A tap at the door disturbed his mental soliloquy, and in answer to his ‘Come in,’ Sir Roger de Launay entered.
“Sorry to interrupt work, Professor!” he said briefly; “The King goes to the Opera this evening, and desires you to be of the party.”
“Good! I shall obey with more pleasure than I have obeyed some of his Majesty’s recent instructions!” And the Professor pushed aside his manuscript to look through his spectacled eyes at the tall equerry’s handsome face and figure. “You have a healthy appearance, Roger! Your complexion speaks of an admirable digestion!”
De Launay smiled.
“You think so? Well! Your professional approval is worth having!” He paused, then went on; “The party will be a pleasant one to-night. The King is in high spirits.”
“Ah!” And Von Glauben’s monosyllable spoke volumes.
“Perhaps he ought not to be?” suggested Sir Roger with a slight touch of anxiety.
“I do not know — I cannot tell! This is the way of it, Roger — see!” And taking off his spectacles, he polished them with due solemnity. “If I were a King, and ruled over a country swarming with dissatisfied subjects, — if I had a fox for a Premier, — and was in love with a woman who could not possibly be my wife, — I should not be in high spirits!”
“Nor I!” said De Launay curtly. “But the fox is not Premier yet. Do you think he ever will be?”
Von Glauben shrugged his shoulders.
“He is bound to be, I presume. What else remains to do? Upset everything? Government, deputies and all?”
“Just that!” responded Sir Roger. “The People will do it, if the King does not.”
“The King will do anything he is asked to do — now—” said the Professor significantly; “If the right person asks him!”
“You forget — she does not know—” Here checking himself abruptly, Sir Roger walked to the window and looked out. It was a fair and peaceful afternoon, — the ocean heaved placidly, covered with innumerable wavelets, over which the seabirds flew and darted, their wings shining like silver and diamonds as they dipped and circled up and down and round the edges of the rocky coast. Far off, a faint rim of amethyst under a slowly sailing white cloud could be recognized as the first line of the shore of The Islands.
“Do you ever go and see the beautiful ‘Gloria’ girl now?” asked Sir Roger suddenly. “The King has never mentioned her since the day we saw her. And you have never explained the mystery of your acquaintance with her, — nor whether it is true that Prince Humphry was specially attracted by her. I shrewdly suspect — —”
“What?”
“That he has been sent off, out of harm’s way!”
“You are right,” said the Professor gravely; “That is exactly the position! He has been sent off out of harm’s way!”
“I heard,” went on De Launay, “that the girl — or some girl of remarkable beauty had been seen here — actually here in the Palace — before the Prince left! And such an odd way he left, too — scuttling off in his own yacht without — so far as I have ever heard — any farewells, or preparation, or suitable companions to go with him. Still one hears such extraordinary stories — —”
“True! — one does!” agreed the Professor; “And after proper experience, one hears without listening!”
De Launay looked at him curiously.
“The girl was certainly beautiful,” he proceeded meditatively; “And her adopted father, — Réné Ronsard, — was not that his name? — was a quaint old fellow. A republican, too! — fiery as a new Danton! Well! The King’s curiosity is apparently satisfied on that score, — but” — here he began to laugh— “I shall never forget your face, Von Glauben, when he caught you on The Islands that day! — never! Like an overgrown boy, discovered with his fingers in a jam-pot!”
“Thank you!” said the Professor imperturbably; “I can assure you that the jam was excellent — and that I still remember its flavour!”
Sir Roger laughed again, but with great good-humour, — then he became suddenly serious.
“The King goes out alone very often now?” he said.
“Very often,” assented the Professor.
“Are we right in allowing him to do so?”
“Allowing him! Who is to forbid him?”
“Is he safe, do you think?”
“Safer, it would seem, my friend, than when laying a foundation-stone, with ourselves and all his suite around him!” responded the Professor. “Besides, it is too late now to count the possible risks of the adventure he has entered upon. He knows the position, and estimates the cost at its correct value. He has made himself the ruler of his own destiny; we are only his servants. Personally, I have no fear, — save of one fatality.”
“And that?”
“Is what kills many strong men off in their middle-age,” said Von Glauben; “A disease for which there is no possible cure at that special time of life, — Love! The love of boys is like a taste for green gooseberries, — it soon passes, leaving a disordered stomach and a general disrelish for acid fruit ever afterwards; — the love of the man-about-town between the twenties and thirties is the love of self; — but the love of a Man, after the Self-and-Clothes Period has passed, is the love of the full-grown human creature clamouring for its mate, — its mate in Soul even more than in Body. There is no gainsaying it — no checking it — no pacifying it; it is a most disastrous business, provocative of all manner of evils, — and to a king who has always been accustomed to have his own way, it means Victory or Death!”
Sir Roger gazed at him perplexedly, — his tone was so solemn and full of earnest meaning.
“You, for example,” continued the Professor dictatorially, fixing his keen piercing eyes full upon him; “You are a curious subject, — a very curious subject! You live on a Dream; it is a good life — an excellent life! It has the advantage, your Dream, of never becoming a reality, — therefore you will always love, — and while you always love, you will always keep young. Your lot is an exceedingly enviable one, my friend! You need not frown, — I am old enough — and let us hope wise enough — to guess your secret — to admire it from a purely philosophic point of view — and to respect it!”
Sir Roger held his peace.
“But,” continued the Professor, “His Majesty is not the manner of man who would consent to subsist, like you, on an idle phantasy. If he loves — he must possess; it is the regal way!”
“He will never succeed in the direction you mean!” said Sir Roger emphatically.
“Never!” agreed Von Glauben with a profound shake of his head; “Strange as it may seem, his case is quite as hopeless as yours!”
The door opened and closed abruptly, — and there followed silence. Von Glauben looked up to find himself alone. He smiled tolerantly.
“Poor Roger!” he murmured; “He lives the life of a martyr by choice! Some men do — and like it! They need not do it; — there is not the least necessity in the world for their deliberately sticking a knife into their hearts and walking about with it in a kind of idiot rapture. It must hurt; — but they seem to enjoy it! Just as some women become nuns, and flagellate themselves, — and then when they are writhing from their own self-inflicted stripes, they dream they are the ‘brides of Christ,’ entirely forgetting the extremely irreligious fact that to have so many ‘brides’ the good Christ Himself might possibly be troubled, and would surely occupy an inconvenient position, even in Heaven! Each man, — each woman, — makes for himself or herself a little groove or pet sorrow, in which to trot round and round and bemoan life; the secret of the whole bemoaning being that he or she cannot have precisely the thing he or she wants. That is all! Such a trifle! Church, State, Prayer and Power — it can all be summed up in one line— ‘I have not the thing I want — give it to me!’”
He resumed his writing, and did not interrupt it again till it was time to join the Royal party at the Opera.
That evening was one destined to be long remembered in the annals
of the kingdom. The beautiful Opera-house, a marvel of art and architecture, was brilliantly full; all the fairest women and most distinguished men occupying the boxes and stalls, while round and round, in a seemingly never-ending galaxy of faces, and crowded in the tiers of balconies above, a mixed audience had gathered, made up of various sections of the populace which filled the space well up to the furthest galleries. The attraction that had drawn so large an audience together was not contained in the magnetic personality of either the King or Queen, for those exalted individuals had only announced their intention of being present just two hours before the curtain rose. Moreover, when their Majesties entered the Royal box, accompanied by their two younger sons, Rupert and Cyprian, and attended by their personal suite, their appearance created very little sensation. The fact that it was the first time the King had showed himself openly in public since his excommunication from the Church, caused perhaps a couple of hundred persons to raise their eyes inquisitively towards him in a kind of half-morbid, half-languid curiosity, but in these days the sentiment of Self is so strong, that it is only a minority of more thoughtful individuals that ever trouble themselves seriously to consider the annoyances or griefs which their fellow-mortals have to endure, often alone and undefended.
The interest of the public on this particular occasion was centred in the new Opera, which had only been given three times before, and in which the little dancer, Pequita, played the part of a child-heroine. The libretto was the work of Paul Zouche, and the music by one of the greatest violinists in the world, Louis Valdor. The plot was slight enough; — yet, described in exquisite verse, and scattered throughout with the daintiest songs and dances, it merited a considerably higher place in musical records than such works as Meyerbeer’s “Dinorah,” or Verdi’s “Rigoletto.” The thread on which the pearls of poesy and harmony were strung, was the story of a wandering fiddler, who, accompanied by his only child (the part played by Pequita), travels from city to city earning a scant livelihood by his own playing and his daughter’s dancing. Chance or fate leads them to throw in their fortunes with a band of enthusiastic adventurers, who, headed by a young hare-brained patriot, elected as their leader, have determined to storm the Vatican, and demand the person of the Pope, that they may convey him to America, there to convene an assemblage of all true Christians (or ‘New Christians’), and found a new and more Christ-like Church. Their expedition fails, — as naturally so wild a scheme would be bound to do, — but though they cannot succeed in capturing the Pope, they secure a large following of the Italian populace, who join with them in singing “The Song of Freedom,” which, with Paul Zouche’s words, and Valdor’s music was the great chef d’oevre of the Opera, rousing the listeners to a pitch of something like frenzy. In this, — the last great scene, — Pequita, dancing the ‘Dagger Dance,’ is supposed to infect the people with that fervour which moves them to sing “The Freedom Chorus,” and the curtain comes down upon a brilliant stage, crowded with enthusiasts and patriots, ready to fight and die for the glory of their country. A love-interest is given to the piece by the passion of the wandering fiddler-hero for a girl whose wealth places her above his reach; and who in the end sacrifices all worldly advantage that she may share his uncertain fortunes for love’s sake only.
Such was the story, — which, wedded to wild and passionate music, had taken the public by storm on its first representation, not only on account of its own merit, but because it gave their new favourite, Pequita, many opportunities for showing off her exquisite grace as a dancer. She, while preparing for the stage on this special night, had been told that her wish was about to be granted — that she would now, at last, really dance before the King; — and her heart beat high, and the rich colour reddened in her soft childish face, as she donned her scarlet skirts with more than her usual care, and knotted back her raven curls with a great glowing damask rose, such as Spanish beauties fasten behind tiny shell-like ears to emphasise the perfection of their contour. Her thoughts flew to her kindest friend, Pasquin Leroy; — she remembered the starry diamond in the ring he had wished to give her, and how he had said, ‘Pequita, the first time you dance before the King, this shall be yours!’
Where was he now, she wondered? She would have given anything to know his place of abode, just to send him word that the King was to be at the Opera that night, and ask him too, to come and see her in her triumph! But she had no time to study ways and means for sending a message to him, either through Sholto, her father, who always waited patiently for her behind the scenes, — or through Paul Zouche, who, though as librettist of the opera, and as a poet of new and rising fame, was treated by everyone with the greatest deference, still made a special point of appearing in the shabbiest clothes, and lounging near the side-wings like a sort of disgraced tramp all the time the performance was in progress. Neither of them knew Leroy’s address; — they only met him or saw him, when he himself chose to come among them. Besides, — the sound of the National Hymn played by the orchestra, warned her that the King had arrived; and that she must hold herself in readiness for her part and think of nothing else.
The blaze of light in the Opera-house seemed more dazzling than usual to the child, when her cue was called, — and as she sprang from the wings and bounded towards the footlights, amid the loud roar of applause which she was now accustomed to receive nightly, she raised her eyes towards the Royal box, half-frightened, half-expectant. Her heart sank as she saw that the King had partially turned away from the stage, and was chatting carelessly with some person or persons behind him, and that only a statuesque woman with a pale face, great eyes, and a crown of diamonds, regarded her steadily with a high-bred air of chill indifference, which was sufficient to turn the little warm beating heart of her into stone. A handsome youth stared down upon her smiling, — his eyes sleepily amorous, — it was the elder of the King’s two younger sons, Prince Rupert. She hated his expression, beautiful though his features were, — and hated herself for having to dance before him. Poor little Pequita! It was her first experience of the insult a girl-child can be made to feel through the look of a budding young profligate. On and on she danced, giddily whirling; — the thoughts in her brain circling as rapidly as her movements. Why would not the King look at her, — she thought? Why was he so indifferent, even when his subjects sought most to please him? At the end of the second act of the Opera a great fatigue and lassitude overcame her, and a look of black resentment clouded her pretty face.
“What ails you?” said Zouche, sauntering up to her as she stood behind the wings; “You look like a small thunder-cloud!”
She gave an unmistakable gesture in the direction of that quarter of the theatre where the Royal box was situated.
“I hate him!” she said, with a stamp of her little foot.
“The King? So do I!” And Zouche lit a cigarette and stuck it between his lips by way of a stop-gap to a threatening violent expletive; “An insolent, pampered, flattered fool! Yet you wanted to dance before him; and now you’ve done it! The fact will serve you as a kind of advertisement! That is all!”
“I do not want to be advertised through his favour!” And Pequita closed her tiny teeth on her scarlet under-lip in suppressed anger; “But I have not danced before him yet! I will!”
Zouche looked at her sleepily. He was not drunk — though he had, — of course, — been drinking.
“You have not danced before him? Then what have you been doing?”
“Walking!” answered Pequita, with a fierce little laugh, her colour coming and going with all the quick wavering hue of irritated and irritable Spanish blood, “I have, as they say ‘walked across the stage.’ I shall dance presently!”
He smiled, flicking a little ash off his cigarette.
“You are a curious child!” he said; “By and by you will want severely keeping in order!”
Pequita laughed again, and shook back her long curls defiantly.
“Who is that cold woman with a face like a mask and the crown of diam
onds, that sits beside the King?”
It was Zouche’s turn to laugh now, and he did so with a keen sense of enjoyment.
“Upon my word!” he exclaimed; “A little experience of the world has given you what newspaper men call ‘local colour.’ The ‘cold woman with the face like a mask,’ is the Queen!”
Pequita made a little grimace of scorn.
“And who is the leering boy?”
“Prince Rupert.”
“The Crown Prince?”
“No. The Crown Prince is travelling abroad. He went away very mysteriously, — no one knows where he has gone, or when he will come back.”
“I am not surprised!” said Pequita; “With such a father and mother, and such impudent-looking brothers, no wonder he wanted to get away!”
Zouche had another fit of laughter. He had never seen the little girl in such a temper. He tried to assume gravity.
“Pequita, you are naughty! The flatteries of the great world are spoiling you!”
“Bah!” said Pequita, with a contemptuous wave of her small brown hands. “The flatteries of the great world! To what do they lead? To that!” and she made another eloquent sign towards the Royal box;— “I would rather dance for you and Lotys, and Sergius Thord, and Pasquin Leroy, than all the Kings of the world together! What I do here is for my father’s sake — you know that!”
“I know!” and Zouche smoked on, and shook his wild head sentimentally, — murmuring in a sotto-voce:
“What I do here, is for the need of gold, —
What I do there, is for sweet love’s sake only;
Love, ever timid there, doth here grow bold, —
And wins such triumph as but leaves me lonely!”
“Is that yours?” said Pequita with a sudden smile.
Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli (Illustrated) (Delphi Series Eight Book 22) Page 568