DROPPING THE PILOT
"The portrait of a lady," repeated Loo, slowly. "Young and beautiful.
That much I remember."
The old nobleman had never removed his covering hand from the locket.
He had never glanced at it himself. He looked slowly round the peering
faces, two and three deep round the table. He was the oldest man
present--one of the oldest in Paris--one of the few now living who had
known Marie Antoinette.
Without uncovering the locket, he handed it to Barebone across the table
with a bow worthy of the old régime and his own historic name.
"It is right that you should be the first to see it," he said. "Since
there is no longer any doubt that the lady was your father's mother."
Loo took the locket, looked at it with strangely glittering eyes and
steady lips. He gave a sort of gasp, which all in the room heard. He was
handing it back to the Vicomte de Castel Aunet without a word of comment,
when a crashing fall on the bare floor startled every one. A lady had
fainted.
"Thank God!" muttered Dormer Colville almost in Barebone's ear and swayed
against him. Barebone turned and looked into a face grey and haggard, and
shining with perspiration. Instinctively he grasped him by the arm and
supported him. In the confusion of the moment no one noticed Colville;
for all were pressing round the prostrate lady. And in a moment Colville
was himself again, though the ready smile sat oddly on such white lips.
"For God's sake be careful," he said, and turned away, handkerchief in
hand.
For the moment the portrait was forgotten until the lady was on her feet
again, smiling reassurances and rubbing her elbow.
"It is nothing," she said, "nothing. My heart--that is all."
And she staggered to a chair with the reassuring smile frozen on her
face.
Then the portrait was passed from hand to hand in silence. It was a
miniature of Marie Antoinette, painted on ivory, which had turned yellow.
The colours were almost lost, but the face stood clearly enough. It was
the face of a young girl, long and narrow, with the hair drawn straight
up and dressed high and simply on the head without ornament.
"It is she," said one and another. "_C'est bien elle_."
"It was painted when she was newly a queen," commented the Vicomte de
Castel Aunet. "I have seen others like it, but not that one before."
Barebone stood apart and no one offered to approach him. Dormer Colville
had gone toward the great fireplace, and was standing by himself there
with his back toward the room. He was surreptitiously wiping from his
face the perspiration which had suddenly run down it, as one may see the
rain running down the face of a statue.
Things had taken an unexpected turn. The Marquis de Gemosac, himself
always on the surface, had stirred others more deeply than he had
anticipated or could now understand. France has always been the victim of
her own emotions; aroused in the first instance half in idleness, allowed
to swell with a semi-restraining laugh, and then suddenly sweeping and
overwhelming. History tells of a hundred such crises in the pilgrimage of
the French people. A few more--and historians shall write "Ichabod"
across the most favoured land in Europe.
It is customary to relate that, after a crisis, those most concerned in
it know not how they faced it or what events succeeded it. "He never
knew," we are informed, "how he got through the rest of the evening."
Loo Barebone knew and remembered every incident, every glance. He was in
full possession of every faculty, and never had each been so keenly alive
to the necessity of the moment. Never had his quick brain been so alert
as it was during the rest of the evening. And those who had come to the
Hotel Gemosac to confirm their adoption of a figure-head went away with
the startling knowledge in their hearts that they had never in the course
of an artificial life met a man less suited to play that undignified
part.
And all the while, in the back of his mind, there lingered with a deadly
patience the desire for the moment which must inevitably come when he
should at last find himself alone, face to face, with Dormer Colville.
It was nearly midnight before this moment came. At last the latest guest
had taken his leave, quitting the house by the garden door and making his
way across that forlorn and weedy desert by the dim light reflected from
the clouds above. At last the Marquis de Gemosac had bidden them good
night, and they were left alone in the vast bedroom which a dozen
candles, in candelabras of silver blackened by damp and neglect, only
served to render more gloomy and mysterious.
In the confusion consequent on the departure of so many guests the locket
had been lost sight of, and Monsieur de Gemosac forgot to make inquiry
for it. It was in Barebone's pocket.
Colville put together with the toe of his boot the logs which were
smouldering in a glow of incandescent heat. He turned and glanced over
his shoulder toward his companion.
Barebone was taking the locket from his waistcoat pocket and approaching
the table where the candles burnt low in their sockets.
"You never really supposed you were the man, did you?" asked Colville,
with a ready smile. He was brave, at all events, for he took the only
course left to him with a sublime assurance.
Barebone looked across the candles at the face which smiled, and smiled.
"That is what I thought," he answered, with a queer laugh.
"Do not jump to any hasty decisions," urged Colville instantly, as if
warned by the laugh.
"No! I want to sift the matter carefully to the bottom. It will be
interesting to learn who are the deceived and who the deceivers."
Barebone had had time to think out a course of action. His face seemed to
puzzle Colville, who was rarely at fault in such judgments of character
as came within his understanding. But he seemed for an instant to be on
the threshold of something beyond his understanding; and yet he had
lived, almost day and night, for some months with Barebone. Since the
beginning--that far-off beginning at Farlingford--their respective
positions had been quite clearly defined. Colville, the elder by nearly
twenty years, had always been the guide and mentor and friend--the
compulsory pilot he had gaily called himself. He had a vast experience of
the world. He had always moved in the best French society. All that he
knew, all the influence he could command, and the experience upon which
he could draw were unreservedly at Barebone's service. The difference in
years had only affected their friendship in so far as it defined their
respective positions and prohibited any thought of rivalry. Colville had
been the unquestioned leader, Barebone the ready disciple.
And now in the twinkling of an eye the positions were reversed. Colville
stood watching Barebone's face with eyes rendered almost servile by a
great suspense. He waited breathless for the next words.
"This portrait," said Barebone, "of the Queen was placed in the locket by
you?"
Colville nodded with a laugh of conscious cleverness rewarded by complete
success. There was nothing in his companion's voice to suggest suppressed
anger. It was all right after all. "I had great difficulty in finding
just what I wanted," he added, modestly.
"What I remember--though the memory is necessarily vague--was a portrait
of a woman older than this. Her style of dress was more elaborate. Her
hair was dressed differently, with sort of curls at the side, and on the
top, half buried in the hair, was the imitation of a nest--a dove's nest.
Such a thing would naturally stick in a child's memory. It stuck in
mine."
"Yes--and nearly gave the game away to-night," said Colville, gulping
down the memory of those tense moments.
"That portrait--the original--you have not destroyed it?"
"Oh no. It is of some value," replied Colville, almost naively. He felt
in his pocket and produced a silver cigar-case. The miniature was wrapped
in a piece of thin paper, which he unfolded. Barebone took the painting
and examined it with a little nod of recognition. His memory had not
failed after twenty years.
"Who is this lady?" he asked.
Dormer Colville hesitated.
"Do you know the history of that period?" he inquired, after a moment's
reflection. For the last hour he had been trying to decide on a course of
conduct. During the last few minutes he had been forced to change it half
a dozen times.
"Septimus Marvin, of Farlingford, is one of the greatest living
authorities on those reigns. I learnt a good deal from him," was the
answer.
"That lady is, I think, the Duchesse de Guiche."
"You think--"
"Even Marvin could not tell you for certain," replied Colville, mildly.
He did not seem to perceive a difference in Barebone's manner toward
himself. The quickest intelligence cannot follow another's mind beyond
its own depth.
"Then the inference is that my father was the illegitimate son of the
Comte d'Artois."
"Afterward Charles X, of France," supplemented Colville, significantly.
"Is that the inference?" persisted Barebone. "I should like to know your
opinion. You must have studied the question very carefully. Your opinion
should be of some interest, though--"
"Though--" echoed Colville, interrogatively, and regretted it
immediately.
"Though it is impossible to say when you speak the truth and when you
lie."
And any who doubted that there was royal blood in Leo Barebone's veins
would assuredly have been satisfied by a glance at his face at that
moment; by the sound of his quiet, judicial voice; by the sudden and
almost terrifying sense of power in his measuring eyes.
Colville turned away with an awkward laugh and gave his attention to the
logs on the hearth. Then suddenly he regained his readiness of speech.
"Look here, Barebone," he cried. "We must not quarrel; we cannot afford
to do that. And after all, what does it matter? You are only giving
yourself the benefit of the doubt--that is all. For there is a doubt. You
may be what you--what we say you are, after all. It is certain enough
that Marie Antoinette and Fersen were in daily correspondence. They were
both clever--two of the cleverest people in France--and they were both
desperate. Remember that. Do you think that they would have failed in a
matter of such intense interest to her, and therefore to him? All these
pretenders, Naundorff and the others, have proved that quite clearly, but
none has succeeded in proving that he was the man."
"And do you think that I shall be able to prove that I am the man--when I
am not?"
By way of reply Dormer Colville turned again to the fireplace and took
down the print of Louis XVI engraved from a portrait painted when he was
still Dauphin. A mirror stood near, and Colville came to the table
carrying the portrait in one hand, the looking-glass in the other.
"Here," he said, eagerly, "Look at one and then at the other. Look in the
mirror and then at the portrait. Prove it! Why, God has proved it for
you."
"I do not think we had better bring Him into the question," was the
retort: an odd reflex of Captain Clubbe's solid East Anglian piety. "No.
If we go on with the thing at all, let us be honest enough to admit to
ourselves that we are dishonest. The portrait in that locket points
clearly enough to the Truth."
"The portrait in that locket is of Marie Antoinette," replied Colville,
half sullenly. "And no one can ever prove anything contrary to that. No
one except myself knows of--of this doubt which you have stumbled upon.
De Gemosac, Parson Marvin, Clubbe--all of them are convinced that your
father was the Dauphin."
"And Miss Liston?"
"Miriam Liston--she also, of course. And I believe she knew it long
before I told her."
Barebone turned and looked at him squarely in the eyes. Colville wondered
a second time why Loo Barebone reminded him of Captain Clubbe to-night.
"What makes you believe that?" he asked.
"Oh, I don't know. But that isn't the question. The question is about the
future. You see how things are in France. It is a question of Louis
Napoleon or a monarchy--you see that. Unless you stop him he will be
Emperor before a year is out, and he will drag France in the gutter. He
is less a Bonaparte than you are a Bourbon. You remember that Louis
Bonaparte himself was the first to say so. He wrote a letter to the Pope,
saying so quite clearly. You will go on with it, of course, Barebone. Say
you will go on with it! To turn back now would be death. We could not do
it if we wanted to. _I_ have been trying to think about it, and I cannot.
That is the truth. It takes one's breath away. At the mere thought of it
I feel as if I were getting out of my depth."
"We have been out of our depths the last month," admitted Barebone,
curtly.
And he stood reflecting, while Colville watched him.
"If I go on," he said, at length, "I go on alone."
"Better not," urged Colville, with a laugh of great relief. "For you
would always have me and my knowledge hanging over you. If you succeeded,
you would have me dunning you for hush-money."
Which seemed true enough. Few men knew more of one side of human nature
than Dormer Colville, it would appear.
"I am not afraid of that."
"You can never tell," laughed Colville, but his laugh rather paled under
Barebone's glance. "You can never tell."
"Wise men do not attempt to blackmail--kings."
And Colville caught his breath.
"Perhaps you are right," he admitted, after a pause. "You seem to be
taking to the position very kindly, Barebone. But I do not mind, you
know. It does not matter what we say to each other, eh? We have been good
friends so long. You must do as you like. And if you succeed, I must be
content to leave my share of the matter to your consideration. You
certainly seem to know the business already, and some day perhaps you
will remember who taught you to be a King."
"It was an old North Sea skipper who taught me that," replied Barebone.
"That is one of the things I learnt at sea."
"Yes--yes," agreed Colville, almost nervously. "And you will go on with
the thing, will you not? Like a good fellow, eh? Think about it till
to-morrow morning. I will go now. Which is my candle? Yes. You will think
about it. Do not jump to any hasty decision."
He hurried to the door as he spoke. He could not understand Barebone at
all.
"If I do go on with it," was the reply, "it will not be in response to
any of your arguments. It will be only and solely for the sake of
France."
"Yes--of course," agreed Colville, and closed the door behind him.
In his own room he turned and looked toward the door leading through to
that from which he had hurriedly escaped. He passed his hand across his
face, which was white and moist.
"For the sake of France!" he echoed in bewilderment. "For the sake of
France! Gad! I believe he _is_ the man after all."