The Bronze Eagle Part 49

"And is it because of it that your love for me has gone?"

He had not meant to put his horrible suspicions into words. The very fact--now that he had spoken--appeared more tangible, even irremediable.

She did not reply to his taunt, and he came a little closer to her and took her hand, and when she tried to withdraw it from his grasp he held it tightly and bent down his head so that in the gathering gloom he could read every line of her face.

"Because of what I told you in my letter you despised me, did you not?"

he asked.

Again she made no reply. What could she say that would not hurt him far more than did her silence? The next moment he had drawn her back right into the shadow of the cathedral walls, into a dark angle, where no one could see either her or him. He placed his hands upon her shoulders and compelled her to look him straight in the face.

"Listen, Crystal," he said slowly and with desperate earnestness. "Once, long ago, I gave you up to de Marmont, to affluence and to considerations of your name and of our caste. It all but broke my heart, but I did it because your father demanded that sacrifice from you and from me. I was ready then to stand aside and to give up all the dreams of my youth. . . . But now everything is different. For one thing, the events of the past hundred days have made every man many years older: the h.e.l.l I went through to-day has helped to make a more sober, more determined man of me. Now I will not give you up. I will not. My way is clear: I can win you with your father's consent and give him and you all that de Marmont had promised. The King trusts me and will give me what I ask. I am no longer a wastrel, no longer poor and obscure. And I will not give you up--I swear it by all that I have gone through to-day. I will not! if I have to kill with my own hand every one who stands in my way."

And Crystal, smiling, quite kindly and a little abstractedly at his impulsive earnestness, gently removed his hands from her shoulders and said calmly:

"You are tired, Maurice, and overwrought. Shall we go in and wait for father? He will be getting anxious about me." And without waiting to see if he followed her, she turned to walk toward the steps.

St. Genis smothered a violent oath, but he said nothing more. He was satisfied with what he had done. He knew that women liked a masterful man and he meant every word which he said. He would not give her up . . . not now . . . and not to . . . Ye G.o.ds! he would not think of that;--he would not think of the lonely roadside nor of the wounded man who had robbed him of Crystal's love. He had done his duty by Clyffurde--what more could he have done at this hour?--and he meant to do far more than that--he meant to go back to the English hospital as soon as possible, to see that Clyffurde had every attention, every care, every comfort that human sympathy can bestow. What more could he do? He would have done no good by going out with the ambulance himself--surely not--he would have missed seeing Crystal--and she would have fretted and been still more anxious . . . his first duty was to Crystal . . . and . . . and . . . St. Genis only thought of Crystal and of himself and the voice of Conscience was compulsorily stilled.

III

Having lulled his conscience to sleep and satisfied his self-love by a pa.s.sionate tirade, Maurice followed Crystal down the steps at the west front of Ste. Gudule.

Immediately opposite them at the corner of the narrow rue de Ligne was the old Auberge des Trois Rois, from whence the diligence started twice a day in time to catch the tide and the English packet at Ostend.

Maurice and Crystal stood for a moment together on the steps watching the bustle and excitement, the comings and goings of the crowd, which always attend such departures. All day there had been a steady stream of fugitives out of the town, taking their belongings with them: the diligence was for the well-to-do and the indifferent who hurried away to England to await the advent of more settled times.

Victor de Marmont had secured his place inside the coach. He had exchanged his borrowed uniform for civilian clothes, he had bestowed his belongings in the vehicle and he was standing about desultorily waiting for the hour of departure. The diligence would not arrive at Ostend till five o'clock in the morning: then with the tide the packet would go out, getting into London well after midday. Chance, as represented by the tide, had seriously handicapped de Marmont's plans. But enthusiasm and doggedness of purpose whispered to him that he still held the winning card. The English packet was timed to arrive in London by two o'clock in the afternoon, he would still have two hours to his credit before closing time on 'Change and another hour in the street. Time to find his broker and half an hour to spare: that would still leave him an hour wherein to make a fortune for his Emperor.

At one time he was afraid that he would not be able to secure a seat in the diligence, so numerous were the travellers who wished to leave Brussels behind them. But in this, Chance and the length of his purse favoured him: he bought his seat for an exorbitant price, but he bought it; and at nine o'clock the diligence was timed to start.

It was now half-past eight. And just then de Marmont caught sight of Crystal and St. Genis coming down the cathedral steps.

He had half an hour to spare and he followed them. He wanted to speak to Crystal--he had wanted it all day--but the difficulty of getting what clothes he required and the trouble and time spent in bargaining for a seat in the diligence had stood in his way. M. le Comte de Cambray would never, of course, admit him inside his doors, and it would have meant hanging about in the rue du Marais and trusting to a chance meeting with Crystal when she went out, and for this he had not the time.

And the chance meeting had come about in spite of all adverse circ.u.mstances: and de Marmont followed Crystal through the crowded streets, hoping that St. Genis would take leave of her before she went indoors. But even if he did not, de Marmont meant to have a few words with Crystal. He was going to win a gigantic fortune for the Emperor--one wherewith that greatest of all adventurers could once again recreate the Empire of France: he himself--rich already--would become richer still and also--if his coup succeeded--one of the most trusted, most influential men in the recreated Empire. He felt that with the offer of his name he could pour out a veritable cornucopia of abundant glory, honours, wealth at a woman's feet. And his ambition had always been bound up in a great measure with Crystal de Cambray. He certainly loved her in his way, for her beauty and her charm; but, above all, he looked on her as the very personification of the old and proud regime which had thought fit to scorn the parvenu n.o.blesse of the Empire, and for a powerful adherent of Napoleon to be possessed of a wife out of that exclusive milieu was like a fresh and glorious trophy of war on a conqueror's chariot-wheel.

De Marmont had the supreme faith of an ambitious man in the power of wealth and of court favour. He knew that Napoleon was not a man who ever forgot a service efficiently rendered, and would repay this one--rendered at the supreme hour of disaster--with a surfeit of grat.i.tude and of gifts which must perforce dazzle any woman's eyes and conquer her imagination.

Besides his schemes, his ambitions, the future which awaited him, what had an impecunious wastrel like St. Genis to offer to a woman like Crystal de Cambray?

Outside the house in the rue du Marais where the Comte de Cambray lodged, St. Genis and Crystal paused, and de Marmont, who still kept within the shadows, waited for a favourable opportunity to make his presence known.

"I'll find M. le Comte and bring him back with me," he heard St. Genis saying. "You are sure I shall find him at the Legitimiste?"

"Quite sure," Crystal replied. "He did not mean to leave the Cercle till about nine. He is sure to wait for every bit of news that comes in."

"It will be a great moment for me, if I am the first to bring in authentic good news."

"You will be quite the first, I should say," she a.s.sented, "but don't let father stay too long talking. Bring him back quickly. Remember I haven't heard all the news yet myself."

St. Genis went up to the front door and rang the bell, then he took leave of Crystal. De Marmont waited his opportunity. Anon, Jeanne opened the door, and St. Genis walked quickly back down the street.

Crystal paused a moment by the open door in order to talk to Jeanne, and while she did so de Marmont slipped quickly past her into the house and was some way down the corridor before the two women had recovered from their surprise. Jeanne, as was her wont, was ready to scream, but despite the fast gathering gloom Crystal had at once recognised de Marmont. She turned a cold look upon him.

"An intrusion, Monsieur?" she asked quietly.

"We'll call it that, Mademoiselle, an you will," he replied imperturbably, "and if you will kindly order your servant to go, it shall be a very brief one."

"My father is from home," she said.

De Marmont smiled and shrugged his shoulders.

"I know that," he said, "or I would not be here."

"Then your intrusion is that of a coward, if you knew that I was unprotected."

"Are you afraid of me, Crystal?" he asked with a sneer.

"I am afraid of no one," she replied. "But since you and I have nothing to say to one another, I beg that you will no longer force your company upon me."

"Your pardon, but there is something very important which I must say to you. I have news of to-day's doings out there at Waterloo, which bear upon the whole of your future and upon your happiness. I myself leave for England in less than half an hour. I was taking my place in the diligence outside the Trois Rois when I saw you coming down the cathedral steps. Fate has given me an opportunity for which I sought vainly all day. You will never regret it, Crystal, if you listen to me now."

"I listen," she broke in coolly. "I pray you be as brief as you can."

"Will you order the servant to go?"

For a moment longer she hesitated. Commonsense told her that it was neither prudent nor expedient to hold converse with this man, who was an avowed and bitter enemy of her cause. But he had spoken of the doings at Waterloo and spoken of them in connection with her own future and her happiness, and--prudent or not--she wanted to hear what he had to say, in the vague hope that from a chance word carelessly dropped by Victor de Marmont she would glean, if only a sc.r.a.p, some news of that on which St. Genis would not dwell but on which hung her heart and her very life--the fate of the British troops.

After all he might know something, he might say something which would help her to bear this intolerable misery of uncertainty: and on the merest chance of that she threw prudence to the winds.

"You may go, Jeanne," she said. "But remain within call. Leave the front door open," she added. "M. le Comte and M. le Marquis will be here directly."

"Oh! you are well protected," said Victor de Marmont with a careless shrug of the shoulders, as Jeanne's heavy, shuffling footsteps died away down the corridor.

"Now, M. de Marmont," said Crystal coolly. "I listen."

She was leaning back against the wall--her hands behind her, her pale face and large blue eyes with their black dilated pupils turned questioningly upon him. The walls of the corridor were painted white, after the manner of Flemish houses, the tiled floor was white too, and Crystal herself was dressed all in white, so that the whole scene made up of pale, soft tints looked weird and ghostly in the twilight and Crystal like an ethereal creature come down from the land of nymphs and of elves.

And de Marmont, too--like St. Genis a while ago--felt that never had this beautiful woman--she was no longer a girl now--looked more exquisite and more desirable, and he--conscious of the power which fortune and success can give, thought that he could woo and win her once again in spite of caste-prejudice and of political hatred. St. Genis had felt his position una.s.sailable by virtue of old a.s.sociations, common sympathies and youthful vows: de Marmont relied on feminine ambition, love of power, of wealth and of station, and at this moment in Crystal's shining eyes he only read excitement and the unspoken desire for all that he was prepared to offer.

"I have only a few moments to spare, Crystal," he said slowly, and with earnest emphasis, "so I will be very brief. For the moment the Emperor has suffered a defeat--as he did at Eylau or at Leipzic--his defeats are always momentary, his victories alone are decisive and abiding. The whole world knows that. It needs no proclaiming from me. But in order to retrieve that momentary defeat of to-day he has deigned to ask my help.

The G.o.ds are good to me! they have put it within my power to help my Emperor in his need. I am going to England to-night in order to carry out his instructions. By to-morrow afternoon I shall have finished my work. The Empire of France will once more rise triumphant and glorious out of the ashes of a brief defeat; the Emperor once more, Phbus-like, will drive the chariot of the Sun, Lord and Master of Europe, greater since his downfall, more powerful, more majestic than ever before. And I, who will have been the humble instrument of his reconquered glory, will deserve to the full his bounty and his grat.i.tude."

He paused for lack of breath, for indeed he had talked fast and volubly: Crystal's voice, cold and measured, broke in on the silence that ensued.

"And in what way does all this concern me, M. de Marmont?" she asked.

"It concerns your whole future, Crystal," he replied with ever-growing solemnity and conviction. "You must have known all along that I have never ceased to love you: you have always been the only possible woman for me--my ideal, in fact. Your father's injustice I am willing to forget. Your troth was plighted to me and I have done nothing to deserve all the insults which he thought fit to heap upon me. I wanted you to know, Crystal, that my love is still yours, and that the fortune and glory which I now go forth to win I will place with inexpressible joy at your feet."