Her peculiarities were incredible. Rubinstein’s name and influence opened every door to her, and the results were unique. She appeared at one Grand Duchess’s in evening dress with woollen gloves, to the dumb amazement of distinguished guests, one sprightly duchess wondering why she had omitted to come in waterproof and goloshes. When introduced to an ambassador, and informed of his passion for music, she coolly surveyed him from the top of his bald head to the edge of his white gold-striped trousers, and said to her host: “I do not want to be introduced to him. A fellow in gold can know nothing about music.”
Her pupils she treated even worse. One young countess who was studying Chopin with her sent her a rich plum cake. The Natzelhuber, as she was called, was smoking a cigarette when the servant entered with the countess’s letter, followed by a powdered footman who presented her the cake with a stately bow.
“Does your mistress fancy I am starving?” roared the artist, throwing away her cigarette and seizing the cake in both hands. “What do I want with her trumpery cakes? Tell her that is the reception it met with from Photini Natzelhuber.”
She opened the door, rolled the unfortunate cake down the stairs, flung the gracious note after it, and upon them the frightened footman, who, not foreseeing what was coming, was easily knocked off his balance by her powerful little wrists. Of course the countess discontinued her studies of Chopin, and the Natzelhuber can hardly be said to have been the gainer in the transaction. These were the stupid blunders that left her soon without a friend or a well-wisher. Incapable of a mean or an ungenerous act; incapable of uttering a spiteful word behind an enemy’s back, she was equally incapable of uttering a gracious one to the face of a friend. The habit of recklessly indulging in vile language which she acquired in the streets of Athens never left her, and ambassadors, noblemen, artists and friends who momentarily offended her were never less than “pigs, asses,” and other such gentle and inoffensive beings. She could not help this failing any more than her bad temper and her passion for brandy and sensual pleasures of every kind.
“I know I am only a street vagabond mistakenly an artist, but I cannot help it, nor do I desire to be otherwise,” she would say, in her clearer moments. “I am mad too, and that I cannot help either.”
Deeply tragic assertions both, but not more deeply tragic than the wasted life and abilities of the woman who made them. The irritable creature, sick to death of Russia, sick of the perpetual and humiliating contrast between her condition and that of those around her,—a humiliation she scorned in the majesty of artistic pride to admit to herself, but smarted from in that vague, unrecognised way all feelings outside music and the grosser sensations stirred within her,—left St. Petersburg without even sending her P. P. C. cards.
She appeared next in Munich, now twenty-seven, at the height of artistic fame, only second to her master, able to command the best audiences and prices, with a European reputation for a startling perfection of technique, a grandeur of inspiration and a simplicity of interpretation that only goes with absolute mastery. Rubinstein and others had dedicated several works to her, and for ten years she traversed the musical world a splendid enigma, a blight, a shame and a sorrow. The possession of certain irregular passions might have found ample apology in her genius, but the Natzelhuber so degraded her art that it quite sank into abeyance in the presence of her iniquities. The wonder was soon, not that such an artist should be so gross, but that such a soulless creature should possess the power of thrilling her hearers with every delicate perception of sense and harmony. As the years gathered over her, a curious slowness, almost a dignity of movement was noticeable in her. She began to awaken to the consciousness that the Natzelhuber was a kind of sovereign in her way, and should attract the eye and silence frivolous tongues by her manner of entering a room. She was stouter now, but carried her bulk well, holding her head erect and looking calmly at each speaker with those strange yellow eyes of hers, so luminous under the boyish, feathery curls. But the light in them shone from no spirit or soul,—sensuously attractive were they, like those of a Circe.
Thus life found her at thirty-five, alone and friendless, though the Viennese were well disposed towards her upon her reappearance in their midst. But she was too embittered and cross-grained to care greatly for their applause, and accepted the love Agiropoulos offered her renown rather than her wretched self, as a kind of feeble protection from her own society. Her princely disdain for money and the making of it left her very naturally in constant debt, and this state of things was hardly calculated to improve her temper.
About this time young Ehrenstein came to Vienna in search of that distraction we are all agreed to prescribe in the first stage of bereavement. He knew Liszt, and from him procured a letter of introduction to Photini. Determined to make a good impression, he ordered expensive tailoring, and went forth to subdue in the amiable superiority of sex and social elegance. The door was opened to him by an extraordinary woman, who held a cigarette in her hand, and glared furiously upon the timid Cæsar who had come to see and conquer.
“What do you want with me, young man? I do not know you, and furthermore, I do not wish to know you. I am not at home.”
Not a reception calculated to justify a young man’s innocent and kindly estimate of his own value. Rudolph’s heart was in his mouth, and the mildest form of expostulation was checked by fright and amazement. Meeting Agiropoulos, he disclosed his hurt, upon which that good-natured individual hastened to remonstrate with his irascible friend.
“Why on earth did you treat poor Ehrenstein so badly?” he asked, surveying her with a look of impertinent amusement. “Do you know, Photini, you often provoke a fellow into wishing you were a man that he might relieve his feelings by a good open fight. But now to quarrel or reason with a woman like you! Ouf! You are impossible!”
“There is the door, if you are tired of me. If not, stay and hold your tongue,” was the contemptuous retort, between two puffs of a cigarette.
Agiropoulos had a certain sense of humor and a keen appreciation of originality in any form. He laughed, and proceeded to roll a cigarette in a very comfortable attitude.
“But really, my dear Photini, you were wrong to behave as you did to the lad. He is a very fair dilettante. He has just come from Pesth, where he saw Liszt, who gave him a letter for you. He is wildly desirous of hearing you play.”
“It is possible. He should have said so. How was I to know that Franz Liszt would send me a yellow-headed girl in trousers?”
“But you did not give him time to say anything. You never do.”
“Nobody ever has anything to say that is worth listening to. Poh, Poh, Poh! The silliness of men and the weariness of life! Tell the fool he can come to-morrow, and I’ll undertake not to eat him.”
“He will be delighted to receive such satisfactory, and, on the whole, rather necessary reassurance. His nature is so knightly that upon no consideration, even the fear of offering himself as a meal, would he dream of refusing to obey a lady’s mandate. And after his adventure of yesterday, it is natural to suppose that he would view compliance to-morrow with considerable trepidation of the possible results. By the way, Photini, I am going to Athens in the morning.”
He looked at her tranquilly, quite prepared for an explosion. She flung away her cigarette, glanced at him just as serenely, and said:—
“So! Then I will follow you.”
“That is kinder than anything I had dared to hope from you, Photini,” said Agiropoulos, gracefully. “Then you care for me enough to disturb yourself on my account.”
The Natzelhuber lighted another cigarette, puffed silently awhile, and fixed her lover with her steady imperturbable gaze.
“Don’t flatter yourself, my dear fellow! I never disturb myself for any one, but I am sick of Vienna.”
“It strikes me, my excellent friend, you are sick of most places in an incredibly short space of time,” said Agiropoulos, sarcastically, nettled by the coolness, of which he wanted a monopoly.
“Possibly.”
“I hope you will be civil to Ehrenstein to-morrow. Play him the ‘Mélodiés Hongroises.’ His mother was a Hungarian, and he adored her. The ‘Mélodiés’ will send him into Paradise.”
“I am not conscious of a desire to procure him that happiness. What the devil do I care about his mother or himself? Either the fellow knows music or he doesn’t.”
Agiropoulos was speeding on his way to Athens while Rudolph was sitting in the Natzelhuber’s undecorated parlor, listening to the magic “Mélodiés Hongroises,” wherein enchanting dance and melody spring exultingly out of subtle waves of variation, their impetuous joy broken suddenly by sharp notes of pathos and vague yearning. Music so gloriously rendered thrilled him into instantaneous love, and his soul was lost irretrievably in exquisite sound.
CHAPTER VIII. THE RESULT OF THE BARON’S ADVICE.
It was the eve of Madame Jarovisky’s ball, and nearly a week had elapsed since Rudolph Ehrenstein had permitted himself the painful pleasure of a visit to Mademoiselle Natzelhuber. He was young and impressionable enough for a week to work a rapid change in him under novel circumstances. He mixed freely in the distinguished diplomatic circles of Athens, had been with the Mowbray Thomases to Tatoi, played cricket with Vincent, whose English-French was a source of piquant amusement to him, his own being irreproachable, played tennis and drank tea with the rowdy American girls his aunt disapproved of, and was accompanied by Miss Eméraude Veritassi when he charmed a small audience with Raff’s Cavatina. The Baron von Hohenfels expressed himself delighted with his nephew’s success, praised his air of distinction and reserve, wished him a little less shy, however, and implored him to cultivate the virtues of tobacco.
“It gives a man a certain tone to be able to appreciate a good cigar,” he explained, airily. “You are improving undoubtedly. Your behaviour with Mademoiselle Veritassi last night was quite pretty and gallant. I may mention, Rudolph, that neither your aunt nor I have any objection to Eméraude Veritassi. Her style is good, and her French—well, should you think of diplomacy by and bye, you would have no reason to be ashamed of it. She is about the only Greek girl I know who looks as if she had been brought up in Paris. Yes, by all means cultivate her, if you are disposed that way, though perhaps it would be wiser to choose your wife at home.”
Rudolph blushed and smiled pleasantly.
“Is it not rather premature to talk of marriage for me, uncle?” he asked, quizzically.
“Quite so. Still, it is possible for a fellow at your age to get disagreeably entangled, and a respectable marriage, you know, is always preferable to that. Amuse yourself, by all means; I would not restrict you in that line. You must be a man of the world, and gallantry is the very finest education. As I said before, in the regular way, there is no objection to Mademoiselle Veritassi, but for all irregular purposes, stick to the married women, my dear boy. Become a favourite with them, and study an attitude of delicate audacity, a kind of playful rouerie.”
All this was Hebrew to Rudolph, but he took care not to press his uncle for an explanation. Instead, he went upstairs, and donned attire less ostentatious and theatrical than the forest coat and long boots. In a faultless suit of navy-blue he was seen an hour later upon the Patissia Road walking towards the Platea Omonia, and a brisk pace brought him to Photini’s door. It was opened by Polyxena, as rough and untidy as ever, who jerked her thumb towards the stairs, and growled:—
“You’ll find her upstairs.”
Rudolph’s heart beat apprehensively as he slowly mounted and knocked outside Photini’s door, which he opened gingerly after a loud “come in.”
“Oh, it is you!” the Natzelhuber exclaimed, more graciously than usual. “I thought it was that fool come for her lesson. Sit down, and let me look at you.”
Rudolph obeyed and smiled enigmatically, as he steadily met her lambent gaze.
“What have you been doing with yourself since I saw you?” she demanded, imperiously.
“Nothing in particular,” said Rudolph.
“Humph! Your face does not show that.”
“May I ask what it shows to your glance of investigation?”
“You are growing impertinent and fatuous. Have you been studying the excellent style of our friend Agiropoulos?”
Rudolph drew himself up proudly. He, a high bred Austrian, to be compared with a vulgar Greek merchant! He drew his aristocratic brows into an angry frown, and raised an irreproachable hand to his fair moustache:
“I cannot think that anything in me could remind you of Monsieur Agiropoulos.”
Photini came over, and stood in front of him with folded arms, calmly surveying him; then she leant forward, and placed her hands on his shoulders, laughing.
“They have doubtless been telling you what a fine fellow you are, and, my dear child, they have been telling you a most infernal lie.”
Rudolph burst out laughing, and took her two hands into his, which he held in a gentle clasp.
“Mademoiselle, you are a very extraordinary woman. Some people might say you are rude. I hardly think the word applies to you. I don’t know what you are.”
“Mad,” said Photini, drawing him to her and kissing him.
Rudolph went red and white, and started back as if he had been shot. No woman, except his mother, had ever kissed him, and the experience coming to him thus, suddenly and unsought, filled him with an inexplicable anger and pain. Without a word Photini walked straight to the piano, and the silence waved into the unfathomable loveliness of Chopin’s “Barcarolle.”
It was a perfect apology. It must be confessed, this woman so dreadful of speech was delicately cognisant of the language of the soul. Had she been playing for a lover, she could not have done better. But she was scarcely conscious of love for Rudolph. Her thirty-five years of wretched hilarity and miserable sadness had left her heart untouched until now, but she was too proud to acknowledge even to herself the steadily growing interest and yearning awakened in her by the innocent eyes of a lad, and while she played she resolutely kept her face averted from Rudolph’s. So she saw nothing of the varying emotions that swept across it as the notes at her magic touch rose and fell. First his eyes closed, then opened and rested upon her profile eagerly; a feverish red burnt in his cheeks, and his breath came hurriedly. A sense of ecstasy oppressed him, and he drew near her as if impelled by a force independent of his control. She looked up, and saw that his eyes were wet, and he burst out:—
“Oh, it is dreadful, I can’t bear it, but I love you!”
Before she could make answer to this unflattering and anguished declaration, the door opened, and Andromache Karapolos stood upon the threshold. Rudolph moved hastily back, and met her glance of pleased surprise with one of almost passionate gratitude. The spell and its compelling influences had ceased with Photini’s last note, and now he was only dreading the consequences of his insane avowal, and patiently awaited the inevitable scene.
But for the first time in her life, Photini showed an amiable front to an intruder. She looked gently at Andromache, turned with a commanding gesture to Rudolph, and stood for the girl to take her place at the piano. Though wishing to escape, Rudolph felt that the words he had just uttered laid him under a new obligation of obedience, and he went and stood at the window, with his forehead pressed dejectedly against the pane, looking down on the bright street, while he speculated drearily on what was going to happen to him.
Andromache’s slim brown fingers ran swiftly up and down the piano several times before a word was uttered. Photini watched them attentively, and then said, very graciously:
“That is much better. But your thumb is still too exposed, and you sway your body too much. You are not supposed to play from the waist. You must give another week to scales, and then we’ll see about exercises.”
Andromache rose, and said her brother was waiting downstairs for her. Rudolph looked round at the sound of her voice, and thought her prettier than before.
“Why, Mademoiselle Veritassi would seem plain beside her,” he said to himself, but his fastidious eyes, running over her dress found it common and ill-cut.
The March-violet eyes rested a moment on his, and were lovely indeed by charm of dewy freshness and girlish timidity. Andromache blushed to the roots of her hair, and the blush was reflected on the young man’s face.
In her nervous tremour she dropped one of her gloves, which he hastened to pick up, and when he handed it to her, they exchanged another glance of mutual admiration, and blushed again more eloquently than before. This short pantomime of two susceptible young creatures was unheeded by Photini, who was tranquilly lighting a cigarette, and when Andromache with a low inclusive bow and a soft “Καλἡ μἑγχ σας,” departed, Rudolph stood in silence at the window to catch a glimpse of her down the street. He saw her cross in the direction of the Academy with a tall military man, in whose black uniform and crimson velvet collar, he recognized an artillery officer. For some foolish undefined reason he rejoiced in this evidence of respectability in her brother.
“My dear child,” Photini began, when they were alone, “you made a fool of yourself a moment ago. It is possible folly is your normal condition,—I believe it is so with men of your stamp, but there are degrees, and you passed the limitations when you made a very uncomplimentary and absurd declaration to me just now.”
She paused to continue smoking. Rudolph breathed a sigh of relief to find he was not taken seriously, and felt himself a cad for that very reason. What right has a man to trifle with such emotions, and then rejoice that he is not taken seriously? Such inconsequence is surely unworthy a gentleman. He stared at her humbly and imploringly.
“See the advantages of smoking! One can hold one’s tongue,” Photini went on, serenely. “And now, please remember that I am an ugly woman of thirty-five, and you a handsome boy of twenty-one. I am old in evil knowledge, you still in the shade of innocence, a very pleasing shade as long as young men can be got to remain in it. You are an aristocrat, and I am a woman of the people. You perceive, Ehrenstein, that we have nothing in common, and now, go about your business. I have had more than enough of you.”
“Photini,” he protested, touched by her brusque magnanimity, “I have perhaps failed as a gentleman, but it is true, I can’t help loving you, though I admit that nothing but sorrow can come of such love.”
“No, you don’t love me, you love my music. In heaven’s name, don’t make a fool of yourself,” she roared.
“But don’t you want me to come again, Photini?”
“No, I don’t. Why should I?”
“Is it possible to care for me a little?” he asked, sulkily.
“You silly jackanapes! Why do you imagine I care for you?”
“Because you kissed me,” Rudolph jerked out boldly.
“And what if I did? There, I’ll kiss you again, and swear I don’t care a rap for you,” she cried, half-laughing, and gathering his head into her hands, she kissed his lips repeatedly. “Now be off, and don’t let me see you come whimpering or stamping about this neighbourhood again.”
She pushed him firmly out of the room, and ferociously slammed the door after him. When she was alone, she flung up her arms spasmodically, and cried:—
“Ouf! the fool! I’ve saved him, and I believe he is grateful to me. Poor Photini! You ugly, forsaken old soul, to love a yellow-headed boy at your time of life, with nothing in the world to recommend him, not even his stupid yellow head.” With that she poured herself out a generous glass of brandy, and drank it off at a draught.
Poor Photini!
That afternoon Ehrenstein met the Greek poet in Stadion Street, and they turned and walked together towards Constitution Square, where they sat down at one of the numerous tables outside the Cafés and drank black coffee. Captain Miltiades passed, looking more military and more fierce than ever, twirling a ferocious moustache and roving a killing dark blue eye in search of feminine victims. He stopped to exchange a few words with the Greek poet, and was introduced to Rudolph.
“Has he not a very pretty sister who is taking lessons from Mademoiselle Natzelhuber?” Rudolph asked, afterwards.
“Who? Karapolos? I never heard of a sister. I always thought he was an antique orphan. No one knows where he lives. He is the most abominable fraud in Athens,—a kind of military clown, but a brave soldier for all that, in spite of his blagues.”
CHAPTER IX. MADAME JAROVISKY’S BALL.
It was a mystery to the Karapolos how Madame Jarovisky had discovered the existence of Andromache. It was customary for her to invite the glorious and elegant warrior, with whom she had formed pleasing relations at the Palace entertainments. Besides, Hadji Adam, the King’s aide-de-camp and the very particular friend of Captain Miltiades, generally stipulated that his heroic comrade should have the right of entrance into all the distinguished houses of Athens. But even Hadji Adam knew nothing about his family, and how did it come that the Desposine Andromache Karapolos received a card of invitation for Madame Jarovisky’s great ball given in honour of an English Cabinet Minister? Julia the elder was not invited, nor was little Themistocles, the bank clerk. Another remarkable circumstance was the lateness of the invitation. It came on the eve of the ball. Andromache’s mother and Julia were strongly of opinion that no notice should be taken of an attention conveyed with such strange discourtesy. They did not know Madame Jarovisky, and no chaperon had been invited to accompany the younger Miss Karapolos. But Andromache was wild with desire to go. She had often glanced in marvelling admiration at the Jarovisky palace of marble and statues and colonnades, though she was virtuous enough to lower her eyes before the undraped statues of the terrace which she regarded as scandalous. And now that the chance of entering its bronzed gates and seeing the glories of its interior was presented to her, she was passionately resolved to go. Miltiades was fond of Andromache, and was easily persuaded into seconding her resolution. The head of the house is chaperon enough for any girl, he explained to his weak mother, and it was probably through Mademoiselle Natzelhuber that Madame Jarovisky had learned of Andromache’s existence, which accounted for the lateness of the invitation.
So it was decided that Andromache should go. The excitement put Maria into a good humour, and she was heard to sing, while starching and ironing white petticoats, the Captain’s evening shirt and lace bodices. A little dressmaker was hired for the day, who at breakfast sat opposite the warlike Miltiades, and blushed when Themistocles filled her glass with wine. Everyone laughed and spoke together at table, except the dressmaker and Themistocles, who regarded it as a personal slight that he had not been included in the invitation, and this insult added to the thought of the forbidden paradise in the next street, more than ever convinced him that there was nothing for him but to emigrate to England. After breakfast, instead of showing himself upon Constitution Square, he retired into his own room, and his violin dismally expressed his dissatisfaction in asthmatic strains supposed to be Schubert’s.
Then what running about for the women, what screaming of reiterated explanations, hysterical adjurations, differences of opinion as to the looping of a flounce, the draping of a fold, the selection of a ribbon or a flower! Maria was, of course, president of the house-parliament; though her vision was frequently impeded by the tangled locks of hair she found it so difficult to keep out of her black eyes. But the warmest discussion has its end, and all longed-for hours eventually arrive. When Themistocles arrived for dinner, he found he was the only person insufficiently nourished upon the day’s excitement. Theodore ministered to his wants, while all the women were in the girls’ chamber robing Andromache.
Very pretty she looked when dressed in cream muslin striped with silk,—an exquisitely soft and dainty texture made at the Ergasterion of Athens—trimmed with bows of crimson ribbon and charming Greek lace. Her costume was inexpensive, and looked home-made, but its very guilelessness was an effective setting to her extreme youth and simplicity. A Greek girl, whatever her deficiencies, is never awkward or vulgar, and the only suggestion Miltiades could offer in the way of improvement, when he examined her critically, was the brushing off of some of the powder which marred the fine olive of her face. Miltiades himself was resplendent in his full-dress uniform, his grande tenue. More than ever did he resemble the mythical slaughterer of those five thousand wretched Turks; and such smiling and satisfied glory as his was calculated to depress and fill with alarm the breast of the Sultan himself.
Andromache was muffled in a woollen shawl, and taking the arm of her gallant escort, they went out into the cold blue air. They walked gingerly down the slanting and unpaved street, dreading to splash their evening shoes in the running streams over which they were obliged to jump every time a fresh street broke theirs horizontally. When they reached the even pavement of University Street, behind Hansen’s lovely marble Academy, outlined sharply against the pure dark sky above the perfumed patch of foliage and flowers between it and the University, their footsteps rang out with a loud echo, Andromache’s high heels tapping the stones aggressively. Already a line of carriages was drawn up outside the Jarovisky’s palace. It was the largest ball given at Athens for years. Every one who was not in mourning was there, and most people who were.
Dr. and Madame Jarovisky received their guests at the head of the chill and magnificent hall. When Miltiades appeared, Dr. Jarovisky shook his hand most cordially and asked after his wife and children, shook hands with Andromache, and remarked that he never saw her looking so well, and was delighted to renew his acquaintance with her. Miltiades telegraphed her a glance of warning against any expression of surprise, and explained to her afterwards that Dr. Jarovisky never remembered any of his guests. Madame Jarovisky feebly expressed the pleasure it gave her to see Miss Andromache Karapolos, and hoped she would enjoy herself.
The rooms were crowded, but in spite of heavy perfumes and laughter and light, they were freezingly cold, built as they were of marble, with porphyry pillars and mosaic floors. Andromache shivered a little, and looked anxiously around while her brother twirled his moustache, and beamed a fatuous smile upon the groups he swiftly scanned.
“See, Miltiades, there is Hadji Adam flirting with Madame von Hohenfels. How handsome he is! and how distinguished she.”
“Madame von Hohenfels is what the French call grande dame. I was introduced to her nephew yesterday. He is a very pretty fellow. I daresay he is somewhere about.”
They entered another room, and here Andromache’s quick glance singled out a noticeable group of laughing and chattering young persons. Mademoiselle Eméraude Veritassi, beautifully arrayed in costly glory from Worth, was its centre, and round her hovered or buzzed like bees, Miss Mary and Master John Perpignani, Agiropoulos, the Greek poet, the young ladies of the American Legation, Ehrenstein and Vincent Mowbray Thomas. At that moment Rudolph happened to look round and met the March-violet eyes, bewitching in the eloquent delight of recognition. She blushed prettily, and an answering blush asserted sympathy on his boyish face. He broke away from the gay crowd, and saluted Captain Karapolos with insinuating cordiality.
If there is a thing the Greek has, at all hours, and in all places, at the disposal of his fellow-man, it is his hand. He shakes hands at every possible pretext, or he embraces. How he would express himself if that method of greeting were suddenly suppressed by act of Parliament, it is not for me to say, but I imagine he would pay a fine rather than forego the habit. Miltiades, after a jaunty military salute, of which he was equally profuse, held out a white-gloved hand, and then stood with the other gracefully reposing on his hip to discourse to Rudolph in unintelligible French.
“Vous êtes bien, Monsieur,” he began cheerfully.
“Mais oui,” responded Rudolph, smiling at Andromache to whom he bowed deferentially. “Est-ce que vous voudriez bien me presenter à Mademoiselle votre sœur?”
“Monsieur Rudolph Ehrenstein; Andromache—ma sœur,” said Karapolos, with a flourish, and then discovered that he had come to an end of his French. He smiled largely, and his teeth and handsome eyes, so like his sister’s, did duty for speech.
And while he was ogling Miss Mary Perpignani, to whose satisfactory dowry he aspired, audacious Rudolph had asked and obtained Andromache’s first quadrille, and furthermore secured her for the cotillon, which, of course, Miltiades would conduct according to custom.
“Vous me ferez l’honneur, Monsieur, de me confier Mademoiselle votre sœur?” Rudolph asked.
“Certainement,” assented Karapolos, delighted at the unexpected remembrance of a new word. “Je—je, comment—tell him, Andromache, I want to dance myself,” he burst out in Greek.
Andromache translated his wish, and as she spoke, with an expression of shy and charming deprecation, dark and light blue eyes held each other in fascinated gaze. Rudolph’s heart, as fresh and innocent as hers, began to comport itself in a very irregular fashion, and his frame thrilled under a sense of exquisite emotion. Her French was a little halting, and he was obliged to choose the easiest words for her, but how pleasant it was to hear her speak? The dancers were taking their places for the first quadrille, and Rudolph offered Andromache his arm. He reddened with pleasure when he looked down and saw her little hand in a white silk glove on his coat sleeve. From that moment he thought silk much prettier than Suède or kid. There was something birdlike and irresponsible in the awakening passion of these two young creatures. Neither dreamed of struggling against it or of consequences, but simply fluttered towards each other with lovely glances of sympathy and candid admiration.
The Baroness von Hohenfels, talking to the Right Honourable Samuel Warren, M. P., raised her gold face à main to scrutinise the dancers casually, and saw her nephew with his dowdy and much too pretty partner. She frowned a little, noting how completely absorbed he was and on what an intimate footing the young pair already appeared to be, and looked round in search of Mademoiselle Veritassi, whom she saw dancing with the amiable Agiropoulos. She beckoned imperiously to her husband, who obediently left the side of the English Minister’s wife, and courteously begged to be enlightened as to the cause of her signal.
“Who is that girl Rudolph is dancing with?”
“You surely don’t expect to find me posted up in the names and parentage of all the young ladies of Athens?” laughed the easy baron, looking round.
“Have you eyes in your head? Can’t you see that they are flirting?” protested the baroness.
“He certainly is greatly taken up with her. I fear, my dear, instead of being the muff I believed him, your nephew is an inveterate flirt. But I’ll inquire about her.”
The baron went back to Mrs. Mowbray Thomas, and the popular poet passing, the baroness touched his arm with her fan, and smiled him an arch invitation.
“M. Michaelopoulos,” she asked, taking his arm, “you know everybody in Athens, don’t you?”
The poet modestly deprecated any such pretension.
“Well, at least you can tell me who that exceedingly attractive young lady is my nephew is dancing with.”
The poet glanced down the room and singled out the couple.
It was impossible for the dullest observer to mistake the language of eyes that constantly dwelt on each other, and the foolish alacrity with which their hands met and clasped in the decorous dance.
“To my eternal desolation, Madame la Baronne, I must admit my ignorance. The young lady is, as you observe, charming—a little provincial, perhaps, clearly not of our world, but charming, very charming. I entreat you, Madame, to note the naïveté and candour of her—how shall we name it? entrainement? the first pressure of the dangerous influence upon tranquil maidenly pulses.”
“Confine yourself to prose, my friend, for the moment, and if you obey me, discover for me her parentage, position, etc.”
“Madame has to command, and I fly to obey her. I conjecture Monsieur Ehrenstein’s latest flame to be a little impossible Athenian, living the Gods know where and how.”
“Latest?” cried the baroness, with a look of displeased inquiry.
“Ah! it is to see that Madame’s great mind soars in the empyrean of diplomatic considerations or upon ground more ethereal still. Her delicate ears do not catch an echo of the vulgar gossip upon which grosser ears are fed.”
“I have requested you, M. Michaelopoulos, to discourse to me in prose. What is the vulgar gossip you refer to?”
The poet looked chill, and said, with brutal directness:
“My faith! Madame, your interesting nephew is thought to be the lover of that dainty morsel of womanhood, the Natzelhuber.”
Madame von Hohenfels frowned, and then laughed.
“You forget, Rudolph is noble.”
“I have not remarked that nobility is specially fastidious in such matters. Women! Well, that is frankly a department in which there is no accounting for tastes, and good blood shows as pretty an eccentricity as any other.”
The English statesman was approaching, and the poet walked away with an expression of countenance clearly indicating an intention to remember the baroness’s snub. The dance was over, and in the pause which ensued, Madame Jarovisky, mindful of Rudolph’s information that Andromache was a very promising pupil of Mademoiselle Natzelhuber, politely requested her to favour the company with a specimen of her powers.
“Your mistress has not yet arrived,” she added by way of encouragement, “and you can take advantage of her absence.”
Rudolph warmly seconded Madame Jarovisky, and thus flatteringly besought, Andromache suffered herself to be led by the young Austrian to the grand piano. At first she was terribly nervous, and the notes faltered and shook unsteadily beneath her fingers, but discovering that small attention was really paid to her, and drinking in courage and nerve from Rudolph’s pleasant glances of admiration, she gradually acquired a firmer touch, and played fairly well, with brilliancy and just expression, a dance of Rubinstein’s. She was more than half-way through her performance, when a whisper ran through the rooms:—“The Natzelhuber!”
The Cabinet Minister immediately adjusted his eyeglass, and held his sharp, heaven-aspiring nose in a beatific pose that denoted an expectation of diversion. Madame von Hohenfels smiled blandly, well pleased that somebody else should have the onerous charge and torture of entertaining the great woman. Photini was marshalled fussily up the room by anxious little Dr. Jarovisky, himself a blaze of medals and decorations, while his wife advanced with an air of pathetic deprecation and prayer, as if by such feeble weapons the thunder of this female Jove might best be averted. Phontini did not meet her hand, but just glanced at her in calm disdain, and nodded a serene, impersonal and inclusive gaze around, walked to a distant mantelpiece and placidly took her stand there.
“Who is that playing?” she asked of Dr. Jarovisky.
“Really, Mademoiselle, I—I—but wait, I will ask my wife,” the doctor hastened to say, and in his hurry to satisfy the inexorable artist, stumbled over a half dozen chairs and guests before he reached his perturbed wife.
“Calliope, she wants to know who is playing?”
“A pupil of hers—Andromache Karapolos,” said Calliope.
Dr. Jarovisky stumbled back in the same awkward and nervous fashion, and said, excitedly:
“You will be charmed, I am sure, Mademoiselle, to learn that the young lady who is delighting us all is a pupil of yours.”
“A pupil of mine, sir?” interrogated Photini, imperiously.
“Mais, oui, ja, ja, Ναἱ,” cried Dr. Jarovisky, in his fright exploding into a multiplicity of tongues. “A Desposine Andromache Karapolos,” and he smiled pleadingly.
“Oh, indeed,” said Photini, with that desperate calm of hers that invariably preluded a thunderstorm.
She rose, and followed by her shaken host, walked slowly down the room with the face of a sphinx. When she came near the piano, Rudolph looked up, saw her, bowed and smiled in anxious conciliation. She neither returned his bow nor his smile, but came behind Andromache, and deliberately dealt that inoffensive maiden a sound box on the ear.
“May I ask who gave you leave to murder Rubinstein for the benefit of a lot of idiots worse than yourself?” she cried.
Pressing her palm to the outraged cheek, now crimson from the blow, Andromache turned round with a face held between indignation and shocked fear. Her tongue refused to give voice to the piteous words that rushed to it, and tears of wounded pride and shame drowned the March violets.
“C’est trop fort, Mademoiselle,” Rudolph exclaimed, with a flame of masterful passion in his eyes.
“Vraiment?” retorted Photini, coolly. “Occupez-vous de vos affaires, Monsieur, et laissez les miennes,” and the utter vileness of her accent seriously imperilled the dignity of her speech and deportment. “As for you,” she continued in Greek, turning to Andromache, “you will be so good as to leave Rubinstein, Ehrenstein and every other ’stein alone, and content yourself with scales and exercises for the next year.”
In spite of her cruel and inadmissible behaviour, it was impossible not to feel some sympathy with the just anger of a severe and conscientious artist, though one naturally wished it had sought a less explosive outlet; and it was equally impossible not to recognise that such severity, in more measured and human form, is very salutary for the inefficient and abnormally rash young amateur. But of course all direct sympathy was for the moment concentrated on poor Andromache. Rudolph followed her, looking like a quarrelsome knight, as he stood guard over insulted girlhood, until her brother rushed forward to carry her home; and swore to himself, with petulant emphasis, that never again would he address a word of civility to the woman he mentally apostrophised as a monster and a fiend.
“Ne pleurez pas, Mademoiselle,” he cried, feverishly. “C’est qui doit avoir honte. Pour vous, vous devez la mepriser. Dieu sait si vous en avez le droit.”
“Laissez-moi, Monsieur. Je ne puis rien dire,” said Andromache in a choking voice, and seeing Miltiades coming towards her with a furious stride and the kind of look he must have worn when he sent those five thousand Turks to Paradise, she rushed to him and gathered her fingers round his arm convulsively. But a warrior and hero like Miltiades could not expect to appreciate the dignity of a pacific departure. With his sister upon his arm he walked to the spot where Photini was seated, listening to the bantering expostulations of Agiropoulos leaning over the back of her chair. She looked impassively at the angry face of the captain, then at the shamed and drooping head of Andromache, but said nothing.
“Mademoiselle Photini Natzelhuber,” said Miltiades, with a curt bow, “I have the honour to announce to you that my sister will in future discontinue her music lessons.”
“And what difference do you think that will make to me?” retorted Photini. “It will be her loss.”
“If you were a man I should know how to deal with you. But as you are only a woman, I can but despise you.”
“If it gives you any satisfaction, I am happy to have afforded you the occasion.”
With this little passage of arms, in which Miltiades may be said to have come off second best, the Captain and his sister retreated, proudly stopping to receive the apologies of Madame and Dr. Jarovisky, and left the field to the enemy.
“A very curious scene indeed,” remarked the Right Honourable Samuel Warren, M. P., to Mrs. Mowbray Thomas. “It is most refreshing to obtain these picturesque glimpses of foreign manners.”
“They’ll have to drop asking that woman into society,” said the English Ambassador. “She is downright dangerous. I never heard of such a thing in my life—striking a pretty, inoffensive girl in a drawing-room.”
“We are perhaps a little insular and restricted, and our drawing-room life is insufficiently supplied with excitement and surprise,” rejoined the Cabinet Minister.
It was some time before the guests fell into the ordinary social groove. Whether they danced, or chatted, or walked about, they managed to keep a careful and apprehensive eye upon the artist who had so unexpectedly upset the universal equilibrium. But Photini tranquilly ate the ice Agiropoulos brought her, indifferent to the general gaze fixed thus upon her, called for a glass of cognac, and then, with a look of bland defiance at Rudolph, who stood leaning sulkily against the wall, announced her intention of playing once only, and then taking her departure. Rudolph neither heeded the purport of her movement nor the direct challenge of her amber glance. His thoughts were away with Andromache, telling him that she was prettier and sweeter than any one in these crowded rooms, wondering if she were crying, and resolving to meet her brother somewhere the next day and to obtain permission to call on her. Photini he simply loathed.
But ah! good heavens, what a horrible test of his hatred! There was that tantalising witch actually playing at him the fatal irresistible “Mélodiés Hongroises.” He closed his eyes, not to be tempted to look at her with softened emotion; steeled his heart against her that it should not melt upon such sound; but he did not shut his ears. And when their eyes met perforce, there was no longer anger in his, and there was triumph in hers.
CHAPTER X. A RANDOM SHOT.
Dr. Selaka was a proud and hopeful man on the morning he saw Gustav Reineke depart for Syra, in charge of the amiable captain of the Sphacteria. On his return from the Piræus, where he had bidden him farewell, he bethought himself of the duty of inquiring into the identity of this mysterious personage. He consulted Dr. Galenides, who in turn consulted the German Consul and was referred then to the Baron von Hohenfels. Herr Gustav Reineke was vaguely known upon learned repute, but of his antecedents, parentage, means, and social and domestic condition, no information could be accurately obtained. Assertion was winged upon surmise, a very untenable resource with foreigners. There might be a Frau Reineke and a domestic circle in the background, and there might not. Of shadier relations no note was taken. In olden days, we know, science went hand in hand with sharp poverty—clearly an undesirable sequel to Inarime’s protected girlhood. With such a possibility ahead, Dr. Selaka recognised the rashness of arresting the eye of hope upon this particular marriage, despite the depressing reflection that his maniacal brother would infinitely prefer to support an archæological son-in-law, than see Inarime gracefully enthroned above Athenian matrons, a jewel in solid, unlearned gold.
“Stavros is right. Better have the girl up to Athens, and play her beauty upon the susceptibilities of our friend Mingros.” But it was a minor question. His attention was engrossed by parliamentary strife and the coming election. This was but the preliminary of ministerial glory. Place him upon the tribune, Hellas would shake with the thunder of his voice, and Europe hold down her abashed head in the face of a violated Treaty of Berlin, and an unenlarged Greek frontier. He mentally apostrophised Europe, and fell to speaking of himself, and gesticulating wildly, as he walked from the station in Hermes Street to inspect the new house he was building close to the Queen’s Hospital. The work was progressing fairly, and as he made a bid for luck by sacrificing a cock before the first stone was laid, he felt healthily free from apprehensions of any sort. Dr. Galenides was coming out of the Hospital as he turned to go, and the friends stopped to discuss the situation.
“Stavros grows more irrepressible,” said Dr. Galenides, with a curious smile. “He wields his pen not as a sword but as a whip to lash us all, friends and enemies.”
“All bluster. He likes to be thought volcanic,” laughed Selaka, easily.
“Perhaps he has no objection to a reputation a trifle more serious,” Galenides suggested, with a look ostensibly blank.
Dr. Selaka glanced sharply round at him.
“Do you distrust him?”
“It is a wise saying—trust nobody. We are all liable to change.”
“What change do you foresee in Stavros?”
“A change you will hardly appreciate,” Dr. Galenides replied, shutting up his lips with a secretive air.
“Turncoat?”
“Well, well, report speaks queerly at times. Had you been wise, you would have hesitated to compromise yourself upon pressure of his. But it is customary for monarchs to yield to the blandishments of their ministers. This understanding is the basis of the throne. Yours, my friend, is not stable.”
“You forget that I am a monarch of a realm that knows neither ministry nor change. By the way, I sent that young man off to Tenos to-day.”
“That’s another bold stroke. You are too fond of random shots. Beware of bringing down the wrong bird.”
Selaka flushed darkly, and frowned in a threatening manner.
“You have the merit of making yourself understood.”
“I always endeavour to do so, Constantine. Good-bye, before we quarrel. Come and dine with me this evening.”
The doctors shook hands perfunctorily. Selaka was profoundly troubled by these hints against the political constancy of his friend and adviser. He had sagacity enough to believe that Galenides would not speak without some justification for his doubts. It was widely known that Galenides was in the confidence of the Minister. Zeus! Could Oïdas have bought him over?
He kept a keen lookout for any casual evidence of disloyalty or coldness. For some days depression lay heavily on his spirits, and a telegram from Pericles announcing the safe arrival of the stranger, only temporarily lifted the gloom.
The week was spent in canvassing on his own account, and everywhere he met with proofs of his follower’s remissness on his behalf. He taxed Stavros with faithlessness, and his chequered feelings were promptly whipped back into confidence by the other’s cordiality and grave assurance.—He desert a friend! Might the soul of his father appear to him that night, and announce eternal perdition to him, if he could be guilty of such meanness! Might hell’s flames encompass him, and the remainder of his days be in shadow! He thumped his chest violently, showed by a crimson cheek the wound upon his honour, and the flame of resentment was in his tawny eyes.
Dr. Selaka was convinced, and apologised. Remorse held his glance averted from that of his wronged friend, so gave the other an opportunity for looking slyly sideways at him, and pursing his lips forward to strangle the perfidious smile about them.
In that evening’s edition of the “New Aristophanes,” there was a sensational announcement that the editor ardently desired to explain to the Athenians the motives of a change of policy, and he considerately gave them rendez-vous on the following Sunday afternoon at the Odeon in Minerva Street.
Selaka was alarmed to the verge of unreason, and found no comfort in an enthusiastic letter received that morning from Pericles, expressing complete satisfaction with Reineke, and his conviction that he was in every way worthy of Inarime. Is it human to be interested in the marriage of a niece when signs of storm are visible upon the political horizon? But it was still possible that a change of policy in Stavros meant no defection upon the question of the mayoralty. All he craved was the lawyer’s help to that post of civic honour, and in parliamentary matters he was free as a weathercock.
There was something so irresistibly comic and original in the audacious proposal of Stavros, that hardly a male in the town failed to put in an appearance at the Odeon. The siesta was cut short, and at half-past three numbers of black-coated civilians were crossing the Platea Omonia, where the afternoon band was playing in front of the Café Charamis. All the tables were speedily vacated, with empty coffee cups to speak of the unwonted evasion. The band went on playing to the nurses and babies, over whom a soldier or two mounted guard.
The Odeon was crowded, and many had to content themselves with being packed closely in the passage, whence a second-hand knowledge of the proceedings could be obtained.
Agiropoulos, always on the alert for surprise and excitement, was there, chatting audibly with the glorious Miltiades. The poet looked on with a casual, contemptuous glance, which clearly expressed his opinion that these Athenians were so very provincial and absurd.
“Absurd? Yes,” ejaculated Agiropoulos, aggressively scanning the assembly through his eyeglass. “That completes their interest.”
“By the soul of Hercules! that fellow they call the King of Tenos is monstrous,” muttered the poet.
“Because he presents the front of a credulous Greek?”
“Because he is a damned idiot.”
Here their flattering comments were interrupted by the appearance of Stavros upon the stage. There was lively promise of what the French would call “une séance à sensation,” and all eyes were fastened curiously upon the lawyer and recreant politician. As for his views, we will not indicate them, nor attempt to reproduce his words. The evolution he attempted to accomplish and gracefully explain might fitly be described less delicately upon non-political ground, but the atmosphere is everything.
Stavros was tightly buttoned in a frock coat, as became a legal deputy. A semi-humorous, wholly false smile ran along his lips, and his audacious eyes twinkled pleasantly with appreciation of his difficulties. He saw Selaka, and he nodded deprecatingly, his smile growing sweet and unsteady. And then, with a preparatory sentence or two, he launched out on the sea of empty eloquence. He glided fluently over trivialities, and lost his listeners in a fog of vague ideas, stringing grandiose expressions with an abominable readiness, until weariness sat upon the spirit of sense and begat regret for the wisdom of silence. Alas! this is a wisdom the modern races are unwilling to acquire. The wordy eloquence of the parliamentarian delights depraved taste here as elsewhere, and as long as Stavros talked grandly of Europe, the Treaty of Berlin, the enlargement of the Greek frontier, the future grasp of Constantinople, he was quite able to drown his own particular villainy with these sprays of aspiration. Some might think him untrue to his political principles, but, after all, what principles could any honest politician have but the good of his country? It had been clearly demonstrated to him that his dear particular friend, Dr. Selaka, the distinguished member for Tenos, was an unfit candidate for the Mayoralty, and that the election of Kyrios Oïdas would redound to the honour and glory of Athens.
“How much has he paid you?” Selaka roared, jumping to his feet, and glaring at the orator.
“Come, Stavros, name the sum,” was shouted from the body of the hall.
Stavros reddened faintly, but he faced the insult with an imperturbable air, dismissing it in disdainful silence. He maundered on, outrageously displaying his conviction that men will swallow any amount of nonsense from a public speaker. His speech was largely interspersed with such sounding and significant words as “patriotism,” and “liberty,” the glory of Greece, duty to his constituents, and the good of Athens, and wound up by protesting that the eye of Europe was anxiously fixed upon the coming election, and it behoved the Athenians to stand upon their honour.
This farrago was followed by loud applause, and Agiropoulos and the poet forced their way out of the hall to enjoy a hearty laugh. Agiropoulos was satirical, and drew a moving picture of Europe trembling upon the issue of the contest between Oïdas and Stavros. The poet turned it into rough verse, and both exploded again in roars of appreciative mirth.
“All the same, he is a villain, that Stavros.”
“A very clever fellow,” protested Agiropoulos, “and noticeably for sale. I don’t blame a man for making the best of his vices and gilding them for exposure.”
Selaka was coming out, in voluble altercation with the great Miltiades. The captain looked majestically indignant, and frowned with dreadful purpose. The Deputy shook his fist back towards the hall, thundered, vociferated, and clamored frantically for vengeance.
“There is nothing for it, my friend, but a duel,” the captain insisted. “You must fight him, positively.”
“I will fight him, yes. I, Constantine Selaka, will mangle, murder, shoot him.”
This wrench of wounded trust was more than the wretched man could bear. Agiropoulos took malicious interest in his raving and ranting. He drew near and, by a sympathetic remark, put a point upon his victim’s sufferings.
“By Zeus! I’ll shoot him, I will. I’ll riddle him with balls, and leave his carcase food for the ravens.”
“A very laudable intention on your part, Kyrie Selaka, and one that every reasonable man will appreciate,” said Agiropoulos, winking at the poet.
“I have urged him to it,” Miltiades explained, heroically. “I am proud to place myself in this delicate matter at the service of Dr. Selaka.”
“It is an honour to know a gallant man and a hero like you, Captain Karapolos,” Agiropoulos rejoined gravely.
Miltiades touched his hat and bowed. His expression eloquently said: “If it’s gallantry and heroism you’re in search of, you’ve come to the right person.”
The distraught doctor, walking between his friends, uttered many a rash word, and no suggestion less than murder could appease his wrath. That evening it was bruited round Athens that he had sent a challenge to Stavros, and the town impatiently awaited the exciting results.
Oïdas acted as second to Stavros. When the hour was fixed, he found his principal plunged in the depths of despair. The lawyer and editor had a very good notion of settling a quarrel with the pen and the tongue, but when it came to a question of loaded pistols, capacity oozed out through his finger-tips, and the sweat of mortal terror drenched his brow.
“If the thing should not go off properly?” he suggested.
“Just hold it straight, and sight your target—like this,” Oïdas explained, lifting the weapon.
“Oh, oh! take care, Oïdas. Mind it doesn’t go off,” Stavros supplicated, making a rush for the door.
“You fool! It is not even loaded.”
Stavros sat up all night to write miserable letters to his mother and sisters at Constantinople, and heaped curses on the head of his frantic enemy. The doctor fared hardly better. Deprived of the stimulating society of his military friend, his spirits sank, his mind became unhinged, and his aspect took a funereal hue. He sent an incoherent missive to Pericles, and lay on his bed weeping and moaning. When Miltiades and Agiropoulos aroused him next morning, his eyelids were appalling to behold, and his effort at cheerfulness most ghastly.
“A soldier never anticipates evil; is that not so, my brave Captain?” laughed Agiropoulos.
“Could not this matter be more pacifically arranged?” Selaka implored, vainly endeavoring to conceal his fear in the mask of humanity. “It is a sinful thing, my friends, to waste the blood of one’s fellow in a private quarrel.”
“If it comes to that,” said the ready Agiropoulos, “there is little to choose between public and private quarrels. Indeed, more often than not, wars have sprung from personal differences.”
“But the law of every civilised country forbids duelling. Stavros and I are both lawgivers—that is, we represent the Constitution, and are bound to uphold it. It would be monstrous for two members of Parliament to break the law,” pleaded Selaka, covering himself with a last poor remnant of virtue.
“We make the laws for others, never for ourselves. Hang it, man, what’s liberty if it can’t provide us with a backstairs to the Temple of Wrong, and can’t supply us with decent excuses for the evasion of principles?”
“There is an abominable looseness in yours,” remarked Selaka, in a doleful attempt at indignation.
“Come, Doctor,” Miltiades cried, clanking his spurs impatiently. “Whatever the laws of the State may be, the laws of honour demand that neither antagonist be a moment behind time. I have the pistols. Be so good as to hurry your movements.”
The doctor’s laggard air suggested the gathering of scattered limbs, and the necessity for adjusting them before a march could be effected. He looked ruefully at the impassible Agiropoulos, and resented his impertinent eyeglass and his irreproachable toilet. He looked at the stern and gallant captain, wavered, and fresh words of protest died in his throat.
“There is no fear of our being discovered and the affair stopped?” he asked, in the tone of one to whom such a contingency would appear the worst possible catastrophe.
“Oh, none whatever,” Miltiades replied, reassuringly.
“Oh!” ejaculated Selaka, with his heart in his boots.
Through a similar hour of agony Stavros had passed, and awaited them with a poor imitation of stoic bearing.
“If anything happens, don’t forget to send this letter to my brother,” Selaka entreated, as he tremblingly took the pistol from Miltiades.
“God have mercy on my soul,” he murmured, firing with closed eyes, and shot—not his enemy but himself.