HIS GUARDIAN ANGEL
Romanoff ceased speaking, and his eyes were fixed on the two streaks of
light.
"Who are you? What do you want?" he asked.
"I am here to bid you desist."
"And who are you?"
Slowly, between him and the light, a shadowy figure emerged. Second
after second its shape became more clearly outlined, until the form of a
woman appeared. But the face was obscure; it was dim and shadowy.
Romanoff's eyes were fixed on the figure; but he uttered no sound. His
tongue was dry, and cleaved to the roof of his mouth. His lips were
parched.
The face became plainer. Its lineaments were more clearly outlined. He
could see waves of light brown hair, eyes that were large and yearning
with a great tenderness and pity, yet lit up with joy and holy resolve.
A mouth tender as that of a child, but with all the firmness of mature
years. A haunting face it was, haunting because of its spiritual beauty,
its tenderness, its ineffable joy; and yet it was stern and strong.
It was the face of the woman whom Dick Faversham had seen in the
smoke-room of the outward-bound vessel years before, the face that had
appeared to him at the doorway of the great house at Wendover.
"You, you!" cried Romanoff at length. "You! Madaline?"
"Yes!"
"Why are you here?"
"To plead with you, to beseech you to let my son alone."
A change came over Romanoff's face as he heard the words. A new
strength seemed to have come to him. Confidence shone in his eyes, his
every feature spoke of triumph.
"Your son! His son!" he cried harshly. "The son of the man for whom you
cast me into the outer darkness. But for him you might have been the
mother of _my_ son, and I--I should not have been what I am."
"You are what you are because you have always yielded to the promptings
of evil," replied the woman. "That was why I never loved you--never
could love you."
"But you looked at me with eyes of love until he came."
"As you know, I was but a child, and when you came with your great name,
your great riches, you for a time fascinated me; but I never loved you.
I told you so before he came."
"But I loved you," said Romanoff hoarsely. "You, the simple country
girl, fascinated me, the Russian noble. And I would have withheld
nothing from you. Houses, lands, position, a great name, all--all were
yours if you would have been my wife. But you rejected me."
"I did not love you. I felt you were evil. I told you so."
"What of that? I loved you. I swore I would win you. But you--you--a
simple country girl, poor, ignorant of the world's ways, resisted me,
me--Romanoff. And you married that insipid scholar fellow, leaving me
scorned, rejected. And I swore I would be revenged, living or dead. Then
your child was born and you died. I could not harm you, you were beyond
me, but your son lived. And I swore again. If I could not harm you, I
could harm him, I could destroy him. I gave myself over to evil for
that. I, too, have passed through the doorway which the world calls
death; but powers have been given me, powers to carry out my oath. While
his father was alive, I could do nothing, but since then my work has
been going forward. And I shall conquer, I shall triumph."
"And I have come here to-night to plead with you on my son's behalf. He
has resisted wrong for a long time. Leave him in peace."
"Never," cried Romanoff. "You passed into heaven, but your heaven shall
be hell, for your son shall go there. He shall become even as I am. His
joy shall be in evil."
"Have you no pity, no mercy?"
"None," replied Romanoff. "Neither pity nor mercy have a place in me.
You drove me to hell, and it is my punishment that the only joy which
may be mine is the joy of what you call evil."
"Then have pity, have mercy on yourself."
"Pity on myself? Mercy on myself? You talk in black ignorance."
"No, I speak in light. Every evil you do only sinks you deeper in mire,
deeper in hell."
"I cannot help that. It is my doom."
"It is not your doom if you repent. If you turn your face, your spirit
to the light."
"I cannot repent. I am of those who love evil. I hate mercy. I despise
pity."
"Then I must seek to save him in spite of you."
"You cannot," and a laugh of savage triumph accompanied his words. "I
have made my plans. Nothing which you can do will save him. He has been
given to me."
For a few seconds there was tense unnatural silence. The room was full
of strange influences, as though conflicting forces were in opposition,
as though light and darkness, good and evil, were struggling together.
"No, no, Madaline," went on Romanoff. "Now is my hour of triumph. The
son you love shall be mine."
"Love is stronger than hate, good is stronger than evil," she replied.
"You are fighting against the Eternal Spirit of Good; you are fighting
against the Supreme Manifestation of that Goodness, which was seen two
thousand years ago on the Cross of Calvary."
"The Cross of Calvary!" replied Romanoff, and his voice was hoarse; "it
is the symbol of defeat, of degradation, of despair. For two thousand
years it has been uplifted, but always to fail."
"Always to conquer," was the calm reply. "Slowly but surely, age after
age, it has been subduing kingdoms, working righteousness, lifting man
up to the Eternal Goodness. It has through all the ages been overcoming
evil with good, and bringing the harmonies of holiness out of the
discord of sin."
"Think of this war!" snarled Romanoff. "Think of Germany, think of
Russia! What is the world but a mad hell?"
"Out of it all will Goodness shine. I cannot understand all, for full
understanding only belongs to the Supreme Father of Lights. But I am
sure of the end. Already the morning is breaking, already light is
shining out of the darkness. Men's eyes are being opened, they are
seeing visions and dreaming dreams. They are seeing the end of war, and
talking of Leagues of Nations, of the Brotherhood of the world."
"But that does not do away with the millions who have died in battle. It
does not atone for blighted and ruined homes, and the darkness of the
world."
"Not one of those who fell in battle is dead. They are all alive. I have
seen them, spoken to them. And the Eternal Goodness is ever with them,
ever bearing them up. They have done what they knew to be their duty,
and they have entered into their reward."
"What, the Evil and the Good together?" sneered Romanoff. "That were
strange justice surely."
"Shall not the Judge of all the Earth do Right? They are all in His
care, and His pity and His love are Infinite. That is why I plead with
you."
"What, to spare your son? If what you say is true I am powerless. But I
am not. Wrong is stronger than right. I defy you."
"Then is it to be a fight between us?"
"If you will. He must be mine."
"And what then?" There was ineffable sorrow in the woman's voice. "Would
you drag him into æons of pain and anguish to satisfy your revenge?"
"I would, and I will. What if right is stronger than wrong, as you say?
What if in the end right shall drag him through hell to heaven? I shall
still know that he has lived in hell, and thus shall I have my
revenge."
"And I, who am his mother, am also his ministering angel, and it is my
work to save him from you."
"And you are powerless--powerless, I tell you?"
"All power is not given to us, but God has given His angels power to
help and save."
"If you have such power, why am I not vanquished?"
"Have you not been vanquished many times?"
"Not once!" cried Romanoff. "Little by little I have been enveloping him
in my toils."
"Think," replied the other. "When he was tossing on the angry sea, whose
arms bore him up? Think again, why was it when you and he were in the
library together at Wendover, and you tempted him to sell his soul for
gain;--whose hand was placed on his, and stopped him from signing the
paper which would have made him your slave?"
"Was it you?" gasped Romanoff.
"Think again. When the woman you selected sought to dazzle him with wild
dreams of power and ambition, and who almost blinded him to the truth,
what led him to discard the picture that came to him as inventions of
evil? Who helped to open his eyes?"
"Then you--you," gasped Romanoff--"you have been fighting against me all
the time! It was you, was it?"
"I was his mother, I am his mother; and I, who never intentionally did
you harm, plead with you again. I love him, even as all true mothers,
whether on earth or in the land of spirits, love their children. And I
am allowed to watch over him, to protect him, to help him. It is my joy
to be his guardian angel, and I plead with you to let him be free from
your designs."
"And if I will--what reward will you give me?"
"I will seek to help you from your doom--the doom which must be the lot
of those who persist in evil."
"That is not enough. No, I will carry out my plans; I will drag him to
hell."
"And I, if need be, will descend into hell to save him."
"You cannot, you cannot!" and triumph rang in his voice. "I swore to
drag him to hell, swore that his soul should be given over to evil."
The woman's face seemed to be drawn with pain, her eyes were filled with
infinite yearning and tenderness. She moved her lips as if in speech,
but Romanoff could distinguish no words. Then her form grew dimmer and
dimmer until there was only a shadowy outline of what had been clear and
distinct.
"What do you say? I cannot hear!" and his voice was mocking.
The man continued to look at the place where he had seen her, but, as
her form disappeared, the two shafts of light grew more and more
luminous. He saw the bright shining Cross distinctly outlined, and his
eyes burnt with a great terror. Then out of the silence, out of the wide
spaces which surrounded the house, out of the broad expanse of the
heavens, words came to him:
"Underneath, _underneath_, UNDERNEATH are the Everlasting Arms."
Fascinated, Romanoff gazed, seeing nothing but the shining outline of
the Cross, while the air seemed to pulsate with the great words I have
set down.
Then slowly the Cross became more and more dim, until at length it
became invisible. The corner of the room which had been illumined by its
radiance became full of dark shadows. Silence became profound.
"What does it mean?" he gasped. "She left me foiled, defeated, in
despair. But the Cross shone. The words filled everything."
For more than a minute he stood like one transfixed, thinking, thinking.
"It means this," he said presently, and the words came from him in
hoarse gasps, "it means that I am to have my way; it means that I shall
conquer him--drag him to hell; but that underneath hell are the
Everlasting Arms. Well, let it be so. I shall have had my revenge. The
son shall suffer what the mother made me suffer, and she shall suffer
hell, too, because she shall see her son in hell."
He turned and placed more wood on the fire, then throwing himself in an
arm-chair he sat for hours, brooding, thinking.
"Yes, Olga will do it," he concluded after a long silence. "The story of
the Garden of Eden is an eternal principle. 'The woman tempted me and I
did eat,' is the story of the world's sin. He is a man, with all a man's
passions, and she is a Venus, a Circe--a woman--and all men fall when a
woman tempts."
All through the night he kept his dark vigils; there in the dark house,
with only flickering lights from the fire, he worked out his plans, and
schemed for the destruction of a man's soul.
In the grey dawn of the wintry morning he was back in London again; but
although the servants looked at him questioningly when he entered his
hotel, as if wondering where he had been, he told no man of his doings.
All his experiences were secret to himself.
During the next few days the little man Polonius seemed exceptionally
busy; three times he went to Wendover, where there seemed to be many
matters that interested him. Several times he made his way to the War
Office, where he appeared to have acquaintances, and where he asked many
questions. He also found his way to the block of buildings where Dick
Faversham's flat was situated, and although Dick never saw him, he
appeared to be greatly interested in the young man's goings out and his
comings in. He also went to the House of Commons, and made the
acquaintance of many Labour Members. Altogether Polonius's time was much
engaged. He went to Count Romanoff's hotel, too, but always late at
night, and he had several interviews with that personage, whom he
evidently held in great awe.
More than a week after Romanoff's experiences at Walton Heath, Olga
Petrovic received a letter which made her very thoughtful. There was a
look of fear in her eyes as she read, as though it contained disturbing
news.
And yet it appeared commonplace and innocent enough, and it contained
only a few lines. Perhaps it was the signature which caused her cheeks
to blanch, and her lips to quiver.
This was how it ran:
"DEAR OLGA,--You must get F. to take you to dinner on Friday
night next. You must go to the Moscow Restaurant, and be there
by 7.45 prompt. Please look your handsomest, and spare no pains
to be agreeable. When the waiter brings you liqueurs be
especially fascinating. Act on the Berlin plan. This is very
important, as a danger has arisen which I had not calculated
upon. The time for action has now come, and I need not remind
you how much success means to you.
"ROMANOFF.
"P.S.--Destroy this as you have destroyed all other correspondence
from me. I shall know whether this is done.--R."
This was the note which had caused Olga Petrovic's cheeks to pale. After
reading it again, she sat thinking for a long time, while more than once
her face was drawn as if by spasms of pain.
Presently she went to her desk, and taking some scented notepaper, she
wrote a letter. She was evidently very particular about the wording, for
she tore up several sheets before she had satisfied herself. There was
the look of an evil woman in her eyes as she sealed it, but there was
something else, too; there was an expression of indescribable longing.
The next afternoon Dick Faversham came to her flat and found Olga
Petrovic alone. He had come in answer to her letter.
"Have I done anything to offend you, Mr. Faversham?" she asked, as she
poured out tea.
"Offend me, Countess? I never thought of such a thing. Why do you ask?"
"You were so cold, so distant when you were here last--and that was
several days ago."
"I have been very busy," replied Dick.
"While I have been very lonely."
"Lonely! You lonely, Countess?"
"Yes, very lonely. How little men know women. Because a number of silly,
chattering people have been here when you have called, you have
imagined that my life has been full of pleasure, that I have been
content. But I haven't a friend in the world, unless----" She lifted her
great languishing eyes to his for a moment, and sighed.
"Unless what?" asked Dick.
"Nothing, nothing. Why should you care about the loneliness of a woman?"
"I care a great deal," replied Dick. "You have been very kind to me--a
lonely man."
From that moment she became very charming. His words gave her the
opening she sought, and a few minutes later she had led him to the
channel of conversation which she desired.
"You do not mind?" she said presently. "I know you are the kind of man
who finds it a bore to take a woman out to dinner. But there will be a
wonderful band at The Moscow, and I love music."
"It will be a pleasure, a very great pleasure," replied Dick.
"And you will not miss being away from the House of Commons for a few
hours, will you? I will try to be very nice."
"As though you needed to try," cried Dick. "As though you could be
anything else."
She looked half coyly, half boldly into his eyes.
"To-morrow night then?" she said.
"Yes, to-morrow night. At half-past seven I will be here."