The Red City Part 32

"He is safe, you tell me. May the G.o.d who has spared my son remember you and bless you through all your days and in all your ways!"

He bent low. "I have my reward, Madame."

Some intuitive recognition of what was in his mind was perhaps naturally in the thought of both. She said, "Will it end here?"

Seeing before him a face which he could not read, he replied, "It is to be desired that it end here, or that some good fortune put the sea between these two."

"And can you, his friend, say that? Not if he is the son I bore. I trust not," and, turning away, she left him; while he looked after her and murmured: "There is more mother in me than in her," and going out to where Rene lay, he said gaily: "Out of prison at last, my boy. A grim jail is sickness."

"Ah, to hear the birds who are so free," said Rene. "Are they ever ill, I wonder?"

"Mr. Hamilton is below, Rene--just come from New York. He has been here twice."

"Then I shall hear of the world. You have starved me of news." There was little good to tell him. The duke, their cousin, had fled from France, and could write to madame only of the Terror and of deaths and ruin.

The Secretary came up fresh with the gaiety of a world in which he was still battling fiercely with the Republican party, glad of the absence of his rival, Jefferson, who saw no good in anything he did or said.

"You are very kind," said De Courval, "to spare me a little of your time, sir." Indeed he felt it. Hamilton sat down, smiling at the eagerness with which Rene questioned him.

"There is much to tell, Vicomte. The outrages on our commerce by the English have become unendurable, and how we are to escape war I do not see. An embargo has been proclaimed by the President; it is for thirty days, and will be extended to thirty more. We have many English ships in our ports. No one of them can leave."

"That ought to bring them to their senses," said Rene.

"It may," returned Hamilton.

"And what, sir, of the treaty with England?"

Hamilton smiled. "I was to have been sent, but there was too much opposition, and now, as I think, wisely, Chief-Justice Jay is to go to London."

"Ah, Mr. Hamilton, if there were but war with England,--and there is cause enough,--some of us poor exiles might find pleasant occupation."

The Secretary became grave. "I would do much, yield much, to escape war, Vicomte. No man of feeling who has ever seen war desires to see it again. If the memory of nations were as retentive as the memory of a man, there would be an end of wars."

"And yet, sir," said Rene, "I hardly see how you--how this people--endure what you so quietly accept."

"Yes, yes. No man more than Washington feels the additions of insult to injury. If to-day you could give him a dozen frigates, our answer to England would not be a request for a treaty which will merely secure peace, and give us that with contempt, and little more. What it personally costs that proud gentleman, our President, to preserve his neutral att.i.tude few men know."

Rene was pleased and flattered by the thoughtful gravity of the statesman's talk.

"I see, sir," he said. "There will be no war."

"No; I think not. I sincerely hope not. But now I must go. My compliments to your mother; and I am glad to see you so well."

As he went out, he met Schmidt in the hall. "Ah, why did you not prevent this duel?" he said.

"No man could, sir. It is, I fear, a business to end only when one of them dies. It dates far back of the blow. Some day we will talk of it, but I do not like the outlook."

"Indeed." He went into the street thoughtful. In principle opposed to duels, he was to die in the prime of life a victim to the pistol of Burr.

The pleasant May weather and the open air brought back to De Courval health and the joys of life. The girl in the garden heard once more his bits of French song, and when June came with roses he was able to lie on the lower porch, swinging at ease in a hammock sent by Captain Biddle, and it seemed as if the world were all kindness. As he lay, Schmidt read to him, and he missed only Margaret, ordered out to the country in the care of Aunt Gainor, while, as he grew better, he had the strange joy of senses freshened and keener than in health, as if he were reborn to a new heritage of tastes and odors, the priceless gift of wholesome convalescence.

He asked no questions concerning Carteaux or what men said of the duel; but as Schmidt, musing, saw him at times gentle, pleased, merry, or again serious, he thought how all men have in them a brute ancestor ready with a club. "Just now the devil is asleep." He alone, and the mother, fore-looking, knew; and so the time ran on, and every one wanted him. The women came with flowers and strawberries, and made much of him, the gray mother not ill-pleased.

In June he was up, allowed to walk out or to lie in the boat while Schmidt caught white perch or crabs and talked of the many lands he had seen. Then at last, to Rene's joy, he might ride.

"Here," said Schmidt, "is a note from Mistress Gainor. We are asked to dine and stay the night. No, not you. You are not yet fit for dinners and gay women. These doctors are cruel. There will be, she writes, Mr.

Jefferson, here for a week; Mr. Langstroth, and a woman or two; and Wolcott of the Treasury, 'if Hamilton will let him come,' she says." For perhaps wisely the new official followed the ex-Secretary's counsels, to the saving of much needless thinking. "A queer party that!" said Schmidt. "What new mischief are she and the ex-Quaker Josiah devising?"

He would be there at three, he wrote, the groom having waited a reply.

"Have you any message for Miss Margaret, Rene?" he asked next day.

"Tell her that all that is left of me remembers her mother's kindness."

And, laughing, he added: "That there is more of me every day."

"And is that all?"

"Yes; that is all. Is there any news?"

"None of moment. Oh, yes, I meant to tell you. The heathen imagine a vain thing--a fine republican mob collected in front of the Harp and Crown yesterday. There was a picture set up over the door in the war--a picture of the Queen of France. A painter was made to paint a ring of blood around the neck and daub the clothes with red. If there is a fool devil, he must grin at that."

"_Canaille!_" said Rene. "Poor queen! We of the religion did not love her; but to insult the dead! Ah, a week in Paris now, and these cowards would fly in fear."

"Yes; it is a feeble sham." And so he left Rene to his book and rode away with change of garments in his saddle-bags.

XVIII

Miss Gainor being busy at her toilette, Schmidt was received at the Hill Farm by the black page, in red plush for contrast, and shown up to his room. He usually wore clothes of simple character and left the changing fashions to others. But this time he dressed as he did rarely, and came down with powdered hair, in maroon-colored velvet with enameled b.u.t.tons, ruffles at the wrists, and the full lace neck-gear still known as a Steenkirk.

Miss Gainor envied him the gold buckles of the broidered garters and shoes, and made her best courtesy to the stately figure which bent low before her.

"They are late," she said. "Go and speak to Margaret in the garden." He found her alone under a great tulip-tree.

"_Ach!_" he cried, "you are looking better. You were pale." She rose with a glad welcome as he saw and wondered. "How fine we are, Pearl!"

"Are we not? But Aunt Gainor would have it. I must courtesy, I suppose."

The dress was a compromise. There were still the gray silks, the underskirt, open wider than common in front, a pale sea-green petticoat, and, alas! even powder--very becoming it seemed to the German gentleman.

I am helpless to describe the prettiness of it. Aunt Gainor had an artist's eye, though she herself delighted in too gorgeous attire.

He gave Margaret the home news and his message from Rene, and no; she was not yet to come to town. It was too hot, and not very healthy this summer.

"Why did not the vicomte write?" she said with some hesitation. "That would have been nicer."

"_Ach, guter Himmel!_ Young men do not write to young women."