A Man and His Money Part 18

"Boris, the superb"; "a tartar toreador of hearts"; "Prince of roubles and kopecs"! So they had jestingly called him in his own warm-cold capital of the north, or in that merry-holy city of four hundred churches. His glance now swept toward a distant door. "Faint heart ne'er won--"

Had he a faint heart? In the past--no! Why, then, now? The pa.s.sionate lines of the poets sang in his ears--rhythms to the "little dove", the "peerless white flower"! He pa.s.sed a big hand across his brow. His heart-beats were like the galloping hoofs of a horse, bearing him whither? Gold of her hair, violet of her eyes! Whither? The raving mad poets! Wine seemed running in his blood; he moved toward the distant door.

It was locked--of course! For the moment he had forgotten. Thrusting his hand into his pocket, he drew out a key and unsteadily fitted it. But before turning it he stood an instant listening. No sound! Should he wait until the morrow? Prudence dictated that course; precipitancy, however, drove him on. Now, as well as ever! Better have an understanding! She would have to accede to his plans, anyway--and the sooner, the better. He had burned his bridges; there was no drawing back now--

He turned slowly the k.n.o.b, applied a sudden pressure to the door and entered.

A girl looked up and saw him. It was a superbly decorated salon he had invaded. Soft-hued rugs were on the floor and draperies of cloth of gold veiled the shadows. Betty Dalrymple had been standing at a window, gazing out at night--only night--or the white glimmer from an electric light that frosting the rail, made the dark darker. She appeared neither surprised nor perturbed at the appearance of the n.o.bleman--doubtlessly she had been expecting that intrusion. He stopped short, his dark eyes gleaming. It was enough for the moment just to look at her. Place and circ.u.mstance seemed forgotten; the spirit of an old ancestor--one of the great khans--looked out in his gaze. Pa.s.sion and anger alternated on his features; when she regarded him like that he longed to crush her to him; instead, now, he continued to stand motionless.

"Pardon me," he could say it with a faint smile. Then threw out a hand.

"Ah, you are beautiful!" All that was oriental in him seemed to vibrate in the words.

Betty Dalrymple's answer was calculated to dispel illusion and glamour.

"Don't you think we can dispense with superfluous words?" Her voice was as ice. "Under the circ.u.mstances," she added, full mistress of herself.

His glance wavered, again concentrated on her, slender, warm-hued as an houri in the ivory and gold palace of one of the old khans--but an houri with disconcerting straightness of gaze, and crisp matter-of-fact directness of utterance. "You are cruel; you have always been," he said.

"I offer you all--everything--my life, and you--"

"More superfluous words," said Betty Dalrymple in the same tone, the flash of her eyes meeting the darkening gleam of his. "Put me ash.o.r.e, and as soon as may be. This farce has gone far enough."

"Farce?" he repeated.

"You have only succeeded in making yourself absurd and in placing me in a ridiculous position. Put me ash.o.r.e and--"

"Ask of me the possible--the humanly possible--" He moved slightly nearer; her figure swayed from him.

"You are mad--mad--"

"Granted!" he said. "A Russian in love is always a madman. But it was you who--"

"Don't!" she returned. "It is like a play--" The red lips curved.

He looked at them and breathed harder. Her words kindled anew the flame in his breast. "A play? That is what it has been for you. A mild comedy of flirtation!" The girl flushed hotly. "Deny it if you can--that you didn't flirt, as you Americans call it, outrageously."

An instant Betty Dalrymple bit her lip but she returned his gaze steadily enough. "The adjective is somewhat strong. Perhaps I might have done what you say, a little bit--for which," with an accent of self-scorn, "I am sorry, as I have already told you."

He brought together his hands. "Was it just a 'little bit' when at Homburg you danced with me nearly every time at the grand d.u.c.h.ess' ball?

_Sapristi_! I have not forgotten. Was it only a 'little bit' when you let me ride with you at Pau--those wild steeplechases!--or permitted me to follow you to Madrid, Nice, elsewhere?--wherever caprice took you?"

"I asked you not to--"

"But with a sparkle in your eyes--a challenge--"

"I knew you for a n.o.bleman; I thought you a gentleman," said Betty Dalrymple spiritedly.

Prince Boris made a savage gesture. "You thought--" He broke off. "I will tell you what you thought: That after amusing yourself with me you could say, _'Va-t-en!'_ with a wave of the hand. As if I were a clod like those we once had under us! American girls would make serfs of their admirers. Their men," contemptuously, "are fools where their women are concerned. You dismiss them; they walk away meekly. Another comes.

_Voila!_" He snapped his fingers. "The game goes on."

A spark appeared in her eyes. "Don't you think you are slightly insulting?" she asked in a low tense tone.

"Is it not the truth? And more"--with a harsh laugh--"I am even told that in your wonderful country the rejected suitor--_mon Dieu!_--often acts as best man at the wedding--that the body-guard on the holy occasion may be composed of a sad but sentimental phalanx from the army of the refused. But with us Russians these matters are different. We can not thus lightly control affairs of the heart; they control us, and--those who flirt, as you call it, must pay. The code of our honor demands it--"

"Your honor?" It was Betty Dalrymple who laughed now.

"You find that--me--very diverting?" slowly. "But you will learn this is no jest."

She disdained to answer and started toward a side door.

"No," he said, stepping between her and the threshold.

"Be good enough!" Miss Dalrymple's voice sounded imperiously; her eyes flashed.

"One moment!" He was fast losing self-control. "You hold yourself from me--refuse to listen to me. Why? Do you know what I think?" Vehemently.

The words of Sonia Turgeinov--"_Est ce qu'elle aime un autre_?"--flamed through his mind. "That there is some one else; that there always was.

And that is the reason you were so gay--so very gay. You sought to forget--"

A change came over Betty Dalrymple's face; she seemed to grow whiter--to become like ice--

"You let me think there wasn't any one; but there was. That story of some one out west?--you laughed it away as idle gossip. And I believed you then--but not now. Who is he--this American?" With a half-sneer.

"There is no one!--there never has been!" said the girl with sudden pa.s.sion, almost wildly. "I told you the truth."

"Ah," said Prince Boris. "You speak with feeling. When a woman denies in a voice like that--"

"Let me by!" The violet eyes were black now.

"Not yet!" He studied her--the cheeks aflame like roses. "He shall never have you, that some one--I will meet him and kill him first--I swear it--"

"Let me by!"

"_Carissima!_ Your eyes are like stars--the stars that look down on one alone on the wild steppe. Your lips are red flowers--poppies to lure to destruction. They are cruel, but the more beautiful--"

He suddenly reached out, took her in his arms.

The cry on her lips was stifled as his sought and almost touched them.

At the same moment the door of the cabin, by which the prince had entered, was abruptly thrown open.

CHAPTER XVII

THE PRINCE IS PUZZLED

His excellency turned. The intruder's eyes were bloodshot from the glare of the furnaces, his face black, unrecognizable, from the soot. "What the dev--" began the n.o.bleman, as if doubting the evidence of his senses.

He must have relaxed his hold, for the girl tore herself loose. She did not pause, but running swiftly to the inner door she had just turned toward, she hastily closed and locked it behind her. As she disappeared Mr. Heatherbloom stopped an instant to gaze after her; but the prince, with sagging jaw and amazement in his eyes, continued to regard only him.