The baron laughed."You will have to take luck with me in the stable-barrack; the chateau is filled.The armory has been turned into a ballroom, and the guard out of it.""Lead on!" said Maurice.
At the entrance to the guardroom, which occupied the left wing of the stables, stood a Lieutenant of the hussars.
"This is Monsieur Carewe," said the baron, "who will occupy a corner in the guardroom.""Ah! Monsieur Carewe," waving his hand cavalierly; "happy to see you again."Maurice was growing weary of his name.
"Enter," said the baron, opening the door.
Maurice entered, but not without suspicion.However, he was in a hurry to mingle with the gay assembly in the chateau.But that body was doomed to proceed without the honor or the knowledge of his distinguished presence.Several troopers were lounging about.
At the sight of the baron they rose.
"Messieurs," he said, "this is Monsieur Carewe, who was expected.""Glad to see you!" they sang out in chorus.They bowed ironically.
Maurice gazed toward the door.As he did so four pairs of arms enveloped him, and before he could offer the slightest resistance, he was bound hand and foot, a scarf was tied over his mouth, and he was pushed most disrespectfully into a chair.
The baron's mouth was twisted out of shape, and the troopers were smiling.
"My faith! but this is the drollest affair I ever was in;" and the baron sat on the edge of the table and held his sides.
"Monsieur Carewe! Ha! ha! You are a little too stiff to dance, eh? Shall I tender your excuses to the ladies? Ass! did you dream for a moment that such canaille as you, might show your countenance to any save the scullery maids? Too stiff to dance!
Ye gods, but that was rich! And you had the audacity to return here! I must go; the thing is killing me." He slipped off the table, red in the face and choking."The telegraph has its uses;it came ahead of you.We trembled for fear you would not come!
Men, guard him as your lives, while I report to Madame, I dare say she will make it droller in the telling."He stepped to the door, turned, looking into the prisoner's glaring eyes; he doubled up again."We are quits; I forgive you the broken arm; this laugh will repay me.How Madame the countess will laugh! And Duckwitz--the General will die of apoplexy! O, but you are a sorry ass; and how neatly we have clipped your ears!" And into the corridor he went, still laughing, heartily and joyously, as if what had taken place was one of the finest jests in the world.
Maurice, white and furious, was positive that he never would laugh again.And the most painful thought was that his honesty had brought him to this pass--or, was it his curiosity?
* * * * *
Fitzgerald stood alone in the library.The music of a Strauss waltz came indistinctly to him.He was troubled, and the speech of it lay in his eyes.From time to time he drummed on the window sill, and followed with his gaze the shadowy forms on the lawns.He was not a part of this fairy scene.He was out of place.So many young and beautiful women eyeing him curiously confused him.In every glance he innocently read his disgrace.
At Madame's request he had dressed himself in the uniform of a Lieutenant-Colonel, which showed how deeply he was in the toils.
Though it emphasized the elegant proportions of his figure, it sat uncomfortably upon him.His vanity was not equal to his sense of guilt.The uniform was a livery of dishonor.He could not distort it into a virtue, try as he would.He lacked that cunning artifice which a man of the world possesses, that of winning over to the right a misdeed.
And Carewe, on whose honesty he would have staked his life, Carewe had betrayed him.Why, he could not conceive.He saw how frail his house of love was.A breath and it was gone.What he had until to-day deemed special favors were favors common to all these military dandies.They, too, could kiss Madame's hand, and he could do no more.And yet she held him.Did she love him? He could not tell.All he knew was that it was impossible not to love her.And to-night he witnessed the culmination of the woman beautiful, and it dazzled him, filled him with fears and oppressions....To bind her hand and foot, to carry her by force to the altar, if need; to call her his in spite of all.
If she were playing with him, making a ball of his heart and her fancy a cup, she knew not of the slumbering lion within.He himself was but dimly conscious of it.Princess? That did not matter.Since that morning the veil had fallen from his eyes, but he had said nothing; he was waiting for her to speak.Would she laugh at him? No, no! The knowledge that had come to him had transformed wax into iron.Princess? She was the woman who had promised to be his wife.
Only two candles burned on the mantel-piece.The library was a room apart from the festivities.A soft, rose-colored darkness pervaded the room.Presently a darker shadow tiptoed over the threshold.He turned, and the shadow approached.Madame's gray eyes, full of lambent fires, looked into his own.
"I was seeking you," she said.The jewels in her hair threw a kind of halo above her head.
"Have I the happiness to be necessary to you?" he asked.
"You have not been enjoying yourself."
