“It is the classic flower of Venus as well as the badge of Imperialism.
And--he who receives it from so fair a hand and does not wear it must
needs be very cold or greatly courageous.” He added, as Dunoisse’s
brilliant black eyes met his own: “I wear no violets, you see. Yet had
she offered them....”
He gave a whimsical, expressive shrug. Dunoisse found himself saying:
“These were not given to me, but dropped in passing.”
The great master’s laugh, mirthful, mellow, genial, responded with the
words:
“Admit at least that the flowers were dropped most opportunely.”
“Monsieur, if the knot of violets were purposely detached,” said
Dunoisse, “then they undoubtedly were meant for you!”
But he made no offer to resign the blossoms, and Hugo laughed again.
“They were not meant for me. Have no fear. I have drunk of a sweet
philter that renders men proof against enchantment. I kissed my child,
sleeping in its cradle.... My wife said: _God keep thee!_ when I left
home to-night.”
The manner had a tinge of grandiloquence, the words did not ring quite
true. Dunoisse, like all the rest of the world, knew that the boasted
philter was not the infallible preventive.... The scrap of tinsel that
would sometimes show among the ermined folds of the kingly mantle
peeped out with a vengeance now.... And yet the man possessed a royal,
noble nature; and a personality so simply impressive that, if he had
chosen to sit upon a three-legged milking stool instead of a carved
chair upon a tapestried dais, it would have seemed, not only to his
followers, a throne.
He went on to speak of the beauty of the lady of the salon, thrilled
Dunoisse by a hint of romance,--breaking off to say:
“But for you, who wear the uniform of M. de Roux’s regiment, there can
be nothing new to hear about Madame?”
Did a drop of subtle, cynical acid mingle with the honey of the
tone?... Dunoisse was conscious of the tang of bitterness even as he
answered:
“Monsieur, I was recalled from Blidah to join the 999th of the Line
barely a month ago. And since then I have been absent on leave in
England. I had the honor of meeting Madame de Roux for the first time
to-night. She interests me indescribably. Pray tell me what you know of
her....”
Hugo said: “Have a care! She wears the Violet in her bosom and the Bee
upon her lips. And in the perfume of the flower there is delirium--in
the honey of the insect a sting.”
Dunoisse said, hardly knowing that he spoke the words aloud:
“Divine madness, exquisite pain!...”
Hugo returned with a sphinx-like smile and a curious intonation:
“You have the intrepidity of youth, with its rashness. Be it so! We
must all live and learn. And so you are but newly from Algeria!--that
explains why you have the coloring, though not why you should possess
the shape and features of an Arab of the Beni-Raten--reared in one of
the hawk’s-nest fort-villages of Kabylia--nourished on mountain air.
Ah!--so you have ridden down the wild partridge on the plains at the
foot of Atlas, and felt on your eyes the kiss of the breeze of the
Desert, and paused to breathe and rest beneath the thatch of some
native hut shadowed by date-palms or sycamores, built beside streams
that flow through hollowed trunks of trees. And women as black as
roasted coffee-berries have brought you whey and millet-cakes, and
platters of dried figs, and ripe mulberries in their dark hands decked
with gold and ivory rings.”
So vivid was the picture evoked that Dunoisse knew the yearning of
home-sickness, wished himself back again in the little house at Blidah,
even to be bored by the trivial gossip of the garrison ladies, even to
be teased by the persistent drub and tinkle of gazelle-eyed Adjmeh’s
_tambur_. And the magician’s voice went on:
“You have asked of Madame de Roux.... Her father was a grandee of
Spain and famous general of guerillas. He was killed during the
counter-Revolutionary operations in Catalonia in 1822.... My father
knew him and his lovely wife, who died of grief within a few years
of the death of her brave husband.... She was a Miss Norah Murphy,
an Irishwoman. And when you say that you say all. For that wet green
island of the mystic threefold leaf and the deep echoing sea-caves,
and the haunting melodies, is the spot of earth whereon the rebellious
Angels of both sexes were doomed by the Divine Decree to dwell until
the Judgment Day. They are the Tuatha da Danaan--the Fairy Race of
whom one must not speak unless as ‘_the good people_’; whose slender,
handsome, green-clad men woo earthly women and lure them away. Madame
de Roux possesses a strain of that blood. It is to be traced in the
daughters of a family for centuries--I say nothing of the sons.... And
its gifts are the voice of music, the touch that thrills; the eyes that
weep and laugh together, the smile that charms and maddens, and the
kiss that enthralls and beguiles....”
“They are hers?” came from Dunoisse, as if in interrogation, and then
repeating the words with an accent of conviction: “They are hers!” he
said, a rush of new sensations crowding in upon him, with the perfume
streaming from the tiny knot of purple blossoms fading in his hand.
“They are hers,” Hugo answered. “They were hers when M. de Roux met
and married her: they were hers when as a bride of seventeen she
found herself established as lady-paramount and reigning Queen of his
regiment, in garrison at Ham. Life is dull in a military fortress,
you will agree, to anyone but a gambler. For distraction one turns
naturally to games of risk and chance....”
He smiled, but his smile was enigmatical:
“The most fascinating of all these is the game of Political Intrigue
and Secret Correspondence. From a prisoner, interned for life within
the Fortress, the young wife learned to play that game. Her teacher had
been a professional player, ruined through an ill-calculated move at
Boulogne--an attempt ending in grotesque failure!”
Dunoisse knew that by the ruined player was meant the Pretender to the
Throne Imperial of France.
“The beautiful Henriette was an apt pupil; she quickly mastered the
First Gambit. I have heard it said that the pawn sacrificed on that
occasion was--the lady’s husband, but whether that be truth or scandal
I do not pretend to know.... But six years later her teacher crossed
the drawbridge in the blouse and fustians of a bricklayer, with a plank
upon his shoulder. And since then”--the pale features of the speaker
were inscrutable--“his pupil has kept her hand in. For Intrigue is a
game that a woman comes to play at last for excitement, though at first
she may have played for love.”
He ceased and began to laugh, and said, still laughing, while Dunoisse
thrilled with pity, anger and yet another emotion:
“It would be strange if so lovely and seductive a woman could conceive
a genuine passion for a little unsuccessful adventurer who pronounces
‘joy’ as ‘_choy_,’ and ‘transport’ as ‘_dransbord_,’ and who has a long
body and short legs. Though, to have suffered for an idea, even as
false as the Idea Imperial, adds stature to the dwarfish and dignity to
the vulgar, even in the eyes of other men. Besides, he was a prisoner
... unfortunate and unhappy.... Why should she not have loved him after
all?”
Dunoisse said, with tingling muscles and frowning brows:
“Monsieur, do you hold that women are incapable of chivalry?”
* * * * *
He had raised his voice, and the clear ringing utterance made itself
distinctly heard above the buzz of general conversation. And as he
spoke a silken rustle went past behind him, and a breath of violets
came to his nostrils.... But Hugo was replying to the query in the
grandiose vein that characterized him....
* * * * *
“No, young man!--since from my place in the House of Deputies I beheld
the Duchess d’Orleans stand up single-handed against a whole nation
in defense of the rights of a weak child.” He added: “In days such as
these the diligent student of Human Nature--the literary artist who
would add a new gloss to the Book of Mankind, discovers a pearl every
hour he lives. Have I not seen within the space of one week a King
hooted from the Tuileries, a throne consumed by fire, a Constitution
tumbled into the dustbin, and the New Republic of France rise, radiant
and regenerate from the ashes, and the dust and blood of Insurrection?
And I am here to-night because I seek, at the first signal of his
arrival, to hasten to offer the hand of brotherhood to a Napoleon
Bonaparte who has freed his chained eagle, fettered his ambitions, and
asks nothing better than to set the torch of Liberty to the pyre of
Empire.” He added, as by an afterthought: “And also, I am here because
I wish to look upon the face of Cain.”
The unexpected peroration hissed like Greek fire upon sea-water.
Dunoisse stammered in bewilderment:
“Pardon, Monsieur! You said ... the face of Cain...?”
The answer came:
“Monsieur, in the interests of the public who subscribe to the
_Avénement_, I should sincerely thank you if you would point out to me
that brother-officer of yours who caused the men of his command to fire
upon the people assembled before the Hotel of the Foreign Ministry.
Having looked upon his face, my desire will be gratified. I shall have
seen Cain!”
The words of dreadful irony fell like the iron-weighted thong of the
knout upon bare flesh, lacerating, excoriating.... Hector Dunoisse,
livid under his ruddy skin, rent between rage and shame, held
speechless by the sense of the utter uselessness of denial, could
only meet the piercing eagle-eyes of the wielder of the scourge. And
infinitely wounding was the dawning of suspicion in those eyes, and
worse the conviction, and worst of all the scorn....
Dunoisse had imagined, when he felt himself the target of greedy,
curious glances and shrill piercing whispers, that this great man,
aware of the undeserved, unmerited accusation under which he writhed,
had looked at him with comprehension and sympathy. Now he found himself
bereft of these; the kindness had died out of the face, if it had ever
really beamed there, and the vast white forehead rose before him like
a rampart with an enemy behind it. His manhood shrank and dwindled. He
found himself saying in the voice of a schoolboy summoned before the
pedagogue for a fault:
“Monsieur Hugo, I thought you had heard all ... knew all.... Your look
seemed to say so, to-night--when first it encountered mine....”
The other answered with wounding irony:
“Previously to your entrance, the well-known fact that certain
ambitious Imperialist intriguers have put forward a claim of Hereditary
Succession to the feudal throne of a small Bavarian principality, had
formed the topic of a brief discussion in which I took my share. Upon
your arrival you were indicated to me as the human peg on which these
adventurers hang their hopes. I was quite unaware of the personal claim
you have established upon the esteem of your fellow-beings by the
wholesale butchery of the Rue des Capucines.”
He added, with a laugh that was vitriol poured into Dunoisse’s wounds:
“I am not ignorant that you have a certain reputation as a fencer and
a duelist. It will be useless to challenge me, let me assure you!...
I am sufficiently courageous to be called a coward for the sake of
my children and my country, dearer even than they.” He scanned the
youthful, quivering face with even more deliberate intention....
“You are even younger than I judged at first,” he said. “What may
not be looked for from the maturity of such a formidable being!...
Paraphrasing Scripture, I am tempted to exclaim: ‘If you are as you are
in the green tree, what may you not become in the dry!’ Personally,
I am, in my character of poet and dramatist, your debtor. For every
classical student knows that Tiberius was magnificently handsome--that
the base and bloody Caligula was of a beauty that dazzled the eyes.
But--who has pictured Judas otherwise than as a red-haired, blear-eyed
humpback? Who has imagined Cain as the reverse of swart, shaggy,
hideous and terrible? No one until now! But when, after years of study
and preparation, I compose in Alexandrine verse the drama of the
Greatest of all Betrayals--rely upon it that the Judas of Hugo will be
more beautiful than John!”
His laughter froze and lacerated Dunoisse’s burning ears like pelting
hailstones. It ceased; and, touched in spite of himself by the mute
bleeding anguish in the young, haggard face, he said roughly:
“Why do you not speak, sir? Why do you not defend yourself?”
Dunoisse’s palate was dry as ashes. He said with the despairing smile
that drags the mouth awry:
“Monsieur, it would be useless. I have read your article in the
_Avénement_. You condemned me before you heard.”
The golden flame of Hugo’s glance played over him like wildfire. The
scrutiny endured but an instant. Then the master said, with a softening
change of voice and face, holding out his hand:
“Young man, if you had been guilty of that crime you would be
infinitely miserable. And, being innocent, you are most unhappy. For no
living mortal, save myself, will believe you so!”
The hand-grasp was brief but significant. Next moment the giver was
lost in the surging crowd of golden epaulets, flower-wreathed ringlets
and well-powdered shoulders, Joinville cravats and curled heads of
masculine hair.
The brilliantly-lighted rooms seemed to darken when the friendly face
had turned away. Dunoisse, wearied and discouraged, began to think of
taking leave. As he looked about for his hostess there was a bustle
near the door. The agitation spread to the confines of the most distant
room of the suite. Loud, eager voices were heard from the anteroom, the
heavy crimson curtain was dragged back by no gentle hand.
A man in brilliant Staff uniform, the white-haired general officer who
had gone by Dunoisse a few moments before with Madame de Roux upon his
arm, appeared in the archway towards which the well-dressed mob now
pressed and surged. His eyes shone--his face had the pallor of intense
emotion and the radiance of unspeakable joy. He cried, in a loud,
hoarse, rattling voice that carried from room to room like a discharge
of grape-shot:
“Prince Louis Napoleon is in Paris! He has arrived at the Hôtel du
Rhin!”
He tore his sword from the scabbard--held it gleaming high above his
haggard, radiant head, and shouted in stentorian tones:
“Long live the Emperor!”
And the scented, well-dressed crowd, revivified by the utterance of
that name of ancient magic, inspired by the breath of an immense
enthusiasm, crazy with joy in the anticipation of what they knew not,
echoed the shout:
“Long live the Emperor!”