_Intrigue_
"Am I in time, Hope?"
"Yes, but the festival is to-night. In an hour or two now. Oh Derek, if
the king holds this festival, the toilers will revolt. They won't stand
it--"
"To-night! It mustn't be held to-night! It doesn't give me time, time to
plan."
I stood listening to their vehement, half-whispered words. For a moment
or two, absorbed, they ignored me.
"The king will make his choice to-night, Derek. He has announced it.
Blanca or Sensua for his queen. And if he chooses the Crimson Sensua--"
She stammered, then she went on:
"If he does--there will be bloodshed. The toilers are waiting, just to
learn his choice."
Derek exclaimed, "But to-night is too soon! I've got to plan. Hope,
where does Rohbar stand in this?"
Strange intrigue! I pieced it together now, from their words, and from
what presently they briefly told me. A festival was about to be held, an
orgy of feasting and merrymaking, of music and dancing. And during it,
this young King Leonto was to choose his queen. There were two
possibilities. The Crimson Sensua, a profligate, debauched woman who, as
queen, would further oppress the workers. And Blanca, a white beauty,
risen from the toilers to be a favorite at the Court. Hope was her
handmaiden.
If Blanca were chosen, the toilers would be appeased. She was one of
them. She would lead this king from his profligate ways, would win from
him justice for the workers.
But Derek and Hope both knew that the pure and gentle Blanca would
never be the king's choice. And to-night the toilers would definitely
know it, and the smoldering revolt would burst into flame.
* * * * *
And there was this Rohbar. Derek said, "He is the king's henchman,
Charlie."
I stood here in the starlight, listening to them. This strange primitive
realm. There were no modern weapons here. We had brought none. The
current used in our transition would have exploded the cartridges of a
revolver. I had a dirk which Hope now gave me, and that was all.
Primitive intrigue. I envisaged this chaotic nation, with its toilers
ignorant as the oppressed Mexican peons at their worst. Striving to
better themselves, yet, not knowing how. Ready to shout for any leader
who might with vainglorious words set himself up as a patriot.
This Rohbar, perhaps, was planning to do just that.
And so was Derek! He said, "Hope, if you could persuade the king to
postpone the festival--if Blanca would help persuade him--just until
to-morrow night...."
"I can try, Derek. But the festival is planned for an hour or two from
now."
"Where is the king?"
"In his palace, near the festival gardens."
She gestured to the south. My mind went back to New York City. This
hillock, where we were standing in the starlight beside a tree, was in
my world about Fifth Avenue and Sixteenth Street. The king's palace--the
festival gardens--stood down at the Battery, where the rivers met in the
broad water of the harbor.
* * * * *
Derek was saying, "We haven't much time: can you get us to the palace?"
"Yes. I have a cart down there on the road."
"And the cloaks for Charlie and me?"
"Yes."
"Good!" said Derek. "We'll go with you. It's a long chance; he probably
won't postpone it. If he does not, we'll be among the audience. And when
he chooses the Red Sensua--"
She shuddered, "Oh, Derek--" And I thought I heard her whisper, "Oh,
Alexandre--" and I saw his finger go to his lips.
His arm went around her. She huddled, small as a child against his tall,
muscular body.
He said gently, "Don't be afraid, little Hope."
His face was grim, his eyes were gleaming. I saw him suddenly as an
instinctive military adventurer. An anachronism in our modern New York
City. Born in a wrong age. But here in this primitive realm he was at
home.
I plucked at him. "How can you--how can we dare plunge into this thing?
Hidden with cloaks, yes. But you talk of leading these toilers."
He cast Hope away and confronted me. "I can do it! You'll see, Charlie."
He was very strangely smiling. "You'll see. But I don't want to come
into the open right away. Not to-night. But if we can only postpone this
accursed festival."
We had been talking perhaps five minutes. We were ready now to start
away. Derek said:
"Whatever comes, Charlie, I want you to take care of Hope. Guard her for
me, will you?"
I said, "Yes, I will try to."
Hope smiled as she held out her hand to me. "I will not be afraid, with
Derek's friend."
* * * * *
Her English was of different intonation from our own, but it was her
native language, I could not doubt.
I took her cold, slightly trembling hand. "Thank you, Hope."
Her eyes were misty with starlight. Tender eyes, but the tenderness was
not for me.
"Yes," I repeated. "You can depend upon me, Derek."
We left the hillock. A food-laden cart came along the road. The driver,
a boy vivid in jacket and wide trousers of red and blue, bravely worn
but tattered, ran alongside guiding the oxen. When they had passed we
followed, and presently we came to the cloaks Hope had hidden. Derek and
I donned them. They were long crimson cloaks with hoods.
Hope said, "Many are gathering for the festival shrouded like that. You
will not be noticed now."
Further along the road we reached a little eminence. I saw the river
ahead of us, and a river behind us. And a few miles to the south, an
open spread of water where the rivers joined. Familiar contours! The
Hudson River! The East River. And down at the end of the island, New
York Harbor.
Hope gestured that way. "The king's palace is there."
We were soon passing occasional houses, primitive thatched dwellings. I
saw inside one. Workers were seated over their frugal evening meal.
Always the same vivid garments, jaunty but tattered. We passed one old
fellow in a field, working late in the starlight. A man bent with age,
but still a tiller of the soil. Hope waved to him and he responded, but
the look he gave us as we hurried by shrouded in our crimson cloaks was
sullenly hostile.
We came to an open cart. It stood by the roadside. An ox with shaggy
coat and spreading horns was fastened to the fence. It was a small cart
with small rollers like wheels. Seats were in it and a vivid canopy over
it. We climbed in and rumbled away.
* * * * *
And this starlit road in our own world was Broadway! We were presently
passing close to the river's edge. This quiet, peaceful, starlit river!
Why, in our world it was massed with docks! Great ocean liners, huge
funneled, with storied decks lay here! Under this river, tunnels with
endless passing vehicles! Tubes, with speeding trains crowded with
people!
The reality here was so different! Behind us what seemed an upper city
was strung along the river. Ahead of us also there were streets and
houses, the city of the workers. A bell was tolling. Along all the roads
now we could see the moving yellow spots of lights on the holiday carts
headed for the festival. And there were spots of yellow torchlight from
boats on the river.
We soon were entering the city streets. Narrow dirt streets they were,
with primitive shacks to the sides. Women came to the doorways to stare
at our little cart rumbling hastily past. I was conscious of my crimson
cloak, and conscious of the sullen glances of hate which were flung at
it from every side, here in this squalid, forlorn section where the
workers lived.
Along every street now the carts were passing, converging to the south.
They were filled, most of them, with young men and girls, all in gaudy
costumes. Some of them, like ourselves, were shrouded in crimson cloaks.
The carts occasionally were piled with flowers. As one larger than us,
and moving faster rumbled by, a girl in it stood up and pelted me with
blossoms. She wore a crimson robe, but it had fallen from her shoulders.
I caught a glimpse of her face, framed in flowing dark hair, and of eyes
with laughter in them, mocking me, alluring.
We came at last to the end of the island. There seemed to be a thousand
or more people arriving, or here already. The tip of the island had an
esplanade with a broad canopy behind it. Burning torches of wood gave
flames of yellow, red and blue fire. A throng of gay young people
promenaded the walk, watching the arriving boats.
* * * * *
And here, behind the walk at the water's edge, was a garden of trees and
lawn, shrubs and beds of tall vivid flowers. Nooks were here to shelter
lovers, pools of water glinted red and green with the reflected
torchlight. In one of the pools I saw a group of girls bathing,
sportive as dolphins.
To one side at a little distance up the river, banked against the water,
was a broad, low building: the palace of the king. About it were broad
gardens, with shrubs and flowers. The whole was surrounded by a high
metal fence, spiked on top.
The main gate was near at hand; we left our cart. Close to the gate was
a guard standing alert, a jaunty fellow in leather pantaloons and
leather jacket, with a spiked helmet, and in his hand a huge,
sharp-pointed lance. The gardens of the palace, what we could see of
them, seemed empty--none but the favored few might enter here. But as I
climbed from the cart, I got the impression that just inside the fence a
figure was lurking. It started away as we approached the gate. The guard
had not seen it--the drab figure of a man in what seemed to be dripping
garments, as though perhaps he had swum in from the water.
And Derek saw him. He muttered, "They are everywhere."
Hope led us to the gate. The guard recognized her. At her imperious
gesture he stood aside. We passed within. I saw the palace now as a long
winged structure of timber and stone, with a high tower at the end of
one wing. The building fronted the river, but here on the garden side
there was a broad doorway up an incline, twenty feet up and over a small
bridge, spanning what seemed a dry moat. Beyond it, a small platform,
then an oval archway, the main entrance to the building.
Derek and I, shrouded in our crimson cloaks with hoods covering us to
the eyes, followed Hope into the palace.