breeze. Yet in
that moment of her awful fear she recognized him, and shrank back
trembling, as though some unseen hand had palsied her tongue, and laid a
cold weight upon her heart They stood face to face, breathless and
speechless. A host of forgotten sensations, kindled by her appearance,
had leaped up within the Sicilian's heart. He had indeed loved this
woman.
"Merciful God! to meet you here," she faltered. "You will help me? Oh,
you will help me? My husband is being murdered there on the cliff by an
escaped lunatic. Oh! Leonardo, save him, and you may strike me dead at
your feet. It is I whom you should hate, not him. Oh, come! Come, or it
will be too late!"
He stood quite still, looking at her curiously.
"And it is I to whom you dare to come for help--I whom you ask to save
him--your husband? Adrienne, do you remember my words on the sands at
Palermo?"
She wrung her hands, frantically imploring.
"How can I remember anything--think of anything, now? For the love of
God, help him," she begged, seizing his hand. "That was all so long ago.
You would not have him killed here before my eyes? Come! Oh, do come!"
"Lead the way," he answered sternly. "Call your loudest for other help.
I make no promise, but I will see this tragedy."
She ran back along the path, and he followed her. They turned suddenly
an abrupt corner, and came upon two men locked in one another's arms,
and swaying backward and forward upon the short green turf. The lunatic,
an immense fellow, more than six feet high, was clutching his opponent's
throat with his left hand, while with his right he brandished a long
table-knife with keenly-sharpened edge. The struggle was virtually over.
The madman's strength was more than human, and desperately though he had
struggled, Lord St. Maurice was lying exhausted and overcome in his
arms.
With a final effort he turned his head at the sound of footsteps, and
saw them come--his wife and this shrunken little old man. But close at
hand though they were, nothing could help him now. He saw the steel
flashing in the sunlight, and he closed his eyes.
The knife descended, but Lord St. Maurice remained unhurt. With a
swiftness which seemed almost incredible, the Sicilian had sprung
between them, and the knife was quivering in his side. Behind, the
lunatic was struggling helplessly in the grasp of three keepers.
There was a wild cry of horror from Lady St. Maurice, a choking gasp of
relief from her husband, and a horrid chuckle of triumph from the madman
as he gazed upon his handiwork. But after that there was silence--a
deep, awe-stricken silence--the silence of those who stand in the
presence of death.
Count Marioni lay on the turf where he had sunk, very white and very
still, with the blood dropping slowly from his wound upon the grass, and
his eyes closed. At first they thought that he was already dead; but, as
though aroused by Lady St. Maurice's broken sobs, he opened his eyes and
looked up. His lips moved, and she stooped low down to catch the sound.
"Will you tell Margharita that this was best?" he faltered. "I have
heard a whisper from over the sea, and--and the White Hyacinth forgives.
I forgive. She will understand."
"Leonardo," she sobbed, "your vengeance----"
He interrupted her.
"This is my vengeance!" he said. "I have kept my oath!"
Then he closed his eyes, and a gray shade stole into his pallid face. A
breeze sprung up from the sea, and the tall, blood-red poppies, which
stood up all around him like a regiment of soldiers, bent their
quivering heads till one or two of them actually touched his cheek. He
did not move; he was dead.
* * * * *
Lord and Lady Lumley had lingered long in Rome, and now, on the eve of
their departure, they had spent nearly the whole of a bright November
afternoon buying curios of a wizened old dealer, whose shop they had
found in one of the dark narrow streets at the back of the Piazza
Angelo. Lady Lumley had taken up a curious old ring, and was examining
it with a vague sense of familiarity.
"Ten pounds for that ring, my lady," the curio dealer remarked, "and it
has a history. You will see that it bears the arms and motto of the
Marionis, once the most powerful family in Sicily. I had it from the
late Count himself."
Lady Lumley sank into the little chair by the counter, holding the ring
tightly in her hand.
"Will you tell us the history?" she asked in a low tone.
The man hesitated.
"If I do so," he said doubtfully, "will you promise to keep it
absolutely secret?"
"Yes."
"Well, then, I have told it to no one yet, but I will tell it to you.
Many years ago I was a chemist, and among my customers was Count
Leonardo di Marioni. His history was a very sad one, as doubtless you
may have heard. When he was quite a young man he was arrested on some
political charge, and imprisoned for five-and-twenty years--a cruel
time. Well, scarcely more than twelve months ago he came to me here, so
altered that I found it hard indeed to recognize him. Poor old
gentleman, when he had talked for a while, I felt quite sure that his
long confinement had affected his mind, and his errand with me made me
sure of it. He came to buy a celebrated poison which I used at one time
to be secretly noted for, and I could tell from his manner that he
wanted it for some fatal use. Well, I thought at first of refusing it
altogether, but what was the use of that? Some one else would have sold
him an equally powerful poison, and the mischief would be done all the
same. So, after a little consideration, I made up quite an innocent
powder, which might cause a little momentary faintness, but which could
do no further harm, and I gave it to him as the real thing. I couldn't
take money for doing a thing like that, so he pressed this ring upon me.
You see, it really has a history."
Lord Lumley took his wife's hand and pressed it tenderly. In the deep
gloom of the shop the curio dealer could not see the tears which
glistened in her dark eyes.
"We will have the ring!" Lord Lumley said, taking a note from his
pocket-book and handing it across the counter.
The man held it up to the light.
"One hundred pounds," he remarked. "I shall owe your lordship ninety."
Lord Lumley shook his head.
"No, Signor Paschuli, you owe me nothing; it is I who owe you a wife.
Come, Margharita, let us get out into the sunshine again."
And Signor Paschuli kept the note. But he has come to the conclusion
that all Englishmen traveling on their honeymoon are mad.
THE GREAT AWAKENING
Sir Powers Fiske, though far from being a sybarite, possessed a
fundamental but crudely developed love of the beautiful. Before all
things with him came his devotion to science and scientific
investigation. But for his unexpected accession to the title and estates
he would, without doubt, have become a denizen of Harley Street, and
made his way without difficulty into the front ranks of his profession.
With the passing away of all necessity for work came a curious era of
half-doubtful dilettanteism, a time during which he read hugely,
traveled a good deal, and finally returned to England with the seeds of
a great unrest sown in his mind.
Mysticism and psychology, which he had dabbled in at first
half-contemptuously, had become serious studies to him. Dimly he felt
the fascination of that unending effort which from the days of the
Chaldeans had swayed the lives of a long succession of the world's
masters, the effort to establish some sort of communication, however
faint, however speculative, between the world of known things and the
world beyond. At times he found himself moved to the most profound
self-ridicule. He would ask himself how it was possible for a man of
science seriously to investigate problems whose very foundation must be
an assumption. He looked at his walls lined with books, and he smiled
grimly as he realized how little, after all, they had taught him. The
sum of all that he had learned from them amounted to nothing. Yet he
remembered what Spencer Trowse, a fellow student, had said to him. A
sudden flush had lightened his thin cheeks, pallid with the ceaseless
energy of their student life.
"After all, Powers, I think that we are wasting our days," he exclaimed.
"Those ancients saw no farther behind the veil than we. I am tired of
all this musty lore, this delving among cobwebs."
"What then?" Powers had asked. "Modern scholarship has taught us little
enough."
"Let us have done with all scholarship," Trowse answered. "It is the
laws of humanity we want to understand. Let us study them at first hand.
Let us go down among the people."
"What can this rabble teach us?" Powers had asked himself, full of the
intellectual contempt of the young student for the whole pleasure-loving
world. "Whether their wings be soiled or pure, they are only
butterflies!"
Trowse smiled grimly.
"They are the living evidences," he said, "of laws which are worth
studying. If we would understand humanity we must not start by despising
any part of it."
With characteristic impetuosity the two young men had thrown themselves
heart and soul into their new enterprise. They haunted police courts and
places of entertainment. They lived for a while in a great industrial
center; they listened to the hoarse, tragic undernote of the millions
underneath. They made their bow at the reception of a duchess, and spent
a whole Bank Holiday dancing upon Hampstead Heath. These and many other
phases of life they had encountered with an amusement, in Powers' case
partly genuine, in Trowse's wholly tolerant. For all the time they kept
strenuously in view their real end. They wanted to understand the causes
of all that they saw; they wanted to discover laws.
The end of their enterprise came suddenly. A disaster in his family left
Trowse unexpectedly poor. It was necessary for him to take at once some
wage-earning position. The two young men parted, curiously enough,
without regret. Powers, though no sentimentalist, possessed his due
share of the affections, had an innate love for the beautiful, and a
longing for a catholic and universal understanding of his fellows. Where
Trowse would gaze with unmoved face, and pursue his calm calculations,
Powers could only peer with barely veiled horror. They held together
through those three years of unorthodox study, but toward the end of it
they had drawn wide apart. Trowse entered the ranks of his profession a
man of steel, without nerves or sentiment or pity. Powers, with his
fuller understanding of life, had no longer any desire for a regular
career. Possessed of ample means, the necessity for it had never
existed. He left England almost at once, and entered upon a somewhat
restless but comprehensive scheme of travel.
At last, shortly after his return home, one afternoon fate cast into his
way on the Edgware Road the very subject that he sought. It was in the
fringe of a city fog; the sky was heavy with clouds, the pavements were
sloppy with recent rains; the broad thoroughfare was almost deserted
when there glided by him the figure of a woman who held herself with a
distinction oddly at variance with her shabby clothes. There was in her
eyes the look of one in extremity--of a woman who had none of the
ordinary fear of death and who would dare great things to pass from the
evil place in which fate had set her to even a momentary draft from the
cup of life.
Sir Powers Fiske approached her. His eyes held hers--they were bright
with a certain steely radiance. She felt her heart beating fast, the
noise of the traffic beyond seemed to her to come from some distance. He
spoke to her, and her eyes which mirrored dark months lost resentment
after a moment and seemed to understand.
They gazed steadfastly at one another--something greater than their
surroundings, greater even than themselves seemed to pass between them.
With swift intelligence, she felt him to be no more a boulevardier than
she was light. He murmured a few conventionalities and when he asked her
to have tea with him she accepted. Inside the warm little tea-room, he
told her of his work and of himself, and once secure in the knowledge of
the mere unit of humanity she represented to him, she told him of
herself. The human note was strong in all she said, and he declared in
all her talk the marks of a cultured intellect that must have rendered
beyond endurance the shoddy environment of a draper's establishment
where she passed her days. He offered her the means of escape from her
present slavery by becoming his subject for experiment and she did not
shrink. On her own testimony she stood alone in the world and upon her
sudden removal from her present life there would be no one with even the
right to search for her. He looked into her frail beautiful face
marveling at the depth of misery which produced this brave despair and
rising held out his hand.
"I must thank you very much for your society--and for your confidence,"
he said, "I have your address and I will write to you."
To-night he was in a curiously disturbed mood. All the evening Eleanor
Surtoes had figured in his thoughts. He had seen her several times since
that first meeting on the Edgware Road. She was one of the more tragic
figures in that world which he had spent so much strenuous effort
seeking to understand. The possibilities in connection with her loomed
large in his imagination. He was oppressed with fears which were
altogether new to him. Fortune could never have provided him with a
human creature modeled more exactly according to his requirements. He
knew her life and the ways of it. The confidence which he felt as to her
ultimate decision was not exaggerated. She would come to him for an
explanation of his words, and she would accept his proposition. Yet
never since his idea had first begun to loom large in his thoughts did
he look upon it with less enthusiasm than at this moment. A few hours
ago he had written to her--asked her to spend a day upon the river with
him. He knew that she would come. The crisis was close at hand. He hoped
to be able to delay it.
The door was quietly opened. His servant stood upon the threshold.
"There is a young lady asking for you, Sir Powers--the name, I believe,
is Surtoes."
"Show her in at once."
The man bowed. A moment later he ushered Eleanor in. Her hat was beaten
about with wind and rain, even her hair was disordered. She was
breathless with rapid walking, her cheeks were wet, and the raindrops
hung about her clothes. Powers held out his hand and drew her toward the
fire.
"So you have come to see me," he said, in a tone as nearly
matter-of-fact as he could make it. "I am delighted! I was just looking
forward to a lonely and a particularly dull evening."
He wheeled an easy chair to the fire, and placed her in it. He saw that
she was nervous and embarrassed, and he continued to talk.
"To-night," he said, "is one of the most horrible instances of our
marvelous climate. I had just written to ask you to have a day upon the
river with me. Imagine it."
She smiled, and the color began to reappear in her cheeks.
"I want you, please, to tell me the exact truth," she said. "My coming
here, I know, is very foolish. I want to know whether it inconveniences
you in any way--whether your mother or any one else might think it
strange?"
He laughed reassuringly.
"Mine is entirely a bachelor establishment," he declared. "My mother and
sister live in Berkeley Square. There is no one here to whom your visit
would be even a subject of remark."
She gave a little sigh of relief, and leaned back in her chair. The
warmth and comfort of the room after that dreary walk through the rain
and hail outside were like a strong, sweet sedative. A curious sense of
rest, of finality, took possession of her. With the closing of the front
door, with the first breath of that air of indefinable luxury which
everywhere pervaded her new surroundings, she seemed to pass into a new
order of things. There had been a single moment of breathless
excitement, of trembling speculation as to the nature of his greeting,
but his welcome had been so easy and natural that her fears had been all
dispelled by his first few words.
"It is perhaps very foolish of me to come here," she said, "but I have
never quite forgotten what you said to me in the tea-room. It was
probably nonsense. If so, please tell me, and let me go."
His brows went up in vague surprise; then ignoring her words, he lighted
a cigarette, and stood thoughtfully puffing it, his elbow resting on the
broad oaken mantelpiece.
"I must tell you something more about myself," he said, presently. "It
chanced that when I was at Calcutta several years ago, I met a native
Indian doctor to whom I was fortunate enough to be of some service. My
meeting with this man was the most wonderful thing which has ever
happened to me. I shall never cease to be grateful to him. If the world
knew his name and what he has made possible to science, he would be the
most famous man of this or any generation. He reawakened all my old
interest in my profession."
His pale face had become fervid, the bright light of the enthusiast was
burning in his dark eyes. Eleanor felt that she had become once more
only a unit in his eyes, a mere atom of humanity, whose interest to him
was purely scientific and impersonal. She found herself trembling. What
had these things to do with her? She was afraid of what might come. She
remembered that he had spoken of death.
"Oh, that wonderful East," he continued, in a low tone. "How puny it
makes us feel with our new civilization, our shoddiness, our
materialism, which is only another name for hopeless ignorance. What
treasures of art lie buried there, what strange secrets sleep forever in
the tombs of their wise men. Halkar told me that he was but the disciple
of one immeasurably greater, who had died, indeed, with many of the
primal secrets of existence locked in his bosom because there was no one
left behind with whom he dared to trust them."
"Tell me about these secrets," Eleanor said. "Were they of the past, or
of the future? And what have you or I to do with them?"
"We are children of the ages," he answered, "and it is our heritage to
learn. Halkar taught me much. He set me down at the gate of that
wonderful inner world. He placed in my hands the key. With your aid, it
is possible that I may pass inside."
"With my aid!" Eleanor exclaimed breathlessly. "How can that be? What
could I do?"
He smiled at her, and Eleanor felt again that vague fear stirring in her
heart.
"One day Halkar took me to a native village. We went to the house of a
rich man. We found him at home, just returned from hunting. He was
handsome, hospitable, and, it seemed to me, intelligent. But just before
we left Halkar asked him a question about the great storm which laid
waste the village and the whole countryside only a year before. He
looked puzzled, answered us courteously, but vaguely. He remembered
nothing."
He paused.
"There was an English nurse-girl," he continued. "Halkar took me to see
her. She was plump, rosy, and good-natured. She was engaged to be
married to a gentleman's servant, and she chattered away gaily, and told
me all about it. A year before a mad fakir had run amuck, had killed a
soldier to whom she was to have been married the next day, and both the
children who had been in her charge. The shock had nearly sent her mad.
Yet when Halkar spoke to her of these things she looked puzzled. She
remembered nothing."
"Well?" Eleanor asked.
"Their memory," he said slowly, "was gone. Their reason was saved.
Halkar was the physician."
She shivered, and sat looking into the fire with eyes full of fear.
"Halkar," he said, "had learned much, but there was more still. It has
taken me many years, but at last I believe that I have learned the
secret which baffled him all his days. All that I need is a subject."
There was a short, tense silence. Eleanor sat quite still, nervously
clasping and unclasping her hands, her eyes steadfastly fixed upon the
fire. He watched her covertly.
"You know so little of me," she murmured, "I am almost a stranger to
you. How can you tell whether I should be suitable--even if I were
willing?"
"You will remember the two cases which I have mentioned to you," he
answered. "The man was chosen by Halkar because in the great storm he
had lost wife, and friends, and children, and in his grief he prayed for
forgetfulness. The girl was chosen because the tragedy which she had
witnessed had driven her far along the road to madness, and this
merciful loss of memory was her salvation, also. The reason you have
been chosen is because I looked into your eyes, and it seemed to me that
I saw there more than the ordinary weariness of life. Then I heard you
speak, and in your tone, too, was more than the ordinary bitterness of
misfortune. Listen, I will tell you more. I will tell you what as yet I
have not breathed to a living soul."
She caught his enthusiasm--a fierce, compelling thing.
"You are a Christian?" he asked.
"I have tried to be," she faltered.
"You believe, at least, in the eternity of human life? You must believe
in it. In nature there is no death, no annihilation. All that takes
place is transmutation! That is obvious," he declared.
"Well?"
"So in human life! The body rots; the spirit passes--where?"
He continued with scarcely a moment's pause:
"Down the broad avenues of time, to appear in a thousand different forms
and shapes. A king in one age is a serf in another, a savage this
century is a scholar in the next. Has there never been a moment in your
life when a sense of unreality has seized you? You doubt for a moment
your own identity, you are haunted by miragelike thoughts, beautiful, or
sad; you are strangely out of touch with your surroundings. Watch a
great concourse of people. It is the most fascinating thing in the
world.
"You will see a beggar who has now and then some trick of carriage or
gesture or speech which has survived his body's degradation, and which
reminds you of a king. Or you will see one of the great ones of the
earth, if you watch closely enough, do some small thing, or speak some
chance word which has crept out unheeded, very likely repeated, yet
which could have no kinship with his present state.
"There are people who have visited a strange country for the first time
in their lives, and found there a street-corner, a shop, or byway which
has awakened a peculiar and inexplicable sense of familiarity. They have
never been there before, never read of the place, yet the sense of
familiarity is there. I have seen a boy fall asleep, and heard him croon
an old Mexican war-song, a song of the time of Cortez and the Incas, in
an almost forgotten language--a boy who awake is a messenger at a
draper's, unimaginative, ignorant, stupid. The secret of these things
will one day be yielded up to science. You and I together may become
immortal."
He ended with a little laugh. The fierce eagerness had burned itself
out. Of the two, Eleanor was now the more disturbed.
"I should like to know how it feels," she said thoughtfully, "to be
without a memory, to start life at twenty-two."
"The things outside your own personal experiences are never lost to
you," he said. "They come back in a perfectly effortless manner. You
will find yourself accepting them as a matter of course."
"How do you know that?" she asked. "One might have to learn to read and
write again. Life without any background at all would become a gigantic
embarrassment."
"There is no fear of anything of the sort," he assured her. "Halkar's
friend and the girl related to me their own experiences. They were
precisely similar. It was of events and persons alone that their mind
was swept bare. Their stock of acquired knowledge remained unimpaired.
Sometimes they even dimly remembered people."
"But there are also many other considerations," she said. "What will
become of me afterward?"
"My dear young lady," he said, "I do not ask you to risk your life,
however remotely, for nothing. I would give half my fortune, were it
necessary, to win your consent. As it is, I promise you freedom and
independence. You shall live the life which seems good to you. You will
be removed into another sphere altogether, and it is possible that you
may take with you a somewhat cloudy recollection of this portion of your
life. Your reward will be an established position in the world and an
honorable one. Beyond this I cannot say a single word. In fact, you must
consider the whole thing as only a possibility.
"I consent," she said simply.
There was a momentary flash in his gray eyes--otherwise he showed no
emotion. He had long since taken her consent as a matter of course.
"There is one thing more which is necessary," he said. "You must tell me
who you are, and if you have any friends who would be likely to make
inquiries for you. I take it for granted that you have no closer ties.
It is imperative that I have this knowledge."
She looked up at him with white face. "Do you mean that?"
"You can surely see the necessity for it yourself," he answered. "You
are virtually going to change your identity. The Eleanor Surtoes of a
month hence will know nothing of your past. Some one must be entrusted
with that knowledge."
"It is a great pain to me," she said wearily, "to speak of it at all.
But to-night nothing seems to matter. My name is Eleanor Surtoes
Marston. My father was Sir Robert Marston. He was a banker at
Hull--Ellifield, Marston and Ellifield. You read the papers. I dare say
you remember."
He inclined his head slowly.
"My mother was dead. I had neither brother nor sister, nor any friends
save those whom my father's prodigality had brought together. When
exposure came, my father killed himself. He left a letter telling me
where to find a large sum of money which he had put on one side. He had
meant to leave England secretly. I returned the money to the bank. They
heard afterward that I was destitute, and they sent me ten pounds. I
came to London, and did my best to get a situation, but I was ignorant,
ill brought up, and uselessly educated. I could do a great many things
in a small way, but nothing well enough to teach. With only a few
shillings left, I wrote to a large firm of drapers in Hull with whom I
had dealt. They sent me an introduction to Bearmain's, and I entered
their employ as a shop girl ten months ago. I have done my best, but I
left to-night, knowing that whatever happened I should never return."
"There is no one, then," he asked, "who is likely to make inquiries
about you? No one who could trace you here?"
"There is no one," she answered bitterly.
Powers looked at his watch.
"I am going to leave you alone for a quarter of an hour," he said. "I do
not think that it will make any difference, but I should like you to
have that time for unbiased reflection."
"As you like," she answered. "I shall not change my mind. I am ready."
She sat before the fire, her eyes fixed upon the burning coals. She
heard muffled voices in the hall, she heard Powers enter an adjoining
room, and close the door behind him. Her fingers clutched the sides of
her chair, her eyeballs were hot. For the first time a spasm of physical
fear seized her. He had gone to make ready. What if it should be death?
She had spoken boldly of it but a moment before. Yet she was young, for
good or evil her life was as yet unlived. Then with a rush came back the
memory of the last ten months. The hopeless weariness of those days
behind the counter, the miserable humiliation of it, the web of bitter
despair drawn so closely and inevitably around her. All the petty
tyrannies to which she had been subject, all the fettering restrictions
which had gone to turn servitude into slavery were suddenly fresh in her
mind. A hideous vista of dreary days and lonely nights--nowhere a ray of
hope; the same, yesterday, to-day, and all other days. The fear passed
away from her. Death might have its terrors, but a return to Bearmain's
would be a living hell. She heard the door open without a single tremor.
She even smiled as she saw Powers standing upon the threshold.
"You have not changed your mind?" he asked.
"There was never any fear of that," she answered. "I am quite ready."
He held open the door. "Will you come this way?" he said.
She rose at once, without reluctance or fear--even gladly. He was
beckoning her into a new life.
* * * * *
Sir Powers Fiske permitted himself the luxury of a rare emotion. His
patient had come back to life. The faint flush of recovery was upon her
cheeks, the light of a dawning intelligence was in her eyes. The first
stage of his great experiment had been successfully reached.
"So you are better, I see!" he remarked, standing by her bedside.
She answered him a little weakly, but distinctly enough.
"I suppose I am. I feel quite well enough to get up. Only----"
"Well?"
There was trouble in her eyes as she looked up at him.
"It seems as though I must be dreaming. I can't remember what has
happened to me--why I am here!"
He smiled at her reassuringly.
"I wouldn't bother about it," he said. "You are with friends, and you
must try to get well quickly. I dare say when you are stronger that it
will all come back to you."
She looked at him reflectively.
"You are a stranger to me," she said slowly. "Is there no one here whom
I have ever seen before?"
He felt a sudden chill. Yet, after all, it was what he had expected.
"I do not suppose that there is," he answered. "You see, you are in
London now. I thought, perhaps, that you might have remembered me. I was
in India, and came to see you when you were a little girl."
"In India!" she repeated vaguely. "Why, what can have happened to me? I
do not remember anything about India."
She raised her hand to her temples. Her eyes were full of an undefined
fear. The words came from her lips in a broken stream.
"You are my doctor, they say, and this is your house. Tell me what it
means--tell me. I try to think, and there is nothing. Something has
happened to my head. Have I been ill for long? Who am I? Where did I
come from? Why am I here?"
"I will answer all your questions," he said quietly, "but you must
please not excite yourself. Your name is Eleanor Hardinge, and you were
shipwrecked on your way from India here. Your father is an old friend of
mine, and you were coming to England to visit my mother. You met with a
very unusual accident. You will notice that your head is still bound up,
and, no doubt, it will affect your memory for some little time. You must
try to make the best of it. You are among friends, and we shall all do
our best to look after you."
She felt the bandage around her head.
"I can't even remember the accident," she said. "I suppose it will all
come back some day."
"There is no doubt about it," he answered. "All that you have to do now
is to keep as quiet as you can. The less you try to think the better."
The nurse entered with a tray. Eleanor sat up and smiled with the
satisfaction of a child.
"You are hungry!" he remarked.
"I think so," she answered. "I should like some chicken, please. No more
beef tea."
"You remember what chicken tastes like, then," he said. "That is a
proof, you see, that your memory still lives. Let me ask you another
question. Who is your favorite author?"
"Shakespeare!" she answered promptly.
He nodded approvingly.
"You see that you need have no fear," he said. "Your loss of memory is
only partial. Now, I am going to leave you to have your dinner. Do not
talk too much, and try to sleep as much as you can."
Her eyes sought his fixedly, pathetically. She seemed suddenly moved by
a new fear. Her large eyes, a little sunken now, were dilated.
"I--I have forgotten my name again," she cried. "It is horrible. What is
it. Tell me quickly."
"You are Eleanor Hardinge," he said. "You are perfectly safe, and you
will soon be quite well."
"But I am afraid," she cried, with a sudden shrill note of terror. "My
head is going round. I cannot think clearly."
He took her hand in his. There was something soothing in the touch of
his firm, cool fingers.
"You have no cause for fear," he said reassuringly--"none whatever. You
are getting better and stronger every hour."
She raised herself a little from among the pillows. Her eyes sought his
eagerly. Her hands refused to let his go.
"I am afraid," she moaned. "There are shadows everywhere among my
thoughts. Tell me. Have I been mad? Am I going to be mad?"
His fingers strayed to her pulse. He smiled upon her as one smiles upon
a child.
"Nonsense! Look at me."
His eyes held her.
"You are not going to be mad. You are merely suffering from a great
shock. By and by everything will be clear to you. You must not be
impatient. I promise you that you will soon be well."
Outside the door on the landing he stood and wiped the dampness from his
forehead. He knew that she had been on the verge of brain fever, that
even now she was scarcely safe. The impulse which had taken him into her
room was an irresistible one. He felt that he must see her. He had
looked into her opened eyes, he had heard her speak. The change, which
he alone could understand, which he alone was responsible for, appalled
him. He was bewildered by a feeling of personal loss. The soul of
Eleanor Surtoes seemed to have passed away with her sense of personal
consciousness. It was another woman who lay there in his guest-chamber.
Afterward she slept. He dined mechanically, and without the ghost of an
appetite. The rest of the night he spent with a pile of medical books
and a note-book kept during his stay in India open before him. In the
early morning he looked out upon the gray dawn-lit streets, haggard, and
with a gnawing fear at his heart. He was unnerved. The ordinary sounds
of the waking household, the street cries outside, the rattling of
carts, jarred upon him. He glanced in the looking-glass, and was
startled at his own reflection. Softly he opened the door and made his
way into the room where Eleanor lay.
Her deep-brown hair lay about the pillow in some confusion. One long
white arm, thin but graceful, hung over the coverlet. Her face,
notwithstanding its pallor, was like the face of a little child. A
certain, almost pathetic, sharpness of outline, which in the days of his
first acquaintance with her had been only too noticeable, seemed to him
to have faded away. Her closed eyes were no longer windows through which
shone the tragical misery of her bitter life. The lines about her mouth
and forehead had all been smoothed away. And with these
things--something else. He found himself struggling with a sense of
unfamiliarity. After all, it was still Eleanor. If only he could
persuade himself of it.
He looked at her long and steadily. Then he left the room and entered
the library. For a time he sat at his desk, irresolute. More than once
he drew note-paper toward him and dipped his pen in the ink. He was
wholly unaccustomed to this indecision. Yet the way before him, which
had seemed so clear only a short while back, seemed now beset with
anxieties. It was not technical skill or knowledge that he needed. So
far as these were concerned, his self-confidence was unimpaired. Only a
new sense of responsibility, a strange new web of fears, seemed suddenly
to have paralyzed his enthusiasm.
For the first time in his life he felt the need for advice--the stimulus
of sympathy. Yet for hours that note remained unwritten. He was unable
to account for his hesitation. The man whom he was about to summon would
approve of all that he had done. He was sure of that. Yet he was
oppressed by the shadow of some nameless fear, some instinct that seemed
to be doing its utmost to warn him against this course which, from any
ordinary point of view, was both natural and advisable. Afterward those
hours of hesitation ranked as history with him. At the time he was
ashamed of them.
The note was written at last, and despatched by an urgent messenger. He
bathed, changed his clothes, and ate some breakfast. Just as he had
finished, a small brougham stopped at the door. Doctor Trowse was
announced. It was the man for whom he had sent. Even at the moment of
his entrance, Powers found himself struggling with an insane desire to
abandon his purpose, to invent some trifling excuse and to keep silence.
The two men shook hands silently.
Trowse looked ten years younger than his age, which was forty-five, and
he was now the greatest known authority upon diseases of the brain. He
eyed Powers curiously.
"What is wrong with you?" he asked.
"Nothing," replied the other.
"You sent for me," Trowse reminded him, "and if you waste my time you'll
have to pay for it. These are my busiest hours."
Powers came back to the present. It was too late to hesitate. He smiled
grimly.
"You won't want payment," he said, "when you have heard why I sent for
you."
A light like the flashing of fire upon polished steel lit up for a
moment those strange-colored eyes. Yet in other respects the man was
unmoved. Not a muscle of his face twitched.
"You have found a subject?" he said.
"I have."
"You are going to attempt the operation, or you want me to?"
"It is done."
Trowse set down his hat, and deliberately selected a chair.
"You've pluck!" he remarked. "Dead or alive?"
"Alive."
The absence of any sentiment of triumph in Powers' face or tone made its
impression upon the older man. He decided at once that the thing had
gone wrong.
"Alive! In what condition is he?"
"It's a she," Powers answered.
"Better subject perhaps. Go on."
"She has recovered consciousness. So far everything has gone according
to calculation."
"You administered your Indian drug?"
"Yes. I was going to tell you. She is conscious, and physically unhurt"
"The memory?"
"Gone!"
Trowse rose briskly.
"Let me see her," he insisted. "Then we will talk."
Silently they made their way to the bedroom. She had made a somewhat
fastidious toilet, and wore, with the air of one who has been used to
such things all her life, a dressing-jacket trimmed with lace, which was
among the things which Marian Fiske had sent. Her hair was tied up with
ribbon, and skilfully arranged to hide the bandages on her head. The
delicacy of her face and hands seemed heightened by the faint spot of
color which flushed her cheeks as the two men entered the room.
"I have brought a friend of mine," Powers said after a few words to
Eleanor and the nurse, "to congratulate me upon my case. This is Doctor
Trowse, nurse. I know that he considers me a dangerous amateur, and I
want to convince him that I am nothing of the sort."
Trowse moved a little forward, and Eleanor turned her head to meet his
earnest gaze. Almost immediately there was a change in her expression.
The color faded from her cheeks, she shrank a little away, a curious,
troubled light filled her eyes. Trowse, if he noticed her agitation,
ignored it. He bent over the bedside, and touched her fingers, asked a
few apparently careless questions, and let his hand rest for a moment
upon her head. Then he turned away and addressed the nurse.
"Sir Powers has justified himself," he said, with a faint smile. "Your
patient is going to have the good sense to get well very quickly."
Eleanor drew a little breath, as though immensely relieved. She turned
her head a little, so as to leave him altogether out of her range of
vision. Powers, who, to some extent, misunderstood her action, exchanged
quick glances with Trowse. The desire for life was there once more,
then.
"I am glad to hear it, sir," the nurse answered quietly. "She seems to
be going on very nicely."
Without turning her head toward him, Eleanor addressed Trowse.
"Will you please tell me something?"
"If I can."
"When shall I remember things?"
He looked at her thoughtfully. She kept her eyes averted, but she seemed
to be shivering a little.
"Perhaps to-morrow," he answered. "Perhaps not for a year. It is one of
those things which science is powerless to determine."
"But I shall--remember--some day?"
"Some day--certainly. Let me ask you a question."
"Well?"
"Are you very anxious to remember?"
"It is so puzzling," she answered. "Sometimes I want to very much,
sometimes I am content."
There was a moment's silence. As though against her will, she turned her
head and looked up at him standing over her bedside. Again there was the
faint shrinking away, again her troubled eyes seemed held by his against
her will.
"I will give you some advice, young lady," he said. "Let things go. You
have made a marvelous recovery. The completion of it is in your own
hands. Accept the present. If the past eludes you--let it. You will
remember this?"
Eleanor remained speechless, though her lips seemed to move. Every word,
though easily spoken, seemed to come to her charged with a precise and
serious meaning. His tone was unemotional, his manner was not even
earnest. Yet she never forgot. The two men left the room. By common
consent, they turned into the study. Trowse eyed his friend curiously.
"I wonder," he said, "what the devil made you send for me?"
Sir Powers Fiske did not immediately reply. The two men stood side by
side upon the hearthrug. Trowse, who seemed to have forgotten his hurry,
lit a cigarette and threw the match into the fire.
"I scarcely see," he said, "where I come in. You have your chance, you
have taken it, and you have succeeded. Very well! What do you want with
me? If it had been before the risk was over, I could have understood it.
At present I must admit that I cannot."
Powers answered as one who makes a confession.
"I have lost my nerve," he said.
Trowse looked at him oddly.
"I might believe that of some men," he said, "not of you. Besides, the
risk is over. The girl will live. You know that as well as I do."
"She will live," Powers answered, "yes! That is certain. And yet, since
she opened her eyes, since I heard her speak, I have felt myself nothing
less than a murderer. That is what I am. A murderer, Trowse."
Trowse stared at his friend for several moments without speaking--a
cold, deliberate inspection. Then he sighed.
"You are not the man you were, Powers," he said, speaking softly, and as
though to himself. "It isn't drink, and you don't smoke much. What has
happened to your nerves?"
Powers looked steadfastly and gloomily out of the window.
"I cannot tell you," he answered. "You know me better than most men,
Trowse. You have never seen me turn a hair at any operation yet.
Together we have watched death come to strong men and to beautiful
women. These things have never troubled me. I have never felt anything
more than curiosity. Yet there is a weak spot somewhere. I have learned
what fear is."
Trowse eyed his friend with interest.
"If the girl were dead," he remarked meditatively, "it might have turned
out awkwardly for you. As it is, you seem to have stumbled across a very
nearly perfect physical creature. She is less likely to die than you or
I. In a fortnight she will be recovered."
Powers frowned impatiently.
"You have not made a study of this thing as I have, Trowse," he said.
"Yours is the purely scientific point of view. You do not see--what lies
beyond."
Trowse shook his head.
"I do not understand you," he said simply.
"I want you to understand," Powers declared. "We have talked of this
thing many times, until it has grown to seem a simple thing. We forgot!"
"Forgot what?"
"Forgot that the continuity of life, after all, is purely physical.
Behind--there is a woman slain--up there a woman created."
Trowse, for a moment, was bewildered. A searching glance into the
other's face showed him that Powers was in earnest. He became
contemplative.
"I am not sure that I understand you, Powers," he said slowly. "In fact,
I am sure that I do not. We have watched operations together, when, to
our certain knowledge, the knife has gone a little deeper, has gone a
little more to the left or right, in order that some addition might be
made to the sum of human knowledge. You have never blenched. We have
seen men die whose lives might have been prolonged, if not altogether
spared, that the race to come might benefit. Tacitly, you and I have
always recognized the principle that the individual must be the servant
of humanity. Therefore, as I say, I do not understand your present
attitude."
"I am not sure, Trowse, that I can make you understand," Powers
answered. "Only remember this: Our point of view is probably not the
same. You are a materialist pure and simple. I am not!"
"Proceed!"
"In the cases which you have mentioned it is the body only which has
suffered. In this case, the body has survived, but something else--has
been destroyed. You know the danger which still exists."
Trowse nodded.
"Lunacy! That, of course, is a possibility."
Powers shivered slightly.
"It is a possibility," he admitted. "Even if she remains sane, will you
tell me this? What connection can there be between the mind of the girl
of a month ago and the woman of a month to come?"
"It is an interesting psychological problem," Trowse answered, "which we
shall know more about shortly. I must admit, though, that your position
is inexplicable to me. Fortune has given you a marvelous opportunity. I
cannot conceive how you could have acted differently. I cannot
understand your present hesitation. If you wish for any sort of
cooperation on my part, tell me how you first met this young woman, and
under what circumstances you persuaded her to become your patient."
In a few words Powers told him.
There was a short silence. Trowse was regarding his friend with cold
surprise.
"All that you tell me," he said, "makes your present hesitation the more
extraordinary. Your scruples are unworthy of you. They would be unworthy
of you even if you belonged to that sickly order of sentimentalists who
would shrink from killing a poisonous snake because the reptile had been
given life. According to your own showing, the girl was in an
intolerable position. She enters upon her new life with every prospect
of happiness. Believe me, Powers, the hand which struck away the bridge
between her past and future was the hand of a benefactor."
"I suppose you must be right," Powers murmured.
"Right! It is hopelessly obvious," Trowse answered. "If this hesitation
is anything more than a passing mood with you, I shall be amazed. You
probably saved the girl from moral shipwreck--you have transported her
into a life which she could certainly never have reached by any other
means!"
In his tone and in his face were signs of a rare and intense enthusiasm.
The eyes of the two men met. Trowse continued, with a gesture stiff, but
almost dramatic:
"Man, it is wonderful! I could kill you as you stand there, for envy. It
is among the possibilities that you, a dilettante, a dabbler, may solve
the secret of all the ages past and to come. It may be that she will
sing to you the songs that Pocahontas sang to the great god of the
Indians or you may wake in the night to hear the wail of one of those
daughters of Judah led captive into Egypt. Perhaps she was a priestess
in the time-forgotten cities of Africa, gone before our history crept
into being, swept who knows where off the face of the earth!"
Powers was shaking with excitement. This sudden eloquence from the one
man on earth whose cold self-restraint had become a byword moved him
strangely.
"Well," he said, "for good or for evil, the thing must go through as it
has been arranged. I am glad that you are interested, Trowse. It may be
that I shall need your help."
"Likely enough," Trowse answered shortly. "It seems to me that you have
let go some of the old ideas. Believe me, they were the safest. The man
who has work to do in the world has no greater enemy than this shifting
sentimentalism. May I come and see your patient to-morrow?"
"You may see her as often as you like," Powers answered, "so long as you
let me know beforehand that you are coming."
"I thank you," Trowse answered, with a cold smile. "You need have no
fear that I shall attempt any single-handed experiments. Only, if you
want my advice, don't give her over to society, no matter what your
promise was. Why on earth don't you keep her quietly to yourself here
instead of sending her to her mother? What do you want to go publishing
her to the world at all for? A thousand things may happen if you carry
out this hairbrained scheme of yours. She may even want to marry. She is
good-looking enough. You might easily lose her altogether."
Powers was suddenly pale. There were, indeed, many possibilities which
he had not seriously considered. Yet he never hesitated.
"I must keep my word to her," he said. "I shall do it at all costs."
"You are a fool," Trowse declared bluntly. "Make her your wife. Bind her
to you. Make sure of her."
Powers walked to the door with his visitor.
"It is useless to argue with you," he said. "We look at the matter from
different points of view. The girl risked her life to gain a certain
end. She has won, and she shall have her reward."
* * * * *
With the passage of the months, Eleanor, little by little, entered upon
a strange new life in accordance with what had been promised her.
Through the London social season she went about with Lady Fiske and was
admired and sought after everywhere. It was as though a magician had
touched her face, and there had passed away from it all sense of
trouble, all evil memories, every trace of suffering. The troubled mouth
seemed ever ready to break into laughter, the faint lines and wrinkles
had faded completely away. She was years younger. The light of past
sorrows had gone from her eyes, they remained only the mirror of the
brightest and gayest things in life. In her youth, her beauty, and her
almost assertive _joie de vivre_ she seemed like a child among the
little company by whom she was constantly surrounded wherever she went
in her soulless, indefatigable quest for amusement.
"Are you not afraid, Eleanor, that some day you will grow tired of
amusing yourself?" Powers asked her one night at a dinner where she had
outshone all others.
A peal of light, sweet laughter rang out above the babel of
conversation. Everyone looked toward Eleanor's table. She was leaning a
little forward in her chair, her lips parted, her cheeks flushed, her
eyes alight with enjoyment. A single row of pearls encircled her long,
graceful neck, her shoulders and bare arms were dazzlingly soft, her
hair gleamed in the shaded lamplight.
"No! Why on earth should I? What else is there to do?"
"What about amusing other people sometimes--by way of change?"
She smiled delightfully.
"How dull! I suppose you mean have a night class for boys, or get up
concerts to send ragged children to the seaside."
"Why not? Such things are kindly enough; they do good! They are
excellent things for a girl to interest herself in."
"But it wouldn't amuse me at all, Powers! I should be bored to death."
"And you are going to think of nothing but amusing yourself all your
life?" he asked slowly.
"Why not?" she answered lightly.
Powers turned his face away in quick vexation, to encounter his mother's
disapproving glance focused on Eleanor from a near-by table.
For Lady Fiske, ever ready to further her son's scientific projects, had
lent the girl her social patronage, and had tried to blind herself to
the arrant selfishness and inconsideration that she everywhere
encountered in their intercourse. Between Eleanor and Powers' sister
Marian there was almost less in common, for the Eleanor of a month ago
had ceased to exist. Beautiful, brilliant, hard, she flitted like a
butterfly through the world that Powers had promised her, beating her
wings in a mad pursuit of amusement and pleasure, commanding homage and
self-sacrifice with a touch as hard as steel.
Powers breathed a long sigh and there was a careworn look in his eyes as
he glanced again at the girl in front of him.
Almost immediately Lady Fiske rose, and the women passed out. Trowse
stood back among the shadows behind the small table at which he had been
sitting, and steadfastly watched the girl of whom he and Marian Fiske
had been talking. Prosperity had indeed had a wonderful effect upon
Eleanor's looks. The light of perfect health had flushed her delicate
cheeks, her figure had filled out; she carried herself with a grace and
confidence which took no count of those days of slow torture through
which she had passed. Yet there was about her beauty some faint note of
peculiarity which had puzzled others before Trowse. He asked himself
what it was as she passed out, a queen running the gantlet of a court of
admiring eyes, fresh, exquisitely natural, the living embodiment of
light-hearted gaiety. When at last the door was closed and the men drew
nearer together, he smiled quietly to himself.
"It is like one of those pictures," he murmured, "which come near to
breaking the heart of the painter. It is perfect in color and form, it
is beautiful--and yet it does not live. There is no background."
He moved to a table nearer the center of the room from which he could
watch his host. The heavily shaded lights were kind enough to the faces
of the men who sat laughing together over their cigarettes, but Trowse
was a keen watcher, and he saw things which were hardly apparent to a
casual observer. Powers had altered during the last few months. There
were curious lines about his mouth, his eyes were a little sunken, his
geniality was a trifle forced. Trowse smiled grimly.
"Conscience!" he muttered to himself. "Powers was never quite free from
the sentimentalities of life. What a fool to trifle with such an
opportunity!"
He waited for his chance, and moved up presently to his host's table.
Powers welcomed him, but without heartiness. It happened that for the
moment the two were virtually isolated. Trowse leaned over toward the
other.
"How does the great experiment go?" he asked, in a low tone.
Powers visibly flinched. He glanced around him nervously.
"I want to talk to you about her, Trowse," he said. "I can't expect your
sympathy, and you can't help me--you nor any other man. But I've got to
talk to some one--or go mad."
Trowse nodded with the air of a Sphinx. "Well?"
"She is so horribly changed," Powers said. "Can't you see it? Of course
you can't judge because you did not know her before. Trowse, I feel like
a man who has created a monster, who has breathed life into some evil
thing and let it loose upon the world."
Trowse smiled grimly.
"Personally," he said, "I admit that I am no judge. I understand,
however, that society in general scarcely takes the same view of Miss
Hardinge. Isn't she supposed to be rather a beauty?"
Powers beat impatiently with his hand upon the table.
"You know that I am not talking about her looks. She's beautiful enough
to bewitch every man who comes near her--and she does it."
"It must be a little inconvenient for you," Trowse remarked. "Beyond
that, I scarcely see your point."
"Man, you have eyes," Powers exclaimed, with subdued passion. "I have
seen you studying her closely when you fancied yourself undisturbed. You
can see what I see. She is like a marvelous piece of mechanism. The
working of it is perfect, but it isn't human. She is ready to be amused
at anything; she is never serious for a single moment. She is only alive
upon the sensuous side. Confound it, Trowse, don't look at me like that.
She has no soul. There is nothing alight inside."
Trowse broke the short silence.
"I am to take it, then," he said coldly, "that you abandon the
experiment. In your present condition it is, I suppose, inevitable. You
have lost all influence over her. It would be hopeless to expect her to
respond to your will."
"I have already abandoned it," Powers answered. "I curse the day and the
thought which made me ever attempt it."
"It is as well, then," Trowse answered, "to give you fair warning. I do
not propose to stand by quietly and watch your folly."
"What do you mean?" Powers demanded.
"This: That if you do not carry this thing through--I shall!"
Powers sprang to his feet, his face was dark with passion.
"If you should dare to interfere," he cried, "if you should make the
slightest attempt to----"
"Stop!"
The monosyllable came like a pistol-shot, incisive, compelling! There
was a breathless silence. Trowse continued, and his words were cold and
hard.
"Do not threaten me," he said. "You should know better than that. You
should know exactly of how much account I hold my life when it comes to
a question of adding to the sum of human knowledge. I shall do as I say.
My decision is unalterable."
Powers was a man again.
"It is well to be prepared," he said. "I thank you for your warning.
Take mine in return. I have as little fear of death as you, and I think
that my love for Eleanor is a passion as strong as your devotion to
science. I tell you that I will not have her made the subject of your
experiments. I will not have her life or reason imperiled, even to solve
the greatest of all mysteries."
Trowse shrugged his shoulders.
"I think," he said, "that we understand one another perfectly."
Their talk fanned a growing distrust of Trowse that Fiske had felt for
weeks. He knew the man's hypnotic power, he saw the fascination with
which his friend haunted Eleanor's side at gatherings where her clear
bright laugh would suddenly cease and a look almost of terror creep into
her eyes with Trowse's entrance. Then she forgot every one else and
yielded herself to his spell.
Very subtly, very deftly, Trowse pursued his cold-blooded course of
experiment while Powers in vain sought to end it. At last he forbade
Trowse to enter his home and all went well until returning one day, at
an unexpected hour, Powers heard from his library ringing through the
house, through closed doors and curtained hallways, the cry of a woman
in mortal fear.
He sprang to the door and threw it open. Outside all was silent. There
was no repetition of the cry. Then a fainter sound reached him--a low,
convulsive moaning as of some creature in pain. He crossed the hall, ran
wildly down a long passage, and flung open the door of the little
sitting-room which had been given to Eleanor for her own. With his foot
upon the threshold he paused for a second. He heard stealthy movements
in the hall, the front door softly opened and shut. On the floor before
him, white and motionless, Eleanor was lying.
He knew that this was Trowse's work; he ran to the front door with
murder in his heart but there was no sight of anyone. Marian, too, from
the drawing room had heard the door close softly.
Powers sat with Eleanor's hand in his, watching for her return to
consciousness. Her fingers lay in his, cold and passive, her hair was in
wild disorder, and her face was still deadly pale. He bent over the
closed eyes, and a fierce, passionate desire crept into his heart. If
only she might wake up as he had known her first. If only these terrible
months of her second existence might be blotted out forever. He was
content to have failed in his great experiment. He had no longer any
ambition to add to the sum of human knowledge. The memory of Halkar and
his patients had become a nightmare to him. Forever he would have been
content to remain ignorant of those things which lay now so short a
distance beyond. It was an unexpected lesson which he had learned, a
strange fever which had wrought so marvelous a transformation in him.
The old ideals were dead and buried, life itself had become centered
around the girl who lay by his side now, white and inanimate.
At last with a little shiver she opened her eyes.
* * * * *
Physically, Eleanor became at that time a puzzle both to Powers and to
the physician whom he called in to attend upon her. From an almost
animal perfection of health, she passed after her recovery from that
prolonged fainting fit into a state of nervous prostration, the more
remarkable from its contrast to her former robustness. She lost her
color, her light gracefulness of movement, her brilliant gaiety of
manner. She moved about listlessly, with pallid cheeks, and always with
a strange gleam in her eyes--of expectancy, mingled with apprehension.
"It is so absurd--so horrible--to look back--and to remember nothing,"
she said one day, with a little break in her voice. "I want to see some
one who really belongs to me--my father, or my uncle, or some one.
Perhaps that would help me--to remember."
"My dear," Powers said, "I am afraid that you would never be able to
find your father. He is in China on a secret mission for the Government.
That is why he cannot write or receive letters. You must be content with
us for a little longer. We may hear from your uncle any day."
There was a dead silence. In her face were traces of a strange new
nervousness.
"If I could get away--a long distance away!" Eleanor exclaimed, with a
sudden tremulous emotion. "If only I could."
Powers took one of her restless hands in his.
"Eleanor," he said, "we have been talking about taking you to a little
place we have in Lincolnshire, close to the sea. There will be only
Marian and I. You shall be alone as much as you choose. No one shall
come near you whom you do not care to see."
She looked at him almost wistfully.
"To-morrow!" she repeated.
They left London early the next morning and Eleanor, with a face that
was almost haggard leaned wearily back in the train and scarcely spoke
during the entire trip.
Toward the end of dinner, on the evening of their arrival, Powers threw
open the French windows and let in the deep music of the sea. She
started to her feet with a strange little cry.
"Hark!"
It was the first sign of her awakening interest in life.
"The tide is coming in," Powers said. "You see the beach is just below
the gardens."
She stepped through the window and crossed the lawn. From there a
winding path led down to the beach. She never paused until she stood
upon the shingle, with her pale, rapt face turned seaward. Powers
followed noiselessly close behind. Almost to their feet, the long waves
came thundering in, weird and ghostlike. She stood like a statue, her
lips parted, her bosom rising and falling quickly under her dinner-gown.
"Listen," she murmured, "it is the old cry, unending, everlasting. Where
have I heard it before? Oh, tell me! Tell me!"
"I cannot," he answered. "I would that I could!"
She paid no more attention to him. She stood with her face turned
seaward, listening--always listening. He went back to the house and
brought wraps. She let him adjust them without thanks or remark. Soon
the gathering darkness blotted out everything except the faint
phosphorescent light on the tops of the breaking waves.
"Come," he said at last, touching her arm gently, "it is late, and we
have left Marian alone."
She did not move, but soon Marian came out and called to them. Then she
permitted him to lead her slowly toward the house, pausing every now and
then to listen. A faint moon was shining through a misty sky, and he
caught a glimpse of her face, which startled him. It was as though she
were listening to voices which he could not hear. There was the breath
of another world about her.
"Are you afraid of being dull here?" he asked. "You see, we have no
neighbors, and the village is a mile away."
She smiled curiously.
"There is never any dullness," she said, "where that is!"
He was prepared for changes in her, but this sudden transition from a
materialism almost gross was staggering. It was only a few weeks ago
that he had watched in vain for a single sign of feeling in her face.
Now she was pale almost to the lips with emotion.
The next afternoon she called to him. He sprang up and found her
standing in the open window dressed for walking. Even in his first rapid
glance he saw a wonderful change in her appearance. Her cheeks were
flushed, and her eyes bright. Once more she carried herself with the old
lightsome grace. She called to him gaily.
"Come for a walk, Powers! I am going to take you somewhere."
He caught up his stick and hat, and followed her. Then he saw that the
color in her cheeks was not wholly natural. She was nervous and excited.
"Why not inland, Eleanor?" he suggested. "Let us go to Turton Woods."
She seemed scarcely to have heard him. Already she was well on her way
shoreward.
He caught her up in a few strides. The tide had gone down, and they
walked dry-footed along the road. Above their heads the larks were
singing, and in their faces the freshening sea wind blew.
Her head was thrown back, her lips were parted. She drank in the breeze
as though it were wine.
"This is the wind which Ulric and his men always loved," she murmured.
"A wind from the north to the shore. Can't you feel the sting of the
Iceland snows?"
"Not I?" he answered, laughing. "To me it is soft and warm enough. But
then, you know, I have no imagination."
"Powers," she said suddenly, "I want to ask you a question. Is there any
fear of my going mad?"
He started violently.
"Certainly not!" he answered. "Why do you ask me such a question?"
"I know that I am not like other girls," she said wistfully. "I cannot
remember my father, or my life in India, or the voyage. When I try to
think about these things my head plays me such strange tricks. I cannot
remember where I was, or what I was doing a year ago--but----"
"Go on. Tell me exactly how you feel," he said encouragingly. "It will
help me to put you right."
"But behind all that," she continued hesitatingly, "I seem to remember
many strange things--things which must have happened a long, long time
ago. They are not things I have been told about, or read of! I can
remember them. They must have happened to me. Powers, it makes me
afraid."
He looked at her with ill-concealed excitement.
"It is the sea," she murmured, "which seems always to be reminding me of
things."
She came a little closer to him. His heart beat fiercely. Her eyes
sought his--the appeal of the weak to the strong. He crushed down his
joy--yet it shone in his face, trembled in his tone.
"Shall I ever be like other girls?"
He took her hands in his. She yielded them readily, but they were cold
as ice.
"I am perfectly sure of it," he declared. "You must trust in me and be
patient."
She held his hands tightly as though wrung with a sudden emotion--an
emotion which he realized was one of fear alone.
"Powers," she begged, "will you lock my door at night? Lock all the
doors in the house."
"You have been walking in your sleep!" he said. "Tell me about it. You
must tell me everything, Eleanor, if I am to succeed."
"Not in my sleep," she answered, in a low tone, "but at night, when
everything is quiet, the sea calls and calls, and I cannot rest. I woke
suddenly this morning at three o'clock, and I went out. Powers, as I
walked and listened, the wind and the sea came to me like old friends. I
remembered many strange things. I remembered people whose graves the sea
has stolen from the land ages ago. I was back in those days myself,
Powers. I sang their songs, my heart beat with their joys."
Powers was silent. It had come, then, after all--the great awakening. He
looked at her with a curiosity almost reverent. His voice trembled.
"Tell me, of those days," he begged.
She shook her head impatiently.
"They came back to me then," she said, "in the twilight, when the whole
world slept, and only the sea kept calling to me. Now they are blotted
out. I am afraid to think of them. Powers, help me to forget."
For a moment his love was in the balance against that unconquerable
thirst for knowledge which had seemed to him once the whole aim of life.
He must look, if only for a second, into that land beyond.
"Eleanor," he said thickly, "tell me what you remembered of those days.
Sing me that song. You need not be afraid. It is no sign of madness,
this!"
She burst into tears, stretched out her hands--the impulsive gesture of
a child, and the desire of his life became suddenly a faint thing beside
his great love of her. He drew her tenderly to him.
"Eleanor," he whispered, "you know that I love you. Give yourself to me,
to guard and to keep. You are the first woman who has ever come into my
life. You will be the last. I will keep you from all harm. I will help
you stifle those evil memories. You shall be my wife, and I will teach
you that love is the greatest and the sweetest thing in the world."
He held her from him and looked anxiously into her face. There was scant
comfort there for him.
"When you talk like that," she murmured, "I feel that I must be
different from all other people. You expect something from me which I
know nothing about. I do not feel toward you in the least like you say
you feel toward me. Why is it?"
"It will come!" he declared confidently. "I am sure of it. In the future
it must come."
She moved away and Powers watched her wistfully. She was thinner than he
had ever known her, and of that wonderful fresh beauty which had taken
London by storm there remained but few traces. Yet to him there came at
that moment a wonderful impulse of love. The wistfulness which shone in
her eyes, the wasted cheeks, the pallor of her once beautiful
complexion, seemed in a sense to have spiritualized her. The child whose
frank sensuousness had horrified him seemed to have passed away.
Once more she was the girl whom he had met on the wet pavement of the
city, brave and womanly, although in desperate straits--the woman who,
however unexpectedly, had first found her way to his heart. Never, even
in those days when her beauty had been unrivaled, and her train of
admirers a constant source of embarrassment, had she seemed to him more
to be desired than at that moment.
As she walked she began to sing softly and to herself. He wondered at
the strange chanting tune and at the time-forgotten words. And as she
sang the color brightened her cheeks, and the wakening breezes blew the
hair about her face.
A great sea-bird, disturbed by her voice, rose from the ditch below with
a flapping of wings and drifted away seaward.
"It is only a bird," she said. "If you had seen as many of them as I
have, you would not heed them. I have seen them in droves, when their
wings darkened the sky, and I have heard them calling to one another
down the north wind. Where have you lived all your life that you know
nothing of these things?"
She laughed softly.
"Come and sit with me on the sand-hill there," she said, "and I will
tell you about the sea."
He followed her. Almost to their feet the long waves made harsh music
upon the shingle.
"Poor man," she said softly. "Listen, have you never heard this when the
north wind blows?"
And again she sang that wonderful song. When her voice died away he
shook his head.
"No, I have never heard that," he said. "It is very beautiful. I have
never heard the music, and I do not know what language it is."
She smiled.
"It is the song of Ulric, the Dane," she told him. "Many a time he has
sung it to me as we stood on the prow of his ship, and the spray broke
over our heads and leaped high into the sunshine. He sang it to me when
the cold sleet stung our cheeks, and the wind came rushing about us, and
we heard no longer the swirl of the oars. He sang it to me in the
darkness, while we stole into the harbor, and below his men sharpened
their swords and fitted their spear-heads."
"Who was Ulric?" he asked tentatively.
"Ulric was my lover," she answered. "Every night, when the tide comes
in, he calls to me, but I do not know where he is. I do not think that I
shall ever see him any more."
"Tell me about him," he begged.
Her eyes shone.
"He was tall and strong like a god," she answered, "with yellow hair and
beard, and wonderful blue eyes. No man save he could wield his sword,
and in battle men gave way before him as the corn falls before the
scythe. And because he loved me he brought me here with him from over
the seas. I sat in the ship, while he and his men fought on the land.
And at night, when the villages were burning, back came my lover with
skins and ornaments, corn and wine, and we were all happy together."
He watched her still with fascinated eyes.
"Do you mean that you remember these things?" he asked. "You have read
about them in a book."
"A book!" she exclaimed scornfully. "What need have I of books to tell
me of these things?--I, to whom their happening was but as yesterday.
Only then my name was Hildegarde, and now they call me Eleanor."
"But this all happened very long ago," he protested. "You are only
twenty-five, you know. It isn't possible for you to remember."
She eyed him with tolerant scorn.
"You foolish man!" she exclaimed. "You do not understand. The days when
I was Hildegarde, and Ulric was my lover, are as clear to me as
moonlight. I could tell you many things of those days if you cared to
listen--how Ulric slew his brother because he lifted his eyes to me, and
how once we were both taken prisoners by the King of East Mercia, and
Ulric burst his bonds, the strongest they could forge, and slew the
guards one by one.
"It was just such a dawn as this when we came running to the seashore,
and when we smelled the salt wind how we laughed in one another's faces
for the joy of our freedom. Behind the Britons were staggering with
fatigue--for Ulric ran like a god, and when I was weary he caught me up
by the waist, and I lay upon his shoulder, and never troubled him. Or I
could tell you how he slew his chief captain because one night he
whispered in my ear."
He clasped her fingers in his. They were hot and feverish.
"Shall we turn now, dear?" he said. "We have walked far enough in this
sun. You shall tell me more of Ulric another day."
They had left the shore, but she turned to the right along a low range
of sand-hills.
"Does this lead to any place in particular?" he asked.
"It leads to Rayston Church," she answered. "We are going there."
He looked at her in quick surprise.
"How did you know that?" he asked. "I have heard of a place called
Rayston, but there is no church there."
She laughed softly.
"I will show you where it stood, then," she answered. "I will show you,
too, what sort of man Ulric was. It was the last of our raids. We had
twelve ships, and nearly five hundred men, and everywhere the people
fled without fighting, for no one could stand against Ulric and his men.
For once I, too, was allowed to land, for we knew that our coming was
unexpected, and there was no fear of defeat. Village by village they
plundered, and sacked, and burned. Night by night we made great fires,
by which the ships followed us along the coast, and I sang to them till
the embers burned low."
She stopped short with a little cry, and pointed inland. To their left
was a plowed field, and in the top corner were three grass and
ivy-covered stone walls of immense thickness.
"See," she cried, "there stood Rayston Church! When we came here an old
man met us waving a green bough. He told Ulric that all the folk had
fled, and that their dwellings might be spared they had collected all
their treasures and belongings and stored them in the church. Ulric
believed him, and they hastened to the church, all shouting and singing
together for joy of such an easy victory. But when they were within a
dozen yards of the building there came suddenly upon them from the slit
apertures and the tower a cloud of poisoned arrows, and Ulric lost more
men in those few minutes than ever in his life before. I was far away
behind, but I saw all. I saw Ulric raise his great two-edged sword and
cut down to the ground the old man who had led them there. I saw them
drag the trunk of a tree to the church door and batter it in, and not
one Briton escaped. Ask that old man, Powers, what they have found in
the fields here."
Powers called a laborer digging on a potato-patch close at hand.
"What is the name of that ruin?" he asked.
The man surveyed it doubtfully.
"There ain't any one as rightly knows, sir," he admitted. "Our vicar has
looked at the walls, and reckoned it must have been a church."
"Have any Danish trophies ever been found about here?"
The old man smiled.
"You see this field, sir?" he answered. "I've heard my grandfather say
that when he used to plow that one day it must have been sown with human
bones. There's an old horn mug been found here, too, that they say, from
the shape of it, must have belonged to some foreigners. It's in the
British Museum in London."
Powers threw him a shilling and turned away with Eleanor.
"You have been here before," he said, in a low tone.
"Never since I came with Ulric," she answered dreamily, "and that must
have been a very, very long time ago. There were no houses in those
days, nor any fields. Yet the land is the same, the land and the sea.
They do not change."
They sat down on a sandy knoll. Powers took her hand in his.
"Dear," he said softly, "it is not well for you to dwell upon these
fancies. Try and think instead of the future--our future.
"Fancies," she repeated scornfully. "They are not fancies. They are
memories."
"Call them what you will, dear," he said, "but let them lie. They belong
to a dead past. It is the future which concerns us."
She drew a little closer to him. For the first time he felt his pressure
upon her fingers returned.
It seemed to him as she sat there, with quivering lips, that it was
indeed the weary shop-girl of the Edgware Road who was with him once
more. There was a light in her eyes as of some new understanding.
A great yearning swept over Powers with the memory of that rain-swept,
wind-tossed bay. All the scientific aspirations, the quiet culture, and
the easy, pleasant days of sybaritical studentship which had filled his
life were suddenly things of the past. His passionate love for Eleanor
was predominant. He was like a man afflicted with a strange fever of
unknown origin, which no physician could prescribe for, and which he
himself was powerless to resist.
In his room that night he sat under his student's lamp into the small
hours, writing--writing....
It was the last chance and he was going to stake his all upon it. He was
appealing to the old German professor of his student days, the man who
more than any other could aid him at this time.
A week later he took Eleanor back to London and placed her in the great
specialist's hands. And then followed weary days and nights of anxious
waiting when all but hope seemed fled. Then came a day when his library
door opened softly and the great German doctor looked at Powers
benevolently through his double glasses.
"My young friend," he said, "the work is finished. My last visit to this
most interesting of patients has been paid. I await now only the
confirmation of our theories."
Powers, though outwardly cool, was trembling with excitement.
"I can go to her?" he asked. "You recommend it? The moment has arrived?"
"It has arrived," Herr Rauchen affirmed. "She is strong enough to bear
your presence--to talk in moderation. I will await here the result. It
is an experiment the most interesting of any I have ever known."
Powers moved toward the door, but the professor called him back.
"My young friend," he said, "one moment. There's no hurry. I would ask a
question."
"Well?"
"You say the room is the same, the nurse is the same. Good! Have you the
clothes she arrived in?"
"They are there in full view," Powers answered. "She has come back to
consciousness among precisely the same surroundings as when she first
came to me eight months ago."
"Very good indeed," the professor declared. "Now you shall go to her.
Meanwhile, I wait for you here."
Once more Powers hesitated, with his foot upon the threshold of her
room. It seemed so short a time ago since he stood there before on his
way to his first interview with her since his great experiment. But his
interest was no longer scientific. He knew very well that the next few
minutes must make or mar his life.
The professor had given him hope; their theories had been based upon a
sound basis. But the issue was the greatest he had ever put to the test.
With it was bound up the whole welfare of the woman he loved. He entered
the room without his usual confidence. Yet the moment he saw her his
heart beat with passionate hope.
She was lying upon a sofa, her hair loosely coiled upon the top of her
head, clad in a becoming morning wrap, white with streaming ribbons. At
the sound of the opening door she turned her head, and she greeted him
with a faint smile. As their eyes met he felt once more that passionate
thrill of hope. For the change in her face was manifest. This was
neither the brilliantly beautiful but soulless child who had taken
London by storm, nor the mystic, moody girl, hovering ever on the brink
of insanity, who had sung to him upon the seashore. It was the Eleanor
of his earlier knowledge, who greeted him now half-shyly, yet with a
certain mischievous look in her clear soft eyes.
"So, after all," she murmured, looking up at him, "I am a
disappointment. The great experiment is a failure. I really haven't
forgotten a single thing."
"Hang the experiment!" he declared cheerfully. "I lost all interest in
that long ago. All that I have been anxious for has been your recovery."
"I am so glad," she said. "I was afraid you would be terribly
disappointed. It really isn't my fault, is it?"
"Not in the least," he assured her heartily. "You were an excellent
subject. I suppose," he added, struggling to keep the anxiety out of his
tone, "there is no doubt about the failure of it?"
"Not the slightest. My memory feels particularly clear. You can
cross-examine me if you like."
"Well, I will ask you a few questions," he said. "Tell me your last
recollection before you came to yourself."
She answered him readily.
"I came to you here," she said, "and told you that I was dismissed from
Bearmain's. I heard your proposals and agreed to them. You sent for a
nurse and you gave me chloroform here. The very last thing in my mind is
that you walked to the window, and looked at your watch just before I
went off."
He drew a quick breath--it sounded almost a gasp. "It is wonderful!" he
exclaimed.
"Everything before that day--my miserable life at Bearmain's, your
kindness to me, and our little jaunts together," she said, "I can
remember quite clearly. I am sorry to wound your vanity, but your
experiment has been shockingly unsuccessful."
He smiled.
"It was a very foolish one," he declared. "I have been terribly worried
about you."
Their eyes met for a moment, and a spot of color burned in her cheeks.
"You need not have worried," she said softly. "You made it all quite
clear to me before I consented. I knew the risk I ran."
He braced himself up for the final test.
"You have been unconscious for a very long time," he said. "Often I used
to listen to you talking to yourself. You don't mind, do you? You see it
was part of the experiment."
"Of course not," she answered. "Was I very foolish?"
"You spoke of a lot of things which, of course, I did not understand,"
he said. "For instance, there was Ulric. Who was he?"
"Ulric?" she repeated the name wonderingly. There was no comprehension
in her face.
"Are you sure of the name?" she asked. "I never heard it in my life
before."
He smothered his agitation with a strange laugh.
"Perhaps," he suggested, "Ulric was one of your companions when you were
a child."
"Perhaps," she assented. "Yet the name is so uncommon that I think I
should have remembered it."
"Well," he continued, "there was a person of the name of Trowse--an
enemy, I should think, or some one you disliked. What of him?"
Again the blankness of non-comprehension. She shook her head at him and
smiled.
"Do you know," she said, "I shall believe soon that it is you who have
been raving. Trowse! Ulric! I never heard such names in my life. Tell
me, was there any one else?"
"You spoke of my mother and sister as though you knew them," he said.
She shook her head.
"I saw them with you in a box at the theater one night, you know," she
reminded him.
He was watching her closely, and permitted himself a little sigh of
relief. She was looking out of the window at the faint April sunshine
which was doing its best to brighten the dull afternoon.
A few days later Powers made his way to her room in the twilight. It was
easy to see that her recovery was now an assured thing. She was standing
by the window when he entered, and he fancied for the first time that
she greeted him a little nervously.
"Your mother and sister have been to see me, Sir Powers," she said.
"Wasn't it delightful of them?"
"Well, I don't know," he answered. "It seems to me a very natural thing
for them to do. I hope you liked my mother, Eleanor."
"How could any one help it?" she said simply. "Your sister was very
kind, too. They spoke as though--I was to go and stay with
them--but----"
"Well?" he said.
She was very nervous under his gaze. All her words took flight with her
long, carefully planned idea of a livelihood that she had wanted to
consult him about.
The feeling in his eyes was unmistakable. A delicate flush stole into
her cheeks and she closed her eyes. In the strong light he noticed more
clearly the fragility of her appearance. He rose hastily.
"Eleanor," he said, "do not think that I expect too much from you now.
But I love you very dearly, and to-day I ask from you only the right to
give you my name, so that I may protect you from all evil, whensoever it
may come. For the rest I am content to wait."
The hot color burned in her cheeks. She looked at him
confused--reproachful.
"But you never seemed as though you cared at all!" she faltered. "I
don't understand."
He caught her to him. His eyes were bright, his face hungry with the
love of her.
"Dear!" he cried, "look at me. What does it matter when first I cared
for you? Look at me now--listen. I love you, Eleanor! You believe me!
You must!"
She laughed as she leaned toward him.
"It is so easy," she murmured, "to believe when one wants to--very
much."
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