Behind the Throne Part 31

While standing there in that painted room with the tarnished gold furniture and mosaic floor, so different from the country drawing-room at Orton, with its bright chintzes and flowers, he had briefly told her of the unexpected offer that had reached him in England, of his acceptance, and of his ultimate appointment to be one of her father's private secretaries.

"Only fancy!" she laughed. "The world is really very small, is it not?

I never thought, when we played tennis together at your uncle's tournament at Thornby, that you would be given an office in the Ministry of War. But I remember now how well you spoke Italian, and that you told me how fond you were of Italy."

"I owe all my good fortune to your father, Miss Morini. Believe me, it has lifted me out of a world of drudgery and insult--for, as I think I told you, I have been secretary to a Member of Parliament named Morgan-Mason."

"Ah! of course!" she exclaimed quickly, regarding him with a curious, fixed look. "You were secretary to Mr Morgan-Mason."

"Yes. Do you know him?"

"Not personally," she faltered, with some confusion. "I--well, I've heard of him. Some English friends of mine know him very well, and through them I have heard of the fellow's pompous egotism."

"Then you can well understand how very deeply I thank your father for his kindnesses towards me." And then he spoke of her engagement, about which everyone in Rome was at that moment talking.

He noticed her disinclination to speak of the man whom she was to marry--that man whom he knew so well.

"The count is in Paris," she answered briefly, when he inquired about him. "Have you not met him yet? I recollect when in England he was very anxious to meet you."

"No. I have not seen him to congratulate him upon his good fortune,"

replied George, with a touch of bitterness; "but no doubt he will soon return, and we shall come across each other."

"He is due back in a week in order to go to the royal reception at the Quirinale on the nineteenth," she said. "When I write to-morrow I will tell him that you are now in Rome."

"No," exclaimed Macbean quickly. "Don't tell him. I like giving old friends pleasant surprises. When he returns I will call on him unexpectedly."

His was a good excuse, and he was gratified to see that she accepted it.

It would, he knew, never do for her to write and inform her lover of his presence in Rome. If she did, he certainly would not dare to return to the Eternal City. George had resolved to conceal his presence from the Frenchman and to carefully watch his movements. Therefore he induced the Minister's daughter to make no mention of him.

He found her somewhat more wan and pale than she had been in England.

She seemed preoccupied, _distraite_, with a touch of sadness in her deep, liquid eyes that was scarcely in keeping with the pa.s.sion and ecstasy of an engagement. She was not her old self, bright, lighthearted, and careless, as she had been in those summer days in England. Something had occurred, but what it was he had no means of ascertaining.

The one thought that held him spellbound was the reflection that she was actually to marry Jules Dubard.

She was about to sacrifice herself, and yet he dare not tell her the terrible truth. He stood gazing into her great brown eyes, speechless before that calm and wondrous beauty that had for months arisen constantly before his eyes amid the whirl of London life. Yes, he loved her--he had fallen to worship at her shrine ever since those warm afternoons when they had played tennis on the level English lawns, and now this re-encounter had awakened within him all the wild pa.s.sion of his yearning heart.

During those days in Rome he had heard much of her, for she was popular everywhere, a reigning beauty in the gay, exclusive circle which surrounded the royal throne, and one of the most courted of all the unmarried girls in the capital. The season was at its height, therefore she was seen everywhere, mostly in company with Dubard. If the truth were told, however, it was much against her own inclination. She was in no mood for gaiety. All the life and gaiety had been crushed from her heart, and she only attended the various functions because it was her duty towards her father to do so. Many a sleepless night she spent in prayer and in tears.

Long ago she had become nauseated by all the glare and glitter, the chatter and music of those gilded salons where smart Rome amused themselves each evening. Whenever she could, she made excuses to stay at home in the quiet and silence of her own room; but as it was part of her father's statecraft that she should be seen and congratulated, she was compelled very often to put on her magnificent gowns with a sigh, dance when her heart was leaden, and smile even though she was bursting with grief.

Yet she rigorously kept the secret of her self-sacrifice, and none suspected that the young French _elegant_ had compelled her to accept him as husband. Indeed, Dubard was already very popular in Rome. He was possessed of means, belonged to the most exclusive Italian club, and drove a smart phaeton and pair each afternoon, frequently with Mary at his side.

The men and women who were Dubard's friends were among the highest in society, yet none knew the truth save Borselli and George Macbean, neither of whom dare, for their own sakes, utter one single word in denunciation.

"You told me at Orton that the count was an old friend, Mr Macbean,"

exclaimed Mary, after a brief pause. She had met his gaze unflinchingly, and then lowered her eyes to the ground. She looked fresh and neat in her plain black tailor-made gown, for she was dressed ready to go out for her morning walk in the Corso.

"Yes. We met several years ago," was Macbean's reply.

"Where?"

"In London."

"You must have been close friends," she remarked, "for he has on several occasions asked whether I had heard of you."

George smiled, for his reflections were bitter ones. "Yes," he said, "I knew him quite well; but we drifted apart, as friends so often do."

"Then you will, of course, be glad to meet him again."

"For one reason, very glad. Because I want to inquire of him what has become of one who was our mutual friend, and who mysteriously disappeared--a very curious affair."

"Was it a man?" asked Mary, suddenly interested.

"Yes--a French army officer--a General Felix Sazarac."

"Sazarac!" she gasped, with open mouth and cheeks suddenly blanched as the name recalled to her the strange conversation between Borselli and her father. "Was Sazarac your friend?"

CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.

AROUND THE THRONE.

Mary, accompanied by the faithful Teresa, a stout, middle-aged woman in black, who had seen fifteen years of service in the family, went out along the Corso, at that hour crowded by the Roman idlers and foreign visitors.

The bright air of the spring morning was refreshing after the dull gloom of the great old Antinori palace, and all Rome was full of life, movement, and gaiety. Carnival had pa.s.sed, and the Pasqua was fast approaching, that time when the Roman season is its gayest and when the hotels are full of wealthy foreigners from the north.

The court receptions and b.a.l.l.s had brought the Italian aristocracy from the various cities, and the amba.s.sadors were mostly at their posts because of the weekly diplomatic receptions.

As Mary went along the Corso to an artists' colour shop, in order to purchase some tubes for the painting which occupied her spare time, she was saluted on every hand, for she was well-known and popular everywhere. Her beauty was remarked wherever she went.

She bowed and smiled her acknowledgments, but, alas! only mechanically.

She really did not recognise any of those men who raised their hats, the smart officers who drew their heels together and saluted, or the well-dressed women who nodded to her. Truth to tell, she was thinking of the man with whom she had so suddenly come face to face, the straight, athletic man who had spoken so openly and so frankly about himself when they had stood upon that green, level tennis-lawn at Orton.

The recollection of him had almost faded from her memory until only half an hour ago, and now she found herself reflecting deeply, wondering whether he had really schemed to enter her father's service, and, if so, with what motive.

He had acknowledged himself to be a friend of Dubard, the man she held in such suspicion and distrust, and yet there was something so frank and honest in his manner that it held her mystified. As she walked along that narrow, crowded thoroughfare in the heart of Rome, memories of those idle summer days in England arose vividly before her, of the rural tennis tournament at Thornby, of the village flower-show held in the old-world rectory garden, and of George Macbean's visit to Orton.

Teresa spoke to her, but she heeded not. Her mind was filled with thoughts of the pleasant past when her life was free and she was unfettered. Now, however, that compact she had made to secure her father's freedom had crushed all light and hope from her young heart, so that day by day, as her marriage approached, she became more inert and melancholy.

Her delicacy, grace, and simplicity were astonishing when one viewed that irresponsible and artificial world of modern _chic_ in which she lived. Her character, indeed, resolved itself into the very elements of womanhood. She was beautiful, modest, and tender, so perfectly unsophisticated, so delicately refined that she was peerless among all others in that vain, silly, out-dressing set, where religion was only the cant of the popular confessor and the scandal of a promenade through Saint Peter's or San Giovanni, the brilliant glittering crowd who formed the court circle of modern Italy around King Umberto's throne.

She had sprung up into beauty in that far-off modest school that faced the grey English Channel at Broadstairs, and on making her bow before her sovereign she had instantly created a sensation and a vogue for herself that still continued, one which, was fostered by the Minister and his wife, although at heart she hated all the hollow shams and scandalous gossip. True, she had had her little flirtations the same as other girls, yet she had never caught from society one imitated or artificial grace. She preferred the society of her father or her mother to that of girl friends; for most of the latter of her own world she found giddy and empty-headed, generally boasting of conquests they had made among men, and ridiculing them as fools.

She tolerated society only under sheer compulsion. Through these three wild years of whirling excitement she had fortunately retained her woman's heart, for it was unalterable and inalienable, as part of her being. And it was because of that she had now sacrificed herself to become the wife of Jules Dubard.

Oh, the tragedy of it all! No single person was there in whom to confide, or of whom to seek advice. The bitter truth was forced upon her more and more each day. The compact with the man whose artificiality and mannerisms she held in such abhorrence she was bound to keep, for did she not hold her beloved father's future in her hands?

Of a sudden, when she was half-way up the Corso towards the Porta del Popolo, she heard the musical sounds of harness bells as a fine landau and pair swept up behind her.

Every man's head was uncovered and every woman bowed, for there flashed by Umberto the Good and his Queen Margherita, both worshipped by the people, and on every hand there rose the cry, "Viva il Re! Viva la Regina!"

Mary bowed with the rest, and Her Majesty, quick to notice her, gave her a nod of recognition and gracious smile; for, as the world of Rome knew quite well, she was one of those behind the throne, a personal friend of the queen, who was never tired of admiring the wondrous beauty of the Minister's daughter.