The next morning Turbo appeared at his usual hour. He was quite calm. So was the King. They greeted each other with cold civility, and Kophetua at once put his formal question, as to what business there was to be done.
"There is business," said Turbo, "which perhaps will not be so painful to your majesty as it is to me!"
"Yes?" replied the King unfeelingly.
"Yesterday," the Chancellor continued, "a scene took place between your majesty and myself which cannot but interrupt the cordial relations that have hitherto existed between us. I regret and am heartily ashamed of the part I permitted to myself, and after what has occurred I feel my only course is to tender to your majesty my resignation."
"Permit me to say, Chancellor," the King replied, for he was touched by this strong man's dignified humility and self-control, "permit me to say that your conduct appears to me entirely worthy of the high place you have won in your sovereign's estimation. You will understand that I desire no unwilling service, but, at the same time, I feel it is impossible to meet your magnanimity otherwise than by a request that you will reconsider your determination."
"Sire, I fear it is useless," answered Turbo. "Your majesty can hardly appreciate the extent of the breach between us."
"I appreciate it," said the King, "but I do not exaggerate it. We have differed on a private matter of absurd triviality. I recall nothing which an apology cannot heal, and that you have already amply given. Of course," he added, with some nervousness, "it is unnecessary to observe that I am assuming the abandonment of the intentions you expressed yesterday."
"Perfectly unnecessary," said the Chancellor gravely.
"You will see," went on Kophetua, almost apologetically, "I am compelled to insist on this. My royal word is passed. It is impossible not to feel a strong interest in a person whom one has saved from a horrible death."
"I understand perfectly, sire," replied Turbo, interrupting the King, who was about to explain the circumstances which compelled him to take Penelophon under his care. "It is precisely that feeling which carried me into such excesses yesterday when this person was referred to, and which now prompts me to embrace cordially the offer of forgiveness and reconciliation which your majesty so magnanimously offers."
"I hardly comprehend," said the King. "You have not saved my life or Pen—— or that of this young person."
"I would crave your majesty's permission to pursue this subject no further," said Turbo.
"Nay, I insist on knowing what you mean," answered the King.
"Then I am forced to tell your majesty," said the Chancellor, with slow and distinct utterance, "that I was present at the Court of St. Lazarus during the whole of the ghastly tragedy at which your majesty assisted. I went thither in order to rescue, if possible, this unhappy young person from what I knew must be the result of the mistaken generosity with which your majesty had treated her. I found, with my crippled frame, I could do nothing. I witnessed your majesty's heroic intervention at the last moment, and saw at once a possibility of escape. Unseen by any one I forced pebbles into the lock which had turned upon you, and having thus secured the necessary delay, I was able to fetch two of my own servants with the simple means of effecting your majesty's escape through the prison window."
"But why did you not tell me this?" asked the King, overwhelmed with surprise. "Why did you run away?"
"I thought it would be only consistent with your majesty's wishes," said Turbo, "that no one should be, or even appear to be, cognisant of your adventure."
For a moment Kophetua was overcome with annoyance and humiliation to think how, all through the piece of knight-errantry on which he had prided himself so much, Turbo had been watching over and humouring him as though he were a child. But his better feelings took possession of him directly.
"Turbo, my dear Turbo," he said with effusion, as he advanced to the Chancellor and took his hand, "why could you not have told me this before, and saved me the injustice I have done you? How shall I ever be able to return your devotion?"
"I beg your majesty will forget the whole affair," answered Turbo. "No one can know better than yourself how unpleasant is the exposure of the good we do by stealth."
"My dear Turbo," said the King, "I can never forget it."
So King and Chancellor were at one again, and Penelophon remained in peace under the protection of Mlle de Tricotrin, happy in the occasional glimpses she had of Trecenito, and happy in the affection which her mistress lavished upon her. For Mlle de Tricotrin had taken a real liking to her gentle handmaid. She had gone through life with hardly a single friend of her own sex, and Penelophon's simple devotion touched her not a little. For, to the beggar-maid, her delivery from the squalor, misery, and cruelty in which she had been brought up was like being lifted out of hell into heaven; and she adored her beautiful mistress almost as much as she did her deliverer. So the days went by in supreme happiness for those two women, and their serenity was in strange contrast to the storm which was brewing around them. The political barometer was beginning to show signs of considerable agitation, and it was clear to the experienced observer that these two women were forming the centre of an important disturbance, which bade fair to develop a dangerous energy.
As has been previously explained, a storm in the troubled waters of politics was a normal event in Oneiria during crises like the present; but never before had there been one which seemed to promise such violence. The cause was not far to seek. The Marquis de Tricotrin had been to England. His stay had not been a short one, and he was not a man to throw away his opportunities. He liked the country and appreciated its peculiar blessings. It was not long before his sagacity detected the secret of our amazing political success, and he determined to lose no time in studying the palladium he had discovered. Fortunately, during the period of his observations the palladium exhibited itself in violent action; it therefore seems almost superfluous to add that the Marquis left the country with quite an uncommon mastery of party tactics and something approaching to genius in the manufacture and manipulation of majorities.
All he required was a field. It is said he attempted something during his sojourn in the Canaries, but his praiseworthy endeavours were disliked and at once suppressed by the Spanish governor. It was then, thirsting for an opportunity for the display of his talents, that the Marquis arrived in Oneiria. Not a day had passed before he recognised the excellence of his fortune. He found himself in the midst of three strongly divided parties, practically without experience of modern methods, and himself and his daughter the bone of contention between them. It was a moment of pardonable enthusiasm. With a hastiness excusable in a foreigner he hurried to the conclusion that as there were three parties there must be three policies, and, what is more, in three days he was persuaded that he clearly understood what they were. Neither conviction was entirely justified, but of this the Marquis was naturally unaware.
To a man of his experience the whole matter was comparatively simple, and, with a decision which would not have disgraced the oldest parliamentary hand, he adopted a plan of campaign. There were three parties, each requiring a policy. All he had to do, then, was to make each party adopt his daughter as its particular programme. That was the obvious objective, and the lines of strategy towards it were no less plain to his penetration. One of the first things he had learned in England was that simple rule which reiterated success has hallowed into a dogma: "When it is impossible to find fault with your adversaries' policy, it is lawful to steal it."
As a policy his daughter was irreproachable. He felt therefore that little more than a mere suggestion of the stratagem to the party leaders was necessary in order to ensure its adoption. The conquest which Mlle de Tricotrin had already made of the Queen was enough to secure the Agathist party, even had it not been that they had already accepted the nomination. As for the Kallikagathists, he felt they were at least half won by the impression his daughter's beauty had made on the soft heart of their gallant leader. In fact, it is not too much to say that General Dolabella was quite unhinged. It was a long time since his admiration for a woman had got so beyond his control as to lead him into melancholy. But this was certainly his case now, and the Marquis saw it. As we have said, he was a man of decisive action who did not lose opportunities, and he determined to occupy the position which the General's weakness exposed to him before that gallant officer could recover himself.
The Marquis found it a more difficult task than he had expected. The General, he confessed, was very stupid, and offered all kinds of objections. He even went so far as to say that he doubted whether the suggested stratagem was quite soldierly, but he was at once pooh-poohed into recantation by the Marquis's English precedents. Still he held out with confused obstinacy, which the Marquis put down to the General's denseness, but which was, in fact, due to his own mistaken estimate of the situation. His hasty and erroneous conclusions as to the real relations between the respective parties had caused him, as has been already hinted, to entirely misunderstand Dolabella's position, and he was adopting a false method of attack.
"But pardon me for saying," said the General, retreating to this point for the tenth time, "that I cannot see what I or my party is to gain by adopting the course you propose." The General always distinguished between himself and his party. It was no doubt entirely due to that unique and complex condition of Oneirian politics, which was the precise element in the question, that the Marquis in his haste had failed to grasp. The shrewd Frenchman began to perceive he was at fault somewhere, and determined to fathom the mystery.
"I perceive," said he, "that you have more than once spoken of yourself as something distinct from the party you lead. May I venture to ask whether the usual procedure in this country is to deal with the two things separately?"
"God forbid!" cried the General in alarm. "To hint of such a thing would smell of disloyalty in any but a foreigner who does not understand us."
"Forgive my ignorance, General," said the Marquis, "and show your pity for it so far as to explain your unintelligible position."
"With great pleasure, my dear Marquis," answered the General, with a look of painful worry at the almost impossible feat demanded of him. "It is a little complicated, but I think I can show you how things lie. You see, although I lead the Kallikagathist party, it does not follow me."
"That is a little difficult," answered the Marquis gravely. "You mean that I should arrange with your party which way it means to go, that you may be in a position to know how to lead it?"
"Not at all," said the General. "We are entirely at one. Our lines of thought are identical. It is only in our lines of action that we differ."
"Which is, of course," replied the Marquis, "a mere detail."
"Precisely," said Dolabella, in a somewhat relieved tone. "You see, my practical policy is to elect the Queen, theirs to elect the Speaker, but both elections are governed by the same principles."
"Your explanation is really masterly," said the Marquis. "I wonder I was so stupid; I see your point now quite clearly. You mean that you cannot make your party responsible for a policy which will not tend to improve the chances of their candidate for the chair."
"Yes," said the General, a little doubtfully, "that does seem to be what I mean."
"Very well," continued De Tricotrin; "then if I could ensure them the support of the Agathist party for their candidate, they would be prepared to accept my daughter at your nomination?"
"But, unfortunately," objected the General, "we have no candidate of sufficient weight to bring about such a coalition."
"Then why don't you stand yourself?" said the Marquis.
"My dear Marquis!" cried the General, completely taken aback. "Such a thing was never heard of."
"So much the better," replied the tempter. "The more unexpected our moves, the better chance we have of success. The idea seems to me to meet every difficulty. What you yourself gain it would not become me to point out. I need only remark that your election would be highly pleasing to my daughter. It is no breach of confidence to say that the poor girl has been more than touched by the chivalrous admiration of a distinguished officer and statesman like yourself. The speakership in this country is an office which bears a peculiar and delicate relation to the Queen. It would be a source of greater pleasure to my daughter than perhaps I ought to reveal, to know that you were to occupy the chair at her coronation, and I am sure that her influence with the Queen-mother and the leaders of the Agathist party is sufficient to ensure their adhesion to her favoured candidate. At the last moment the nominal candidate of their party shall be withdrawn and the coast left clear for your certain return. Say now, my dear General, will you give my daughter this one last satisfaction before her marriage?"
During the beginning of this speech the General had been staring at the Frenchman, with eyes wide with amazement, but as he proceeded, the blissful picture which was artfully called up before him was too much for his susceptible nature. To kiss those lovely lips, and embrace that bewitching form! It was a rapture of which he had not dared to dream. He closed his eyes as he listened, and a foolish smile of complacent and inexpressible satisfaction overspread his rouged and powdered face. When the Marquis ceased he collected himself with a sudden effort to a more dignified expression. He rose with the air of a statesman who is resolved to pursue a policy worthy of his magnanimity, and took the Marquis solemnly by the hand.
"Marquis!" said he, "you are a great man. Your generalship will ensure the election of this lady, whose beauty, virtue, and intelligence make it the duty of every loyal subject of the King's to espouse her cause. Your admirably conceived plan demands of me and my party a sacrifice. Monsieur le Marquis, we will make that sacrifice!"
Thereupon Monsieur de Tricotrin embraced the gallant martyr, told him he had a noble heart, and assured him with effusion that courage, devotion, intelligence, and sensibility would be carved in highest relief upon the imperishable fabric of his memory. And so he took his departure, leaving the General to wonder whether Madame Dolabella would view his conduct in the same light.
The Agathist and Kallikagathist parties were practically won. There remained still the most difficult task. The Marquis was perfectly aware of the King's antipathy to matrimony, and was fully convinced that there was still a great chance of failure, unless Turbo's support could be gained. To achieve this he felt was a task of the greatest delicacy and difficulty, and one worthy of his skill as a politician. There was clearly but one way in which it could be done. To approach the Chancellor directly was out of the question. Pressure must be put on him through his party.
With a light heart, which confidence in his abilities can alone give a man, the Marquis set about his task, little imagining the extraordinary result his ingenious manœuvres were to have.
CHAPTER XII. A DECISIVE ACTION.
The activity of M. de Tricotrin soon began to make itself felt. There was something so delightfully cynical about the political maxim upon which he was working, that most of the prominent Kallists, whom he sounded, embraced his idea with enthusiasm. The result was a marked and sudden acrimony in the conduct of the campaign.
The situation was entirely new, and was discussed with all the fire and recklessness which is the attribute of new situations everywhere. Before, the question had always lain between the claims of the ladies whom the respective parties supported; now it was between the claims of the respective parties upon a lady whom they all supported. There was something particularly invigorating in the freshness of the political atmosphere.
As each party gradually recognised the discreditable tactics of its opponents, feeling began to run very high. For of course the Speaker was not chosen on his merits. It has been explained how, in this unique country, nothing was ever done or omitted on its merits. The Speaker was chosen on the merits of the candidate for the "Crown of Kisses." Hence the interest which politicians of every grade displayed in her and her relation to the principles which were supposed to guide the different parties.
The progress of the discussion, which each day grew more heated, only serves to show us what unprincipled politicians the Oneirians were. Instead of attacking the real views of their opponents, as we always do, no matter how great the danger of defeat, they were accustomed to attribute to them views which they knew, or might easily have known, they did not possess, and emptied their artillery furiously at the monsters they had thus themselves created. It was a method that had something to commend it. It was often successful. The débris of these paper giants not unfrequently smothered the hosts which were the real object of attack, and gave the victors an ill-gotten peace till the enemy could repeat the manœuvre to their own advantage.
All parties were now busy on the old lines. As soon as the Agathists recovered from the shock which the attempt on their candidate gave them, they raised an angry scream that the whole thing was immoral, shameful, and ridiculous. That the Kallists, who objected to virtue and only admired beauty, should pretend to support an angel like Mlle de Tricotrin was a piece of duplicity and presumption which no words would adequately characterise. The Kallists replied with equal warmth, declaring that absolute falsehood was the last thing to stand in the way of a hypocritical Agathist when he wanted to gain his selfish ends; they knew perfectly well that the Kallists did not object to virtue; they admired beauty, which was a very different thing. Above all things Mlle de Tricotrin was beautiful, the most beautiful woman that had ever appeared in Oneiria, and it was therefore sheer nonsense to pretend that she ought to be an Agathist candidate. It was well known that Agathists hated beauty, and cared for nothing but virtue; and therefore for them to set up a claim to Mlle de Tricotrin was nothing less than unconstitutional.
The Kallikagathists as usual held a little aloof. They did not hurl themselves into the thick of the fight. The party, it has been said, consisted chiefly of superior persons, and was nothing if not dignified. They listened to the clangour of the fray with lofty contempt, assuring each other the while, with well-bred reserve, that whatever lies idiotic politicians might tell, the true state of the case must be clear to all plain, sensible people. At last a lady had appeared who was at once divinely beautiful and sublimely virtuous. No amount of clamour therefore could disguise the simple fact—and facts were strong things—that Mlle de Tricotrin could not by any possibility be the candidate of any party but their own.
So furiously did the battle rage that Kophetua could hardly get the Council to pay any attention to the state of the Liberties of St. Lazarus. Objections and insuperable difficulties they had in plenty, but that was all. Turbo, however, fortunately adopted a different view, and he was a host in himself. He seemed to be taking no interest whatever in what was going on about him. To all appearances he might have been entirely ignorant of the whole discussion, and of how serious was the pressure which was likely to be put upon the King to induce him to accept the hand of Mlle de Tricotrin. Perhaps, however, he had the matter more deeply in his mind than was suspected. It was, possibly, nothing but this which induced him to give his unqualified support to his majesty's suggestion that, as a preliminary measure, details of the frontier gendarmerie should be gradually concentrated in the neighbourhood of the capital. Whatever may have been his real motive, this policy was certainly calculated to distract the King's attention from matrimony and Mlle de Tricotrin.
The indifference of their chief, however, in no way lessened the ardour of the Kallist party. By the time the day came round for the usual monthly reception at the palace, the quarrel was in full swing. The occasion was expected with considerable excitement, for it was an open secret that each party was going to make it the scene of a demonstration, by which each thought to gain a march upon its adversaries.
The Agathists especially were in a high state of elation, and not without cause. The stroke they had prepared displayed real political ability. The Queen-mother was of course surrounded by Agathist ladies. Every day they had an opportunity of seeing and speaking to Mlle de Tricotrin, for Margaret seemed unable to pass a single day without the society of her new friend during some portion of it. Thus there was plenty of opportunity of examining Mlle de Tricotrin's costumes minutely, and by dint of intense application the ladies of the Queen's circle were able to prepare for the reception a number of gowns whose resemblance to the original model was very creditable, considering the impediment of unsuitable materials and the difficulty which the rococo tastes of the designers naturally had in grasping the spirit of Mlle de Tricotrin's neo-classic style.
All was ready the day before the momentous occasion. A great strategical advantage seemed assured to the Agathist party, when, unfortunately, the vigilance of the Kallist intelligence department discovered the secret by means of a corrupt maid. In the utmost consternation they flew to the Marquis with the news. His Parisian experience of the influence of women in politics told him at once that it was a crisis of the highest gravity—a crisis of that transcendent nature which serves to mark out the great from the moderate men—a crisis to which intellects like M. de Tricotrin's are alone equal. He gravely heard the whole case, considered for a few moments, and then it was plain that he had taken his decision.
"I presume," he said, with an air of calm resolution, "that Lady Kora and the Count will be there." The Count was the Kallist candidate for the chair, and Lady Kora, his daughter, was the beauty of the party. Of course they would be there. "Very well," continued the Marquis; "request them to be so kind as to come to my house to-morrow afternoon, and beg them not to be at the trouble of dressing for the reception."
The deputation was satisfied. They were coming to have entire confidence in the Marquis's generalship, and they retired with expressions of mutual esteem. M. de Tricotrin at once went to his daughter's apartment. As it happened, he found Penelophon laying out a beautiful gown for her mistress's inspection.
"See, sir," cried Mlle de Tricotrin, as he entered. "There is the gown I wear to-morrow. Is it not lovely?"
The Marquis looked at it critically. "Is that the handsomest one you have?" he asked.
"Yes, sir," she answered. "It is the loveliest one I ever had. I have kept it back on purpose for a time like this. I am so happy that I did."
"I am happy too, my child, for I want it."
"But it won't suit you, sir?"
"My child," said the Marquis, with Spartan severity, "this is no time for levity. We are on the brink of a desperate crisis. It is a moment of gravest peril, and that gown alone can save us." And then he explained to her the whole situation, and how he had resolved that Lady Kora should wear her most beautiful dress. Poor Mlle de Tricotrin! Like most pretty women, and many others, she was very fond of her pretty frocks. She had an exquisite taste in them, and had been preparing this present one for a triumph which should outdo all her previous successes. She and Penelophon had been thinking of little else for some days past, and her beautiful eyes filled with tears at her bitter disappointment.
"O sir," she said, "you are always asking sacrifices of me."
"But I ask none," he answered, "that I do not make myself. I shall lend the Count the very last suit of clothes which I had from Paris."
"But that is so different," she answered.
"I really cannot see how," said he; "but that is a matter of detail. You have some intelligence, my child, and you must see that as long as we can hold the balance true between the parties, they will all struggle which is to support us most vigorously. If we once let one of them get the upper hand, we shall immediately have an opposition. No! be brave, be my own daughter, and fling your gown into the rising scale as I do my plum-coloured suit. It is a sacrifice, I know, but to win a crown you must expect greater sacrifices than this. Many have to sacrifice honour, and even lives, to their ambition; be thankful that this is all I demand of you—as yet."
"Take it away, Penelophon," said Mlle de Tricotrin desperately, "I cannot bear to see it now; and yet how pretty it is! Had you told me yesterday I would give this up, I should have said, 'No, that is impossible; as impossible as that I should sacrifice you, child.'"
It was miserable work for both mistress and maid dressing Lady Kora on the following afternoon. But Mlle de Tricotrin had made the sacrifice, and had sense and determination enough to be loyal to it, and make the most of it. She draped Lady Kora herself, and Penelophon dressed her hair as she had been taught by her mistress. Lady Kora had pretty hair and a pretty complexion, so she was well enough without her rouge and powder. It made poor Mlle de Tricotrin almost break down to see how charming she had made her look in her own best-loved gown.
But the effect on the Agathist ladies was something very much more severe. When they assembled in the throne-room, they were in the highest spirits. Nothing was heard but mutual congratulations on the success of their manœuvre, and the sour looks of the opposition. True, the costumes were not all that they had intended. The rich satins and flowered brocades upon which they had worked did not lend themselves particularly well to the neo-classic treatment. The general effect was decidedly bunchy. There was a want of softness and grace about the folds, and some of the coiffures gave evidence of a serious want of feeling for the style. The harmonious disorder of Mlle de Tricotrin it was found very hard to attain. Most of the heads presented a shock of ugly tangle, such as the Sleeping Beauty must have suffered from when she first awoke; others had frankly given up the attempt, and, merely abandoning their powder, had kept to their old-world design, with a somewhat painfully incongruous effect. Still, whatever might be the artistic verdict, politically it was an immense success, and Agathist spirits ran high.
The Kallikagathist ladies displayed their characteristic moderation with an increase of self-respect which, as usual, was in direct proportion to the contempt with which it inspired their opponents. With sagacious self-control they had given up powder, clung to their rouge, and shortened their waists without lessening the girth of their hoop. The compromise served well to mark their principles, but sadly spoilt their figures.
We can imagine, then, the terrible shock which the entrance of Lady Kora and her father created. That the Kallist candidate should outshine the Marquis was bad enough, but that his daughter, the recognised beauty and leader of fashion in Kallist circles, should put Mlle de Tricotrin into the shade with her gown was simply a disaster. The more the Agathist ladies looked at her, the more absurd and bunchy did they feel. With the appalling conviction that they had made themselves ridiculous they tried to hide themselves in the throng. More than one poor girl was found in tears as she thought of her shock head, and the hateful costume she had been compelled to wear. How could they ever recover their reputation?
The cup of the vanquished was full when the King danced a second minuet with Lady Kora. The Marquis even began to be alarmed lest his manœuvre was being too successful. Still there was in any case one point gained. In spite of Turbo, the Kallist party was openly committed to the support of Mlle de Tricotrin. Turbo saw it plainly, and saw it without dismay. With perfect unconcern, he had been watching while De Tricotrin laboriously constructed his matrimonial engine. The ingenuity which the Frenchman displayed only served to amuse him while he was waiting for the moment to deliver the blow, which he calculated would smash the elaborate machine to pieces. He well knew how Kophetua would see through the whole conspiracy, and resent the pressure that was being prepared for him. He was fully alive to the fact that the least thing would now be enough to turn his pupil against Mlle de Tricotrin, and he laughed to himself to think how, when the hour was come, at one stroke he would gain all he wanted, and prevent all he did not want. It was now that the hour had come.
"Permit me, Marquis, to make you a compliment," said Turbo, as with engaging freedom he drew the Frenchman on to a balcony in a secluded part of the state apartments. "Your generalship is simply consummate; I am completely out-manœuvred."
"My dear Chancellor," replied the Marquis in some suspicion at this sudden surrender, "I trust you will not interpret any move that I have made as an offensive operation against yourself."
"M. le Marquis," said Turbo, looking frankly at his rival, "let us be perfectly open. We are each of us too old to be deceived by the other. Each knows the other's game perfectly well. You are quite aware that as regards your daughter's marriage with the King I am in opposition, and I know equally well that this splendid combination—for so you must permit me to call it—this splendid combination, which has cut my party from under my feet, is the product of your genius and nothing else."
"Your frankness, Chancellor," replied the Marquis, with pardonable pride, "is as charming as your compliment. I meant to thwart you, and I think I have pretty well succeeded."
"Precisely," said Turbo, "and, while I still have a chance, I wish to make terms with you."
"I am prepared to consider anything in reason," replied the Marquis magnanimously.
"I am glad you take that tone," said the Chancellor, "for you see I have a reserve which I should be very loth to use, but which I should be compelled to use, if we failed to agree."
"Well," said the Marquis, smiling with lofty incredulity, "let me hear your terms."
"It is merely that you should hand over to me, without reserve, your daughter's new maid."
"My dear Chancellor, nothing would give me greater pleasure, but my daughter would never consent to such a thing." The Marquis was an old schemer, and at once winded a very cunning attempt to blacken his daughter's character irrevocably in the eyes of the King.
"Are you sure?"
"Perfectly."
"Then I must take my own course."
"By all means; I am quite prepared with mine."
"Ah! you think I am so silly as to boast of forces that I do not possess. Wait! I will be franker with you still. I will draw my weapon and show you how bright and sharp it is."
"Really, Chancellor, you are very kind."
"Listen," hissed Turbo in his ear. "The King does not love your daughter. He loves her maid. None but I know it. Why do you think he used to watch the beggar-maid continually from his windows? Why did he fetch her at the risk of his life and in disguise out of the Liberties? Why did he place her with the most accomplished woman he knew, to be refined and sweetened for him? Why does he sit continually before the old picture in the library? Ha! he thought he was so cunning when he put her with your daughter. He thought no one would guess, if she were under the wing of the woman whom every one thinks is going to be his bride. But I know him. I was not blinded. He means to marry the beggar-maid to spite you all, and because he loves her. Think what his principles are! How he would rejoice to share his throne with one of the lowest of the people! He is a dreamer. You do not know him. He is a dreamer, and it is a thing that has happened here before."
Turbo's infatuation for Penelophon made him believe every word he said, and his intense earnestness was not without its effect upon the Marquis. After his long career of intrigue, De Tricotrin was a man difficult to deceive, and he was also a man to know when another was speaking what he thought to be the truth.
"This is a very serious view to take of the situation, Chancellor," he said, after a short silence. "Pardon me if I cannot adopt it at once. There are difficulties. He did not ask my daughter to receive this girl; it was she that chanced to offer."
"Chanced!" said Turbo scornfully. "Are you deceived by such a trick as that? Why do you think he chose the very hour when your daughter was with the Queen? Why, only because he knew the Queen would refuse, and that your daughter would offer."
"True!" answered the Marquis thoughtfully, "I remember she told me the King asked her to remain while he made his request. Are you sure you are right in your story of this romantic abduction? Is there evidence of it?"
"See," said Turbo, coolly bringing a paper from his pocket, "here is the very warrant under which General Dolabella detained her till she could be otherwise disposed of."
"But how do you come by it?"
"After execution all warrants are brought to me to file in the archives."
"And all you ask," said the Marquis, after carefully examining the warrant, "is the surrender of this girl? It seems a small price to pay for your adhesion."
"Possibly, but it is not so," replied Turbo. "To begin with: I cannot prevent the King marrying either your daughter or the beggar. I must lose my game now, in any case. Then I have a strong fancy for this girl myself, and ask her as the price of my not prolonging the struggle. Of course I could manage that the King should marry her, but I should gain nothing by it. By the present arrangement I do."
"Your position is quite clear to me now," said the Marquis.
"Then you accept my terms?"
"I do."
CHAPTER XIII. MISTRESS AND MAID.
It would be hard to imagine a prettier picture than there was to be seen in the apartments of Mlle de Tricotrin on the afternoon of the day following the eventful reception. The cold season was drawing to a close. The day had been very sultry; and clad in the rich déshabillé of the zenana, the beauty was lying listlessly on a luxurious divan, pretending to finish her siesta. A loose white robe of softest cotton was wrapped about her negligently, and her bare feet peeped shyly out of it. Her rounded arms, her littered brown hair, the tumbled heap of gaily striped pillows, in which her flushed face was half buried, all told of the languorous unrest of the East; and the soft, rose-coloured light glimmered in from the domed ceiling upon a scene in which Europe seemed quite forgotten.
Indeed, it was in its only half-concealed Orientalism that Oneiria had the greatest charm for her. That was easy to see in all the decoration and appointments of the room, in the harmonious shimmer of the arabesques, with which the plastered walls were painted, and the dwarf tables, and scattered cushions and softly glowing mats, which almost hid the cool, polished floor. No less was it visible in her own dress, and that of Penelophon, who stood fanning her mistress with a large and gaudy palm-leaf fan. It has been said that Mlle de Tricotrin had a pretty taste in costume, and it was her delight to devise modifications of the Eastern attires, which surrounded her amongst the lower orders, and dress her pretty maid in them. To-day Penelophon wore in the Moorish fashion, to which she was accustomed, a long robe that reached loosely from her shoulders to her feet, of a soft yellow hue. Low about her waist it was girt by a band of scarlet cloth, richly embroidered with gold, and of almost extravagant breadth. Yet there is no other cincture which will so beautifully express the grace of a lithe young figure. It confined without restraint, and allowed the robe to fall open naturally at the breast, so as to show beneath it a glimpse of a scarlet bodice. A silken scarf, knotted about her head, almost concealed her dark hair. Her arms and feet were bare, and looked almost as white as the silver anklets and armlets with which they were clasped, and which jingled with a soft and pleasant sound as she gently moved the fan. All other noise was hushed, and Penelophon stood quiet and content to look down with deepest admiration at the lovely face resting in the pillows, while she waited patiently till her mistress should be tired of pretending to sleep.
"'Tis useless," said Mlle de Tricotrin at last, rousing herself with a lazy toss of her arms; "I can sleep no more."
"Is it thinking of Trecenito that keeps you awake?" asked Penelophon, as her mistress sat up on the divan, and she kneeled at her feet to put on her dainty slippers.
"Hush! hush! my girl; a maid must not speak of such things to her mistress."
"Forgive me, madam, for indeed I meant no harm," said Penelophon, pausing in her work and looking up wistfully.
"And you did no harm," replied her mistress. "Yes, you may speak of this to me. I like to hear you, for you are maid and friend in one. Yes, child," she went on, taking the sweet upturned face in her hand caressingly, "you are the only woman I ever loved; the only friend I ever had."
She sank back wearily upon the divan, and Penelophon stooped and kissed in deep devotion the little white foot she held in her hand before she hid it in the slipper.
"Why do you do that, child?" asked her mistress.
"I don't know," answered Penelophon; "but you are so kind, and I am so happy, and you love Trecenito so."
The girls great dark eyes were brimming with tears as she looked up, and her mistress saw them. "Why, child," she said, "you love him too!"
"No, no," said Penelophon eagerly, a faint blush tinting her pale face. "I do not love him. He is high above where my love can reach. I adore him and worship him, and it is you I love because you love him. There is no one but you in the wide world whom such a man as he could love. It is only such a one as you who can know how to love him, and that is why you are so dear to me. You are the sweet saint that helps me to reach the throne of my heaven. It is like worship to tire your hair, and dress you, and send you away in all your beauty to make him glad. You are the prayers I say to him, and the hymns I sing, and the sweet incense I offer to my god."
"My child, my child," said her mistress in a hushed voice, as of one who speaks in some vast, solemn cathedral, "whence and what are you? It is only the angels who love like that. Surely it was one of them who whispered in my ear that I should ask him to give you to me."
"Yes," answered the maid, "and it was surely one that brought you to him, because they knew how good he would be to me. 'He must not wait for paradise,' they said. 'We will bring him a wife as bright and pure and beautiful as the heavens, and he shall have a paradise on earth.' So they brought you to him, and they will show him the sunshine in your face, and the blue sky that slumbers in your eyes; he shall feel the warm glow of your lips, and know it is the spirit of life; he shall hear the murmur of your voice, and know it is the echo of the prayers which the saints have prayed."
"Hush! hush!" said her mistress, almost beneath her breath. "You must not speak so. You frighten me. I am not what you think. God help me! I am not what you think. And yet, child, yet I believe you would almost make me what you say. Ah me! if I had had a sister such as you! Sing to me, child, while I lie and think what I am and what I might have been."
Penelophon rose, and took a kind of lute, which was the instrument of the people, and began to sing to it some half Moorish love-song, full of those slurs and weird modulations which sound so strange to European ears. But Penelophon's plaintive voice had a fascination for her mistress, and she lay quite still listening till the end. As the song finished, the door opened, and Monsieur de Tricotrin came in.
"My child," said he, "I want to speak to you."
"Alone?"
"Yes, alone."
"Go then, Penelophon," said Mlle de Tricotrin; "but come back and talk to me before I dress."
"It is a pretty wench the King gave you," said the Marquis, as the beggar-maid left the room. "I doubt if she helps much when he sees you together."
"But I am very fond of her, sir!"
"That is what I fancy is the case with him."
"No, that is impossible. A man could never be taken with a child like her."
"You must remember, my dear," said the Marquis, "they have been playing hero and heroine together in a very romantic drama? You know?"
"Perfectly, sir; Penelophon has told me."
"And yet you do not believe a man may be infatuated with her?"
"No, sir. She has nothing to charm a man."
"Well, I have reasons for what I say."
"Indeed, sir."
"Yes. To begin with, Turbo, the Chancellor, is crazy about her."
"That was but the passing fancy of a brutal nature."
"My dear, you are quite mistaken. He is crazy still."
"You surely must be joking, sir."
"Not at all. In fact, it is on this very subject I came to speak. He wants you to give her up to him."
"I would rather give up the throne!" cried she warmly.
"Softly, my child," said the Marquis. "Do not decide this matter too hastily. A throne is not a thing to be lightly cast on one side for the sake of a miserable little beggar-girl."
"Yes; but that is not the question now."
"My dear, it is the question."
"You do not mean——"
"I mean simply that the Chancellor asks your maid as the price of his adhesion, and without his adhesion we cannot succeed. That is all. I call it really handsome."
"And I—I call it infamous!" cried Mlle de Tricotrin hotly. "It is a villainy, and I will never consent to it!"
"My dear," said the Marquis soothingly, "what a fuss to make about this miserable creature. It is a mere matter of business; for you can hardly call a beggar a human being. Equality and fraternity are all very well, but that would be going too far."
"I know your principles of equality well enough, sir, and I do not call this poor girl human. She is an angel, and he—he is a fiend that Penelophon dreams of and wakes screaming. She shudders when she even thinks of him, and the sight of him is a horror that paralyses her. No, no; I will not part with her. You have my answer, sir."
"My child," said the Marquis calmly, in spite of his vexation, "I am not pleased with you. You are talking very foolishly. I did not ask you for an answer now, and I will not take one. This evening, ere you retire for the night, I will hear your decision. Turbo will be in waiting, and you can send the girl to him to be got out of the way, or else you can let her stay for the King to marry, whichever you like. Remember what has happened in this country before, and remember the character of the present sovereign. That is all I ask at present. I will leave you to consider the matter."
With these words M. de Tricotrin went abruptly from the room. He saw he had made an impression upon his daughter by what he had said, and he was an old enough hand at the game of persuading women to know the value of allowing impressions so made to ferment by themselves. He knew that further discussion would only disturb her and arrest the process, till perhaps what he considered a mere girlish fantastic mood would become solidified into a wholly illogical and obstinate determination which might afterwards prove quite insoluble.
"Women," he used to say, "have no opinions. They have merely contradictory states of mind, which serve them indifferently instead. They are states of mind which live upon contradictions. Failing this they perish, and, consequently, as a state of mind of some kind is a moral necessity, to women no less than to men, in the absence of external contradiction, they will soon contradict themselves."
Whether the Marquis's theory has any real scientific value is a matter of doubt. It is merely interesting here as the one upon which he acted with his daughter. She was not always easy to manage. She was naturally a woman of spirit, and, moreover, quite understood the high pecuniary value her father placed upon her. She had known all her life that she was the best card he had to play, and that now she was the only one. It is not to be wondered at then, that, being human, she from time to time showed a strong disposition to have a say in the game. The Marquis saw she was in one of her antagonistic moods now; so, as we have said, he left the poisonous barm he had dexterously planted to ferment and produce the metamorphosis he desired.
Mlle de Tricotrin did not talk much to Penelophon when she returned. She was occupied in trying to convince herself that no man of the world could possibly admire the girl. She had always liked the pale, delicate face herself for its purity and dreamy simplicity. She could imagine, perhaps, a painter, or a sculptor, or a poet—yes, but was not Kophetua a poet after all? Were not all the high-flown democratic opinions which he was constantly expressing nothing but the love of a poet for nature, and the base multitude whom he idealised as the children of nature?
She was conscious of feeling distinctly colder to her maid, as she was being dressed for Count Kora's rout, to which she was going that evening. But Penelophon saw no difference, and she fondled her idol's lustrous hair, and caressed the soft folds of her gown as lovingly as ever; and when all was done rejoiced as unaffectedly in the surpassing beauty she was sending forth as her offering to the hero she worshipped.
The Marquis did not refer again to the subject at his heart; but as he ascended the stairs of the Kora Palace, he gently stirred the fermentation he had set up.
"You know, my child," he said blandly, "that your presence here to-night finally marks you as the accepted candidate of the Kallists."
"You have told me so, sir."
"And you know that there remain now only two persons to gain."
"You mean, sir, I presume——"
"The Chancellor and the King. To-night you will either win or lose the former. You have to play a stroke which will count more than everything we have done. You understand?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then, as you are determined to refuse the price Turbo asks for his alliance, you had better try and win him by the other way in which you are so clever, my dear."
"He is invulnerable to those weapons, sir. I might as well try to charm the wind."
"Then I suppose we must call him lost."
Mlle de Tricotrin did not answer. It was a good sign. The Marquis felt hopeful, and determined to assure the Chancellor that if he would be present at the time and place appointed he would not be disappointed.