The Man from Brodney's

by George Barr McCutcheon

  CHAPTER XIII

  CHASE PERFORMS A MIRACLE

  Hollingsworth Chase now felt that he was on neutral ground with thePrincess Genevra. He could hardly credit his senses. When he leftRapp-Thorberg in disgrace some months before, his susceptibilities werein a most thoroughly chastened condition; a cat might look at a king,but he had forsworn peeping into the secret affairs of princesses.

  His strange connection with the Skaggs will case is easily explained.After leaving Thorberg he went directly to Paris; thence, after tendays, to London, where he hoped to get on as a staff correspondent forone of the big dailies. One day at the Savage Club, he listened to arecital of the amazing conditions which attended the execution ofSkaggs's will. He had shot wild game in South Africa with Sir JohnBrodney, chief counsellor for the islanders, and, as luck would have it,was to lunch with him on the following day at the Savoy.

  His soul hungered for excitement, novelty. The next day, when Sir Johnsuddenly proposed that he go out to Japat as the firm's representative,he leaped at the chance. There would be no difficulty about certainlittle irregularities, such as his nationality and the fact that he wasnot a member of the London bar: Sir John stood sponsor for him, and theislanders would take him on faith.

  In truth, Rasula was more than glad to have the services of an American.He had heard Wyckholme talk of the manner in which civil causes wereconducted and tried in the United States, and he felt that one Yankee onthe scene was worth ten Englishmen at home. Doubtless he got hisimpressions of the genus Englishman by observation of the devotedBowles.

  The good-looking Mr. Chase, writhing under the dread of exposure as aninternational jackass, welcomed the opportunity to get as far away fromcivilisation as possible. He knew that the Prince Karl story would notlie dormant. It would be just as well for him if he were where the lashof ridicule could not reach him, for he was thin-skinned.

  We know how and when he came to the island and we have renewed our shortacquaintance with him under peculiar circumstances. It would be sadlyremiss, however, to suppress the information that he could not banishthe fair face of the Princess Genevra from his thoughts during the longvoyage; nor would it be stretching the point to say that his day dreamswere of her as he sat and smoked in his bungalow porch.

  Before Chase left London, Sir John Brodney bluntly cautioned him againstthe dangers that lurked in Lady Deppingham's eyes.

  "She won't leave you a peg to stand on, Chase, if you seek anencounter," he said. "She's pretty and she's clever, and she's madefools of better men than you, my boy. I don't say she's a bad lot,because she's too smart for that. But I will say that a dozen men are inlove with her to-day. I suppose you'll say that she can't help that. I'monly warning you on the presumption that they don't seem to be able tohelp it, either. Remember, my boy, you are going out there to offset,not to beset, Lady Deppingham."

  Chase learned more of the attractive Lady Agnes and her court before heleft England. Common report credited her with being dangerously pretty,scandalously unwise, eminently virtuous, distractingly adventurous inthe search for pleasure, charmingly unscrupulous in her treatment ofmen's hearts, but withal, sufficiently clever to dodge the consequencesof her widespread though gentle iniquities. He was quite prepared toadmire her, and yet equally resolved to avoid her. Something told himthat he was not of the age and valor of St. Anthony. He went out toJapat with a stern resolution to lead himself not into temptation; tosteer clear of the highway of roses and stick close to the thorny pathsbelow. Besides, he felt that he deserved some sort of punishment forlooking so high in the Duchy of Rapp-Thorberg.

  Not that he was in love with the proud Princess Genevra; he denied thatto himself a hundred times a day as he sat in his bungalow and smokedthe situation over.

  He had proved to himself, quite beyond a doubt, that he was not in love,when, like a bolt from a clear sky, she stepped out of the oblivion intowhich he had cast her, to smile upon him without warning. It was mostunfair. Her smile had been one of the most difficult obstacles toovercome in the effort to return a fair and final verdict.

  As he sat in the shade of his bungalow porch on the afternoon of herarrival, he lamented that every argument he had presented in the causeof common sense had been knocked into a cocked hat by that electricsmile. Could anything be more miraculous than that she should come tothe unheard-of island of Japat--unless, possibly, that he should bethere when she came? She was there for him to look upon and love andlose, just as he had dreamed all these months. It mattered little thatshe was now the wife of Prince Karl of Brabetz; to him she was still thePrincess Genevra of Rapp-Thorberg.

  If he had ever hoped that she might be more to him than an unattainabledivinity, he was not fool enough to imagine that such a hope could berealised. She was a princess royal, he the slave who stood afar off andworshipped beyond the barrier of her disdain. In his leather pocketbooklay the ever-present reminder that she could be no more than a dream tohim. It was the clipping from a Paris newspaper, announcing that thePrincess Genevra was to wed Prince Karl during the Christmas holidays.

  He had seen the Christmas holidays come and go with the certainknowledge in his heart that they had given her to Brabetz as the mostglorious present that man had ever received. If he was tormented by thisthought at the happiest season of the year, his crustiness wasattributed by others to the loneliness of his life on the island. If hegrew leaner and more morose, no one knew that it was due to the passingof a woman.

  Now she was come to the island and, so far as he had been able to see,there was no sign of the Prince of Brabetz in attendance. The absence ofthe little musician set Chase to thinking, then to speculating and, inthe end, to rejoicing. Her uncle by marriage, an English nobleman ofhigh degree, in gathering his friends for the long cruise, evidently hadleft the Prince out of his party, for what reason Chase could notimagine. To say that the omission was gratifying to the tall Americanwould be too simple a statement. There is no telling to what heights histhoughts might have carried him on that sultry afternoon if they had notbeen harshly checked by the arrival of a messenger from the chateau. Hisblood leaped with anticipation. Selim brought word that the messengerwas waiting to deliver a note. The Enemy, who shall be called by histrue name hereafter, steadied himself and commanded that the man bebrought forthwith.

  Could it be possible--but no! _She_ would not be writing to him. What aridiculous thought! Lady Deppingham? Ah, there was the solution! She wasacting as the go-between, she was the intermediary! She and the Princesshad put their cunning heads together--but, alas! His hopes fell flat asthe note was put into his eager hand. It was from Britt.

  Still he broke the seal with considerable eagerness. As he perused thesomewhat lengthy message, his disappointment gave way to a no uncertainform of excitement; with its conclusion, he was on his feet, his eyesgleaming with enthusiasm.

  "By George!" he exclaimed. "What luck! Things are coming my way with avengeance. I'll do it this very night, thanks to Britt. And I must notforget Browne. Ah, what a consolation it is to know that there areAmericans wherever one goes. Selim! Selim!" He was standing as straightas a corporal and his eyes were glistening with the fire of battle whenSelim came up and forgot to salute, so great was his wonder at thetransformation. "Get word to the men that I want every mother's son of'em to attend a meeting in the market-place to-night at nine. Veryimportant, tell 'em. Tell Von Blitz that he's _got_ to be there. I'mgoing to show him and my picturesque friend, Rasula, that I am here tostay. And, Selim, tell that messenger to wait. There's an answer."

  Long before nine o'clock the men of Japat began to gather in the marketand trading place. It was evident that they expected and were preparedfor the crisis. Von Blitz and Rasula, who had played second fiddle untilhe could stand it no longer, were surprised and somewhat staggered bythe peremptory tone of the call, but could see no chance for theAmerican to shift his troublesome burden. The subdued, sullen air of themen who filled the torchlighted market-place brooded ill for any attemptChase might make to re
concile them to his peculiar views, no matter howthoroughly they may have been misunderstood by the people. Explanationswere easy to make, but difficult to establish. Chase could convincethem, no doubt, that he was not guilty of double dealing, but it wouldbe next to impossible to extinguish the blaze of jealousy that wasconsuming the reason of the head men of Japat, skilfully fed by thetortured Von Blitz and blown upon ceaselessly by the breath of scandal.

  Five hundred dark, sinister men were gathered in knots about the square.They talked in subdued tones and looked from fiery eyes that beliedtheir outward calm.

  Hollingsworth Chase, attended by Selim, came down from his mountainretreat. He heard the sibilant hiss of the scorned Persians as he passedamong them on the outskirts of the crowd; he observed the threateningattitude of the men who waited and watched; he saw the white, ugly faceof Von Blitz quivering with triumph; he felt the breath of disaster uponhis cheek. And yet he walked among them without fear, his head erect,his eyes defiant. He knew that a crisis had come, but he smiled as hewalked up to meet it, with a confidence that was sublime.

  The market-place was a large open tract in the extreme west end of thetown, some distance removed from the business street and the pier. Ontwo sides were the tents of the fruit peddlers and the vegetablehucksters, negroes who came in from the country with their produce. Theother sides were taken up by the fabric and gewgaw venders, while in thecentre stood the platforms from which the auctioneers offered treasuresfrom the Occident. Through a break in the foothills, the chateau wasplainly discernible, the sea being obscured from view by the denseforest that crowned the cliffs.

  Chase made his way boldly to the nearest platform, exchanging bows withthe surprised Von Blitz and the saturnine Rasula, who stood quite near.The men of Japat slowly drew close in as he mounted the platform, Thegleaming eyes that shone in the light of the torches did not create anyvisible sign of uneasiness in the American, even though down in hisheart he trembled. He knew the double chance he was to take. From wherehe stood looking out over those bronze faces, he could pick out thescowling husbands who hated him because their wives hated them. He couldsee Ben Ali, the master of two beauties from Teheran and the handsomedancing girl from Cairo; there was Amriph, who basked erstwhile in thesunshine of a bargain from Damascus and a seraph from Bagdad, but whonow groped about in the blackness of their contempt; and others, all ofwhom felt in their bitter hearts that their misery was due to theprowess of this gallant figure.

  Afar off stood the group of women who had inspired this hatred anddistrust. Behind them, despised and uncountenanced by the Orientalelect, were crowded the native women, who, down in their hearts, loathedthe usurpers. It was Chase's hope that the husbands of these simplewomen would ultimately stand at his side in the fight for supremacy--andthey were vastly in the majority. If he could convince these men thathis dealings with them were honest, Von Blitz could "go hang."

  He faced the crowd, knowing that all there were against him. "VonBlitz!" he called suddenly. The German started and stepped backinvoluntarily, as if he had been reprimanded.

  "I've called this meeting in order to give you a chance to say to myface some of the things you are saying behind my back. Thank God, all ofyou men understand English. I want you to hear what Von Blitz has to sayin public, and then I want you to hear what I say to him. Incidentally,you may have something to say for yourselves. In the first place, I wantyou all to understand just how I stand in respect to my duties as yourlegal representative. Von Blitz and Rasula and others, I hear, haveundertaken to discredit my motives as the agent of your London advisers.Let me say, right here, that the man who says that I have played youfalse in the slightest degree, is a liar--a _damned_ liar, if you preferit that way. You have been told that I am selling you out to the lawyersfor the opposition. That is lie number one. You have been led to believethat I make false reports to your London solicitors. Lie number two. Youhave been poisoned with the story that I covet certain women in thistown--too numerous to mention, I believe. That is lie number three. Theyare all beautiful, my friends, but I wouldn't have one of 'em as a gift.

  "For the past few nights my home has been watched. I want to announce toyou that if I see anybody hanging around the bungalow after to-day, I'mgoing to put a bullet through him, just as I would through a dog. Pleasebear that in mind. Now, to come down to Von Blitz. You can't drive meout of this island, old man. You have lied about me ever since I beatyou up that night. You are sacrificing the best interests of thesepeople in order to gratify a personal spite, in order to wreak apersonal vengeance. Stop! You can talk when I have finished. You haveset spies upon my track. You have told these husbands that their wivesneed watching. You have turned them against me and against their wives,who are as pure and virtuous as the snow which you never see. (God,forgive me!) All this, my friend, in order to get even with me. I don'task you to retract anything you've said. I only intend you to know thatI can crush you as I would a peanut, if you know what that is. You----"

  Von Blitz, foaming with rage, broke in: "I suppose you vill call out derwarships! We are not fools! You can fool some of----"

  "Now, see here, Von Blitz, I'll show whether I can call out a warshipwhenever I need one. I have never intended to ask naval help except incase of an attack by our enemies up at the chateau. You can't believethat I seek to turn those big guns against my own clients--the clients Icame out here to serve with my life's blood if necessary. But, hear me,you Dutch lobster! I can have a British man-of-war here in ten hours totake you off this island and hang you from a yard arm on the charge ofconspiracy against the Crown."

  Von Blitz and Rasula laughed scornfully and turned to the crowd. Thelatter began to harangue his fellows. "This man is a--a--" he began.

  "A bluff!" prompted Von Blitz, glaring at his tall accuser.

  "A bluff," went on Rasula. "He can do none of these things. Nor can theAmericans at the chateau. I know that they are liars. They--"

  "I'll make you pay for that, Rasula. Your time is short. Men of Japat, Idon't want to serve you unless you trust me--"

  A dozen voices cried: "We don't trust you!" "Dog of a Christian! Son ofa snake!" Von Blitz glowed with satisfaction.

  "One moment, please! Rasula knows that I came out here to represent SirJohn Brodney. He knows how I am regarded in London. He is jealousbecause I have not listened to his chatter. I am not responsible for theprobable delay in settling the estate. If you are not very careful, youwill ruin every hope for success that you may have had in the beginning.The Crown will take it out of your hands. You've got to show yourselvesworthy of handling the affairs of this company. You can't do it if youlisten to such carrion as Von Blitz and Rasula. Oh, I'm not afraid ofyou! I know that you have written to Sir John, Rasula, asking that I berecalled. He won't recall me, rest assured, unless he throws up thecase. I have his own letters to prove that he is satisfied with my workout here. I am satisfied that there are enough fair-minded men in thiscrowd to protect me. They will stand by me in the end. I call upon--"

  But a howl of dissent from the throng brought him up sharply. His facewent white and for a moment he feared the malevolence that stared at himfrom all sides. He looked frequently in the direction of the distantchateau. An anxious gleam came into his eyes--was it of despair? Ahundred men were shouting, but no one seemed to have the courage tobreak over the line that he had drawn. Knives slipped from many sashes;Von Blitz was screaming with insane laughter, pointing his finger at thediscredited American. While they shouted and cursed, his gaze never leftthe cleft in the hills. He did not attempt to cry them down; the effortwould have been in vain. Suddenly a wild, happy light came into hisanxious, searching eyes. He gave a mighty shout and raised his hands,commanding silence.

  Selim, clinging to his side, also had seen the sky-rocket which arose upfrom the chateau and dropped almost instantly into the wall of trees.

  There was something in the face and voice of the American that quelledthe riotous disorder.

  "You fools!" he shouted, "take war
ning! I have told you that I would notturn the guns of England and America against you unless you turnedagainst me. I am your friend--but, by the great Mohammed you'll pay formy life with every one of your own if you resort to violence. Listen!To-day I learned that my life was threatened. I sent a message in theair to the nearest battleship. There is not an hour in the day or nightthat I or the people in the chateau cannot call upon our governments forhelp. My call to-day has been answered, as I knew it would be. There isalways a warship near at hand, my friends. It is for you to say whethera storm of shot and shell--"

  Von Blitz leaped upon a platform and shouted madly: "Fools! Don'tbelieve him! He cannot bring der ships here! He lies--he lies! He--"

  At that moment, a shrill clamour of voices arose in the distance--thecries of women and children. Chase's heart gave a great bound of joy. Heknew what it meant. The crowd turned to learn the cause of this suddendisturbance. Across the square, coming from the town, raced the womenand children, gesticulating wildly and screaming with excitement.

  Chase pointed his finger at Von Blitz and shouted:

  "I can't, eh? There's a British warship standing off the harbour now,and her guns are trained--"

  But he did not complete the astounding, stupefying sentence. The womenwere screaming:

  "The warship! The warship! Fly! Fly!"

  In a second, the entire assemblage was racing furiously, doubtingly, yetfearfully toward the pier. Von Blitz and Rasula shouted in vain. Theywere left with Chase, who smiled triumphantly upon their ghastly faces.

  "Gentlemen, they are not deceived. There _is_ a warship out there. Youcame near to showing your hand to-night. Now come along with me, andI'll show my hand to you. Rasula, you'd better draw in your claws.You're entitled to some consideration. But Von Blitz! Jacob, you arestanding on very thin ice. I can have you shot to-morrow morning."

  Von Blitz sputtered and snarled. "It is all a lie! It is a trick!" Hewould have drawn his revolver had not Rasula grasped his arm. The nativelawyer dragged him off toward the pier, half-doubting his own senses.

  Just outside the harbour, plainly distinguishable in the moonlight, laya great cruiser, her searchlights whipping the sky and sea with longwhite lashes.

  The gaping, awe-struck crowd in the street parted to let Chase passthrough on his way to the bungalow. He was riding one of Wyckholme'sthoroughbreds, a fiery, beautiful grey. His manner was that of amedieval conqueror. He looked neither to right nor to left, but kept hiseyes straight ahead, ignoring the islanders as completely as if they didnot exist.

  "It's more like a Christian Endeavour meeting than it was ten minutesago," he was saying to himself, all the time wondering when somereckless unbeliever would hurl a knife at his back. He gravely winkedhis eye in the direction of the chateau. "Good old Britt!" he mutteredin his exultation.