Truxton King: A Story of Graustark Part 14

CHAPTER VI

INGOMEDE THE BEAUTIFUL

A light, chilling drizzle had been falling all evening, pattering softly upon the roof of leaves that covered the sidewalks along Castle Avenue, glistening on the lamp-lit pavements and blowing ever so gently in the faces of those who walked in the dripping shades. Far back from the s.h.i.+mmering sidewalks, surrounded by the blackest of shadows, and approached by hedge-bordered paths and driveways, stood the mansions occupied by the n.o.bility of this gay little kingdom. A score or more of ancient palaces, in which the spirit, of modern aggression had wrought interior changes but had left the exteriors untouched, formed this aristocratic line of homes. Here were houses that had been built in the fifteenth century,--great, square, solemn-looking structures, grown grey and green with age.

There were lights in a thousand windows along this misty, royal road--lights that reflected the pleasures of the rich and yet caused no envy in time hearts of the loyal poor.

Almost in the centre of the imposing line stood the home of the Duke of Perse, Minister of Finance, flanked on either side by structures as grim and as gay as itself, yet far less significant in their generation. Here dwelt the most important man in the princ.i.p.ality, not excepting the devoted prime minister himself. Not that Perse was so well beloved, but that he held the destinies of the land in Midas-like fingers. More than that, he was the father of the far-famed Countess Marlanx, the most glorious beauty at the Austrian and Russian courts. She had gone forth from Graustark as its most notable bride since the wedding day of the Princess Yetive, late in the nineties. Ingomede, the beautiful, had journeyed far to the hymeneal altar; the husband who claimed her was a hated, dishonoured man in his own land. They were married in Buda Pesth.

All Europe pitied her at the time; there was but one form of prophecy as to her future. There were those who went so far as to say that her father had delivered her into the hands of a latter-day Bluebeard, who whisked her off into the highlands many leagues from Vienna.

She was seen no more in the gay courts for a year. Then, of a sudden, she appeared before them all, as dazzlingly beautiful as ever, but with a haunting, wistful look in her dark eyes that could not be mistaken.

The old Count found an uneasy delight in exhibiting her to the world once more, plainly as a bit of property that all men were expected to look upon with envy in their hearts. She came up out of the sombre hills, freed from what must have been nothing less than captivity in that once feudal castle, to prove to his world that she thrived in spite of prophetic babblers. They danced from court to court, grotesquely mis-mated, deceiving no one as to the true relations that existed between them. She despised him without concealment; he took pride in showing that he could best resent her att.i.tude by the most scrupulous devotion, so marked that its intent could not be mistaken.

Then the Duke of Perse resumed his residence in Edelweiss, opening the old palace once more to the world. His daughter, after the death of the Princess, began her extended visits to the home of her girlhood. So long as the Princess was alive she remained away from Edelweiss, reluctant to meet the friend who had banished her husband long before the wedding day in Buda Pesth. Now she came frequently and stayed for weeks at a time, apparently happy during these escapes from life in the great capitals. Here, at least, she was free from the grim old man whose countess she was; here, all was sweet and warm and friendly, delicious contrast to the cold, bitter life she knew on the Danube.

Without warning she came and without farewells she left Edelweiss on the occasion of these periodical visits. No word was ever spoken concerning her husband, except on the rare occasions when she opened her heart to the father who had bartered her into slavery for the sake of certain social franchises that the Iron Count had at his disposal. The outside world, which loved her, never heard of these bitter pa.s.sages between father and child. Like Cinderella, she sometimes disappeared from joyous things at midnight; the next heard of her, she was in Vienna, or at Schloss Marlanx.

If the Duke of Perse repented of his bargain in giving his daughter to the Iron Count, he was never known to intimate as much. He loved Ingomede in his own, hard way. No doubt he was sorry for her. It is a fact that she was sorry for him. She could read his bitter thoughts more clearly than he suspected.

Of late she came more frequently to Edelweiss than before. She was seen often at the Castle; no court function was complete without the presence of this lovely n.o.blewoman; no _salon_ worth while unless graced by her wit and her beauty.

John Tullis was always to remember the moment when he looked upon this exquisite creature for the first time. That was months ago. After that he never ceased being a secret, silent wors.h.i.+pper at her transient shrine.

Ten o'clock on this rainy night: A carriage has drawn up before the lower gates to the Perse grounds, and a tall, shadowy figure leaves it to hurry through the shrub lined walks to the ma.s.sive doors. A watchman in the garden salutes him. The tall figure dips his umbrella in response, characteristically laconic. A footman lifts his hand to his forelock at the top of the steps and throws open the doors without question. This visitor is expected, it is plain to be seen; a circ.u.mstance which may or may not explain the nervousness that attends him as he crosses the broad hall toward the library.

Tullis had long since ceased to be a welcome visitor in the home of the Duke of Perse. The men were openly unfriendly to each other. The Duke resented the cool interference of the sandy-haired American; on the other hand, Tullis made no effort to conceal his dislike, if not distrust, of the older man. He argued--with unofficial and somewhat personal authority,--that a man who could trade his only child for selfish ends might also be impelled to sacrifice his country's interests without cramping his conscience.

The Countess was alone in the long, warm-tinted library. She stood before the dying embers in the huge old fireplace, her foot upon one of the great iron dogs. Her smiling face was turned toward the door as he entered.

"It is good of you to come," she said, as they shook hands warmly. "Do you know it is almost a year since you last came to this house?"

"It would be a century, Countess, if I were not welcomed in other houses where I am sure of a glimpse of you from time to time and a word now and then. Still, a year's a year. The room hasn't changed so far as I can see. The same old tiger-skin there, the rugs, the books, the pictures--the leopard's skin here and the--yes, the lamp is just where it used to be. 'Pon my soul, I believe you are standing just as you were when I last saw you here. It's uncanny. One might think you had not moved in all these months!"

"Or that it has been a minute instead of a year," she supplemented. His quick, involuntary glance about him did not escape her understanding.

"The Duke has gone to Ganlook to play Bridge with friends," she said at once. "He will not return till late. I have just telephoned--to make sure." Her smile did more than to rea.s.sure him.

"Of course, you will understand how impossible it is for me to come here, Countess. Your father, the Duke, doesn't mince matters, and I'm not quite a fool." Tullis squinted at the fire.

"Do you think ill of me for asking you to come to-night?"

"Not at all," he said cheerfully, "so long as you are quite sure that your father is in Ganlook. He would be perfectly justified in kicking me out if he were to catch me here. And as I'm rather c.u.mbersome and he's somewhat venerable, I don't like to think of the jar it would be to his system. But, so long as he isn't here, and I am, why shouldn't I draw up a chair before the fire for you, and another for myself, with the cigarettes and a world between us, to discuss conditions as they are, not as they might be if we were discovered? Shall I? Good! I defy any one's father to get me out of this chair until I am ready to relinquish it voluntarily."

"I suppose you superintended the 'going-to-bed' of Prince Robin before you left the Castle?" she said, lying back in the comfortable chair and stretching her feet out to the fire. He handed her a match and watched her light the long, ridiculously thin cigarette.

"Yes. I never miss it, Countess. The last thing he does, after saying his prayers, is to recall me from exile. He wouldn't be happy if he couldn't do that. He says amen and hops into bed. Then he grins in a far from imperial way and announces that he's willing to give me another chance, and please won't I tell him the latest news concerning Jack-the-giant-killer. He asked me to-night if I thought you'd mind if he banished your father. They've had a children's quarrel, I believe. If you do mind, I am to let him know: he won't banish him. He's very fond of you, Countess." She laughed gaily.

"He is a dear boy. I adore him. I think I quite understand why you are giving up your life to him. At first I wasn't sure."

"You thought I expected to gain something by it, is not that so? Well, there are a great many people who think so still--your father among them. They'll never understand. I don't blame them, for, I declare to you, I don't fully appreciate it myself. John Tullis playing nurse and story-teller to a seven-year-old boy, to the exclusion of everything else, is more than I can grasp. Somehow, I've come to feel that he's mine. That must be the reason. But you've heard me prate on this subject a hundred times. Don't let me start it again. There's something else you want to talk to me about, so please don't encourage me to tell all the wonderful things he has said and done to-day."

"It is of the Prince that I want to speak, Mr. Tullis," she said, suddenly serious. "I don't care to hear whether he stubbed his toe to-day or just how much he has grown since yesterday, but I do want to talk very seriously with you concerning his future--I might say his immediate future."

He looked at her narrowly.

"Are you quite serious?"

"Quite. I could not have asked you to come to this house for anything trivial. We have become very good friends, you and I. Too good, perhaps, for I've no doubt there are old tabbies in Edelweiss who are provoked to criticism--you know what I mean. Their world is full of imaginary affairs, else what would there be left for old age? But we are good friends and we understand why we are good friends, so there's the end to that. As I say, I could not have asked so true a friend into the house of his enemy for the mere sake of having my vanity pleased by his obedience."

"I am quite sure of that," he said. "Are you in trouble, Countess? Is there anything I can do?"

"It has to do with the Prince, not with me," she said. "And yet I am in trouble--or perhaps I should say, I am troubled."

"The Prince is a st.u.r.dy little beggar," he began, but she lifted her hand in protest.

"And he has st.u.r.dy, loyal friends. That is agreed. And yet--" she paused, a perplexed line coming between her expressive eyes.

John Tullis opened his own eyes very wide. "You don't mean to say that he is--he is in peril of any sort?"

She looked at him a long time before speaking. He could feel that she was turning something over in her mind before giving utterance to the thought.

At last she leaned nearer to him, dropping the ash from her cigarette into the receiver as she spoke slowly, intensely. "I think he is in peril--in deadly peril."

He stared hard. "What do you mean?" he demanded, with an involuntary glance over his shoulder. She interpreted that glance correctly.

"The peril is not here, Mr. Tullis. I know what you are thinking. My father is a loyal subject. The peril I suggest never comes to Graustark."

She said no more but leaned forward, her face whiter than its wont. He frowned, but it was the effect of temporary perplexity. Gradually the meaning of her simple, though significant remark filtered through his brain.

"Never comes to Graustark?" he almost whispered. "You don't--you can't mean your--your husband?"

"I mean Count Marlanx," she said steadily.

"He means evil to Prince Robin? Good Heavens, Countess, I--I can't believe it. I know he is bitter, revengeful, and all that, but--"

"He is all that and more," she said. "First, you must let me impress you that I am not a traitor to his cause. I could not be that, for the sufficient reason that I only suspect its existence. I am not in any sense a part of it. I do not _know_ anything. I only feel. I dare say you realise that I do not love Count Marlanx--that there is absolutely nothing in common between us except a name. We won't go into that. I--"

"I am overjoyed to hear you say this, Countess," he said very seriously.

"I have been so bold on occasion as to a.s.sert--for your private ear, of course--that you could not, by any freak of nature, happen to care for Count Marlanx, whom I know only by description. You have laughed at my so-called American wit, and you have been most tolerant. Now, I feel that I am justified. I'm immeasurably glad to hear you confess that you do not love your husband."

"I cannot imagine any one so stupid as to think that I do love Count Marlanx, for that matter, that he loves me. Still, I am relieved to hear you say that you are glad. It simplifies the present for us, and that is what we are to discuss."

"You are very, very beautiful, and young, and unhappy," he said irrelevantly, a darker glow in his cheeks. She smiled serenely, without a trace of diffidence or protest.

"I can almost believe it, you say it so convincingly," she said. For a moment she relaxed luxuriantly into an att.i.tude of physical enjoyment of herself, surveying her toe-tips with a thoughtfulness that comprehended more; and then as abruptly came back to the business of the moment. "You must not spoil it all by saying it too fervently," she went on with a smile of warning. He gave a short laugh of confusion and sank back in the chair.

"You have never tried to make love to me," she went on. "That's what I like about you. I think most men are silly, not because I am so very young, but because my husband is so ridiculously old. Don't you think so? But, never mind! I see you are quite eager to answer--that's enough.

Take another cigarette and--listen to what I am going to say." He declined the cigarette with a shake of his head.