The Greatest Historical Novels. Rafael Sabatini
yet. Madame sets out tomorrow for Turin. I am to accompany her Highness. My position at court demands it. I beg that you will not laugh, Monsieur Moreau.'
'I am not laughing, madame.'
'You have great self-restraint. I had already observed it.' The dimples showed again in her cheeks. Then she swept on: 'Madame's train has been reduced to vanishing-point by the King of Sardinia, who looks upon us as locusts. Her only ladies besides myself were to be the Duchess of Caylus and Madame de Gourbillon. But now, at the last moment, her Highness has insisted that Mademoiselle de Kercadiou be added. Do you perceive the aim, and what must follow? If she leaves Mademoiselle de Kercadiou in Coblentz, that may well be the last that she will ever see of her. You may be married, you two; or other circumstances may arise to prevent her from ever returning to court. But if mademoiselle remains at her side, in a month—in two months at most—when this campaign is ended, we shall be back at Versailles, and your Aline will again be dangled before Monsieur, whose heart may have grown fonder in the absence. You understand me, I think, Monsieur Moreau.'
'Oh, perfectly, madame.' His tone was stern and not without a touch of reproof. 'Even that in your calculations you leave out of all account Mademoiselle de Kercadiou's strength of character and virtue.'
The Countess de Balbi shrugged, pursed her full lips and smiled.
'Yes. You have the fine spirit of a lover: to regard the virtue of his mistress as a rock. But I, who am a mere woman, and who, therefore, know women, who have lived a little longer than you, and who have spent this life of mine in courts, I tell you that it is imprudent to ground your faith on nothing more. Virtue, when all is said, is an idea. And ideas are governed by environment. The environment of a court plays havoc with virtue, my friend. Accept my word for it. You know, at least, that nothing will so quickly wilt a woman's reputation as the attentions of a prince. There is a glamour about the office which no cloddishness in the holder can completely extinguish. Princes in a woman's eyes are heirs to all the romance of the ages even when they are as unromantic in themselves as our poor King Louis.'
'You tell me nothing that I do not know, madame.'
'Ah, true!' her irony flashed out again. 'I had almost forgotten that you are a republican.'
'Not so. I am a constitutional monarchist.'
'Faith, that's accounted even worse here at Coblentz.' She rose abruptly. 'I have said all that I came to say. The rest is for you.'
'And for Mademoiselle de Kercadiou.'
She looked at him, and shook her head. She set a dainty hand upon his arm. Her smile broke dazzlingly upon her roguish face. 'Are you so much the gentle, serving, docile lover? This will not answer. A woman needs to be ordered by the man to whom she has given the right. If you cannot prevent Mademoiselle de Kercadiou from going to Turin, why, faith, you do not deserve to win her, and you were better not to do so.'
André-Louis considered her gravely. 'I do not think that I am very clever with women, madame,' he confessed, and so far as I can discover it is the only lack of cleverness to which he ever did confess.
'You'll lack experience. Indeed, you have the air of it.' She drew still nearer to him. Her superb eyes glowed upon him, magnetically disturbing. 'Do you reserve for men all your audacity? Your enterprise?'
He laughed, ill-at-ease, bewildered, almost struggling with an odd intoxication.
She sighed. 'Why, yes. I fear you do. Well, well! Time may instruct you better. You shall be remembered in my prayers, Monsieur Moreau.'
She held out her hand to him. He took it and bent to kiss it. Almost, he says—which is fantastic—he was conscious of a response in it to the pressure of his lips.
'Madame,' he murmured, 'you leave me conscious of an obligation.'
'Repay me by your friendship, monsieur. Think kindly of Anne de Balbi, if only because she thinks kindly of you.'
She rustled out, flashed him a last smile as he held the door, and was gone, leaving him deeply perturbed and thoughtful.
Her judgment of him had been quite accurate, he knew. Masterful in all else, he had no masterfulness in love. And this because in love he saw no place for mastery. Love was not a thing to be snatched, constrained, compelled. To be worth possessing, it must be freely given.
Intensely practical in all else, in love he was entirely idealistic. How could he assume the master's tone, the overseer's whip, and command where he desired to worship? He could pray and plead. But if Aline should desire to go to Turin—and he could well understand her wish to see the world—upon what grounds was he to plead with her against it? What grounds existed? Had he so little faith in her that he must suppose her unable to withstand temptation? And what, after all, was the temptation? He smiled at the mental picture of the Comte de Provence as a wooer. To Aline in such a guise the Prince could only be ridiculous.
In his utter trust in Aline, André-Louis would have found peace but for another thought that assailed him. However Aline might be proof against temptation, he could not endure the thought of her being subjected to the pain and annoyance of an amorous persecution. Because of this possibility, he must oppose her journey to Turin. Since he could not hope to succeed by prayers and pleas, which would appear to be merely selfish and unreasonable, he would have recourse to Scaramouche's weapons of intrigue.
He sought his godfather, and stood by the bedside.
'You are desperately ill, sir,' he informed him.
The great night-capped head was agitated on its pillows; alarm dawned in the eyes. 'What do you tell me, André?'
'What we must both tell Aline. I have just learnt that it is Madame's intention to bear her off in her train to Turin. I know of no other way to oppose her going save by arousing her concern for you. Therefore, be good enough to become very ill, indeed.'
The greying eyebrows came together. 'To Turin! Ah! And you do not wish her to go?'
'Do you, monsieur?'
Monsieur de Kercadiou hesitated. The notion of parting with Aline was a little desolating. It would leave him very lonely in this exile amid his makeshift surroundings. But Monsieur de Kercadiou's life had been spent in preferring the wishes of others to his own.
'If it should be her desire ... life here would be so dull for the child ...'
'But infinitely healthier, monsieur.' André-Louis spoke of the perilous frivolity of court life. If Madame de Plougastel had also been in Madame's train, things would have been different. But in the circumstances Aline would be utterly alone. Her very inexperience would render her vulnerable to the vexations that lie in wait for a young lady of her attractions. And it was possible that, however eager she might now be at the prospect, once she found herself away from them in distant Savoy, she might be unhappy and they would not be at hand to avail her.
Monsieur de Kercadiou sat up in bed, and gave him reason. Thus it fell out that when Aline arrived a little later, she found two conspirators awaiting her.
André-Louis received her in the living-room. It was their first meeting since that sub-acid parting at Schönbornlust.
'I am so glad you have come, Aline. Monsieur de Kercadiou is not well at all. His condition gives me anxiety. It is fortunate that you are about to be relieved of your duties with Madame, for your uncle requires more attention than can be expected from strangers or than a clumsy fellow like myself is able to supply.'
He saw the dismay that overspread her face, and guessed that it sprang from more than concern for her uncle, however deep this might be in her tender heart. Her resolve to continue on her dignity with André-Louis was blotted out.
'I was to have accompanied Madame to Turin,' she said, in tones of deepest disappointment.
His heart leapt at the tense she already used.
'It's an ill wind that blows no good at all,' said he gently. 'You will be saved the discomforts of a tedious journey.'
'Tedious! Oh, André!'
He