My Friend Prospero

by Henry Harland

  VI

  "Who was it said of some one that he dearly loved a lord?" MariaDolores, her chin in the air, asked of Frau Brandt.

  "I do not know," Frau Brandt replied, knitting.

  "Well, at least, you know whether it would be possible for a man andwife to live luxuriously on sixpence a week. Would it?" pursued hertease.

  "You are well aware that it would not," said Frau Brandt.

  "How about six hundred pounds a year?"

  "Six hundred pounds--?" Frau Brandt computed. "That would be sixthousand florins, no? It would depend upon their station in the world."

  "Well, suppose their station were about my station--and my lord's?"

  "You," said Frau Brandt, with a chuckle of contentment, swaying herwhite-bonneted head. "You would need twice that for your dress alone."

  "One could dress more simply," said Maria Dolores.

  "No," said Frau Brandt, her good eyes beaming, "you must always dress inthe very finest that can be had."

  "But then," Maria Dolores asked with wistfulness, "what am I to do? Forsix hundred pounds is the total of his income."

  "You have, unless I am mistaken, an income of your own," Frau Brandtremarked.

  "Yes--but he won't let me use it," said Maria Dolores.

  "He? Who?" demanded Frau Brandt, bridling. "Who is there that dares tosay let or not let to you?

  "My future husband," said Maria Dolores. "He has peculiar ideas ofhonour. He does not like the notion of marrying a woman who is richerthan himself. So he will marry me only on the condition that I send myown fortune to be dropped in the middle of the sea."

  "What nonsense is this?" said Frau Brandt, composed.

  "No, it is the truth," said Maria Dolores, "the true truth. He is tooproud to live in luxury at his wife's expense."

  "I like a man making conditions, when it is a question of marrying you,"said Frau Brandt, with scorn.

  "So do I," said Maria Dolores, with heartiness.

  "Well, at any rate, I am glad to see that he is not after you for yourmoney," Frau Brandt reflected.

  "I suppose we shall have to dress in sackcloth and dine on lentils,"said Maria Dolores.

  "Of course you will tell him to take his conditions to the Old One,"said Frau Brandt. "It is out of the question for you to change themanner of your life."

  "I feel indeed as if it were," admitted Maria Dolores. "But if heinsists?"

  "Then tell him to go to the Old One himself," was Frau Brandt's bluntadvice.

  Maria Dolores laughed. "It seems like an _impasse_," she said. "Who isto break the news to my brother?"

  "We will wait until there is some news to break," the old woman amiablygrumbled.

  Again at the sunset hour Maria Dolores met him in the garden. He wasseated on one of their marble benches, amongst marble columns,(rose-tinted by the western light, and casting long purple shadows), ina vine-embowered pergola. He was leaning forward, legs crossed, browwrinkled, as one deep in thought. But of course at the sound of herfootstep he jumped up.

  "What mighty problem were you revolving?" she asked. "You looked likeRembrandt's _philosophe en meditation_."

  "I was revolving the problem of human love," he answered. "I wasmutilating Browning.

  '_Was it something said, Something done, Was it touch of hand, Turn of head?_'

  I was also thinking about you. I was wondering whether it would be mycruel destiny not to see you this evening, and thinking of the firsttime I ever saw you."

  "Oh," said she, lightly, "that morning among the olives,--when yougathered the windflowers for me?"

  "No," said he. "That was the second time."

  "Indeed?" said she, surprised. She sat down on the marble bench. Johnstood before her.

  "Yes," said he. "The first time was the day before. You were crossingthe garden--you were bending over the sun-dial--and I spied upon youfrom a window of the _piano nobile_. Lady Blanchemain was there with me,and she made a prediction."

  "What did she predict?" asked Maria Dolores, unsuspicious.

  "She predicted that I would fall--" But he dropped his sentence in themiddle. "She predicted what has happened."

  "Oh," murmured Maria Dolores, and looked at the horizon. By-and-by,"That morning among the olives was the first time that I saw you--whenyou dashed like a paladin to my assistance. I feel that I have neversufficiently thanked you."

  "A paladin oddly panoplied," said John. "Tell me honestly, weren't youin two minds whether or not to reward me with largesse? You had silverin your hand."

  Maria Dolores laughed. I think she coloured a little.

  "Perhaps I was, for half a second," she confessed. "But your grandmanner soon put me in one mind."

  John also laughed. He took a turn backwards and forwards. "I have wakedin the dead of night, and grown hot and cold to remember the figure offun I was."

  "No," said Maria Dolores, to console him. "You weren't a figure of fun.Your costume had the air of being an impromptu, but," she laughed, "yournative dignity shone through."

  "Thank you," said John, bowing. "The next time I saw you was that sameafternoon. You were with Annunziata in the avenue. I carried my visionof you, like a melody, all the way to Roccadoro-and all the way homeagain."

  "I had just made Annunziata's acquaintance," said Maria Dolores.

  "You had a white sunshade and a lilac frock," said John. "The next timewas that night in the moonlight. You were all in white, with a scarf ofwhite lace over your hair. You threw me a white rose from yourbalcony--and I have carried that rose with me ever since."

  "I threw you a white rose?" doubted Maria Dolores, looking up, at fault.

  "Yes," said John. "Have you forgotten it?"

  "I certainly have," said she, with emphasis.

  "You threw me a smile that was like a white rose," said he.

  She laughed.

  "I think I just distantly acknowledged your bow," she said.

  "Well, some people's distant acknowledgments are like white roses," saidhe. "I hope, at least, you remember what a glorious night it was, andhow the nightingales were singing?"

  "Yes," said she. "I remember that."

  "I have a fancy," he declared, "that it will be a more glorious nightstill to-night, and that the nightingales will sing better than theyhave ever sung before."

  Maria Dolores did not speak.

  "Do you happen," John asked, after a long silence, while they gazed atthe deepening colours in the west, "do you happen to possess such athing as a copy of the Almanach de Gotha?"

  "Yes," said she.

  "Really? I wonder whether you will lend it to me?"

  "I am sorry--it is in Vienna." And after an instant's pause, sheventured, "What, if it isn't indiscreet to inquire, do you wish to lookup?"

  "I wish to look up a lady--a dream lady--a lady who walks in beauty likethe night of cloudless climes--and whose pocket-handkerchiefs areembroidered with the initials M.D., in a cypher, under a princelycrown."

  "I should think," said Maria Dolores, considering, "that she wouldprobably be a member of one of the mediatised princely houses. But ifyou have nothing more than her initials to go by, you would find itdifficult to trace her in the Almanach de Gotha."

  "No doubt," said John. "But to a man of spirit a difficulty is achallenge."

  "Do you make a practice," asked she, "of appropriating people'shandkerchiefs?"

  "Certain people's--yes," unblushing, he promptly owned.

  "M.D. under a princely crown, I think you said?" she mused. "It occursto me that Maria Dolores of Zelt-Neuminster's pocket-handkerchiefs mightbe so embroidered."

  "Ah?" said John. "Zelt-Neuminster? That would be a daughter of the manwho owns this Castle?"

  "No, she is a sister of the man who owns this Castle."

  "I understand," said John. "I wonder that the sister of the man who ownsthis Castle never comes here to see how fine it is."

  "She has been here quite recently," said Maria Dolores. "She has beenhere visiti
ng her foster-mother, who lives in the pavilion beyond theclock. She came to make a sort of retreat--to think something over."

  "Yes--?" questioned he.

  "Her brother is very anxious to marry her off. He is anxious that sheshould marry her second cousin, the Prince of Zelt-Zelt. She came hereto make up her mind."

  "Has she made it up?" he asked.

  "I am not sure," said she.

  "Yet you seem to be deep in her confidence," said he.

  "Yes--but she is not quite sure herself."

  "Oh--?" said John.

  "She is one of those foolish women who dream of marriage as a highromance."

  "Wise men," said John, "dream of it as the highest."

  She shook her head.

  "A marriage with her cousin would be an end to all romance for ever. Shewas thinking a little while ago, I believe, of marrying a plaincommoner, the nephew of a farmer. That would have been indeed romantic.Now, I hear, she is considering, a future member of your English Houseof Lords."

  "Wouldn't even that be rather romantic--if a step down constitutesromance?" John suggested.

  "Oh, a British peer is scarcely a step down," she returned. "Besides,there are people who don't care--what is the expression?--twopence aboutrank."

  "When I said that," John explained, "I had no inkling that her rank wasso exalted."

  "Did you think she was the daughter of a cobbler?" Maria Doloresquickly, with some haughtiness, inquired.

  "I thought she was a daughter of the stars," John answered.

  "And you feared her name was Smitti," she said, haughtiness dissolvingin mirth. "I will never tell you what she feared that yours was."

  "See," said John, "how they are hanging the heavens with banners. Itmust be in honour of some great impending event."

  Yesterday the west had been a sea. To-day it was a city, a vast grey andviolet city, with palaces and battlemented towers, and countless airyspires and pinnacles; and here, there, everywhere, its walls were gaywith gold and crimson, as with drooping banners.

  "'Tis a city _en fete_," said John. "'Tis the city where marriages aremade. They must have one in hand."

  "Hark," said she, putting up a finger. "There are your nightingalesbeginning."

  But the raised finger reminded him of something. "Have you a rootedobjection to rings?" he asked.

  "Why?" asked she.

  "I notice that you don't wear any."

  "Oh, sometimes I wear many," she said. "Then one has moods in which oneleaves them off."

  "I have a ring in my pocket which I think belongs to you," said he.

  "Really? I don't know that any of my rings are missing."

  "Here it is," said he. He produced the little old shagreen case he hadreceived from Lady Blanchemain, opened, and offered it.

  "It is a singularly beautiful ring," said she, her eyes admiring. "Butit doesn't belong to me."

  "I think it does," said he. "May I try it on your finger?"

  She put forth her right hand.

  "No--your left hand, please," he said. He dropped upon one knee beforeher, and when the delicate white hand was surrendered, I imagine he madeof getting the ring upon the alliance finger a longer business by a gooddeal than was necessary. "There," he said in the end, "you see. It looksas if it had grown there. Of course it belongs to you." He still heldher hand, warm and firm and velvet-soft. I think in another second hewould have touched it with his lips. But she drew it away.

  She gazed into the depths of the heart-shaped ruby, tremulous withliquid light, and smiled as at secret thoughts.

  "But I don't see," said John, getting to his feet, "how any man can aska Princess of the House of Zelt to marry him and live on six hundredpounds a year."

  "She would have to modify her habits a good deal, that is very certain,"said Maria Dolores.

  "She would have to modify them utterly," said John. "Six hundred a yearis poverty even for a single man. For a married couple it would bebeggary. She would have to live like the wife of a petty employe. Shewould have to travel second class and stay at fourth-rate hotels. Shewould have to turn her old dresses and trim her own bonnets. She wouldhave to do without a maid. And all this means that she would havevirtually to renounce her caste, to give up the society of her equals,who demand a certain scale of appearances, and to live among pariahs orto live in isolation. Don't you think a man would be a monster ofselfishness to exact such sacrifices?"

  "Oh, some men have excessively far-fetched and morbid notions ofhonour," said she.

  "Do you think the Princess, with all this brought to her attention,would ever dream of consenting?"

  "Women in love are weak--they will consent to almost anything," saidshe, her dark eyes smiling for an instant into his.

  Why didn't he take her in his arms? Hope deferred maketh the heart sick,but to defer the consummation of a joy assured (observes the Persianpoet) giveth the heart a peculiar sweet excitement.

  "Well," said John. "I'm glad to think she is weak; but I'll never ask mywife to consent to anything so unpleasant. A Princess and a futurepeeress, living on six hundred pounds a year! It's unheard of."

  She looked at him, puzzled, incredulous.

  "Oh--? Can you possibly mean--that you will--take back your condition?"

  "Yes," said he, humbly. "Who am I to make conditions?"

  "You will let her spend as much of her own money as she likes?" shewondered, wide-eyed.

  "As a lover of thrift, I shall deprecate extravagance," said John. "Butas a submissive husband, I shall let her do in all things as her fancydictates."

  "Well," marvelled she, "here is a surprise--here is a volte-faceindeed."

  And she looked at the city in the sky, and appeared to turn things over.

  John was mysteriously chuckling.

  "Haven't you your opinion," he asked, "of men who eat their words andput their scruples in their pockets?"

  "I don't understand," said she, looking wild. "There is, of course, somejoke."

  "There is a joke, indeed," said he; "the joke is that I'm ten timesricher than I told you I was."

  She started back, and fixed him with a glance.

  "Then all that about your being poor was only humbug?" There wasreproach in her voice, I'm not sure there wasn't disappointment.

  "No," said he, "it was the exact and literal truth. But I have come intoa modest competency over-night."

  "I don't understand," said she.

  "My own part in the story is a sufficiently inglorious one," said he."I'm the benefactee. Lady Blanchemain and my uncle have put their headstogether, and endowed me. I feel rather small at letting them, but itenables me to look my affianced boldly in the money-eye."

  "Oh? You are affianced? Already?" she asked gaily.

  "No--not unless you are," gaily answered John.

  She looked down at her ring.