A GROUND OF HOPE.
Cyril’s troubles were by no means over when he had been carried
across the plain to Jericho, with infinite difficulty, upon a litter
made by tying branches together with handkerchiefs and turbans. His
Jewish host listened with a terrified countenance to the story of the
attack, and although he did not actually entreat his guests to quit
his roof, he expressed dismal apprehensions as to its safety if they
remained under its shelter. Finding that they did not take the hint,
he withdrew to lament the state of affairs with his family, if the
sounds of weeping and wailing that followed were to be accepted as
evidence. Mansfield was disposed to ridicule his conduct as the result
merely of constitutional cowardice, but Mr Hicks pointed out to him
the strong probability that the man’s fears were well founded. A
second band of pilgrims was expected that evening at the Scythian
hospice, and it was not in human nature that the morning’s assailants,
thus reinforced, should resist the temptation to wipe out their
defeat. That motive would be sufficient, even without the hope of
killing the man whom they regarded honestly and with full conviction
as Antichrist. Clearly there was no time to be lost, and after a visit
to the authorities, which resulted in their posting a ragged and
half-armed guard about the house, Mansfield started on a hurried ride
to Jerusalem to consult the Chevalier Goldberg’s agent. It was with no
small reluctance that he consented to leave Cyril, even though Mr
Hicks had sworn to fight in his defence until the house fell in ruins
around them. Still, not only the lives of the party but the future of
the Jewish cause hung upon this day’s doings, and since Cyril was
unable to decide upon the steps to be taken, the Chevalier was the
most suitable person to do so.
In the course of the night Mansfield returned, half-dead with fatigue,
but accompanied by an escort of soldiers, and provided with full
directions for the future. Cyril was to be carried in a mule-litter to
an estate belonging to the Chevalier at Urtas, some miles to the south
of Jerusalem, where he could remain in safety until he was well again.
The agent would send out furniture and provisions, and see that the
place was properly guarded, and neither the hostile pilgrims nor the
Jerusalem concession-hunters were to be allowed to know where their
victim had taken refuge. A rest of an hour or so was all that was
granted to Mansfield and the soldiers, for Cyril’s host was on thorns
to get him out of the house. Mr Hicks, who had tacitly invited himself
to remain in medical charge of the patient, ordered a start soon after
daybreak, and Mansfield and he heaved a sigh of relief as they left
the house, only less fervent than that of the Hebrew who had succeeded
in getting rid of them. The travellers took the road to Jerusalem, but
turned southwards before reaching the city, and continued in that
direction until they arrived at the boundary of the Chevalier’s
estate. Here the steward, at the head of a well-armed body of
gardeners and husbandmen, welcomed the visitors in his master’s name,
and the escort, their duty performed, accepted a hearty meal and
sundry presents, and returned to Jerusalem.
Life at Urtas was at once business-like and unconventional. The estate
was practically a huge botanical garden, in which experiments were
made in acclimatising foreign plants and improving by scientific
cultivation the products of the country. The house was merely a large
native dwelling, of no great pretensions, but the agent had sent out
from Jerusalem a wealth of rich carpets, bright-hued draperies, and
luxurious cushions, together with the irreducible minimum of European
furniture, as represented by a shaky table and four assorted chairs.
His care had even gone so far as to provide a Greek cook and a box of
books, the latter principally French and Italian novels of an
unimproving tendency. During the first few days Cyril was unable to do
anything but recline upon the cushioned divans and enjoy the Oriental
luxury of his surroundings, but before long the effect of the shock he
had received passed away, together with certain feverish symptoms
which had alarmed Mr Hicks at Jericho. Considerably before he could
fairly be called convalescent he was as busy as ever, although his
broken arm forbade him to write for himself. Every day the agent
forwarded from Jerusalem a huge pile of letters and telegrams, dealing
with all the complicated issues raised by the political situation, and
Cyril dictated the answers from his divan while Mansfield and
Paschics, who had joined the party from Jerusalem, took it in turns to
write, and Mr Hicks lounged in the verandah, looking in at the workers
now and then with a benevolent caution not to overdo things. When the
letters were finished, Paschics, who was less likely to be recognised
than either his colleague or the American, would ride with them to
Jerusalem, often bringing back a second instalment of correspondence
with him in the evening.
Nothing relating to the affairs of Zion could be settled without
Cyril’s advice, for the political barometer showed one of the curious
lulls which the wise in such matters consider to herald an approaching
storm. The Powers, cajoled, bribed, or threatened one by one into
submitting to the Jewish acquisition of Palestine, were waiting, all
dissatisfied but each reluctant to be the first to move, to see what
the Jews would do. At the New Year the control of the Holy Places was
to be handed over to the consular body, as representing united
Christendom, and the Roumi officials would give place to a Jewish
provisional government, under the suzerainty of the Grand Seignior.
The formation of this Cabinet, as it might be called, was one of the
most delicate tasks before the leaders of the movement. In order to
uphold the theory of representative institutions, dear to the hearts
of Dr Koepfle and his school, it was necessary that the members should
be formally elected by the Children of Zion throughout the world,
voting according to their “tents” or lodges. Whether representative
institutions stood or fell, however, it was obviously indispensable
that the persons chosen should not be obnoxious to the Powers, and
should be willing to maintain friendly, even respectful, relations
with the United Nation Syndicate. Cyril’s Balkan experience had left
him little to learn in the matter of conducting an election from
above, and it was to him that harassed wire-pullers appealed in every
difficulty. Frantic telegrams poured in upon him when a “tent” refused
steadily to vote for the candidate recommended to it by headquarters,
or when all the “tents” of one country plumped for Dr Texelius, who
was not one of the official candidates, to the huge delight of the
Anti-Semitic press, or when, as happened in England, those Jews who
were opposed to political Zionism made a vigorous attempt to capture
all the “tents” of the country, with the view of electing a
reactionary Cabinet. The wire-pullers did not appeal in vain, and even
Mr Hicks was moved to admiration by Cyril’s strategy, giving it as his
opinion that Tammany could afford to learn a trick or two from
Thracia.
The result of the election was to fill the prospective Cabinet with
men holding moderate views and willing to be guided; and if they were
virtually the nominees of Cyril and the Syndicate, this fact was not
likely to make the task of government less easy, but rather the
reverse. Cyril could not but be aware, although he gave no sign of
having perceived the fact, that to the Jews who were now crowding into
Palestine he was the Moses of this second Exodus. They were coming,
not with a wild rush, but in orderly bands, each family or individual
selected by the “tent” to which it or he belonged, and allowed to
start only when the necessary land had been secured in Palestine. The
genius of Dr Koepfle directed this migration with almost mathematical
accuracy; but Cyril’s name bulked far more largely before the world
than his, and there could be little doubt that when the immigrants
were invited to designate by means of a _plébiscite_ the man who
should rule them, they would vote unanimously for Count Mortimer.
But this consummation, however devoutly to be wished, was at present
merely in the clouds. The Constitution which was to be administered by
the provisional government had been drawn up by the foremost Jewish
jurists--which is almost equivalent to saying the principal
Continental lawyers--and had gone the round of the Powers for approval
and criticism. It guaranteed freedom of conscience, freedom of trade,
and every political blessing that the human heart could in theory
desire, to people of all creeds and all nationalities, and yet the
Powers were not satisfied, although no one could suggest any
improvement. The lowering state of the political sky carried Cyril’s
mind back to the days when Caerleon and he had held the fort in
Thracia, alone against Europe, and when the only thing that saved them
from annihilation was the mutual jealousy of the Powers. “Nothing will
succeed here but success,” he said to himself, as he had said then.
“While each of them is waiting to see what the rest will do, we may
pull the thing through.” And he chafed the more under the physical
weakness which kept him tied at Urtas, when he might have been putting
his fortune to the touch, and gaining not only the position which his
Jewish friends desired for him, but also the happiness which up to
this point he had contrived to miss in his life.
Mansfield was very happy during this sojourn at Urtas. His work was
hard and the hours long, but he found time for a good deal of out-door
recreation. The agent had provided horses for the party, of a very
different type from the serviceable beasts which they had procured for
their journeys, and Mansfield loved all horses; while in the estate
and the model farm he found a whole world of delight. The steward, a
shrewd and ponderous Dutch Jew, told him when he heard of his path in
life that he was a good farmer spoilt, but Mansfield was quite content
to regard farming as merely a holiday amusement. It would not bring
him nearer to Philippa, which was what he hoped his secretaryship
would do.
Sometimes Mr Hicks would join him in his rides, and generally on these
occasions they went hunting, as the natives called it, dignifying with
this lofty name a little quail- and partridge-shooting, for Mansfield
drew the line at shooting a fox, much to the disappointment of his
attendants. It was on their return from one of these rides that the
American said casually--
“Say, Mr Mansfield, not come to any notion yet what your boss has got
on his mind, have you?”
“On his mind?” repeated Mansfield, in astonishment. “Nothing more than
the work and the political situation, I suppose.”
“I guess that would be about enough for most men,” said Mr Hicks
grimly; “but there’s something else wrong with him, He’s just pining
to make tracks from this place right now.”
“I haven’t noticed it,” said Mansfield, intending the remark as a
snub.
“You bet your life you haven’t, Mr Mansfield. You weren’t meant to.”
“But what is it?” Mansfield turned to face his tormentor; “and how do
you know anything about it?”
“Well, sir, if you saw a man fretting like a spirited horse to find
himself held fast in one place, and working all he knew to keep
himself from thinking, and all the time taking no proper pleasure in
his work or anything, what would be your opinion of that man?”
“He might be in fear of his life,”--this was intended to be sarcastic;
“or he might”--reluctantly--“be in love.”
“Sir, you have hit the very central point of the bull’s-eye. That’s
what’s wrong with the boss.”
“I don’t see that it concerns you if it is.”
“There’s no lady in Palestine that he might have been on his way to
interview?” continued Mr Hicks imperturbably.
“You mean that Queen--Queen Ernestine of Thracia?” asked Mansfield
blankly. Could it be possible that the moral problem Cyril had
propounded to him before leaving Ludwigsbad had been based upon
Cyril’s own experience?
“That’s my notion,” was the cheerful reply.
“But why wait so long, and go so far round?”
“Because he’s half ashamed of coming back to her anyhow, and half of
being so long about it,” said Mr Hicks concisely.
“I don’t see how you know that.”
“Sir, I was at Bellaviste when King Michael came of age. You bet I
made things hum in New York with my reports of the festivities, and
the other specials had to fly around to get even with me, but when it
came to Count Mortimer’s dismissal the ‘Crier’ fairly took the cake.
The hours I spent hanging around at that Palace, working up all the
ins and outs of the affair from the servants and minor officials! But
it paid, sir, it paid. I wrote up the incident for the paper in my
most elegant style--real high-toned dramatic situations, heart-rending
pathos, and all the rest. I tell you, Mr Mansfield, those sheets were
wet with the scalding tears of the most beautiful women in America.
The Four Hundred was divided; half the ladies took the Queen’s side,
and half the Count’s--and where will you find a stronger testimony to
the fairness with which I had done my work? There wasn’t a likeness of
either of ’em left in a single store from one end of the Union to the
other. And having gone into the case to that extent, you tell me I’m
not even in the ring!”
“By the bye,” said Mansfield, still impenitent, “what miles of
interviews you must be sending off to your paper every day now!”
“I am doing my duty to the ‘Crier,’ sir. I was sent out to keep an eye
on all the proceedings in this transfer of Palestine, in which my
country has as large an interest as yours, and I am informed that all
the Churches in the States are subscribing to the paper since my
descriptive articles on the crisis started to appear. There’s not a
half-starved home missionary or a New Rush school-ma’am out West but
cherishes the hope of seeing Palestine before sending in their checks
at last, and they all calculate to have a share in the country. We are
giving ’em what they want--not a move in this high political game but
they hear of it, and if intelligent interest was allowed any weight,
the territory would be ours. But since it’s not likely that your
played-out old Powers will conclude to appoint America the guardian of
Palestine, as they ought to do if they want the property developed to
any extent, why, I am booming your boss all I know. When the pinch
comes, the great American nation will hurl itself solid on the side of
Cyril de B. Mortimer, and it would not surprise me if he took his
stand under the fostering wings of the American eagle. He knows who
are his friends, and would as lief do a deal with ’em in a friendly
spirit as not. He gives me an item or two most every day for my paper,
and is ready all the time to favour me with his opinions,--not like
some of your fine old crusted diplomats, who wouldn’t open their
mouths to save their lives. Now there was Sir Dugald Haigh, a real
petrified old chunk of British oak, no less. I was in Ethiopia for the
paper at the time of his Mission, close upon fifteen years ago now,
and not a word to be got out of any of ’em. Kept me fooling around the
servants’ quarters, trying to find out what they were doing, and
wasting my valuable time. Well, there’s something mysterious about
these things, any way----”
“Well?” asked Mansfield, for Mr Hicks had paused darkly.
“Well, sir, that Mission was next door to a failure.”
“Perhaps that was not altogether the fault of the Ethiopians, was it?”
“Mr Mansfield, I guess I’m a white man. You don’t find me taking sides
with niggers against my own colour. No, sir. The fat was just saved by
Mr Stratford, the second in command (he’s Sir Egerton now and your
Ambassador at Czarigrad), who snatched it out of the fire when we were
all making our wills, but Sir Dugald had no hand in it. And now,
instead of prancing around in a coronet and ermine robes in the House
of Lords, that old man is buried up in Scotland somewhere, cultivating
oatmeal and a little literature--that is to say, he makes himself a
general nuisance by writing to the ‘Times’ when there’s any question
on hand connected with foreign politics.”
“Well?” asked Mansfield again.
“Well, sir, the boss is not that sort. He knows where the pay-dirt
lies, as I said, and things will pan out as he means ’em to. If he
concludes that he didn’t treat the lady you mentioned handsomely, he
may go back to her, but if he does, it’ll be because it suits his
book.”
“Look here,” said Mansfield, “if you go on making these vile
insinuations against him any more, you and I shall quarrel.”
“You bet!” was the unsympathetic reply. “No, sir, when a man finds
himself able to hitch his conscience and his convenience to his waggon
together, all that the public can do is to admire his team. Why it
should turn ugly and make nasty remarks on the harness I don’t know,
and you won’t find me doing it.”
Mr Hicks swung himself off his horse as he spoke, with the air of one
who dismissed the subject, for they had ridden up to the house, but
Mansfield had been too much disturbed by the new ideas suggested to
him to be able to banish the conversation from his mind. When work was
over that evening, instead of going out as usual for a second ride, he
hung about the room in which he had been writing at Cyril’s dictation,
alternately rearranging his papers and trying to place Cyril’s
cushions more comfortably.
“Well, Mansfield, what is it?” asked his employer at last.
“I thought--I didn’t know--it occurred to me that you might want a
message taken to--to some other part of the country, as you are tied
here,” stammered Mansfield.
“You are very considerate. A message to whom?”
“To the--to some one you were particularly anxious to see.”
“Come, Mansfield, out with it! Who is this mysterious person? Has
Hicks been pulling your leg?”
“I knew he had made it all up!” burst joyfully from Mansfield.
“All what? I am afraid not. Did he tell you that I was on my way to
ask for an interview with Queen Ernestine, when the pilgrims
interfered with my plans?”
“Yes, but I didn’t believe him.”
“Cultivate a more credulous spirit. What he told you was perfectly
true, and so was his further information that this delay is almost
intolerable to me.”
“I’ll start to-night,” said Mansfield, reproaching himself deeply.
“You can do nothing, unfortunately. I must see the Queen myself, and
approach her _in forma pauperis_. You know that I treated her
shamefully?”
“No. You can’t make me believe that.”
“But it is true, you see. King Michael behaved to her badly enough,
but it was not that which drove her into exile in Syria. She would
have gone with me cheerfully to poverty and obscurity in England, but
I would not take her. She entreated me on her knees, but I refused to
listen.”
Cyril spoke in a hard, even voice, and when he ceased there was
silence in the room. Mansfield tried in vain to think of something to
say, and each moment made the silence harder to interrupt. “I would
never have believed it if any one else had told me,” he groaned at
last, breaking the spell with a mighty effort.
“I knew that. You and I have taken a fancy to one another, Mansfield,
and I was curious to see what you would say when you knew how I had
treated the woman----”
“Who loved you,” supplied Mansfield, in a tone which was at once harsh
and dull.
“And whom I loved.”
There was a further silence, then Mansfield came hesitatingly forward.
“I can’t help it,” he said. “I should never have thought I could speak
civilly to a man who had done such a thing as that, but--it’s you.”
“My dear Mansfield!” The reaction from the strained feeling of the
moment before forced a smile from Cyril. Mansfield sitting in judgment
upon him, and allowing his just severity to be biassed by his
affection for the culprit, was very funny. “You hate the sin, but you
have a sneaking kindness left for the sinner, eh?”
Mansfield laughed uncomfortably, and Cyril shook his head.
“I am afraid I shall have to send you back to England, Mansfield. You
must be deteriorating horribly, if you can condone such a departure
from your creed, even in my case. I suppose I have corrupted you. What
would Lady Phil say?”
“I shall never tell her. It would make her too miserable--about you, I
mean. But, Count----”
“Go on. I will relieve your wounded feelings in any way I can.”
“You were intending to--to try and get the Queen to be reconciled?”
“Before there was any idea of its being to my advantage? Yes.”
“And you mean to do it still? You think she will forgive you?”
“The woman I used to know would forgive me. But suppose she is
changed? I have no right to expect anything else, and I have only
myself to thank. There is just one thing----”
“Yes?” said Mansfield eagerly.
“Some time ago I was shown a photograph of her, taken since she left
Europe. The woman who showed it to me would have been the last person
in the world to wish to give me any hope, but she did not see the
significance of what I noticed. On the Queen’s arm there was a
bracelet----”
“Which you had given her?”
“Not quite. Prince Mirkovics’s daughter, one of her _Hofdamen_, gave
it to her once at Christmas. It had one very large diamond in it, and
to the uninitiated that was all. But the diamond was so cut that by
looking at it at a certain angle you could see a portrait in the
setting behind it. The Queen was delighted.”
“And it was your portrait? and she was wearing it still?”
“She was wearing it still. That is my sole ground of hope. But why I
should be pouring out my sorrows to you in this way, like young
Werther or the celebrated Mr Rochester, I don’t know. It isn’t for a
warning, because I can’t by any stretch of imagination conceive you to
be in need of it, and it certainly isn’t because I was yearning for a
confidant. It must have been simply your astonishing cheek in leading
up to the subject. Well, now your idol is broken, and I hope you are
pleased.”
“I can’t think what made me do it,” said Mansfield, awkwardly. “I know
I must seem disgustingly inquisitive to you, but I only wanted
to--to----”
“To annihilate time and space for my benefit, I know. Well, don’t
distress yourself. I could have shut you up at any moment I chose. As
I said, I wished to see whether you would quite turn your back upon me
when you knew the whole truth.”
“I could never do that, whatever happened. Try me.”
“I believe you. And now, if you have probed into my past history
sufficiently, perhaps you would not mind going round to the steward’s
and seeing what he has to say about the mule-litter that Hicks
mentioned this morning?”
Mr Hicks himself entered the room as Mansfield stumbled out of it, and
cast a glance of quizzical reproof at Cyril as he sat down on the
divan.
“I’d lay my last red cent, Count, that you’ve been tormenting that
unhappy young man again. The way you work upon his finer feelings is
the cruellest thing I ever saw. You play upon him like an organ.”
“Then why does he lend himself to it?” asked Cyril. “It’s not in human
nature to neglect such an opportunity. The luckless youth is
provokingly sane otherwise. My brother values his opinion, my nephew
and niece look up to him devoutly; I believe he even fancies himself a
little as a man of the world. Why should he take it into his head to
conceive such an adoration for me that he becomes like a child in my
hands? I can make him blush and stammer like a girl, and for no reason
whatever.”
“He don’t get much show out of his adoration, sir, any way.”
“No, indeed; and yet he keeps it up. Why does a woman torment her
lovers, Hicks? To show her power, I suppose--not necessarily because
she delights in seeing them miserable. It gives me a kind of pleasure,
no doubt, to know that I can raise the unfortunate Mansfield from
despair to the seventh heaven by a word, and plunge him down into the
depths again by another, and therefore I do it.”
“Guess you are keeping your hand in, Count, against the time they fix
you up with a whole territory to practise your fascinations upon.”
“Don’t dabble in prophecy, Hicks, unless you want to postpone that
desirable time until the Greek Kalends. So poor Mansfield is tortured
to make a pastime for me, is he? Well, it will be all made up to him.
I intend him to marry my niece, and she takes after her father, and
could not hurt any one’s feelings in cold blood to save her life.”
“Is that so, Count? Well, Mr Mansfield will have earned his
happiness,” said Mr Hicks drily. “But I guess you know some folks have
figured it out that the young lady is to marry the King of Thracia?
Old Prince Mirkovics is flying round putting the kingdom in order, and
whispering the secret to most every one he meets. You are not in it,
then?”
“Scarcely. For one thing, I don’t think my niece would come into the
scheme, and I am not so foolish as to undertake to marry her to any
one against her will. And then, you see, I am retained, as I said, in
Mansfield’s behalf.”