The Purchase Price Part 37

"I am sure of it," answered the old man soberly. "Did he use her well?"

"All her life. He gave her everything--"

"Oh, that is nothing! Did he give her--after he had learned, maybe, that she was not what he had thought--did he give her then--love--belief, trust? Did he--are you very sure that any man in such case, after such an incident, _could_ have loved, really loved, the woman whom he held in that way--"

"I not only believe he might, my dear girl, but I know that in this one case--the only one of my experience"--he smiled--"such was the truth. There was some untold reason why they two did not, or could not, marry. I do not go into that.

"Consider, my dear girl," he resumed; "you are young, and I am so old that it is as though I too were young now and had no experience--so we may talk. Our life is a contest among men for money and for love; that is all success can bring us. In older days men fought for that. To-day we have modified life a little, and have other ways; but I fancy the game in which that certain lady figured was only one form of contest--it was a fight, the spoils to go to the victor."

"Horrible! But you might have been the victor? In that case, would you have loved her, would you have used her well, all your life, and hers?"

He drew back now with dignity. "Madam, my position in later years defends me from necessity of answering you. You are young, impulsive, but you should not forget the proprieties even now--"

His face was now hotly flushed.

"I ask your pardon! But _would_ you?"

He smiled in spite of himself, something of the old fire of gallantry still burning in his withered veins. "My dear girl, if it were yourself, I would! And by the Lord! I'd play again with Parish, or any other man, if my chance otherwise, merely by cruel circ.u.mstances, had been left hopeless. Some one must win."

"But how could the winner be sure? How could the--how did she--I would say--"

"Dear girl, let us not be too cold in our philosophy, nor too wise.

I can not say how or why these things go as they do. All I know is that the right man won in that case, and that he proved it later, by each act of kindness he gave her, all her life. This, my dear, is an odd world, when it comes to all that."

"Was he--did he have anybody else in the world who--"

"Oh, only a wife, I believe, that was all!"

"Did she die, soon? Was there ever--"

"How you question! What do you plan for _yourself_? My word! You are putting me through a strange initiation on our first acquaintance, my dear Countess! Let us not pursue such matters further, or I shall begin to think your own interest in these questions is that of the original Eve!"

"To the victor does not always belong the spoils," she said slowly.

"Not till he has won--earned them--in war, in conquest! Perhaps conquest of himself."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "To the victor does not always belong the spoils."]

"You speak in enigmas for me, my dear Countess."

She shook her head slowly, from side to side. "That poor girl!

Did she ever feel she had been won in the real game, I wonder? To whom would belong herself--if she felt that she had something in her own life to forget, some great thing to be done, in penance perhaps, in eagerness perhaps, some step to take, up--something to put her into a higher plane in the scheme of life? To do something, for some one else--not just to be selfish--suppose that was in her heart; after that game?"

"Why, you read her story as though you saw it! That was her life, absolutely. Never lived a woman more respected there, more loved.

She disarmed even the women, old and young--yes, even the single ones!"

"It is an odd world," she said slowly. "But"--drawing back--"I do not think I will go back to Europe. It would delight me to meet again my friend, the patriot Kossuth. But here I have many ideas which I must work out."

"My dear Countess, you oppress me with a sense of failure! I had so much hoped that you would lend your aid in this mission of my own abroad. You would be valuable. You are so much prized in the opinions of the administration, I am sure, that--"

"What do you mean? Does the administration know of me? _Why_ should it know? What have I done?"

But the old statesman before her was no such fool as to waste time in a lost cause. This one was lost, he knew, and it booted little for him to become involved where, even at the best issue, there was risk enough for him. He reflected that risk must have existed even had this young lady been a shade more dull of mind, of less brilliant faculty in leaping to conclusions and resolutions. She _was_ a firebrand, that was sure. Let others handle such, but not that task for him!

"Now you ask questions whose answers lie entirely beyond my power,"

he replied easily. "You must remember that I am not of this party, let alone this administration. My own day in politics has past, and I must seek seclusion, modestly. I own that the mission to Europe, to examine in a wholly non-partisan way, the working out there of this revolutionary idea--the testing on the soil of monarchies of the principle of democratic government--has a great appeal to me; and I fancied it would offer appeal also to yourself.

But if--"

"All life is chance, is it not? But in your belief, does the right man always win?"

He rose, smiling, inscrutable once more, astute and suave politician again, and pa.s.sing about the table he bowed over her hand to kiss it.

"My dear Countess," he said, "my dear girl, all I can say is that in the very limited experience I can claim in such matters, the victor usually is the right man. But I find you here, alone, intent on visionary plans which never can be carried out, undertaking a labor naturally foreign to a woman's methods of life, alien to her usual ideas of happiness. So, my dear, my dear, I fear you yourself have not played out the game--you have not fulfilled its issue! The stakes are not yet given over! I can not say as to the right man, but I can say with all my heart that he who wins such prize is fortunate indeed, and should cherish it for ever. See, I am not after all devoid of wit or courage, my dear young girl! Because, I know, though you do not tell me, that there is some game at which you play, yourself, and that you will not stop that game to partic.i.p.ate in my smaller enterprise of visiting Kossuth and the lands of Europe! I accept defeat myself, once more, in a game where a woman is at stake. Again, I lose!"

There was more truth than she knew in his words, for what was in his mind and in the minds of others there in Washington, regarding her, were matters not then within her knowledge. But she was guided once more, as many a woman has been, by her unerring instinct, her sixth sense of womanhood, her scent for things of danger. Now, though she stood with face grave, pensive, almost melancholy, to give him curtsy as he pa.s.sed, there was not weakness nor faltering in her mien or speech.

"But he would have to _win_!" she said, as though following out some train of thought. "He would first need to win in the larger game. Ah! What woman would be taken, except by the man who really had won in the real game of life."

"You would demand that, my dear?" smiled the pleasant gentleman who now was bowing himself toward the door.

"I would demand it!"

By the time he had opportunity to rally his senses, a.s.sailed as they were by the sight of her, by the splendor of her apparel, by the music of her voice, the fragrance which clung about her, the charm of her smiles,--by the time, in short, which he required to turn half about, she was gone. He heard her light step at the stair.

"My soul!" he exclaimed, wiping his brow with a silken kerchief.

"So much for attempting to sacrifice principle--for expecting to mix Free Soil and Whig! d.a.m.n that Kentuckian!"

CHAPTER XXVII

A SPLENDID FAILURE

If it is easy to discover why there was no special emba.s.sy sent by this government to Turkey for the purpose of inviting the distinguished patriot Kossuth to visit America, (that matter being concluded in rather less formal fashion after the return home of the Hungarian committee of inquiry--a ship of our navy being despatched to carry him to our sh.o.r.es) it with equal ease may be understood why the Countess St. Auban after this remained unmolested. A quaking administration, bent only on keeping political matters in perfect balance, and on quenching promptly, as best it might, any incipient blaze of anti-slavery zeal which might break out from its smoldering, dared make no further move against her. She was now too much in the public eye to be safe even in suppression, and so was left to pursue her own way for a time; this the more readily, of course, because she was doing nothing either illegal or reprehensible. Indeed, as has been said, she was only carrying out in private way a pet measure of Mr. Fillmore himself, one which he had only with difficulty been persuaded to eliminate from his first presidential message--that of purchasing the slaves and deporting them from our sh.o.r.es. The government at Washington perforce looked on, shivering, dreading lest this thing might fail, dreading also lest it might not fail. It was a day of compromise, of cowardice, of politics played as politics; a day of that political unwisdom which always is dangerous--the fear of riding straight, the ignorance of the saving quality of honest courage.

Wherefore, matters went on thus, fit foundation now building for that divided and ill-ordered house of this republic, whose purification could only be found in the cleansing catastrophe of fire so soon to come.

As to the unfortunate work in which this warm-hearted enthusiast thus impulsively engaged, small comment need be made, since its failure so soon was to become apparent to the popular mind. The Countess St. Auban was not the first to look to colonization and deportation as the solution of the negro problem in America. But as the Colonization Society for more than a decade had failed to accomplish results, so did she in her turn fail. In a work which continued through all that spring and summer, she drew again and again upon her own private fortune. Carlisle and Kammerer had charge of the details, but she herself was the driving force of the enterprise. While they were abroad lecturing and asking contributions to their cause--taking with them the slave girl Lily as an example of what slavery had done--she remained at Washington.

They actually did arrange for the deportation of a ship-load of blacks to Hayti, another ship-load to Liberia. A colony of blacks whose freedom had been purchased was established in Tennessee, others were planned for yet other localities. It was part of her intent to establish nuclei of freed blacks in different portions of the southern section.

In all this work Lily, late servant of Josephine St. Auban, a.s.sumed a certain prominence, this being given to her not wholly with wisdom. Although but little negro blood remained in her veins, this former slave had not risen above the life that had surrounded her. Ignorant, emotional, at times working herself into a frenzy of religious zeal, she was farthest of all from being a sober judge or a fair-minded agent for the views of others. Yet in time her two guardians, Carlisle and Kammerer, unwisely allowed her more and more liberty. She was even, in times of great hurry, furnished funds to go upon trips of investigation for herself, as one best fitted to judge of the conditions of her people. As to these details, Josephine St. Auban knew little. There was enough to occupy her mind at the center of these affairs, where labors grew rapidly and quite beyond her original plan.

As is always the case in such hopeless enterprises, the expenses multiplied beyond belief. True, contributions came meagerly from the North, here and there some abolitionist appearing who would do something besides write and preach. In all, more than a half million dollars was spent before the end of the year 1851. Then, swiftly and without warning, there came the end.

One morning, almost a year after her return to Washington, Josephine St. Auban sat in her apartments, looking at a long doc.u.ment inscribed in a fine, foreign hand. It was the report of the agent of her estates in Prance and Hungary. As she read it the lines blurred before her eyes. It demanded an effort even of her superb courage fairly to face and meet the meaning. In fact, it was this: The revolution of Louis Napoleon of 1851 had resulted in the confiscation of many estates in France, all her own included.

As though by concert among the monarchies of Europe, the heavy hand of confiscation fell, in this nation and in that. The thrones of the Old World are not supported by revolutionists; nor are revolutionists supported by the occupants of thrones. Her Hungarian lands had followed those which she had owned in France.

The rents of her estates no longer could be collected. Her revenues were absolutely gone. Moreover, she herself was an exile.

[Ill.u.s.tration: She herself was an exile.]

Thus, then, had her high-blown hopes come to an end. It was proof of the splendid courage of the woman that she shed not a tear. Not a lash trembled as presently she turned to despatch a message for her lieutenant, Carlisle, to come to her. The latter was absent at some western point, but within two days he appeared in Washington and presently made his call, as yet ignorant of what were his employer's wishes.