Sophy of Kravonia Part 38

The streets were quiet; soldiers occupied the corners of the ways; they looked curiously at Markart's pale face and disordered uniform. A dull roar came from the direction of St. Michael's Square, and thither Markart aimed his course. He found all one side of the Square full of a dense crowd, swaying, jostling, talking. On the other side troops were ma.s.sed; in an open s.p.a.ce in front of the troops, facing the crowd, was Colonel Stafnitz, and by his side a little boy on a white pony.

Markart was too far off to hear what Stafnitz said when he began to speak--nay, the cheers of the troops behind the Colonel came so sharp on his words as almost to drown them; and after a moment's hesitation (as it seemed to Markart), the crowd of people on the other side of the Square echoed back the acclamations of the soldiers.

All Countess Ellenburg's ambitions were at stake; for Stenovics and Stafnitz it was a matter of life itself now, so daringly had they raised their hands against King Sergius. Countess Ellenburg had indeed prayed--and now prayed all alone in a deserted Palace--but not one of the three had hesitated. At the head of a united army, in the name of a united people, Stafnitz had demanded the proclamation of young Alexis as King. For an hour Stenovics had made a show of demurring; then he bowed to the national will. That night young Alexis enjoyed more honor than he had asked of Lepage the valet--he was called not Prince, but Majesty. He was King in Slavna, and the first work to which they set his childish hand was the proclamation of a state of siege.

Slavna chose him willingly--or because it must at the bidding of the soldiers. But Volseni was of another mind. They would not have the German woman's son to reign over them. Into that faithful city the wounded King threw himself with all his friends.

The body of Mist.i.tch lay all day and all night by the wayside. Next morning at dawn the King's grooms came back from Volseni and buried it under a clump of trees by the side of the lane running down to Lake Talti. Their curses were the only words spoken over the grave; and they flattened the earth level with the ground again, that none might know where the man rested who had lifted his hand against their master.

The King was carried to Volseni sore stricken; they did not know whether he would live or die. He had a dangerous wound in the lungs, and, to make matters worse, the surgical skill available in Volseni was very primitive.

But in that regard fortune brought aid, and brought also to Sophy a strange conjuncture of the new life with the old. The landlord of the inn sent word to Lukovitch that two foreign gentlemen had arrived at his house that afternoon, and that the pa.s.sport of one of them described him as a surgeon; the landlord had told him how things stood, and he was anxious to render help.

It was Basil Williamson. Dunstanbury and he, accompanied by Henry Brown, Dunstanbury's servant, had reached Volseni that day on their return from a tour in the Crimea and round the sh.o.r.es of the Sea of Azof.

XIX

THE SILVER RING

It was late at night, and quiet reigned in Volseni--the quiet not of security, but of ordered vigilance. A light burned in every house; men lined the time-worn walls and camped in the market-place; there were scouts out on the road as far as Praslok. No news came from outside, and no news yet from the room in the guard-house where the wounded King lay.

The street on which the room looked was empty, save for one man, who walked patiently up and down, smoking a cigar. Dunstanbury waited for Basil Williamson, who was in attendance on the King and was to p.r.o.nounce to Volseni whether he could live or must die.

Dunstanbury had been glad that Basil could be of use, but for the rest he had listened to the story which Zerkovitch told him with an amused, rather contemptuous indifference--with an Englishman's wonder why other countries cannot manage their affairs better, and something of a traveller's pleasure at coming in for a bit of such vivid, almost blazing "local color" in the course of his journey. But whether Alexis reigned, or Sergius, mattered nothing to him, and, in his opinion, very little to anybody else.

Nor had he given much thought to the lady whose name figured so prominently in Zerkovitch's narrative, the Baroness Dobrava. Such a personage seemed no less appropriate to the surroundings than the rest of the story--no less appropriate and certainly not a whit more important. Of course he hoped Basil would make a good report, but his mind was not disturbed; his chief hope was that the claims of humanity would not prolong his stay in Volseni beyond a few days. It was a picturesque little place, but not one for a long visit; and in any case he was homeward bound now, rather eager for the pleasures of the London season after his winter journey--the third he had made in the interests of a book on Russia which he had in contemplation, a book designed to recommend him as an expert student of foreign affairs. He could hardly consider that these goings-on in Kravonia came within the purview of a serious study of his subject. But it was a pleasant, moonlit night, the old street was very quaint, the crisis he had happened on bizarre and amusing. He smoked his cigar and waited for Basil without impatience.

He had strolled a hundred yards away and just turned to loiter back, when he saw a figure come out of the guard-house, pause for a moment, and then advance slowly towards him. The sheepskin cap and tunic made him think at first that the stranger was one of the Volsenian levy; the next moment he saw the skirt. At once he guessed that he was in the presence of Baroness Dobrava, the heroine of the piece, as he had called her in his own mind and with a smile.

Evidently she meant to speak to him; he threw away his cigar and walked to meet her. As they drew near to each other he raised his hat. Sophy bowed gravely. Thus they met for the first time since Sophy washed her lettuces in the scullery at Morpingham, and, at the young lord's bidding, fetched Lorenzo the Magnificent a bone. This meeting was, however remotely, the result of that. Dunstanbury had started her career on the road which had led her to where she was.

"I've seen Mr. Williamson," she said, "and he knows me now. But you don't yet, do you, Lord Dunstanbury? And anyhow, perhaps, you wouldn't remember."

She had been a slip of a girl when he saw her last, in a print frock, washing lettuces. With a smile and a deprecatory gesture he confessed his ignorance and his surprise. "Really, I'm afraid I--I don't. I've been such a traveller, and meet so many--" An acquaintance with Baroness Dobrava was among the last with which he would have credited himself--or perhaps (to speak his true thoughts), charged his reputation.

"Mr. Williamson knew me almost directly--the moment I reminded him of my mark." She touched her cheek. Dunstanbury looked more closely at her, a vague recollection stirring in him. Sophy's face was very sad, yet she smiled just a little as she added: "I remember you so well--and your dog Lorenzo. I'm Sophy Grouch of Morpingham, and I became Lady Meg's companion. Now do you remember?"

He stepped quickly up to her, peered into her eyes, and saw the Red Star.

"Good Heavens!" he said, smiling at her in an almost helpless way.

"Well, that is curious!" he added. "Sophy Grouch! And you are--Baroness Dobrava?"

"There's nothing much in that," said Sophy. "I'll tell you all about that soon, if we have time. To-night I can think of nothing but Monseigneur. Mr. Williamson has extracted the bullet, but I'm afraid he's very bad. You won't take Mr. Williamson away until--until it's settled--one way or the other, will you?"

"Neither Basil nor I will leave so long as we can be of the least service to you," he told her.

With a sudden impulse she put her hands in his. "It's strangely good to find you here to-night--so strange and so good! It gives me strength, and I want strength. Oh, my friends are brave men, but you--well, there's something in home and the same blood, I suppose."

Dunstanbury thought that there was certainly something in having two Englishmen about, instead of Kravonians only, but such a blunt sentiment might not be acceptable. He pressed her hands as he released them.

"I rejoice at the chance that brings us here. You can have every confidence in Basil. He's a first-rate man. But tell me about yourself.

We have time now, haven't we?"

"Really, I suppose we have! Monseigneur has been put to sleep. But I couldn't sleep. Come, we'll go up on the wall."

They mounted on to the city wall, just by the gate, and leaned against the mouldering parapets. Below lay Lake Talti in the moonlight, and beyond it the ma.s.ses of the mountains. Yet while Sophy talked, Dunstanbury's eyes seldom left her face; nay, once or twice he caught himself not listening, but only looking, tracing how she had grown from Sophy Grouch in her scullery to this. He had never forgotten the strange girl: once or twice he and Basil had talked of her; he had resented Lady Meg's brusque and unceremonious dismissal of her protegee; in his memory, half-overgrown, had lain the mark on Sophy's cheek. Now here she was, in Kravonia, of all places--Baroness Dobrava, of all people! And what else, who knew? The train of events which had brought this about was strange; yet his greater wonder was for the woman herself.

"And here we are!" she ended with a woful smile. "If Monseigneur lives, I think we shall win. For the moment we can do no more than hold Volseni; I think we can do that. But presently, when he's better and can lead us, we shall attack. Down in Slavna they won't like being ruled by the Countess and Stenovics as much as they expect. Little by little we shall grow stronger." Her voice rose a little. "At last Monseigneur will sit firm on his throne," she said. "Then we'll see what we can do for Kravonia. It's a fine country, and rich, Lord Dunstanbury, and outside Slavna the people are good material. We shall be able to make it very different--if Monseigneur lives."

"And if not?" he asked, in a low voice.

"What is it to me except for Monseigneur? If he dies--!" Her hands thrown wide in a gesture of despair ended her sentence.

If she lived and worked for Kravonia, it was for Monseigneur's sake.

Without him, what was Kravonia to her? Such was her mood; plainly she took no pains to conceal it from Dunstanbury. The next moment she turned to him with a smile. "You think I talk strangely, saying: 'We'll do this and that'? Yes, you must, and it's suddenly become strange to me to say it--to say it to you, because you've brought back the old things to my mind, and all this is so out of keeping with the old things--with Sophy Grouch, and Julia Robins, and Morpingham! But until you came it didn't seem strange. Everything that has happened since I came to this country seemed to lead up to it--to bring it about naturally and irresistibly. I forgot till just now how funny it must sound to you--and how--how bad, I suppose. Well, you must accustom yourself to Kravonia. It's not Ess.e.x, you know."

"If the King lives?" he asked.

"I shall be with Monseigneur if he lives," she answered.

Yes, it was very strange; yet already, even now--when he had known her again for half an hour, had seen her and talked to her--gradually and insidiously it began to seem less strange, less fantastic, more natural.

Dunstanbury had to give himself a mental shake to get back to Ess.e.x and to Sophy Grouch. Volseni set old and gray amid the hills, the King whose breath struggled with his blood for life, the beautiful woman who would be with the King if and so long as he lived--these were the present realities he saw in vivid immediate vision; they made the shadows of the past seem not indeed dim--they kept all their distinctness of outline in memory--but in their turn fantastic, and in no relation to the actual.

Was that the air of Kravonia working on him? Or was it a woman's voice, the pallid pride of a woman's face?

"In Slavna they call me a witch," she said, "and tell terrible tales about this little mark--my Red Star. But here in Volseni they like me--yes, and I can win over Slavna, too, if I get the opportunity. No, I sha'n't be a weakness to Monseigneur if he lives."

"You'll be--?"

"His wife?" she interrupted. "Yes." She smiled again--nay, almost laughed. "That seems worst of all--worse than anything else?"

Dunstanbury allowed himself to smile too. "Well, yes, of course that's true," he said. "Out of Kravonia, anyhow. What's true in Kravonia I really don't know yet."

"I suppose it's true in Kravonia too. But what I tell you is Monseigneur's will about me."

He looked hard at her. "You love him?" he asked.

"As my life, and more," said Sophy, simply.

At last Dunstanbury ceased to look at her; he laid his elbows on the battlements and stood there, his eyes roaming over the lake in the valley to the mountains beyond. Sophy left his side, and began to walk slowly up and down the rugged, uneven, overgrown surface of the walls.

The moon was sinking in the sky; there would be three or four dark hours before the dawn. A man galloped up to the gate and gave a countersign in return to a challenge; the heavy gates rolled open; he rode in; another rode out and cantered off along the road towards Praslok. There was watch and ward--Volseni was not to be caught napping as Praslok had been. Whether the King lived or died, his Volsenians were on guard.

Dunstanbury turned his back on the hills and came up to Sophy.

"We Ess.e.x folk ought to stand by one another," he said. "It's the merest chance that has brought me here, but I'm glad of the chance now. And it's beginning to feel not the least strange. So long as you've need of help, count me among your soldiers."