The Lord of the Sea Part 39

But to consent was one thing: the _how_ another: the mere suspicion of the willingness of Kaiser or Tsar shook their thrones. Whereupon Russia said to Hogarth: "Recently dispossessed, they cling dyingly now to their lands, so I will _buy_ the land from them, and _you_ will lend me the money"; to which Hogarth virtually replied: "It is too childish to talk of buying part of a heavenly body from a Russian: have you no sense of humour? You may give the Russian 'n.o.bles' some money, if that pleases you: but without my help. If His Majesty the Tsar is more afraid of them than of me, my only way will be to prove myself more truly terrible than they".

But high words hurl down no hundred-headed hydra: in France--fast, faster--with dizzy vertigo--millions were forming themselves into secret societies, while in England was One only--but stronger than the many of France.

By the date of Rebekah's pilgrimage Hogarth had so far failed and yielded, as almost to decide that from the _Boodah_ nothing could be done, unless he went to the extent of ruining and starving. The other alternative was the fixing upon one nation, becoming its recognized ruler, and there furnishing an example both of _modus operandi_, and of a subsequent state of happiness, which others could not long refrain from imitating.

But this modification was still in the air; and, meanwhile, he listened, weighed, revolved: using men, impressing, convincing, extracting for his use the wisdom of their experience, estimating the exact pressure of the Time, the _timbre_ of its roar.

So on the morning after Rebekah's arrival his Gold Stick became his rack from the moment of the bow from the throne till noon: name after name--cordons, orders, gold-lace, sashes, stars, tiaras; till enter the four Jewesses, the bank-manager, the rabbi, Hogarth's pallor showing up his three moles and nose-freckles, adding a glare to his eyes, he suffering from the runaway drumming of his heart.

The ladies stoop through curtseys; the men do reverence; Hogarth bows.

There like a Begum of Bhopal stood Rebekah, floridly reflected in the gla.s.sy floor, sallow under the eyes, smiling at him, he at her; and very quickly now, she once in his sight, he recovered comparative calm, and the strength of his heart.

"Your first visit to the _Boodah_, I think?"--looking at her.

"Yes, my Lord King"--curtseying.

"Do you like her?"

"Why, yes: she is solid, and mighty, and rich. In my own, and the name of my friends, I beg to thank your Lordship's Majesty for your Lordship's Majesty's kind and good hospitality to us".

"Humbugging little beggar", thought Hogarth, his mind slowly gathering tone, but rushing meanwhile into a species of frivolous a.s.surance after those agitations, his hands still cold.

"Well", he said, "but you have not seen her! I think I know her fairly well, and I propose to be myself your guide, if that will interest you--"

The Rabbi spoke with trembling voice: "It is gracious, my Lord King.

We are here, however, humbly to present an urgent pet.i.tion to your Lordship's Majesty. Baruch Frankl, at present a prisoner in the _Boodah_, a man no longer young, and habituated to comfort--"

"Stay", interrupted Hogarth: "if you have a pet.i.tion the day and hour must be arranged by negotiation between yourself and my Chamberlain. But surely, meantime, I may consider you my guest? Miss Frankl and I--have met--in the world. Come, ladies--come, sirs--say yes!"

Rebekah, standing averted, flashed a look at him, reading his heart, and Jews and Jewesses laid heads together, whispering a little, until the Rabbi said, bowing: "We bend to your Lordship's Majesty's most gracious will".

"Agreed, then, sir. We might now see the _Boodah_, and if you will luncheon with me--Mr. Chamberlain! direct Admiral Quilter-Beckett to meet me at once in the north corridor".

He rose, master of his limbs now, descended, unrobed in an alcove, and in a corridor above the circular stair came upon Quilter-Beckett, who, acting as guide, Rebekah's hand now resting on Hogarth's arm, led them about the _Boodah_, now walking, now slipping in little trains over eighty-foot rails, rolled in one heat, laid down the vanishing length of dim-lit corridors floored with white tiles, their frieze of majolica, with rows of ceramics; and they saw the armouries, piles of rifles, cutla.s.ses, pistols; ferneries grown by electric light; great cold-storage rooms that struck a chill, for preserving meats, b.u.t.ter, fruit; the doctors' _environ_, the dispensary, and roomy hospital; watched from a railing the working engines that fixed the _Boodah's_ position, Hogarth here saying: "There you have a menagerie of gnome-land: observe those two black beetles, sedately nodding; and there is daddy-longlegs, working his legs gymnastically; and the three pairs of gallant grey stallions, galloping grandly neck to neck; and those two ridiculous beings, rubbing their palms together, round and round: each preoccupied, comically solemn, busied about its own quaint affairs--like a varied gnomeland".

And Rebekah said in a meek tone, like the hen submitting: "Yes, I see now you say it, my Lord King".

Up stairs and down, round semicircles, up lifts, through nooks, corridors: saw the guns, and how by hydraulics everything was done--the hoisting of ammunition, loading, training: guns intact, guns wrecked by the Dreadnoughts; and shimmering kitchens, which reeked a smell of heat, and the dairy-maids, and the line of kine, and the row of prison-doors, and the mechanism of ventilation, fans and blowers, the drainage-system, and the dynamos for lighting, for supplying power to motors, for heating, and for shimmering forth rich in the search-lights; and the central ballroom, the clothes store, the original one-ninety-sixth model, the Amba.s.sador-region, the steaming laundry, and the roof, where Rebekah saw her initials on the breeze, and the vertical pop-guns under shields for dealing with aeroplane attack, and the cream theatre, and the paymaster's suite, and the bunkers, the Government-offices, and the tax-receiving rooms, the telephone system, and the lady-telegraphists--till all were tired, though half had not been seen. They luncheoned together; in the early afternoon there was an Invest.i.ture, and she was there; for "five-o'clock" there was a Gounod concert in the theatre, and she sat in his box; at night the Bulgarian Amba.s.sador gave a ball, and she danced a gavotte with him.

When they parted a dying wind sighed his name: "_Hogarth_..."; and when Loveday before sleeping happened to ask: "When do we set out for London, Richard?" Hogarth with a laugh turned upon him, replying: "When do we set out for Arcturus and the Pleiades? Do give one time to look round him!"

The next morning Rebekah, led forward from a semicircle of courtiers by a backing Silver Stick, approached within four feet of the Throne, and after the protracted humiliation of her curtsey, said ruefully: "Our party have failed, my Lord King, to obtain audience for our humble pet.i.tion till after four days".

"Is that too long?"

"We could not wait beyond to-night. Our good Rabbi, and my father's Manager--both must hurry back, and we others with them. This being so, _I_ appeal to Your Lordship's Majesty ".

"A _personal_ appeal?"

"Yes"--poutingly.

"Then, I grant an audience".

"Where?"

"Here".

"Who will be here?"

"Why--you and I."

"_No_"--very low, with pressed lips.

"I am so sorry", says he: "it is the only chance I shall have; not for long--a few minutes--I am so busy. Otherwise, you will have to stay four days--and your poor father suffering--"

She seemed unsure now, and his hands in the uncertainty of that moment were moist like melting ice.

"So, then, you accept", said he: "a little audience--you grant me? Or rather, I grant you".

"When, my Lord King?"

"At three--No, what folly! At four. Will you? At four? And here? Say at four".

He spoke leaning keenly forward; and she, with a curtsey of acquiescence, retired.

They were near again, and yet far, in the _salle a manger_ at luncheon, a function of a hundred guests at small tables, with more of orchestra than of talk; and even as Hogarth and his train entered, and the crowd rose, she saw his eyes, by some power, prowl and find her.

Afterwards there were two hours to wait.

Such a heat of haste now possessed them both! Hogarth locked himself from his attendants into his bed-chamber, and, tumbling a chaos of clothes and uniforms upon the carpet, stumbled bitterly among them, hunting for a cravat whose effect he remembered; wished at the mirror that he had no moles and nose-freckles, or that his father had turned him out rather less black; and anon a delicious chill pang of mingled sugar and peppermint would gash his heart at the thought: "_she consented!_" He broke gla.s.s, dropped his watch to fragments, hissing "d.a.m.n the thing!"; and about half-past three the hands of Rebekah, too, in _her_ locked closet, were like the scattering sirocco among powder-boxes brushes, jewel-cases, and toilet-toys. What a hot haste was here! She too much blued her eyes, and bruised the skin in wiping, intense the contest between poudre blanche and poudre Rachel, violette and germandree, she manoeuvring among mirrors to catch each angle of view, but with a blind impatience; and, if she wanted something, she tripped running, breathless: such a disease of flurry, an eruption and conflagration of haste--for nothing; yet, all the while, with a miserable sub-feeling of the penal creeping of time.

At four Hogarth in the Throne-room alone was now afraid that he would not be able to utter a syllable, and wished that she would not come; then, in a minute, began to fear that she would not, and wondered whether he was not a deluded fool ever to have dreamed it, he walking quick, or anon listening like a thief in that half-dark: for few lights were shining, the hall like the after-flush of sunset just before the dark.

At four past four he was aware of a rustling train's rush down the steps, and now was like a man with his neck on the block, awaiting the axe. A moment afterwards she was before him, and two moments afterwards he was collected and hot, and a man again.

"_Dear_", he whispered at her ear, leading her by the hand to an ottoman in a near alcove.

She, in self-defence, was repellent, breathlessly saying with galloping haste: "No--I will not sit: you sit, and I will stand here: do as I say, Hogarth--or I repent and go: I know you, and you know me--or you should.

Our talk must be short. You say _dear_ to me: that is very gentle, my friend; but it was not to bandy such words that I am here--alone--with you and your strength--Hogarth. I come as a suppliant, to implore you--firstly for the man who is my father--and secondly for yourself, to warn you. You are said to be about to become the sovereign of England--"

"_I_ am?"--starting where he sat obediently before her, surprised that she should utter the purpose then forming in his mind: "witch--of Endor!"

"_I_ am not the witch, but an old lady in whose predictions many Jews believe, who prophesies the return of the Jews to Palestine--through you. Be that as it may, if it is so that you are about to meddle with the inst.i.tutions of England, oh beware, the resistence will be terrible!"

"With respect to England I am omnipotent".

"Yes, you can starve it, but _will_ you? You won't. And listen to your friend: there is now in London a society, enormously powerful I believe, sworn to your destruction".