The Rising Storm

by Dennis Wheatley

  It was not that he wished to reduce Roger to a cautious, hum-drum collector of information; as to have attempted it would have deprived him of the use of his most valuable assets—imagination and initiative—but he did want him to develop a greater sense of responsibility regarding his work.

  Mr. Pitt had no personal animus against Madame Marie Antoinette, but since her removal to the Tuileries he had had no confirmation of Roger’s story that her life was in danger, and he saw no reason why he should pay him to further her intrigues.

  In the matter of de Périgord he had been much influenced by the opinion of his old preceptor and friend Bishop Tomline, and he recalled the positive horror that had shaken the poor Bishop when he had learned of de Périgord’s bill to rob the Church of all its property in France. As a fiscal measure there might be sound arguments for such a step; but for an ordained priest to propose it had seemed to both of them a perfidy which put him for ever outside the pale. As for the story of his midnight visit to the Comte d’Artois, there was no possibility of checking that, as His Highness had taken refuge with his wife’s relatives at the Court of Turin, but Mr. Pitt did not believe it for one moment.

  The intelligence about de Mirabeau sounded even more improbable. Billy Pitt was of aristocratic descent only on his mother’s side, but the truly noble mentality of his great father, and a very unusual upbringing, had combined to make him the most fastidious of aristocrats; and he regarded de Mirabeau as a renegade to his order. According to British Embassy reports the King and Queen of France continued to hold receptions in the Tuileries, to transact business and be advised by the same Ministers as they had had while at Versailles; so, as yet, Mr. Pitt had no true appreciation of their situation. In consequence, to anyone of his haughty nature it was inconceivable that Madame Marie Antoinette could have brought herself to have dealings with any demagogue, let alone one having de Mirabeau’s debauched and venal history.

  The Prime Minister had always regarded Roger as rather a shrewd young man, so he was somewhat surprised that he should have allowed himself to be taken in to such an extent; and could only account for it by the supposition that outside interests had prevented him giving his full mind to his proper duties. In any case, he had for some time been of the opinion that Roger’s talents could be used to better advantage at a Court than in a democratic society; and William Grenville, Mr. Pitt’s trusted friend, had suggested that one William Augustus Miles should be sent to Paris to replace him. Mr. Miles had got on very well with the Dutch burghers while acting as a secret diplomatic agent in Holland, so no doubt he would prove equally successful in winning the confidence of the bourgeois politicians from whom the new governing class in France were mainly drawn. He might not have the debonair charm of Mr. Brook, but he was much better qualified to operate in the Paris of the new régime.

  Nevertheless, the long-sighted Mr. Pitt had no intention of denying himself Roger’s services permanently. He considered that the young man had more than proved his value in the past and believed that, given the right opportunities, he might do so many times again. In the meantime it would do him a lot of good, and make him more cautious in the future about cultivating contacts of such dubious value, if he were left to cool his heels for a little with no prospect of employment. In due course a chastened Mr. Brook would, no doubt, be very happy at being given another chance to exercise his wits and courage to better purpose.

  Mr. Pitt emptied the remaining contents of the decanter of Port into his glass, and having no British Ambassador in Madrid to instruct, began to draft a letter to the Spanish Ambassador in London, to the effect that an insult having been done to the British Flag in distant Nootka Sound, he could not even consider any discussion of the reasons alleged by the Spaniards for their act until the wrong had been acknowledged and full reparation for it made.

  Roger, knowing nothing of Mr. Pitt’s intentions, walked slowly across the Green Park to Amesbury House. There he found his baggage just being delivered from the coach station, and was roused a fraction from his half-stunned state by the welcome news that his friend Lord Edward Fitz-Deverel was in residence.

  “Droopy Ned”, as his lordship had been nicknamed at school from the permanent stoop that afflicted his tall, frail figure, spent most of his life cultivating three hobbies: the collection of antique jewellery, experimenting with Eastern drugs, and studying ancient religions. That day he was devoting to the last of these, and on going up to his rooms Roger found him employed in carefully unwinding the hundreds of yards of bandage that encased an Egyptian mummy. On a table beside him there were already over a dozen little amulets that he had found among the successive layers of wrappings, and his long delicate hands were trembling with excitement as he picked out another.

  Seeing his friend’s absorption in his task, Roger restrained his impatience to begin talking about his woes; and, when they had greeted one another, sat down to watch the completion of the business. At length the brown parchment-covered body of a short, slender woman was revealed. Her mummy was in an excellent state of preservation, having a cavity only below the left ribs where the flesh had gone to powder, and when Droopy tapped it on the chest it gave out a hollow note. He remarked that his agent had had to pay an Arab merchant two hundred guineas for it; and that owing to the superstitious fears of sailors at having a corpse on board he had had to pay a Greek captain a further hundred to smuggle it to England for him disguised as a bale of carpets; but he was well satisfied with his purchase. Only then did Roger announce the shattering result of his interview with Mr. Pitt.

  Immediately, Droopy was all concern, and they set about discussing Roger’s future. Financially he had had an excellent nine months, as with the money Madame Marie Antoinette had given him, the balance of the sum he had received from Isabella, his accumulated allowance from his father and what was due to him from the Foreign Office, he reckoned that he had the better part of fourteen hundred pounds to his credit. So after they had been talking for a while, he said:

  “Fortunately I am well in funds, so in no situation where I must take the first thing that offers from immediate necessity to earn my living. The things that distress me most are the breaking of my association with Mr. Pitt, and the unlikelihood of ever obtaining another opening which would afford me both the means and opportunity to continue my travels.”

  Droopy scratched his long nose and said thoughtfully: “It would not surprise me greatly if after a while Mr. Pitt sends for you again. Should you prove right in your contention that the information you have sent from Paris is better founded than that supplied by the British Embassy, the fact will emerge in due course. ’Tis even probable that the Prime Minister repudiated your beliefs simply because they do not fit in with his own preconceptions. I doubt if in recent weeks he can have followed events in France at all closely, as such time as he would devote to foreign affairs must have been occupied with the far more serious developments in Belgium.”

  “More serious!” Roger exclaimed. “Oh come, Ned!”

  “Egad, man, they are so regarded in England. The fall of the Bastille and the attack by the mob on Versailles are now half a year old. The general opinion here is that the most dangerous phase of the French Revolution is over, and that in a few more months the nation will settle down under a Liberal Constitution. But the troubles in Belgium came to a head only just before Christmas, and their outcome still lies in the balance.”

  “I had heard that there have been riots in the Low Countries in favour of a Republic, but have been too occupied to acquaint myself with the details. Have the Belgians also established a democratic form of government?”

  Droopy’s wide mouth opened in a grin. “You are indeed out of touch with what we look on here as the burning question of the moment. I had best give you the gist of it. The revolution in Belgium has been of an entirely different character from that in France, and has sprung from a diametrically opposite cause. For a long time past the Emperor Joseph II has been endeavouring to introduce a great var
iety of reforms in the Austrian Netherlands; but the people appear to prefer their own time-honoured way of life, that has existed almost unchanged since the Middle Ages. The root of the trouble lies in the Emperor’s Germanic passion for uniformity. Each Province formed a miniature State differing in its constitution and administration from the others. He wished to do away with all these inconsistencies so that everyone should enjoy the same degree of liberty. He wanted all the priests to be educated in one central Seminary at Louvain; and he wanted the Kermesses—as the great Fairs are called—of all the different towns to be held on the same day.”

  Blinking his weak blue eyes, Droopy went on: “The edicts from distant Vienna ordering these innovations met with increasing resistance, until last November the Estates of Brabant and Hainault defied the Emperor and refused to vote further taxes. On Joseph resorting to disciplinary measures the normally pacific burghers took up arms against him. In December they threw off the Austrian yoke and proclaimed their country as the Republic of the United States of Belgium. At the moment the Emperor is still in negotiation with his rebellious Netherlanders, but he is known to be mobilising an army for their suppression. Meanwhile they are endeavouring to secure armed support against him from the Prussians and the Dutch.”

  Roger knew that it had for long been a cardinal factor in British Foreign policy that the Low Countries, and particularly the great port of Antwerp, should remain in the hands of a power incapable of using them for offensive purposes; so he felt that Droopy’s guess—that Mr. Pitt had recently been concentrating his interest on events in Belgium to the exclusion of those in France—was very probably right. But, if it were so, that still did not alter the fact that he had been dismissed for refusing to go to Spain; and the problem now uppermost in his mind was whether to start seeking some new permanent career right away or first to take things easy for a while at Lymington.

  Knowing his friend’s highly strung nature, Droopy was much against his going to the country, as he feared that there he would brood over his dismissal. He urged that, while there was no hurry to settle on anything, Roger ought to remain in London, as only in it was he likely to meet people in a situation to offer him some post suitable to his talents, and that if he could first collect a few ideas to think over he would later enjoy a visit to his home much more.

  In consequence, instead of staying at Amesbury House for only a few nights, Roger remained on; and, in the company of the foppish, short-sighted, but extremely astute Droopy, once more entered the idle round of pleasure that made up the life of London society.

  In the latter half of February fresh impetus was given to interest in the Belgian situation by the arrival of the news of the Emperor Joseph’s death; and few vigorous, intelligent, Liberal-minded Monarchs have died in such sad circumstances. He had started out with high hopes of consolidating his vast, scattered dominions and bringing liberty to all his subjects. Diplomatic defeats had prevented him from achieving the former and the backwardness of the peoples he governed prevented the latter. At the time of his death Belgium had declared her independence; the nobles of Hungary had forced him to cancel all his reforms with the single exception of the abolition of serfdom; he was at war with Turkey in the south; his only ally, Catherine II of Russia, was in no situation to help him; and the Turks had just concluded an alliance with the Prussians, who, in conjunction with the Poles, were now massing an army with the intention of invading Austria from the north. So it looked as if the whole Habsburg Empire was about to fall into ruins.

  He was succeeded by his younger brother, Leopold of Tuscany; and Roger wondered if even the outstanding abilities of the equally Liberal-minded but much more cautious Grand Duke would prove up to pulling the Empire out of the mess it was in. He wondered, too, if the beautiful Donna Livia had accompanied Leopold to Vienna; and recalled his brief affaire with her as one of the most amusing and delightful adventures of its kind that fortune had ever sent him.

  Early in March his memories of another titian-haired lady with whom he had dallied, although in a more discreet manner, were revived with much greater directness. At a ball at Chandos House he ran into Amanda Godfrey.

  Somehow he had never associated her with London, so he was all the more struck by seeing her for the first time in such a setting and dressed in the height of fashion. Her tall figure and graceful carriage lent themselves well to fuller petticoats and a higher headdress than she ever wore in the country; yet she retained her natural, imperturbable manner, which made her even more outstanding among the affected young women who were flirting their fans and sniffing their salts near by.

  Roger at once asked her for a dance, and she said with her usual vagueness that she had no idea if she had any left, but would be enchanted if he cared to snatch her sometime during the evening; so snatch her he did, and to avoid possible trouble with other claimants to her company they sat out three dances running in an alcove off the refreshment-room.

  After they had been talking for some twenty minutes she said: “Roger, my dear, you are mightily improved since we last met, and I am happy indeed to find you so much more like the man you were a twelvemonth back.”

  “That is easy to explain,” he laughed. “I am no longer in love. Except, of course, in being newly smitten with your fair self.”

  “You foolish fellow,” she smiled languidly. “But I am glad to hear it. That you are no longer in love, I mean. ’Tis a plaguey wearing business.”

  He sighed. “There is certainly no other to compare with it for depriving a man of his normal faculties, and reducing him to a morose, hag-ridden shadow of himself.”

  “Or a woman either. I pray God that I may never again be afflicted with the disease in virulent form.”

  “So you, too, have known that agony?”

  She nodded. “I thought I would ne’er recover when first we met, but your gallant attentions over that Christmas did much to help me. They were flattering without being serious enough to cause me any perturbation, so the very tonic needed to restore my amour propre.”

  “I am glad,” said Roger seriously, “that I should have been even the unconscious means of assisting your recovery.”

  “I would that I could have done as much for you,” she replied, “but your amour propre needed no restoring.”

  “Your kindness in allowing me the status of a favoured beau last summer, while knowing that my heart was set elsewhere, was truly generous, and helped me mightily.”

  “Nay; not in the healing of your wound.” She shook her head, then went on thoughtfully: “I had been near desperate with love for a man who would have none of me. He thought me a fool. Mayhap he is right in that, for I know well that at times I both say and do the most plaguey stupid things. ’Twas my hard lot to have to play gooseberry to a cousin of mine while he courted and married her. She has a bookish cleverness that I shall ever lack; but a mean, petty mind; and that made it all the harder.

  “Then there came Christmas at Lymington, and yourself. I knew full well that your intentions were not serious; but you were the handsomest beau in the district, so well enough to flirt with. And it was, I think, the very fact that you were not obsessed with my physical attractions that made you talk to me the more. I mean, apart from the usual persiflage of gallantry. You would not recall it, but you asked my opinion upon a hundred matters, ignored my vagueness about things that are of little account, and showed a genuine interest in all I had to say. On one occasion you said to me: ‘ ’Tis the combination of such femininity with so clear and deep a mind as yours, Amanda, that enables great courtesans to rule Empires.’ Oh, Roger, had you been the ugliest man on earth I could have kissed you for that!”

  He placed a hand gently over hers. “My dear, I vow to you I meant it.”

  She smiled. “The way you said it at the time convinced me of that; and although clever I shall never be, no one will ever again make me believe that at bottom I am a fool. But your case last summer was very different. You were in love with a woman who returned your
love, but debarred by circumstances from attaining your mutual desires. Consciously or unconsciously I could do nothing to aid you in such a pass. Yet I find you now recovered. Tell me; how have you managed to free yourself from the grip of this ghastly malady that is praised by poets with such stupendous unreason?”

  “I hardly know myself,” Roger confessed. “In part, perhaps, ’tis because when I was last abroad I met the lady of my love again, under unexpected and most favourable conditions. Yet since we were little more than a week together ’tis no case of having satiated our passion, on either side. I moved heaven and earth in an attempt to persuade her to fly with me, but she would not; and her refusal was no slight upon her love, as she considered herself tied from the fact that in a few weeks now she is to bear her husband a child.”

  “You could rejoin her later; visit her from time to time and seize such opportunities as offer to renew your transports.”

  “Nay. What kind of a life would that be? ’Tis better, far, that she should build a new life round her child; and that I should consider myself free to marry.”

  “If you marry—even had you been able to marry her—do you believe that you would remain faithful to a wife?”

  Roger laughed. “You have me there! I fear ’tis most unlikely.”

  “I am glad you have the honesty to admit it,” Amanda smiled, “for all I have ever learnt of men has led me to believe that ’tis against nature in them to be monogamous. Granted then that you would be unfaithful to a wife, why should you not marry if you have a mind to it, and still at intervals indulge your passion for your Spanish mistress, rather than for some other?”