Beatrice Boville and Other Stories Part 20

"That's little L'Estrange," laughed G.o.dolphin: "the beloved Bella's cousin. He's met her there every day for the last three months. I don't know how much further the affair may have gone, or if----"

"My dear Harry, your imagination is running away with you," said Falkenstein, impatiently. "I never made an appointment with her in my life; she's not the same style as Mrs. Metcalfe."

Oh the jesuitism of the most candid men on occasion! He never made an appointment with her, because it was utterly unnecessary, he knowing perfectly that he should find her feeding the ducks with Julius Adolphus any morning he chose to look for her.

"All friendship is it, then?" laughed G.o.dolphin. "Stick to it, my boy, if you can. Take care what you do, though, for to carry her off to Duke Street would give Max such a handle as he would not let go in a hurry; And to marry (though that of course, will never enter your wildest dreams) with anybody of the Cashranger's race, were it the heiress instead of the companion, would be such a come-down to the princely house, as would infallibly strike you out of Count Ferdinand's will."

Waldemar threw back his head like a thorough-bred impatient of the punishing. "The 'princely house,' as you call it, is not so extraordinarily stainless; but leave Valerie alone, she and I have nothing to do with other, and never shall have. I have enough on my hands, in all conscience, without plunging into another love affair."

"I did hear," continued G.o.dolphin, "that Forester proposed to her, but I don't suppose it's true; he'd scarcely be such a fool."

Falkenstein looked up quickly, but did not speak.

"I think it is true," said Bevan; "and, moreover, I fancy she refused him, for he used to cry her up to the skies, and now he's always snapping and sneering at her, which is beastly ungenerous, but after the manner of many fellows."

"One would think you were an old woman, Tom, believing all the tales you hear," said G.o.dolphin. "She'd better know you disclaim her, Falkenstein, that she mayn't waste her chances waiting for you."

Waldemar cast a quick, annoyed, contemptuous glance upon him. "You are wonderfully careful over her interests," he said, sharply, "but I never heard that having her on your lips, Harry, ever did a woman much good.

Pa.s.s me that whisky, Conrad, will you?"

The next morning, however, though he "disclaimed" her, Waldemar, about ten, took his stick, whistled his dog, and walked down to Kensington Gardens. Under the beeches just budding their first leaves, he saw what he expected to see--Valerie L'Estrange. She turned--even at that distance he thought he saw the _longs yeux bleus_ flash and sparkle--dropped the biscuits she was giving the ducks to the tender mercies of Julius Adolphus, and came to meet him. Spit, the little Skye he had given her, welcoming him noisily.

"Spit is as pleased to see you as I am," said Valerie, laughing. "We have both been wondering whether you would come this morning. I am so glad you have, for I have been reading your 'Pollnitz Memoirs,' and want to talk to you about them. You know I can talk to no one as I can to you."

"You do me much honor," said Falkenstein, rather formally. He was wondering in his mind whether she _had_ refused Forester or not.

"What a cold, distant speech! It is very unkind of you to answer me so.

What is the matter with you, Count Waldemar?"

She always called him by the t.i.tle he had dropped in English society; she had a fervent reverence for his historic _antecedens_; and besides, as she told him one day, "she liked to call him something no one else did."

"Matter with me? Nothing at all, I a.s.sure you," he answered, still distantly.

"You are not like yourself, at all events," persisted Valerie. "You should be kind to me. I have so few who are."

The tone touched him; he smiled, but did not speak, as he sat down by her poking up the turf with his stick.

"Count Waldemar," said Valerie, suddenly, brushing Spit's hair off his bright little eyes, "do tell me; hasn't something vexed you?"

"Nothing new," answered Falkenstein, with a short laugh. "The same entanglements and annoyances that have been netting their toils round me for many years--that is all. I am young enough, as time counts, yet I give you my word I have as little hope in my future, and I know as well what my life will be as if I were fourscore."

"Hush, don't say so," said Valerie, with a gesture of pain. "You are so worthy of happiness; your nature was made to be happy; and if you are not, fate has misused you cruelly."

"Fate? there is no such thing. I have been a fool, and my folly is now working itself out. I have made my own life, and I have n.o.body but myself to thank for it."

"I don't know that. Circ.u.mstances, temptation, education, opportunity, a.s.sociation, often take the place of the Parcae, and gild or cut the threads of our destiny."

"No. I don't accept that doctrine," said Falkenstein, always much sterner judge to himself than anybody would have been to him. "What I have done has been with my eyes open. I have known the price I should pay for my pleasures, but I never paused to count it. I never stopped for any obstacle, and for what I desired, I would, like the men in the old legends, have sold myself to the devil. Now, of course, I am hampered with ten thousand embarra.s.sments. You are young; you are a woman; you cannot understand the reckless madness which will drink the wine to-day, though one's life paid for it to-morrow. Screened from opportunity, fenced in by education, position, and society, you cannot know how impossible it is to a man, whose very energies and strength become his tempters, to put a check upon himself in the vortex of pleasure round him----"

"Yes," interrupted Valerie, "I can. Feeling for you, I can sympathise in all things with you. Had I been a man, I should have done as you have done, drunk the ambrosia without heeding its cost. Go on--I love to hear you speak of yourself; and I know your real nature, Count Waldemar, into whatever errors or hasty acts repented of in cooler moments the hot spirit of your race may have led you."

Falkenstein was pleased, despite himself, half amused, half saddened. He turned it off with a laugh. "By Heaven, I wish they had made a brewer of me--I might now be as rich and free from care as your uncle."

"You a brewer!" cried Valerie. Her father, a poor gentleman, had left her his aristocratic leanings. "What an absurd idea! All the old Falkensteins would come out of their crypts, and chanceries, and cloisters, to see the coronet surmounting the beer vats!"

He smiled at her vehemence. "The coronet! I had better have full pockets than empty t.i.tles."

"For shame!" cried Valerie. "Yes, bark at him, Spit dear; he is telling stories. You do not mean it; you know you are proud of your glorious name. Who would not rather be a Falkenstein on a hundred a year, than a Cashranger on a thousand?"

"I wouldn't," said Waldemar, wilfully. "If I had money, I could find oblivion for my past, and hope for my future. If I had money, what loads of friends would open their purses for me to borrow the money they'd know I did not need. As it is, if I except poor Tom Bevan, who's as hard up as I am, and who's a good-hearted, single-minded fellow, and likes me, I believe I haven't a friend. G.o.dolphin welcomes me as a companion, a bon vivant, a good card player; but if he heard I was in the Queen's Bench, or had shot myself, he'd say, 'Poor devil! I am not surprised,'

as he lighted his pipe and forgot me a second after. So they would all.

I don't blame them."

"But I do," cried Valerie, her cheeks burning; "they are wicked and heartless, and I hate them all. Oh! Count Waldemar, I would not do so. I would not desert you if all the world did!"

He smiled: he was accustomed to her pa.s.sionate ebullitions. "Poor child, I believe you would be truer than the rest," he muttered, half aloud, as he rose hastily and took out his watch. "I must be in Downing Street by eleven, and it only wants ten minutes. If you will walk with me to the gates, I have something to tell you about your MS."

III.

"SCARLET AND WHITE" MAKES A HIT, AND FALKENSTEIN FEELS THE WEIGHT OF THE GOLDEN FETTERS.

"Tom, will you come to the theatre with me to-night?" said Falkenstein as they lounged by the rails one afternoon in May.

"The theatre! What for? Who's that girl with a scarlet tie, on that roan there? I don't know her face. The ballet is the only thing worth stirring a step for in town. Which theatre is it?"

"I am going to see the new piece Pomps and Vanities is bringing out, and I want you as a sort of claqueur."

"Very well. I'll come," said Tom, who regarded Falkenstein, who had been his school and formfellow, still rather as a Highlandman his chief; "but, certainly, the first night of a play is the very last I should select. But if you wish it---- There's that roan coming round again!

Good action, hasn't it?"

Obedient to his chiefs orders, Bevan brushed his whiskers, settled his tie, or rather let his valet do it for him, and accompanied Waldemar to one of the crack-up theatres, where Pomps and Vanities, as the manager was irreverently styled by the habitues of his green-room, reigned in a state of scenic magnificence, very different to the days when Garrick played Macbeth in wig and gaiters.

Bevan asked no questions; he was rather a silent man, and probably knew by experience that he would most likely get no answers, unless the information was volunteered. So settling in his own mind that it was the debut of some protegee of Falkenstein's, he followed him to the door of a private box. Waldemar opened it, and entered. In it sat two women: one, a middle-aged lady-like-looking person; the other a young one, in whom, as she turned round with a radiant smile, and gave Falkenstein her hand, Bevan recognised Valerie L'Estrange. "Keep up your courage,"

whispered Waldemar, as he took the seat behind her, and leaned forward with a smile. Tom stared at them both. It was high Dutch to him; but being endowed with very little curiosity, and a lion's share of British immovability, he waited without any impatience for the elucidation of the mystery, and seeing the Count and Valerie absorbed in earnest and low-toned conversation, he first studied the house, and finding not a single decent-looking woman, he dropped his gla.s.s and studied the play-bill. The bill announced the new piece as "Scarlet and White."

"Queer t.i.tle," thought Bevan, a little consoled for his self-immolation by seeing that Rosalie Rivers, a very pretty little brunette, was to fill the soubrette role. The curtain drew up. Tom, looking at Valerie instead of the stage, fancied she looked very pale, and her eyes were fixed, not on the actors, but on Falkenstein. The first act pa.s.sed off in ominous silence. An audience is often afraid to compromise itself by applauding a new piece too quickly. Then the story began to develop itself--wit and pa.s.sion, badinage and pathos, were well intermingled. It turned on the love of a Catholic girl, a fille d'honneur to Catherine de Medicis, for a Huguenot, Vicomte de Valere, a friend of Conde and Coligny. The despairing love of the woman, the fierce struggle of her lover between his pa.s.sion and his faith, the intrigues of the court, the cruelty and weakness of Charles Neuf, were all strikingly and forcibly written. The actors, being warmly applauded as the plot thickened and the audience became interested, played with energy and spirit; and when the curtain fell the success of "Scarlet and White" was proclaimed through the house.

"Very good play--very good indeed," said Tom, approvingly. "I hope you've been pleased, Miss L'Estrange." Valerie did not hear him; she was trembling and breathless, her blue eyes almost black with excitement, while Falkenstein bent over her, his face more full of animation and pleasure than Bevan had seen it for many a day. "Well," thought Tom, "Forester _did_ say little Val was original. I should think that was a polite term for insane. I suppose Falkenstein's keeper."

At that minute the applause redoubled. Pomps and Vanities had announced "Scarlet and White" for repet.i.tion, and from the pit to the G.o.ds there was a cry for the author. Falkenstein bent his head till his lips touched her hair, and whispered a few words. She looked up in his face.

"Do you wish me?"

"Certainly."

His word was law. She rose and went to the front of the box, a burning color in her cheeks, smiles on her lips, and tears lying under her lashes.