Heaven, and Hell, and this earthly ball,
And Jealousy confounds them all.
“I have always loved you! You only! You alone, ever since you were a
little baby no higher than my knee!”
Marguerite laughed. “You are a vile flatterer!” she declared, making an
adorable little grimace at her lord and master. “Who would have thought
that my grim mentor of years ago--oh, so many years ago!--would one day
descend to such trickery?”
They were sitting under the pink-and-white awning of their villa on the
“Azure Coast”--as it is so fittingly called. In front of them a heavy
garland of ivy-geraniums, a mass of rose-colored bloom nestling in their
white-and-green foliage, seemed the _rendez-vous_ of every butterfly of
the littoral. Marguerite’s gown was rose-hued, too, and her favorite
floppy shape of garden hat was covered with pink acacia; on the
love-finger of her left hand glowed the great ruby of her
_fiançailles_, and Basil, in a spirit of emulation, wore a
pink-and-white carnation in the lapel of his light-gray morning coat.
The honeymoon was, officially speaking, over, but only officially, for
those two would be lovers always; and soon they would sail north again,
where Régis and Piotr awaited their return with what patience they
could muster.
It had been a pretty wedding _au-village_. The Castle chapel filled
with flowers, the peasants and sailors and salt-workers in their gala
costumes, the bagpipes blowing merrily on the green outside, and a whole
ox roasting under the trees for the feast given to all the people, who,
had come for miles around to do honor to the _Chevalier_ “_Gamin_.”
Tatiana and Jean and Pavlo had arrived from Russia, other friends and
relatives from all corners of France, and also from other lands, and
during a week the countryside had been _en fête_.
Piotr as his father’s best man had made a brave show, wearing proudly
a Court suit with a little sword at his side; and as to the bride
herself, words fail to describe that dream-maiden in her cloud of
whiteness, like wreaths of delicate vapor one over the other, caught up
here and there by clusters of odorous blossoms from the _orangerie_; and
her long illusion veil, with the diadem of orange-buds that held
something mystical in its fragrant purity. At Basil’s demand the
“Moonglade” idea he loved was carried out by a jewel--the only one she
wore--which he had himself designed, and combined, and ordered--a
crescent moon of palest sapphires embedded in diamonds, and drooping
from it fluent chain after fluent chain of the same gems--so exquisitely
wrought that one could discover no setting--falling from her heart, over
which the crescent was fastened, sideways, to the edge of her skirt in a
wavy succession of softly shimmering rays, like those of a very young
moon over misty water. Tatiana had cried out that _fiancées_ in France
wear no gems, and this is true enough, in the real “world” of old
principles and aristocratic ways, but Basil had pleaded, and Marguerite
had declared that his word was her law; and so Tatiana had yielded,
laughing over her own discomfiture.
When at last the long days of festivity were over, Piotr, who, strange
to relate, had displayed no jealousy of his father, had been taken to
Salvières for a time by Régis to avoid his moping after his “little
darling Malou.”
Two months had now elapsed since all these incidents: the vagabondage of
the _voyage-de-noces_ was over, and Marguerite’s yacht, _La Mauve_
(Jean de Salvières’s marriage-gift to her), was waiting at anchor on
the blue Mediterranean waters, a few cable-lengths from the villa, to
take them back to Brittany.
“Will you like it at Plenhöel?” Marguerite asked, suddenly, a little
anxiety in her voice, for the only shadow in her happiness was the
thought that perhaps her Basil would miss Russia and his active life
there among his own people.
“Will I like it?” he laughed. “Why d’you think I might not?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” she replied. “Brittany is not over-cheerful with
its wild seas, its storms, its bleak moorlands and rock-girt shores. I
adore it, but then I was born there, you know, which makes all the
difference.”
“You perhaps forget that I am a bit of a Breton myself,” he retorted.
“Not such a bad combination, either--Celt and Slav. What do you say,
Madame ‘Moonglade’?”
“I find it extremely satisfactory,” she admitted, “still, I wish I were
sure that you like it altogether--as much as you do Russia?”
Basil threw his half-smoked cigarette far into the bushes near the
sea-wall, and rose.
“I didn’t want to talk about it; indeed, nothing was farther from my
mind than to let the very essence of a surprise out of the bag, but you
are irresistible, my little siren, and so here goes!”
“What _are_ you talking about?” asked Marguerite, wide-eyed.
“This: do you remember a certain antique ruin with many _beaux-restes_
like your old friend Madame de Belbye ... a ruin, say I, perched on a
lofty rock, with forests of cork-oaks and other useful vegetables
unfurling their evergreen waves against the demantibulated bastions of
the above-mentioned fortress, a few leagues only from Plenhöel?”
“_La Tour du Chevalier!_” she cried, her eyes dancing with
interest--“_La Tour du Chevalier!_ the old warhold where Du Guesclin
dwelt, and before him dozens of other great knights of Brittany, for
hundreds and hundreds of years ... the finest, most romantic spot that
exists or has ever existed!”
“The same!” gravely admitted Basil.
“And what of it?” she demanded, breathlessly.
“What of it? There’s a question to ask! What of it, forsooth? Millions
of workmen--you know how I despise exaggeration--millions of workmen,
therefore, are even now dealing with those mossy ancient stones, those
tottering battlements where your hero ... and other heroes--you have
such a collection of them, by the way, Marguerite--enough to make one
horribly jealous--”
“Were not one the chief and dearest of them all?” she interrupted him.
He bowed, his hand on his heart. “Thanks, my lady-love, queen of my
soul. Those tottering battlements, as I was endeavoring to
explain--well, in short, the workmen are cementing their reunion. Flocks
of decorators under the guidance of the most distinguished
Viollet-le-Duc of our period are at this very instant evoking the past,
poring over documentary evidence in black, and red-letter, tearing their
hair and rolling their eyes, and laying back their ears in the endeavor
to put together again _La Tour du Chevalier_ as it once reigned over the
border--_La Tour du Chevalier_, for one _Chevalier_ ‘_Gamin_,’ whose
home in Brittany it is to be.”
With a cry of delight Marguerite jumped up and threw her arms around her
husband’s neck.
“Oh! You fairy prince! Aladdin of the Wonder-Lamp! Do you mean it? Is
the _Tour du Chevalier_ to come back to life for my sake? Really?
Really?”
With eyes full of joyful tears she nestled against him. The dream of her
childhood had come true at the touch of a magician’s wand, as it were;
and he, who had not realized quite what boundless pleasure he was
giving, held closely the happy little creature he worshiped. Nor did he
entirely understand until she told him of her rovings to the _Tour du
Chevalier_ from her earliest childhood, her evocations there of Merlin
and Mélusine, and the knights of Arthur riding in their splendid armor
under the forest boughs. Of how she had wandered untiringly in and out
of the dismantled halls and roofless galleries, the enormous crackling
walls of which seemed held together merely by huge clinging ropes of ivy
thick as a man’s leg. Ah! _La Tour du Chevalier_ had been her fairest
record of chivalry, her window into that mediæval period where she had
lived in thought, and whence she seemed to have emerged aimed
_cap-à-pié_ with the virtues of those great Ages--their heroism and
dauntlessness, their generosity and nobility and faith. And wasn’t
Basil a proud man that day!
“Would it be ready?” she inquired, in the fashion of a child asking when
Christmas will be here. “Could it be possible that it would be ready
soon?”
Never had Basil been so conscious of the power of great wealth as he was
now. Yes! The multiplication of hands and of ducats was easy to him, as
easy, he asserted, as, “Kiss your hand, my lady.” Nothing was being
neglected to hasten _l’accomplissement du rêve_. Moreover, ever since
that unclouded morn when she had said “Yes” to him, the work had been
going on. “So there, Madame ‘Moonglade,’ reassure yourself. Your
slightest desire is an order to me--” etc., etc.--_da-capo_--to the end
of the chapter!
So one very fine day, “once upon a time,” as the good Perrault tells us
in his _Contes de Fées_, the prince and his princess returned from
afar, and lo, and behold! the keys of the citadel were presented to
them by their leal son and _maître-du-palais_ on a velvet cushion that
he held on bended knee--Piotr in azure velvet, his curls falling on a
broad lace collar, his plumed bonnet in one sunburnt hand--a _dauphin_
after their own heart.
Régis felt as if his “Gamin” had been spirited away for eons upon eons
of time, but there she was again, close to him; so “Antinoüs” looked
more “_Antinouistic_” than ever.
* * * * *
Months of happiness followed; days woven of silk and gold (_tissus de
soie et d’or_), as the good saying goes, cloudless, enchanting;
“almost too perfect to be real,” mused Basil. Had he deserved it all?
Presumably, since they were his and hers and Régis’s and Piotr’s;
Piotr glorying in his father’s reconquered love, in the constant
tenderness of his little darling Malou.
One late afternoon he rushed into the octagonal salon where she sat
often now before her embroidery-frame or at her spinnet, like those
ladies of the long ago who had preceded her at the _Tour du Chevalier_.
Greatly to Piotr’s chagrin she did not gallop in the forest with him
now, nor canoe on the inlet below the Castle, nor undertake those
league-long rambles over the moors that he was so fond of. She was,
however, if possible, more tender than ever to him, and this consoled
him somewhat.
“You are getting so lazy, little darling Malou!” he cried, throwing on
her lap an armful of almond-scented white-and-pink thorn he had wrenched
from its prickly fastness with some damage to his strong little fingers.
“Why don’t you come out and play with me and Papa? We are throwing the
_paume_--like Henri-Quatre and his gentlemen.”
Marguerite laughed. “Come here, Piotr,” she said, making room for him on
the broad window-seat beside her. “I want to speak to you, my son.”
“Isn’t it funny, little darling Malou? It’s true I am your son now!
Just as Cousin Pavlo is Aunt Tatiana’s; but I’m your comrade and
playfellow the same as I always was, and you love me better than any,
any one else in the world.”
“I love your Papa, too,” she said, smiling, “and my own Papa, and
Pavlo’s Papa--such a lot of Papas!”
“Yes, but I don’t mind that; they’re all big gentlemen, and you
can’t love them as you do your little Piotr. Can you?”
“There are many different kinds of love--as many as there are kinds of
stars in the sky, Piotr. They are all beautiful, and created to
illuminate the dark places of the world; for where there is no love
there is no light, my little one, and people are always plunged in
gloom.”
“You do speak awfully pretty, little darling Malou. I like to listen to
what you say.”
“Thank you, Piotr; so now listen. In a little while your father and
I--if you are very good--are going to make you a present of a little
playmate. He will be very tiny and awkward at the beginning, but he will
grow up fast, and be able to romp with you, and toss the _paume_ like
Henri-Quatre. Won’t you be pleased, Piotr?”
The boy, leaning against her knees, looked slowly up at her, his eyes
heavy with doubt.
“Is that another fairy-tale, like the ones you tell me every day, little
darling Malou?” he asked, the corners of his mouth beginning to droop.
“A fairy-tale? Why, no, Piotr, it’s a true, true story!”
“And,” the child continued, “will you _truly, truly_ bring another Piotr
here to play with me instead of you and Papa and Uncle Régis?”
Marguerite was not quite reassured. She knew her Piotr too well, and her
thumbs began to prick oddly, as she claimed they invariably did when
trouble was afoot.
“I imagined you’d like it very much,” she cautiously hazarded, not by
any means certain of her ground and feeling her way about, so to speak.
Piotr’s strongly marked dark brows came together above his imperious
little nose and his nostrils quivered.
“I would hate it!” he said, decisively; “so don’t bring a disgusting
brat here, little darling Malou, or I’ll pitch him in the _oubliettes_
under the great round tower. I swear I will!”
She noticed a nervous twitching of his left eyebrow, which she was
acquainted with as a very bad sign of the weather, and she hastened to
try and smooth things down.
“Don’t talk like that, darling,” she said, stroking the rebellious
head. “You know very well that you would never do anything so wicked;
besides, you might get to be awfully fond of your little playmate.”
With a sudden brutality of gesture utterly disconcerting, Piotr snatched
the starry branches from Marguerite’s lap and threw them
helter-skelter across the room. Then turning, he fled toward the door.
“Piotr,” she called, very calmly, “come back to Malou!”
She had not stirred, her face was white; but there was no quiver in her
voice, and the child, his hand already on the knob, paused at full
tension, his back toward her.
“Come back here, please!” Again she did not raise her tone, but there
was a new quality in it; and very reluctantly, his face dark as thunder,
Piotr retraced his steps one by one until he stood within a foot of her.
“My little Piotr,” she murmured, very tenderly, “are you going to be bad
with me, too?”
No answer. Her heart for a moment misgave her, but she held out her arms
to him with infinite gentleness.
“Don’t you love Malou any more, Piotr?” she asked, almost in a
whisper.
Fiercely the boy flung himself upon her and began to sob noiselessly,
convulsively, with pitiful indrawings of the breath; and now she
could no longer doubt what was coming. Weak and dizzy, she felt like
calling aloud for help, but the mere thought of bringing Basil upon
the scene, and of what his anger would be against Piotr, choked the
appeal in her throat. Instead she gathered him closer and closer to
her, crooning over him, hoping that she might once more avert the
storm as she had so often done before; but the very roots of his
being seemed to have been shaken, and nothing she could do would
calm him.
At last there was a momentary lull, when, exhausted by his jealous fury,
Piotr lay panting across her knees, head down, face hidden, throbbing
all over like a little over-charged engine.
“Piotr,” she ventured, ready to burst into tears herself--“Piotr,
please, please be quiet. You hurt me!”
Like a galvanized frog the boy bounded away from her, and, swaying back
and forth, his eyes ablaze, literally shaking from head to foot in his
uncontrollable rage, he roared:
“Promise you won’t bring the beast--promise--promise--promise--or
I--tell--you--I’ll bash in his--his--h-head!” And all at once he
rolled on the carpet at her feet, kicking with all his might.
At that unfortunate moment Basil opened the door and walked in. One
glance, and although he had never as yet seen his son in one of these
fits, he understood, also he realized the risk of such a scene for
Marguerite, and in two strides he reached Piotr and, picking him up as
if he weighed an ounce, held him tight.
“What do you mean by that, sir?” he asked, grimly.
“Basil!” Marguerite cried, rushing to him. “Basil! For God’s sake--he
doesn’t know what he is doing! Please, for my sake, don’t be harsh!”
“Never you mind, Marguerite,” Basil answered, greatly alarmed for her.
“I won’t be harsh, but we must understand each other, he and I.”
An understanding did not seem likely to result, for Piotr, far from
desisting, was wriggling desperately in Basil’s arms, poor little
chap! maddened by the impossibility of escape, his face gray, his eyes
nearly starting out of his head; and Marguerite suddenly caught hold of
her husband’s shoulder with a grip that surprised him.
“You sha’n’t do that!” she commanded. “He is quite beside himself.
You’ll only make it worse. Give him to me. I know what to do when he
is like this!”
What would have followed cannot be conjectured had not Garrassime,
attracted by the noise, and guessing what was happening, run into the
room and, without a word, taken hold of Piotr and carried him off
without further ceremony, still kicking and yelling.
Basil, for an instant completely dumfounded, remained planted, as it
were, in the middle of the room, while Marguerite, thoroughly ashamed of
her momentary loss of self-control, hung her head and twisted the ends
of her peignoir ribbons, vainly trying to recapture herself.
“Well!” said Basil at last. “Well, this is a pretty state of things! Is
he often like that, Marguerite? I never knew--my poor little girl!”
With difficulty she prevented her voice from trembling. “No; very
rarely,” she said, shortly.
“Then what made him burst out like that? But here, for pity’s sake,
sit down, Marguerite. This _is_ pleasant for you!”
“No! Not if you will only not interfere,” she faltered. “I couldn’t
bear to see you two _aux-prises_. It was my fault. I tried to--to
prepare him for what is--what is coming, that’s all.”
She had gone back to her seat in the window and glanced imploringly up
at him. Quickly he joined her and, bending before her, took her little
icy hands in one of his.
“I beg your pardon from my heart. I beg your pardon, Marguerite,” he
said, penitently. “You should not have had to suffer this!”
“My poor boy!” she tremulously murmured. “It is from you I should have
wished to keep it concealed. He is such a fine little chap! He can’t
help what he does now and then, and punishment would only make it worse.
I know it. I am convinced that force would be folly to attempt. Don’t
you ever try it!”
Touched by her courage and exceeding generosity he stared at her. “I
believe from my soul you are more than half an angel,” he said. “I shall
do what you say, whatever happens--I give you my word on it; but still
he should be made to understand what he does. What may not one of these
attacks bring about?”
“He will get out of it when he grows older,” she pleaded. “He is so very
manly that one easily forgets what a baby he is yet.”
“My God!” Basil was thinking, “what obscure inheritance is this the
result of?” And suddenly the image of Laurence flashed before him,
Laurence beautiful and vicious, cankered inwardly like a fruit, splendid
to the eye only.
He took a couple of turns up and down before speaking again.
“It is jealousy, then?” he said at length, stopping in front of her.
“Yes,” she admitted, “jealousy of me.”
“Then,” Basil continued, “why isn’t he jealous of my love for you, my
presence near you?”
“He just told me,” she said, with the ghost of a smile lurking at the
corners of her rosy mouth--for she had already recovered her delicate
color--“that I couldn’t possibly love a grown-up gentleman like you as
I did him--my little Piotr.”
Basil could not help laughing. “That’s ingenious!” he conceded; “very
ingenious and plausible--and fortunate, too! What would we do if he had
extended these kindly sentiments to me?”
“I don’t know. Sufficient unto the hour is the wonderment thereof,”
she replied, delighted to find that he was not disposed to take the
affair too tragically. “A few weeks ago he wanted to fight a duel with
_Boustifaille_, his ex-_canot_ lad, when he came to pay his respects on
his return from the Banks, because I was imprudent enough to admire the
finely bronzed appearance of the interesting _Terre-neuvas_.”
“Wanted to fight him? Swords or pistols for two, eh?” asked Basil,
amused in spite of himself.
“Clasp-knives, if you please,” she responded. “Clasp-knives, sailor
fashion.”
“Oh,” commented Basil, “nothing if not energetic!”
“Mercy, yes! Blood will tell, you know! You yourself are no milksop,
my dearest Basil. Neither were your ancestors, from all I’ve heard
and read.”
A shadow passed over his forehead. He could not as yet quite endure
being reminded of the horrible period of doubt he had gone through with
regard to Piotr’s birthright. During the last days of their sojourn on
the Côte-d’Azur they had come unexpectedly, and most unpleasantly for
him, across Sir Robert and Lady Seton stepping from the dinghy of their
yacht. There had been a moment’s embarrassment, and then all four had
sauntered on the promenade together, studiously avoiding any allusion to
Laurence. Later on, by a special, if somewhat diffident, request of the
nautical baronet, Basil had rowed back with him to the yacht for a short
talk--a rather painful experience. Sir Robert, his choleric blue eye
cocked up to the saloon skylight of the _Phyllis_, had roundly denounced
his late niece, overbearing Basil’s chivalrous silence, and, glad to
be able to let himself go for once, had used language of exceeding
saltiness--picturesque, much to the point, and altogether adequate even
to that subject.
This encounter had re-opened a wound or two which had not been very
prompt to heal again, and had served, moreover, to show him how very
much more deeply he had suffered during his first marriage than he had
believed.
“I must dress for dinner now,” Marguerite said, cutting into his
unamiable reminiscences. “Run along, dear, and do likewise.”
“Are you going to dress at once,” he asked, “or do you intend to go
mooning after Piotr to get the latest bulletin, Madame ‘Moonglade’?”
“I shall do, beloved, just precisely as I see fit,” she laughed. “You
gave me Piotr quite a long time ago as an earnest of good-will. He is,
therefore, more mine than anybody else’s--past, present, or future--so
kindly turn your exclusive attention to the tying of your cravat--the
color of your buttonhole flower. I shall make myself very beautiful in
rose and silver, since it is my lord’s favorite combination of tints,
and meanwhile I bid you God-speed.”
She courtesied to him, made a quick little run, raised her delicious
mouth to be kissed, and in a flurry of gauze and cobwebby lace
disappeared through the narrow door in the arras leading to her
apartments.