The Puppet Crown Part 32

"I trust Madame will find it droll."

"And you?"

"And I, Madame?"

"Yes; did you not bring the clown to your feet?"

"No, Madame."

"How? You did not have the joy denied me--of laughing in his face?"

"No, Madame." With each answer the voice grew lower.

"Since when have I been Madame to you?"

"Since to-day."

Madame reached out a band and pressed down the screen. "Elsa, what is it?"

"What is what, Madame?"

"This strange mood of yours."

Silence.

"You were gay enough this morning. Tell me."

"There is nothing to tell, Madame, save that my sacrifices are at an end. I have nothing left."

"What! You forsake me when the end is won?" in astonishment.

"I did not say that I should desert you; I said that I had no more sacrifices to make." The Countess rose. "For your sake, Madame, because you have always been kind to me, and because it is impossible not to love you, I have degraded myself. I have pretended to love a man who saw through the artifice and told me so, to save me further shame. O Madame, it is all execrable!

"And you will use this love which you have gained--this first love of a man who has known no other and will know no other while he lives!--to bring about his ruin? This other, at whose head you threw me--beware of him. He is light-hearted and gay, perhaps. You call him a clown; he is cunning and brave; and unless you judge him at his true value, your fabric of schemes will fall ere it reaches its culmination. Could even you trick him with words? No. You were compelled to use force. Is he not handsome, Madame?" with a feverish gaiety. "Is there a gentleman at your court who is a more perfect cavalier? Why, he blushes like a woman! Is there in your court--" But her sentence broke, and she could not go on.

"Elsa, are you mad?"

"Yes, Madame, yes; they call it a species of madness." Then, with a sudden gust of wrath: "Why did you not leave me in peace? You have destroyed me! O, the shame of it!" and she fled into her own room.

Madame sat motionless. This, among other things, she had not reckoned on.

Only the troopers and the servants slept in peace that night.

Maurice was up betimes next morning. The hills and valleys lay under a mantle of sparkling rime, and the very air, keen of edge and whistling, glistened in the sunlight. The iron shoes of the horses beat sharply on the stone flooring of the court yard. Maurice examined his riding furniture; pulled at the saddle, tugged at the rein buckles, lifted the leather flaps and tried the stirrup straps. It was not that he doubted the ability of the groom; it was because this particular care was second nature to him.

Fitzgerald watched him, and meditated. Some of his thoughts were not pleasant. His eyes were heavy. At times he would lift his shoulders and permit half a smile to flicker over his lips; a certain thought caused this. The Colonel sat astride a broad-chested cavalry horse, spotless white. He was going to accompany Maurice to the frontier. He had imbibed the exhilarating tonic of the morning, and his spirits ran high. At length Maurice leaped into the saddle, caught the stirrups well, and signaled to the Colonel that he was ready.

"You understand, Maurice?" Fitzgerald asked.

"Yes, John; all the world loves a lover. Besides, it is a glorious morning for a ride. Up, portcullis, down drawbridge!" waving his hand to the Colonel.

And away they went through the gateway, into the frosted road. Maurice felt the spirit of some medieval ancestor creep into his veins and he longed for an hour of the feudal days, to rescue a princess from some dungeon-keep and to harry an over-lord. After all, she was a wonderful woman, and Fitzgerald was only a man. To give up all for the love of woman is the only sacrifice a man can make.

"En avant!" cried the Colonel. "A fine day, a fine day for the house of Auersperg!"

"And a devilish bad one for the houses of Fitzgerald and Carewe. Woman's ambition, coupled with her deceit, is the root of all evil; money is simply an invention of man to protect himself from her encroachments.

Eve was ambitious and deceitful; all women are her daughters. When the pages of history grow dull--"

"Time puts a maggot in my lady's brain," supplemented the Colonel. "It is like a row of dominoes. The power behind the throne, the woman behind the power; an impulse moves the woman, and lo! how they clatter down.

But without woman, history would be poor reading. The greatest battles in the world, could we but see behind, were fought for women. Men are but footnotes, and unfortunately history is made up of footnotes. But it is a fine thing to be a footnote; that is my ambition.

"Ah, if you but knew what a pleasure it is for an old man like me to have a finger in the game time plays! To meddle with affairs, directly or indirectly! Kingdoms are but judy shows, kings and queens but puppets; but we who pull the strings--Ah, that is it! To play a game of chess with crowns!"

"There are exceptions; Madame seems to hold the strings in this instance."

"Madame follows my advice in all she does."

Maurice opened his eyes at this statement.

"Would you believe an old man like me could lay such a train? All this was my idea. It was difficult to get Madame to agree with my views.

War? I am not afraid of it; I am suspicious of it. One day your friend returned a personal letter of Madame's having written across it, `I laugh at you.' It was very foolish. No man laughs at Madame more than once. She will, one day, return this letter to him. A crown, a fine revenge, in one fell swoop."

"She will ruin him utterly?"

"Utterly."

"Have you any idea what sort of man my friend is?"

"He lacks the polish of a man of affairs, and he surrenders too easily."

"He will never surrender--Madame."

"How?"

"You remember his father; he will prove his father's son, every inch of him. O, my Colonel, the curtain has only risen. One fine morning your duchy will wake up without a d.u.c.h.ess."

"What do you imply--an abduction?" The Colonel laughed.

"That is my secret."

"And the pretty countess?" banteringly.

"It was rather bad taste in Madame. It was putting love and patriotism to questionable purposes. I am a gentleman."

"It was out of consideration for you; Madame was not quite sure about you. But you are right; all of it has rather a dark shade. You may rob a man of his valuables and give them back; a broken word is not to be mended. Why did you keep the hiding place so secret? I could have got those consols, and all this would have been avoided."

"How should I know where they were? It was none of my affair."