The Bronze Eagle

Chapter 8

THE SOUND OF REVELRY BY NIGHT

I

But the hand had lost its cunning, the mighty brain its indomitable will-power. Genius was still there, but it was cramped now by indecision--the indecision born of a sense of enmity around, suspicion where there should have been nothing but enthusiasm, and the blind devotion of the past.

The man who, all alone, by the force of his personality and of his prestige had reconquered France, who had been acclaimed from the Gulf of Jouan to the gates of the Tuileries as the saviour of France, the people's Emperor, the beloved of the nation returned from exile, the man who on the 20th of March had said with his old vigour and his old pride: "Failure is the nightmare of the feeble! impotence, the refuge of the poltroon!" the man who had marched as in a dream from end to end of France to find himself face to face with the whole of Europe in league against him, with a million men being hastily armed to hurl him from his throne again, now found the south of France in open revolt, the west ready to rise against him, the north in accord with his enemies.

He has not enough men to oppose to those millions, his arsenals are depleted, his treasury empty. And after he has worked sixteen hours out of the twenty-four at reorganising his army, his finances, his machinery of war, he has to meet a set of apathetic or openly hostile ministers, constitutional representatives, men who are ready to thwart him at every turn, jealous only of curtailing his power, of obscuring his ascendency, of clipping the eagle's wings, ere it soars to giddy heights again. And to them he must give in, from them he must beg, entreat: give up, give up all the time one hoped-for privilege after another, one power after another.

He yields the military dictatorship to other--far less competent--hands; he grants liberty to the press, liberty of debate, liberty of election, liberty to all and sundry: but suspicion lurks around him; they suspect his sincerity, his goodwill, they doubt his promises, they mistrust that dormant Olympian ambition which has precipitated France into humiliation and brought the strangers' armies within her gates.

The same man was there--the same genius who even now could have mastered all the enemies of France and saved her from her present subjection and European insignificance, but the men round him were not the same. He, the guiding hand, was still there, but the machinery no longer worked as it had done in the past before disaster had blunted and stiffened the temper of its steel.

The men around the Emperor were not now as they were in the days of Jena and Austerlitz and Wagram. Their characters and temperaments had undergone a change. Disaster had brought on slackness, the past year of constant failures had engendered a sense of discouragement and demoralisation, a desire to argue, to foresee difficulties, to foretell further disasters.

He saw it all well enough--he the man with the far-seeing mind and the eagle-eyes that missed nothing--neither a look of indecision, nor an indication of revolt. He saw it all but he could do nothing, for he too felt overwhelmed by that wave of indecision and of discouragement. Faith in himself, energy in action, had gone. He envisaged the possibility of a vanquished and dismembered France.

Above all he had lost belief in his Star: the star of his destiny which, rising over the small island of Corsica, shining above a humble middle-class home, had guided him step by step, from triumph to triumph, to the highest pinnacle of glory to which man's ambition has ever reached.

That star had been dimmed once, its radiance was no longer unquenchable: "Destiny has turned against me," he said, "and in her I have lost my most valuable helpmate."

And now the whole of Europe had declared war against him, and in a final impassioned speech he turns to his ministers and to the representatives of his people: "Help me to save France!" he begs, "afterwards we'll settle our quarrels."

One hundred days after he began his dream-march, from the gulf of Jouan in the wake of his eagle, he started from Paris with the Army which he loved and which alone he trusted, to meet Europe and his fate on the plains of Belgium.

II

And in Brussels they danced, danced late into the night. No one was to know that within the next three days the destinies of the whole world would be changed by the hand of God.

And how to hide from timid eyes the sense of this oncoming destiny? how to stop for a few brief hours the flow of women's tears?

The ball should have been postponed--Her Grace of Richmond was willing that it should be so. How could men and women dance, flirt and make merry while Death was already reckoning the heavy toll of brave young lives which she would demand on the morrow? But who knows England who has not seen her at the hour of danger?

Put off the ball? why! perish the thought! The timid townsfolk of Brussels or the ladies of the French royalist party who were in great numbers in the city might think there was something amiss. What was amiss? some gallant young men would go on the morrow and conquer or die for England's honour! there's nothing amiss in that! Why put off the ball? The girls would be disappointed--they who like to dance--why should they be deprived of partners, just because some of them would lie dead on the battlefield to-morrow?

Open your salons, Madame la Duchesse! The soldiers of Britain will come to your ball. They will laugh and dance and flirt to-night as bravely as they will die to-morrow.

The sands of life are running low for them: in a few hours perhaps a bullet, a bayonet, who knows? will cut short that merry laugh, still the gallant heart that even now takes a last and fond farewell from a blushing partner, after a waltz, in a sweet-scented alcove with sounds of soft and distinct music around that stills the coming cannon's roar.

Gordon and Lancey, Crawford and Ponsonby and Halkett, aye! and Wellington too! What immortal names are spoken by the flunkeys to-night as they usher in these brave men into the hostess' presence. The ballroom is brilliantly illuminated with hundreds of wax candles, the women have put on their pretty dresses, displaying bare arms and dazzling shoulders; the men are in showy uniforms, glittering with stars and decorations: Orange, Brunswick, Nassau, English, Belgian, Scottish, French, all are there gay with gold and silver braid.

The confusion of tongues is greater surely than round the tower of Babel. German and French and English, Scots accent and Irish brogue, pedantic Hanoverian and lusty Brunswick tones, all and more of these varied sounds mingle with one another, and half-drown by their clamour the sweet strains of the Viennese orchestra that discoursed dreamy waltzes from behind a bower of crimson roses; whilst ponderous Flemish wives of city burgomasters gaze open-mouthed at the elegant ladies of the old French noblesse, and shy Belgian misses peep enviously at their more self-reliant English friends.

And the hostess smiles equally graciously to all: she is ready with a bright word of welcome for everybody now, just as she will be anon with a mute look of farewell, when--at ten o'clock--by Wellington's commands, one by one, one officer after another will slip out of this hospitable house, out into the rainy night, for a hurried visit to lodgings or barracks to collect a few necessaries, and then to work--to horse or march--to form into the ranks of battle as they had formed for the quadrille--squares to face the enemy--advance, deploy as they had done in the mazes of the dance! to fight as they had danced! to give their life as they had given a kiss.

Bobby Clyffurde only saw Crystal de Cambray from afar. He had his commission in Colin Halkett's brigade; his orders were the same as those of many others to-night: to put in an appearance at Her Grace's ball, to dispel any fears that might be confided to him through a fair partner's lips: to show confidence, courage and gaiety, and at ten o'clock to report for duty.

But the crowd in the ball-room was great, and Crystal de Cambray was the centre of a very close and exclusive little crowd, as indeed were all the ladies of the old French noblesse, who were here in their numbers. They had left their country in the wake of their dethroned king and despite the anxieties and sorrows of the past three months, while the star of the Corsican adventurer seemed to shine with renewed splendour, and that of the unfortunate King of France to be more and more on the wane, they had somehow filled the sleepy towns of Belgium--Ghent, Brussels, Charleroi--with the atmosphere of their own elegance and their unimpeachable good taste.

Clyffurde knew that the Comte de Cambray had settled in Brussels with his daughter and sister, pending the new turn in the fortunes of his cause: the English colony there provided the royalist fugitives with many friends, and Ghent was already overfull with the immediate entourage of the King. But Bobby had never met either the Comte or Crystal again.

He had crossed over to England almost directly after that final and fateful interview with them: he had obtained his commission and was back again in Belgium--as a fighting man, ready for the work which was expected from Britain's sons by the whole of Europe now.

And to-night he saw her again. His instinct, intuition, prescience, what you will, had told him that he would meet her here--and to his weary eyes, when first he caught sight of her across the crowded room, she had never seemed more exquisite, nor more desirable. She was dressed all in white, with arms and shoulders bare, her fair hair dressed in the quaint mode of the moment with a high comb and a multiplicity of curls. She had a bunch of white roses in her belt and carried a shawl of gossamer lace that encircled her shoulders, like a diaphanous cobweb, through which gleamed the shimmering whiteness of her skin.

She did not see him of course: he was only one of so many in a crowd of English officers who were about to fight and to die for her country and her cause as much as for their own. But to him she was the only living, breathing person in the room--all the others were phantoms or puppets that had no tangible existence for him save as a setting, a background for her.

And poor Bobby would so gladly have thrown all pride to the winds for the right to run straight to her across the width of the room, to fall at her feet, to encircle her knees, and to wring from her a word of comfort or of trust. So strong was this impulse, that for one moment it seemed absolutely irresistible; but the next she had turned to Maurice de St. Genis, who was never absent from her side, and who seemed to hover over her with an air of proprietorship and of triumphant mastery which caused poor Bobby to grind his heel into the oak floor, and to smother a bitter curse which had risen insistent to his lips.

III

Madame la Duchesse d'Agen spoke to him once, while he stood by watching Crystal's dainty form walking through the mazes of a quadrille with her hand in that of St. Genis.

"They look well matched, do they not, Mr. Clyffurde?" Madame said in broken English and with something of her usual tartness; "and you? are you not going to recognise old friends, may I ask?"

He turned abruptly, whilst the hot blood rushed up to his cheek, so sudden had been the wave of memory which flooded his brain, at the sound of Madame's sharp voice. Now he stooped and kissed the slender little hand which was being so cordially held out to him.

"Old friends, Madame la Duchesse?" he queried with a quick sigh of bitterness. "Nay! you forget that it was as a traitor and a liar that you knew me last."

"It was as a young fool that I knew you all the time," she retorted tartly, even though a kindly look and a kindly smile tempered the gruffness of her sally. "The male creature, my dear Mr. Clyffurde," she added, "was intended by God and by nature to be a selfish beast. When he ceases to think of himself, he loses his bearings, flounders in a quagmire of unprofitable heroism which benefits no one, and generally behaves like a fool."

"Did I do all that?" asked Clyffurde with a smile.

"All of it and more. And look at the muddle you have made of things. Crystal has never got over that miserably aborted engagement of hers to de Marmont, and is no happier now with Maurice de St. Genis than she would have been with . . . well! with anybody else who had had the good sense to woo and win her in a straightforward, proper and selfish masculine way."

"Mademoiselle de Cambray, I understand," rejoined Clyffurde stiffly, "is formally affianced now to M. de St. Genis."

"She is not formally affianced, as you so pedantically and affectedly put it, my friend," replied Madame with her accustomed acerbity. "But she probably will marry him, if he comes out of this abominable war alive, and if the King of France . . . whom may God protect--comes into his own again. For His Majesty has taken those two young jackanapes under his most gracious protection, and has promised Maurice a lucrative appointment at his court--if he ever has a court again."

"Then Mademoiselle de Cambray must be very happy, for which--if I dare say so--I am heartily rejoiced."

"So am I," said the Duchesse drily, "but let me at the same time tell you this: I have always known that Englishmen were peculiarly idiotic in certain important matters of life, but I must say that I had no idea idiocy could reach the boundless proportions which it has done in your case. Well!" she added with sudden gentleness, "farewell for the present, mon preux chevalier: it is not too late, remember, to bear in mind certain old axioms both of chivalry and of commonsense--the most obvious of which is that nothing is gained by sitting open-mouthed, whilst some one else gets the largest helpings at supper. And if it is any comfort to you to know that I never believed St. Genis' story of lonely inns, of murderous banditti and whatnots, well then, I give you that information for what you may choose to make of it."

And with a final friendly nod and a gentle pressure of her aristocratic hand on his, which warmed and comforted Bobby's sore heart, she turned away from him and was quickly swallowed up by the crowd.

IV

In spite of rain and blustering wind outside the fine ballroom--as the evening progressed--became unpleasantly hot. Dancing was in full swing and the orchestra had just struck up the first strains of that inspiriting new dance--the latest importation from Vienna--a dreamy waltz of which dowagers strongly disapproved, deeming it licentious, indecent, and certainly ungraceful, but which the young folk delighted in, and persisted in dancing, defying the mammas and all the proprieties.

Maurice de St. Genis after the last quadrille had led Crystal away from the ballroom to a small boudoir adjoining it, where the cool air from outside fanned the curtains and hangings and stirred the leaves and petals of a bank of roses that formed a background to a couple of seats--obviously arranged for the convenience of two persons who desired quiet conversation well away from prying eyes and ears.

Here Crystal had been sitting with Maurice for the past quarter of an hour, while from the ballroom close by came as in a dream to her the gentle lilt of the waltz, and from behind her, a cluster of sweet-scented crimson roses filled the air with their fragrance. Crystal didn't feel that she wanted to talk, only to sit here quietly with the sound of the music in her ears and the scent of roses in her nostrils. Maurice sat beside her, but he did not hold her hand. He was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and he talked much and earnestly, the while she listened half absently, like one in a dream.

She had often heard, in the olden days in England, her aunt speak of the strange doings of that Doctor Mesmer in Paris who had even involved proud Marie Antoinette in an unpleasant scandal with his weird incantations and wizard-like acts, whereby people--sensible women and men--were sent at his will into a curious torpor, which was neither sleep nor yet wakefulness, and which produced a yet more strange sense of unreality and dreaminess, and visions of things unsubstantial and unearthly.

And sitting here surrounded with roses and with that languorous lilt in her ear, Crystal felt as if she too were under the influence of some unseen Mesmer, who had lulled the activity of her brain into a kind of wakeful sleep even while her senses remained keenly, vitally on the alert. She knew, for instance, that Maurice spoke of the coming struggle, the final fight for King and country. He had been enrolled in a Nassau regiment, under the command of the Prince of Orange: he expected to be in the thick of a fight to-morrow. "Bonaparte never waits," Crystal heard him say quite distinctly, "he is always ready to attack. Audacity and a bold use of his artillery were always his most effectual weapons."

And he went on to tell her of his own plans, his future, his hopes: he spoke of the possibility of death and of this being a last farewell. Crystal tried to follow him, tried to respond when he spoke of his love for her--a love, the strength of which--he said--she would never be able to gauge.

"If it were not for the strength of my love for you, Crystal," he said almost fiercely, "I could not bear to face possible death to-morrow . . . not without telling you . . . not without making reparation for my sin."

And still in that curious trance-like sense of aloofness, Crystal murmured vaguely:

"Sin, Maurice? What sin do you mean?"

But he did not seem to give her a direct reply: he spoke once more only of his love. "Love atones for all sins!" he reiterated once or twice with passionate earnestness. "Even God puts Love above everything on earth. Love is an excuse for everything. Love justifies everything. Such love as I have for you, Crystal, makes everything else--even sin, even cowardice--seem insignificant and meaningless."

She agreed with what he said, for indeed she felt too tired to argue the point, or even to get his sophistry into her head. Strangely enough she felt out of tune with him to-night--with him--Maurice--the lover of her girlhood, the man from whom she had parted with such desperate heartache three months ago, in the avenue at Brestalou. Then it had seemed as if the world could never hold any happiness for her again, once Maurice had gone out of her life. Now he had come back into it. Chance and the favour of the King had once more made a future happy union with him possible. She ought to have been supremely happy, yet she was out of tune. His passionate words of love found only a cold response in her heart.

For the past three months she had constantly been at war with her own self for this: she hated and despised herself for that numbness of the heart which had so unaccountably taken all the zest and the joy out of her life. Does one love one day and become indifferent the next? What had become of the girlish love that had invested Maurice de St. Genis with the attributes of a hero? What had he done that the pedestal on which her ideality had hoisted him should have proved of such brittle clay?

He was still the gallant, high-born, well-bred gentleman whom she had always known; he was on the eve of fighting for his King and country, ready to give his life for the same cause which she loved so ardently; he was even now speaking tender words of love and of farewell. Yet she was out of tune with him. His words of Love almost irritated her, for they dragged her out of that delicious dream-like torpor which momentarily peopled the world for her with gold-headed, white-winged mysterious angels, and filled the air with soft murmurings and sweet sounds, and a divine fragrance that was not of this earth.

It must have been that she grew very sleepy--probably the heat weighed her eyelids down--certainly she found it impossible to keep her eyes open, and Maurice apparently thought that she felt faint. Always in the same vague way she heard him making suggestions for her comfort: "Could he get her some wine?" or "Should he try and find Madame la Duchesse?"

Then she realised how she longed for a little rest, for perfect solitude, for perfect freedom to give herself over to the sweet torpor which paralysed her brain and limbs--tired, sleepy, or under the subtle influence of some mysterious agency--she did not know which she was; but she did know that she would have given everything she could at this moment for a few minutes' complete solitude.

So she contrived to smile and to look up almost gaily into Maurice's anxious face: "I think really, Maurice," she said, "I am just a little bit sleepy. If I could remain alone for five minutes, I would go honestly to sleep and not be ashamed of myself. Could you . . . could you just leave me for five or ten minutes? . . . and . . . and, Maurice, will you draw that screen a little nearer? . . ." she added, affecting a little yawn; "nobody can see me then . . . and really, really I shall be all right . . . if I could have a few minutes' quiet sleep."

"You shall, Crystal, of course you shall," said Maurice, eager and anxious to do all that she wanted. He arranged a cushion behind her head, put a footstool to her feet and pulled the screen forward so that now--where she sat--no one could see her from the ballroom, and as in response to repeated encores from the dancers, the orchestra had embarked upon a new waltz, she was not likely to be disturbed.

"I'll try and find Mme. la Duchesse," he said after he had assured himself that she was quite comfortable, "and tell her that you are quite well, but must not be disturbed."

She caught his hand and gave it a little squeeze.

"You are kind, Maurice," she murmured.

She felt exactly like a tired child, now that she had been made so comfortable, and she liked Maurice so much, oh! so much! no brother could have been dearer.

"You won't go way without waking me, Maurice," she said as he bent down to kiss her.

"No, no, of course not," he replied; "it still wants a quarter before ten."

The screen shut off all the glare from the candles. The sense of isolation was complete and delicious: the roses smelt very sweet, the soft strains of the waltz sounded like elfin music.

V

Like elfin music--tender, fitful, dreamy!--an exquisite languor stole into Crystal's limbs. She was not asleep, yet she was in dreamland--all alone in semi-darkness, that was restful and soothing, and with the fragrance of crimson roses in her nostrils and their velvety petals brushing against her cheek.

Like elfin music!--sweet strains of infinite sadness--the tune of the Infinite mingling with the semblance of reality!

Like elfin music--or like the voice of a human being in pain--the note of sadness became the only real note now!

What really happened after this Crystal never rightly knew. Whenever in the future her memory went back to this hour, she could not be sure whether in truth she had been waking or dreaming, or at what precise moment she became fully conscious of a presence close beside her--just behind the bank of roses--and of a voice--low, earnest, quivering with passionate emotion--that reached her ear as if through the tender melodies played by the orchestra.

It almost seemed to her--when she thought over all the circumstances in her mind--that she must have been subtly conscious of the presence all along--all the while that Maurice was still with her and she felt so curiously languid, longing only for darkness and solitude.

Something encompassed her now that she could not define: the warmth of Love, the sense of protection and security--almost as if unseen arms, that were strong and devoted and selfless, held her closely, shielding her from evil and from the taint of selfish human passions.

And presently she heard her name--whispered low and with a note of tender appeal.

Her eyes were closed and she paid no heed: but the appeal was once more whispered--this time more insistently, and almost against her will she murmured:

"Who calls?"

"An unfortunate whom you hate and despise, and who would have given his life to serve you."

"Who is it?" she reiterated.

"A poor heart-broken wretch who could not keep away from your side, and longed for one more sound of your voice even though it uttered words more cruel than man can stand."

"What would you like to hear?"

"One word of comfort to ease that terrible sting of hate which has burned into my very soul, till every minute of life has become unendurable agony."

"How could I know," she asked, and now her eyes were wide open, gazing out into nothingness, not turned yet in the direction whence that dream-voice came: "how could I know that my hatred made you suffer or that you cared for comfort from me?"

"How could you know, Crystal?" the voice replied. "You could know that, my dear, just as surely as you know that in a stormy night the sky is dark, just as you know that when heavy clouds obscure the blue ether above, no ray of sunshine warms the shivering earth. Just as you know that you are beautiful and exquisite, so you knew, Crystal, that I loved you from the deepest depths of my soul."

"How could I guess?"

"By that subtle sense which every human being has. And you did guess it, Crystal, else you would not have hated me as you did."

"I hated you because I thought you a traitor."

"Is it too late to swear to you that my only thought was to serve you? . . ."

"By working against my King and country?" she retorted with just this one brief flash of her old vehemence.

"By working for my country and for yours. This I swear by your sweet eyes--by your dear mouth that hurt me so cruelly that evening--I swear it by the damnable agony which you made me endure . . . by the abject cowardice which dragged me to your side now like a whining wretch that craves for a crumb of comfort . . . by all that you have made me suffer. . . . Crystal, I swear to you that I was never false . . . false, great God! when with every drop of my blood, with every fibre of my heart, with every nerve, every sinew, every thought I love you."

The voice was so low, never above a whisper, and all around her Crystal felt again that delicious sense of warmth--the breath of Love that brings man's heart so near to God--the sense of security in a man's all-encompassing Love which women prize above everything else on earth.

The music was just an accompaniment to that low, earnest whispering; the soft strains of the violins made it still seem like a voice that comes through a veil of dreams. Instinctively Crystal began to hum the waltz-tune and her little head with its quaint coronet of fair curls beat time to the languid lilt.

"Will you dance with me, Crystal?"

"No! no!" she protested.

"Just once--to-night. To-morrow we fight--let us dance to-night."

And before she could protest further, her will seemed to fall away from her: she knew that her father, her aunt would be angry, that--as like as not--Maurice would make a scene. She knew that Maurice--to whom she had plighted her troth--had branded this man as a liar and a traitor: her father believed him to be a traitor, and she . . . Well! what had he done to disprove Maurice's accusations? A few words of passionate protestations! . . . Did they count? . . . He wore his King's uniform--many careless adventurers did that these strenuous times! . . .

And he wanted her to dance . . . ! how could she--Crystal de Cambray, the future wife of the Marquis de St. Genis, the cynosure of a great many eyes to-night--how could she show herself in public on his arm, in a crowded ballroom?

Yet she could not refuse. She could not. Surely it was all a dream, and in a dream man is but the slave of circumstance and has no will of his own.

She was very young and loved to dance: and she had heard that Englishmen danced well. Besides, it was all a dream. She would wake in a moment or two and find herself sitting quietly among the roses with Maurice beside her, telling her of his love, and of their happy future together.

VI

But in the meanwhile the dream was lasting. Her partner was a perfect dancer, and this new, delicious waltz--inspiriting yet languorous, rhythmical and half barbaric--sent a keen feeling of joy and of zest into Crystal's whole being.

She was not conscious of the many stares that were levelled at her as she suddenly appeared among the crowd in the ballroom, her face flushed with excitement, her perfect figure moving with exquisite grace to the measure of the dance.

The last dance together!

A few moments before, Clyffurde had made his way to the small boudoir in search of fresh air, and had withdrawn to a window embrasure away from a throng that maddened him in his misery of loneliness: then he realised that Crystal was sitting quite close to him, that St. Genis, who had been in constant attendance on her, presently left her to herself and that without even moving from where he was he could whisper into her ear that which had lain so heavily on his heart that at times he had felt that it must break under the intolerable load.

Then as the soft strains of the music from the orchestra struck upon his ear, the insistent whim seized him to make her dance with him, just once--to-night. To-morrow the cannon would roar once more--to-morrow Europe would make yet another stand against the bold adventurer whom seemingly nothing could crush.

To-morrow a bullet--a bayonet--a sword-thrust--but to-night a last dance together.

Those whims come at times to those who are doomed to die. Clyffurde's one hope of peace lay in death upon the battlefield. Life was empty now. He had fought against the burden of loneliness left upon him when Crystal passed finally out of his life. But the burden had proved unconquerable. Only death could ease him of the load: for life like this was stupid and intolerable.

Men would die within the next few days in their hundreds and in their thousands: men who were happy, who had wives and children, men on whose lives Love shed its happy radiance. Then why not he? who was more lonely than any man on earth--left lonely because the one woman who filled all the world for him, hated him and was gone from him for ever.

But a last dance with her to-night! The right to hold her in his arms! this he had never done, though his muscles had often ached with the longing to hold her. But dancing with her he could feel her against him, clasp her closely, feel her breath against his cheek.

She was not very tall and her head--had she chosen--could just have rested in the hollow of his shoulder. The thought of it sent the blood rushing hotly to his head and with his two strong hands he would at that moment have bent a bar of iron, or smashed something to atoms, in order to crush that longing to curse against Fate, against his destiny that had so wantonly dangled happiness before him, only to thrust him into utter loneliness again.

Then he spoke to her--and finally asked for the dance.

And now he held her, and guided her through the throng, her tiny feet moving in unison with his. And all the world had vanished: he had her to himself, for these few happy moments he could hold her and refuse to let her go. He did not care--nor did she--that many curious and some angry glances followed their every movement. Till the last bar was played, till the final chord was struck she was absolutely his--for she had given up her will to him.

The last dance together! He sent his heart to her, all his heart--and the music helped him, and the rhythm; the very atmosphere of the room--rose-scented--helped him to make her understand. He could have kissed her hair, so close were the heaped-up fair curls to his mouth; he could have whispered to her, and nobody would hear: he could have told her something at any rate, of that love which had filled his heart since all time, not months or years since he had known her, but since all time filling every minute of his life. He could have taught her what love meant, thrilled her heart with thoughts of might-have-been; he could have roused sweet pity in her soul, love's gentle mother that has the power to give birth to Love.

But he did not kiss her, nor did he speak: because though he was quite sure that she would understand, he was equally sure that she could not respond. She was not his--not his in the world of realities, at any rate. Her heart belonged to the friend of her childhood, the only man whom she would ever love--the man by whom he--poor Bobby!--had been content to be defamed and vilified in order that she should remain happy in her ideals and in her choice. So he was content only to hold her, his arm round her waist, one hand holding hers imprisoned--she herself becoming more and more the creature of his dreams, the angel that haunted him in wakefulness and in sleep: immortally his bride, yet never to be wholly his again as she was now in this heavenly moment where they stood together within the pale of eternity.

In this, their last dance together!

VII

Far into the night, into the small hours of the morning, Crystal de Cambray sat by the open window of her tiny bedroom in the small apartment which her father had taken for himself and his family in the rue du Marais.

She sat, with one elbow resting on the window-sill, her right hand fingering, with nervy, febrile movements, a letter which she held. Jeanne had handed it to her when she came home from the ball: M. de St. Genis, Jeanne explained, had given it to her earlier in the evening . . . soon after ten o'clock it must have been . . . M. le Marquis seemed in a great hurry, but he made Jeanne swear most solemnly that Mademoiselle Crystal should have the letter as soon as she came home . . . also M. le Marquis had insisted that the letter should be given to Mademoiselle when she was alone.

Not a little puzzled--for had she not taken fond leave of Maurice shortly before ten o'clock, when he had told her that his orders were to quit the ball then and report himself at once at headquarters. He had seemed very despondent, Crystal thought, and the words which he spoke when finally he kissed her, had in them all the sadness of a last farewell. Crystal even had felt a tinge of remorse--when she saw how sad he was--that she had not responded more warmly to his kiss. It almost seemed as if her heart rebelled against it, and when he pressed her with his accustomed passionate ardour to his breast, she had felt a curious shrinking within herself, a desire to push him away, even though her whole heart went out to him with pity and with sorrow.

And now here was this letter. Crystal was a long time before she made up her mind to open it: the paper--damp with the rain--seemed to hold a certain fatefulness within its folds. At last she read the letter, and long after she had read it she sat at the open window, listening to the dreary, monotonous patter of the rain, and to the distant sounds of moving horses and men, the rattle of wheels, the bugle calls, the departure of the allied troops to meet the armies of the great adventurer on the billowing plains of Belgium.

This is what Maurice had written to her a few moments before he left; and it must have taken him some time to pen the lengthy epistle.

"MY BEAUTIFUL CRYSTAL,

"I may never come back. Something tells me that my life, such as it is--empty and worthless enough, God knows--has nearly run its full course. But if I do come back to claim the happiness which your love holds out for me,--I will not face you again with so deep a stain upon mine honour. I did not tell you before because I was too great a coward. I could not bear to think that you would despise me--I could not encounter the look of contempt in your eyes: so I remained silent to the call of honour. And now I speak because the next few hours will atone for everything. If I come back you will forgive. If I fall you will mourn. In either case I shall be happy that you know. Crystal! in all my life I spoke only one lie, and that was three months ago, when I set out to reclaim the King's money, which had been filched from you on the high road, and returned empty-handed. I found the money and I found the thief. No thief he, Crystal, but just a quixotic man, who desired to serve his country, our cause and you. That man was your friend Mr. Clyffurde. I don't think that I was ever jealous of him. I am not jealous of him now. Our love, Crystal, is too great and too strong to fear rivalry from anyone. He had taken the money from you because he knew that Victor de Marmont, with a strong body of men to help him, would have filched it from you for the benefit of the Corsican. He took the money from you because he knew that neither you nor the Comte would have listened to any warnings from him. He took the money from you with the sole purpose of conveying it to the King. Then I found him and taunted him, until the temptation came to me to act the part of a coward and a traitor. And this I did, Crystal, only because I loved you--because I knew that I could never win you while I was poor and in humble circumstances. I soon found out that Clyffurde was a friend. I begged him to let me have the money so that I might take it to the King and earn consideration and a reward thereby. That was my sin, Crystal, and also that I lied to you to disguise the sorry r** which I had played. Clyffurde gave me the money because I told him how we loved one another--you and I--and that happiness could only come to you through our mutual love. He acted well, though in truth I meant to do him no wrong. Later Victor de Marmont came upon me, and wrested the money from me, and I was helpless to guard that for which I had played the part of a coward.

"I have eased my soul by telling you this, Crystal, and I know that no hard thoughts of me will dwell in your mind whilst I do all that a man can do for honour, King and country.

"Remember that the next few hours, perhaps, will atone for everything, and that Love excuses all things.

"Yours in love and sorrow,

"MAURICE."

The letter, crumpled and damp, remained in Crystal's hand all the while that she sat by the open window, and the sound of moving horses and men in the distance conjured up before her eyes mental visions of all that to-morrow might mean. The letter was damp with her tears now, they had fallen incessantly on the paper while she re-read it a second time and then re-read it again.

A quixotic man! Maurice said airily. How little he understood! How well she--Crystal--knew what had been the motive of that quixotic action. She had learned so much to-night in the mazes of a waltz. Now, when she closed her eyes, she could still feel the dreamy motion with that strong arm round her, and she could hear the sweet, languid lilt of the music, and all the delicious elvish whisperings that reached her ear through the monotonous cadence of the dance. Of what her heart had felt then, she need now no longer be ashamed: all that should shame her now were her thoughts in the past, the belief that the hand which had held hers on that evening--long ago--in Brestalou could possibly have been the hand of a traitor: that the low-toned voice that spoke to her so earnestly of friendship then could ever be raised for the utterance of a lie.

Of such thoughts indeed she could be ashamed, and of her cruelty that other night in Paris, when she had made him suffer so abominably through her injustice and her contempt.

"The next few hours, perhaps, will atone for everything," Maurice had added. Ah, well! perhaps! But they could not erase the past; they could not control the more distant future. Maurice would come back--Crystal prayed earnestly that he should--but Clyffurde was gone out of her life for ever. God alone knew how this renewed war would end! How could she hope ever to meet a friend who had gone away determined never to see her again?

A last dance together! Well! they had had it! and that was the end. The end of a sweet romance that had had no beginning. He had gone now, as Maurice had gone, as all the men had gone who had listened to their country's call, and she, Crystal, could not convey to him even by a message, by a word, that she understood all that he had done for her, all that his actions had meant of devotion, of self-effacement, of pure and tender Love.

A last dance together, and that had been the end. Even thoughts of him would be forbidden her after this: for her thoughts were no longer free of him, her heart was no longer free; her promise belonged to Maurice, but her heart, her thoughts were no longer hers to give.

It was all too late! too late! the next few hours might atone for the past but they could not call it back.

Weary and heart-sick Crystal crawled into bed when the grey light of dawn peeped cold and shy into her room. She could not sleep, but she lay quite still while one by one those distant sounds died away in the misty morning. In this semi-dreamlike state it seemed to her as if she must be able to distinguish the sound of his horse's hoofs from among a thousand others: it seemed as if something in herself must tell her quite plainly where he was, what he did, when he got to horse, which way he went. And presently she closed her eyes against the grey, monotonous light, and during one brief moment she felt deliciously conscious of a sweet, protecting presence somewhere near her, of soft whisperings of fondness and of friendship: the sound of a dream-voice reached her ear and once again as in the sweet-scented alcove she felt herself murmuring: "Who calls?" and once more she heard the tender wailing as of a stricken soul in pain: "A poor heart-broken wretch who could not keep away from your side."

And memory-echoes lingered round her, bringing back every sound of his mellow voice, every look in his eyes, the touch of his hand--oh! that exquisite touch!--and his last words before he asked her to dance: "With every drop of my blood, with every nerve, every sinew, every thought I love you."

And her heart with a long-drawn-out moan of unconquerable sorrow sent out into the still morning air its agonised call in reply:

"Come back, my love, come back! I cannot live without you! You have taught me what Love is--pure, selfless and protecting--you cannot go from me now--you cannot. In the name of that Love which your tender voice has brought into being, come back to me. Do not leave me desolate!"