Petticoat Rule Part 42

She called to milor's valet: "Achille!" but only in a whisper, lest milor from within should hear. Then as there was no sound, no movement, she called once more:

"Achille! is milor still awake? Achille! are you here?"

She had raised her voice a little, thinking the man might be asleep.

But no sound answered her, save from outside the cry of a bird frightened by some midnight prowler.

Then she walked up to the door. There behind it, in that inner sanctum hung with curtains of dull gold, the man still sat whom she had so often, so determinedly wronged, and who had wounded her to-night with a cruelty and a surety of hand which had left her broken of spirit, bruised of heart, a suffering and pa.s.sionate woman. She put her hand on the k.n.o.b of the door. Nothing stirred within; milor was writing mayhap! Perhaps he had dropped asleep! And Gaston preparing to ride to Le Havre in order to send the swiftest s.h.i.+p to do its deed of treachery!

No! no! anything but that!

At this moment Lydie had nerved herself to endure every rebuff, to suffer any humiliation, to throw herself at her husband's feet, embrace his knees if need be, beg, pray and entreat for money, for help, anything that might even now perhaps avert the terrible catastrophe.

Boldly now she knocked at the door.

"Milor! milor! open! . . . it is I! . . . ! Lydie. . . . !"

Then as there was no answer from within she knocked louder still.

"Milor! Milor! awake! Milor! in the name of Heaven I entreat you to let me speak with you!"

At first she had thought that he slept, then that obstinate resentment caused him to deny her admittance. She tried to turn the k.n.o.b of the door, but it did not yield.

"Milor! Milor!" she cried again, and then again.

Naught but silence was the reply.

Excitement grew upon her now, a febrile nervousness which caused her to pull at the lock, to bruise her fingers against the gilt ornaments of the panel, whilst her voice, hoa.r.s.e and broken with sobs, rent with its echoes the peace and solemnity of the night.

"Milor! Milor!"

She had fallen on her knees, exhausted mentally and physically, the blood beating against her temples until the blackness around her seemed to have become a vivid red. In her ear was a sound like that of a tempestuous sea breaking against gigantic rocks, with voices calling at intervals, voices of dying men, loudly accusing her of treachery.

The minutes were speeding by! Anon would come the dawn when Gaston would to horse, bearing the hideous message which would mean her lifelong infamy and the death of those who trusted her.

"Milor! milor! awake!" She now put her lips to the keyhole, breathing the words through the tiny orifice, hoping that he would hear. "Gaston will start at dawn . . . They will send _Le Monarque_, and she is ready to put to sea . . . Milor! your friend is in deadly peril. . . ! I entreat you to let me enter!"

She beat her hands against the door, wounding her delicate flesh. She was not conscious of what she was doing. A mystic veil divided her reasoning powers from that terrible mental picture which glowed before her through the blood-red darkness. The lonely sh.o.r.e, the angry sea, the French s.h.i.+p _Le Monarque_ flying the pennant of traitors!

Then suddenly an astonished and deeply horrified voice broke in upon her ears.

"Madame la Marquise, in the name of Heaven! Madame la Marquise!"

She heard quick footsteps behind her, and left off hammering against the door, left off screaming and moaning, but she had not the power to raise herself from her knees.

"Madame la Marquise," came in respectful, yet frightened accents, "will Madame la Marquise deign to allow me to raise her--I fear Madame la Marquise is not well!"

She recognized the voice of Achille, milor's valet, yet it never entered her mind to feel ashamed at being found by a lacquey, thus kneeling before her husband's door. The worthy Achille was very upset.

Etiquette forbade him to touch Madame la Marquise, but could he leave her there? in that position? He advanced timidly. His behaviour was superlatively correct even in this terrible emergency, and there was nothing in his deferential att.i.tude to indicate that he thought anything abnormal had occurred.

"I thought I heard Madame la Marquise calling," he said, "and I thought perhaps Madame la Marquise would wish to speak with milor . . ."

But at the word she quickly interrupted him; rising to her feet even as she spoke.

"Yes! yes . . . ! milor . . . I do wish to speak with him . . . open the door, Achille . . . quick . . ."

"The door is locked on the outside, Madame la Marquise, but I have the key by me," said M. Achille gravely. "I had fortunately recollected that mayhap milor had forgotten to put out the lights, and would in any case have come to see that all was safe . . . if Madame la Marquise will deign to permit me . . ."

It was a little difficult to reconcile utmost respect of movement and demeanour with the endeavour to open the door against which Madame la Marquise was still standing. However, everything that was deferential and correct was possible to Monsieur Achille; he fitted the key in the lock and the next moment had thrown the door wide open, whilst he himself stood immediately aside to enable Madame la Marquise to enter.

Four candles were burning in one of the candelabra; milor had evidently forgotten to extinguish them. Everything else in the room was perfectly tidy. On the secretaire there were two or three heavy books similar to those Monsieur Durand usually carried about with him when he had to interview milor, also the inkpot and sand-well, with two or three quills methodically laid on a silver tray. One window must have been open behind the drawn curtains, for the heavy damask hangings waved gently in the sudden current of air, caused by the opening of the door. The candles too, flickered weirdly in the draught. In the centre of the room was the armchair on which Lydie had sat a while ago, the cus.h.i.+on of red embroidery which milor had put to her back, and below the little footstool covered in gold brocade on which her foot had rested . . . a while ago.

And beside the secretaire his own empty chair, and on the table the spot where his hand had rested, white and slightly tremulous, when she proffered her self-accusation.

"Milor?" she murmured inquiringly, turning glowing eyes, dilated with the intensity of disappointment and despair on the impa.s.sive face of Achille, "milor . . . ? where is milor?"

"Milor has been gone some little time, Madame la Marquise," replied Achille.

"Gone? Whither?"

"I do not know, Madame la Marquise . . . Milor did not tell me . . .

Two gentlemen called to see him at about ten o'clock; as soon as they had gone milor asked for his outdoor clothes and Hector booted and spurred him . . . whilst I dressed his hair and tied his cravat . . .

Milor has been gone about half an hour, I think."

"Enough . . . that will do!"

That is all that she contrived to say. This final disappointment had been beyond the endurance of her nerves. Physically now she completely broke down, a mist gathered before her eyes, the candles seemed to flicker more and more weirdly until their lights a.s.sumed strange ghoul-like shapes which drew nearer to her and nearer; faces in the gloom grinned at her and seemed to mock, the walls of the room closed in around her, her senses reeled, her very brain felt as if it throbbed with pain, and without a cry or moan, only with one long sigh of infinite weariness, she sank lifeless to the ground.

CHAPTER x.x.xII

THE DAWN

M. le Comte de Stainville only shrugged his shoulders when M. de Belle-Isle and young de Lugeac brought him milor's reply.

"Bah!" he said with a sneer, "he'll have to fight me later on or I'll hound him out of France! Never fear, gentlemen, we'll have our meed of fun very soon."

On the whole Gaston was not sorry that this stupid so-called "affair of honour" would not force him to rise before dawn. He had no special ill-will against _le pet.i.t Anglais_, for whom he had always tried to cultivate a modic.u.m of contempt. He had not always succeeded in this praiseworthy endeavour, for milor as a rule chose to ignore M. de Stainville, as far as, and often more than, courtesy permitted.

The two men had not often met since the memorable evening when milor s.n.a.t.c.hed the golden prize which Gaston had so clumsily cast aside.

Their tastes were very dissimilar, and so was their entourage. Milor was officially considered to belong to the Queen's set, whilst Gaston clung to the more entertaining company of Madame de Pompadour and her friends; nor had M. de Stainville had the bad grace to interfere with his wife's obvious predeliction for Lord Eglinton's company.

The memorable day which was just drawing to its close had seen many changes--changes that were almost upheavals of old traditions and of habitual conditions of court life. Gaston had deceived and then hideously outraged the woman whom long ago he had already wronged. A year ago she had humiliated him, had s.n.a.t.c.hed from him the golden prize which his ambition had coveted, and which she made him understand that he could not obtain without her. To-day had been his hour; he had dragged her down to the very mire in which he himself had grovelled, he had laid her pride to dust and shaken the pinnacle of virtue and integrity on which she stood.

That she had partly revenged herself by a public affront against Irene mattered little to Gaston. He had long ago ceased to care for _la belle brune de Bordeaux_, the beautiful girl who had enchained his early affections and thereby become a bar to his boundless ambition.

The social ostracism--applicable only by a certain set of puritanical devotes--and the disdain of Queen Marie Leszcynska which his wife might have to endure would be more than compensated by the grat.i.tude of Pompadour and of His Majesty himself, for the services rendered by Gaston in the cause of the proffered English millions.

But for him the expedition against the Stuart prince could never have been undertaken; at any rate, it had been fraught with great difficulties; delays and subsequent failure would probably have resulted. Gaston de Stainville felt sure that in the future he could take care that the King should never forget his services.