A Modern Mercenary Part 25

He put her gently back against the wall and looked at her, but the lace was drawn close about her face.

'I must pa.s.s,' she said.

The man's back was to the light, but she knew the shape of the head and shoulders.

'No one can pa.s.s, Madame.'

The relief of knowing Rallywood was safe jarred in her mind with the hideous suspicion that Isolde's allurements had after all conquered his allegiance to the Duke. He clearly recognised the cloak and believed her to be the Countess. She would have been more than woman not to take advantage of the mistake. She bent forward a little.

'Come with me,' she whispered.

'I cannot.'

'Do you forget your promise?'

'Under the circ.u.mstances'--he glanced back at the Duke's door--'you know I could make none.'

'But I am in danger--and you promised, surely you promised, with your lips there!'

Rallywood stared at the shapely hand and firm white wrist thrust out from the dark sables, with a great leap at his heart. The sight took him unawares.

'Valerie!' he exclaimed.

CHAPTER XVII.

IRIS.

From its beetling crags the Castle of Sagan looked out that night with many luminous eyes over the crowding black pine woods and away across the frost-bound, melancholy marshes of the frontier. The renewed violence of the storm had not abated, and the wind moaned about the old walls.

There was one in Sagan that night to whom the wind had an old yet new story to tell. The Duke had heard it in his cradle even in the summer palace where he was born; during later years his dulled senses paid little heed to that wild singing, and, in truth, pa.s.sing most of his life as he now preferred to do in the low-lying sheltered palace at Revonde, where the state apartments were well within the towering ma.s.s of masonry, and protected on the river side by the Cloister of St.

Anthony, he seldom heard its voice. So that to-night, while the _tsa_ whimpered and clamoured about the exposed b.u.t.tresses and towers of Sagan, it sounded to his ears like the calling of some long-dead friend, a wraith belonging to his lost youth. Sleeping memories awoke and troubled him; he fancied he had read a vague menace in Count Simon's bloodshot eyes, and every little incident that had taken place since his arrival now a.s.sumed strange and malign meanings.

He looked around the great vaulted chamber oppressed by a presentiment of danger, and tried to still his jangled nerves. For with the instinct of failing mastership he resolved to think out some scheme of defence and a spontaneous policy, by which he might not only defeat his enemies, but outwit and overwhelm his rebellious servants.

Selpdorf--was he also false and self-seeking? For more years than he cared to remember the Duke had forced this man to enact the part of virtual ruler of the State, always believing in his loyalty--if not to Gustave of Maasau, at least to Maasau the Free. Any dimmest doubt of Selpdorf's patriotism had never during all that period entered into the soddened brain of his master. But to-night, as the Duke recalled the half-jesting proposal to disband the Guard, made by the Chancellor on the day of the review, and added to that hint the pregnant significance of Valerie's speech, he realised that evil days were overtaking him, that his most trusted minister had been bid for and bought by his foes, and that it now behoved him to strike out a personal policy, whereby he should secure strong friends and supporters to aid him in the coming struggle against these traitors.

He had retired to his room at an early hour under the plea of weariness.

He was, as a matter of fact, worn out by the flood of fears and anxieties that Valerie's one reckless sentence had let loose upon him.

So long was it since he had placed these weightier matters of diplomacy and government in other hands, that the renewed sense of responsibility and the imminent need for action seemed to be crushing in his brain. But the instinct of self-preservation, backed by the one kingly attribute left him--love of his country--strengthened him to attempt a final effort to combat the overpowering odds which he felt rather than knew to be against him.

Tossed and harried by a hundred terrifying thoughts, the self-enfeebled creature broke at length into that dreadful crying, the scanty painful tears, the aching sobs, which is the weeping of age or of an exhausted const.i.tution.

When the paroxysm was over he lay back in his bed, absolutely drained of strength and of all power to think longer. Whether he dozed or not he scarcely knew, but after an interval he seemed to awake as if from sleep with his thoughts once more under control.

Oh, that he had his Guard about him! The Guard, always reliable and full of the old grim dash and power which had been the firm foundation of the ducal throne from the beginning. Amongst their ranks was no slackening of discipline, of devotion, or of that splendid recklessness which had made them what they were--the premier Garde du Corps of Europe! In spirit he yearned once more to see their plumes and gleaming equipment come dancing down the sunny wind, and to hear the grand thunder of their charge, which but the other day he had been half-inclined to call stale and unprofitable. In this solitary hour, when the night-lamps flickered on the ma.s.sive walls and the sense of loneliness grew upon him till he sickened at the unceasing cry of the pitiless wind, he realised that the Guard was the sole bulwark now as always of Maasau. He shivered down among the soft coverings and listened apprehensively.

Unziar and Rallywood with two troopers watched in the guard-room, through which lay the only approach to his sleeping chamber. Unziar, could Unziar be trusted? He had heard something of Unziar and that handsome vixen of Selpdorf's. Then Colendorp--ah, there was no doubt there! Dark and resentful, his poverty and his pride were the bye-words of the barracks; he, whatever the temptation, would never fall from honour.

There remained Rallywood. He, too, was to be depended upon, the Duke decided quickly, though for no special reason but that he had taken some vague fancy to the Englishman's bronzed face and swinging stride. Yet Simon was powerful and unscrupulous; how could this handful of men oppose him?

He sprang up in his bed as the door opened and a man stood on the threshold.

'Sire, there is treason! Colendorp has been murdered.'

'Is it you, Unziar?' The Duke's voice came strangely from his pillows.

'Send for the whole escort of the Guard from their quarters.'

'Impossible, sire! The corridors are held by Count Sagan's men.

Mademoiselle Selpdorf has brought the news.'

'What! You told me not two hours ago she was engaged to von Elmur. She is the price of Selpdorf's treason.'

Unziar stepped nearer.

'Mademoiselle Selpdorf has already risked her life to warn us that we are in danger. I'd stake my soul she is loyal.'

'Good indeed, Anthony! I'd sooner have your honour than your soul. But go, in the name of the Virgin, and since the corridors are closed to the men of my Guard, send the girl for Major Counsellor. She can but die!'

Unziar saluted and hurried back to the ante-room where Valerie and Rallywood were waiting. In spite of his personal horror at the thought of her danger, he was well aware that only by Valerie's aid could they hope to reach Counsellor.

Valerie listened to the Duke's order, then wrapping the lace as before about her head turned to Rallywood. He accompanied her through the guard-room and some little way along the pa.s.sage. It seemed as if he could not let her go forth on this perilous enterprise.

'For G.o.d's sake, take care of yourself!' he said. 'If anything were to happen to you.'

The prolonged excitement of events, the sense of responsibility and danger, the exaltation of such a moment must have reacted on Valerie.

Whether prompted by some instinct of coquetry, or betrayed into a touch of real feeling, or perhaps moved by the knowledge that death stood close beside them both, she drew her hand from his arm and raising her face asked in her soft voice:

'Do you remember what you said to me once--on the night of the palace ball?'

He saw the deep eyes upraised to his, though their meaning in that dim place he could not be sure of, but a rush of quick memories came over him.

'Yes.'

She gave a little excited laugh.

'Then expect me!' she said. And she was gone.

When Valerie returned to Madame de Sagan half an hour later she was still white and breathless. Isolde, in a fever of impatient terror, caught her by the arm.

'Where is he? When is he coming! Valerie--'

Valerie made a supreme effort to control herself.

'He is on guard.'