A Modern Mercenary Part 21

Valerie threw back her head with the slight haughty lift he knew so well.

'You are rather too certain of your own power,' she said.

'You say you remember that night?--not so well as I do? You think I am very sure of myself. And yet I have been mistaken on points that touch me close. I thought that night when I knew I might never see the morning--I dared to fancy that we--you and I--understood each other--a little.' He waited, but Valerie had turned away; her profile looked exquisite, but cold, against the dark shutter as she watched the driving snow. 'So I was the fool after all, you see!' he ended lamely.

According to the immemorial fashion of love, they understood and misunderstood each other alternately playing high and low at every other moment upon the wide gamut of feeling, touching faint sweet notes that would echo for ever.

Rallywood's self-control was giving way a little, and she instinctively felt her power and used it.

'I wonder what you really think of us behind that quiet alertness of yours,' she said lightly, 'I believe I did imagine I--understood you a little that night; but I imagine it no longer! Perhaps I misjudge you now, but it cannot matter; you told me once you knew how to wait, and of course you are certain that all unfair opinions of you must come right in the end.'

But Rallywood pa.s.sed over her many sentences to seize the central idea that appealed to him.

'Yes, I have learned to wait. I told you that everything comes to him who waits. Unfortunately a proverb is true often, not always. One thing can never come to me however long I wait. For me there is no hope.'

'I don't know what you hope for,' replied the girl, slowly, as if she were choosing her words; but she hardly knew what she said, she was lost in a mult.i.tude of dreams, and her words but filled in the rare crevices between them. 'I thought that every man carried his own fate in his own hand.'

'A man can fight the tangible, but no man can struggle against the ordinary laws of social life. We may laugh at conventional methods, but even in Revonde there are some which must be yielded to.'

'I don't think,' said Valerie, 'we yield to many in Revonde.'

Rallywood saw a group of people advancing towards them. Valerie, with her changes of mood and manner, distracted him, and drove him on to say what he had resolved never to be tempted into saying.

'I am a soldier--only a soldier; I gain a livelihood, but no more. I have no luck and no genius. To make a fortune or a name is beyond me.

And without fortune many desirable things are impossible.'

Valerie turned upon him a bewildering smile.

'I shall know for the future, Captain Rallywood, what you are thinking of. You will be thinking, for all those grave eyes of yours, of the fortune you cannot make!'

'Not quite that, Mademoiselle,' he answered, 'I shall be thinking of the girl I cannot win.'

Valerie found herself drawn away from him by the pa.s.sing group. She was aware of a warm throb at her heart, she was trembling a little, and the fear of the morning had temporarily vanished. For no definite reason which she could afterwards discover, she felt suddenly happy.

By evening the _tsa_ had blown away the snow-clouds for the time, and a thin moon gleamed fitfully over the wide expanses of white. Remote, m.u.f.fled in leagues of snow, and alive with hungry pa.s.sions and unscrupulous strength, the Castle of Sagan did not, on that wild January night, offer desirable housing to the Grand Duke of Maasau. He had yet some thirty hours to spend as his cousin's guest before he could return to his capital without showing suspicion or giving offence. A hundred times he wished himself back in his great palace by the river bank where the squadrons of the Guard lay within call. But he bore himself well notwithstanding, and although, on the plea of chill and fatigue, he kept to his rooms more than usual, his short appearances in public left in one sense nothing to be desired. He did not carry himself as a man in mortal anxiety, but was as dissatisfied, as discourteous, and as disagreeable as it was his custom to be.

Late in the afternoon Madame de Sagan retired to take some rest before dinner. Wrapped in lace and silk, she was standing in front of her mirror with her women about her, when the Count entered. At his first imperious word the attendants vanished.

Isolde continued to stare into the gla.s.s like one fascinated, for in it she not only saw the reflection of her own slender white-clad figure, but over her shoulder the fierce face she dreaded.

For a long minute husband and wife remained reading each other's faces in the looking-gla.s.s.

She had seen aversion and menace in the Count's lowering face many a time before, and was at length beginning to believe the almost impossible fact to be true, that a man lived who hated her, over whom her beauty had no power.

The young Countess shivered in mortal terror.

'Simon,' she wailed suddenly, 'you are changed,--you do not love me any more!'

A broad smile flitted across the savage old face.

'You are a fool, but a very pretty fool, Isolde, and for that a man might forgive you many things. Now listen to me. After you retire to your rooms for the night, keep close to them, no matter what you hear.

There may be a disturbance, and you had better have Selpdorf's daughter to keep you company.' His expression changed as he spoke of Valerie.

'There is danger,' she gasped, 'danger. What is it, oh, tell me what it is!' Her first fear leaping towards Rallywood.

He stared into her shrinking eyes.

'If you ever hope to be d.u.c.h.ess of Maasau,' he answered significantly, 'leave Valerie's lovers, Unziar and the Englishman, to take care of themselves. Keep your tongue silent! Remember!' He caught her slender wrist roughly as he spoke and pressed it to enforce the command.

The Countess made no reply, but her fingers closed in upon her palms.

'Come, give me a kiss, and promise me to do so much towards making yourself a Grand d.u.c.h.ess.' He brushed her lips carelessly with his moustache.

The caress brought no response; but as he bent over her she whispered, 'Have mercy on me Simon!' (it was a prayer born rather of some vague instinct of danger than any defined fear); 'don't kill me!'

He put his thick arm round her and shook her impatiently.

'Kill you, Isolde? Are you mad? You are far more useful to me living than dead. Get rid of your silly fears, and remember--silence!'

Then putting her back on the couch with more gentleness than might have been expected of him, he walked out of the room. For a little while she sat listening, then opened her eyes and glanced about her. Yes, he was gone. But it was characteristic of her that at such a time her chief and overpowering thought was Valerie as a rival! 'Valerie's lovers, Unziar and the Englishman!' A score of trifles rushed back upon her memory; but no it could not be. It was one of the Count's amiable ways to suggest causes of jealousy to his wife. He meant nothing, for what could he know? The soothing conviction grew upon her that the taunt was thrown at her for what it was worth. Oh, how she hated Sagan--hated his bloodshot, beast's eyes, his mocking laugh, his cruel hands, his crueller gibes!

She pushed back the lace from her wrist and saw the thin parallels of bruised flesh his fingers had left--entirely unaware, it must be owned--upon her whiteness. Ah, she would show these to Rallywood--as a proof that she was in danger, that she actually needed his protection, and so win him from his post, which to-night would become the post of death.

All her little vain soul thrilled within her at the possibility of triumph--of defeating the honour of such a man--of winning him from his watch for love's sake--of overcoming the scruples that had for so long a time stood out against her wiles.

And yet in her poor way she loved him--loved him as she would probably never love another. Some women are made in that way, they take pride in the loftiness of the height from which they drag men down. Then he must be saved, she told herself, at all costs saved! He would live to thank her yet. A thought of him lying dead in his blood by the dark embrasure that masked the entrance to the royal apartments flashed across her mind. She stretched out her arms with a soft call like a bird's.

'Oh, love, love, I will save you!'

CHAPTER XIV.

HALF A PROMISE.

Ten minutes later a big emblazoned footman brought Rallywood a summons from the Countess, as he stood talking to Counsellor and the Russian _attache_.

As he moved away Blivinski placed a bony impressive finger on Counsellor's sleeve.

'If he were not English, you could not trust him,' he said enigmatically.

Counsellor raised his bushy eyebrows, with a humorous glance. 'We have had our day.'

'Ah, my friend, you know most things. Also I know a very few,' Blivinski said significantly, 'but with your nation patriotism is not a virtue, it is a part of your physical system. You sacrifice all for your country, not because it is right to do so, but simply because you cannot help it; the good G.o.d made you so. Therefore this young man, in face of the supreme temptation of youth, may be trusted. I speak of these things now because you will remember, in good time, that those who are against you will not dare to injure'--he removed the finger to his own breast--'us also!'

And the little silent swarthy man slipped away almost before Counsellor realised that Russia, the mighty, had given him a pledge which might prove of immense value in the uncertain future.