The progress of the Czar from Buckingham Palace to the Mansion House,
where he had, after all, consented to lunch with the Lord Mayor,
witnessed a popular outburst of enthusiasm absolutely inexplicable to
the general public. It was known that affairs in Central Europe were in
a dangerously precarious state, and it was felt that the Czar’s visit
here, and the urgent summons which had brought from St. Petersburg his
Foreign Minister, were indications that the long wished-for entente
between Russia and this country was now actually at hand. There was in
the Press a curious reticence with regard to the development of the
political situation. One felt everywhere that it was the calm before
the storm—that at any moment the great black headlines might tell of
some startling stroke of diplomacy, some dangerous peril averted or
defied. The circumstances themselves of the Czar’s visit had been a
little peculiar. On his arrival it was announced that, for reasons of
health, the original period of his stay, namely a week, was to be cut
down to two days. No sooner had he arrived at Windsor, however, than a
change was announced. The Czar had so far recovered as to be able even
to extend the period at first fixed for his visit. Simultaneously with
this, the German and Austrian Press were full of bitter and barely
veiled articles, whose meaning was unmistakable. The Czar had thrown in
his lot at first with Austria and Germany. That he was going
deliberately to break away from that arrangement there seemed now
scarcely any manner of doubt.
Bellamy and Louise, from a window in Fleet Street, watched him go by.
Prince Rosmaran had been specially bidden to the luncheon, but he, too,
had been with them earlier in the morning. Afterwards they turned their
backs upon the city, and as soon as the crowd had thinned made their
way to one of the west-end restaurants.
“It seems too good to be true,” declared Louise. Bellamy nodded.
“Nevertheless I am convinced that it is true. The humor of the whole
thing is that it was our friends in Germany themselves who pressed the
Czar not to altogether cancel his visit for fear of exciting suspicion.
That, of course, was when there seemed to be no question of the news of
the Vienna compact leaking out. They would never have dared to expose a
man to such a trial as the Czar must have faced when the resume of the
Vienna proceedings, in the Chancellor’s own handwriting, was read to
him at Windsor.”
“You saw the telegram from Paris?” Louise interposed. “The special
mission from St. Petersburg has been recalled.”
Bellamy smiled.
“It all goes to prove what I say,” he went on. “Any morning you may
expect to hear that Austria and Germany have received an ultimatum.”
“I wonder,” she remarked, “what became of Streuss.”
“He is hiding somewhere in London, without a doubt,” Bellamy answered.
“There’s always plenty of work for spies.”
“Don’t use that word,” she begged.
He made a little grimace.
“You are thinking of my own connection with the profession, are you
not?” he asked. “Well, that counts for nothing now. I hope I may still
serve my country for many years, but it must be in a different way.”
“What do you mean?” she demanded.
“I heard from my uncle’s solicitors this morning,” Bellamy continued,
“that he is very feeble and cannot live more than a few months. When he
dies, of course, I must take my place in the House of Lords. It is his
wish that I should not leave England again now, so I suppose there is
nothing left for me but to give it up. I have done my share of
traveling and work, after all,” he concluded, thoughtfully.
“Your share, indeed,” she murmured. “Remember that but for that
document which was read to the Czar at Windsor, Servia must have gone
down, and England would have had to take a place among the second-class
Powers. There may be war now, it is true, but it will be a glorious
war.”
“Louise, very soon we shall know. Until then I will say nothing. But I
do not want you altogether to forget that there has been something in
my life dearer to me even than my career for these last few years.”
Her blue eyes were suddenly soft. She looked across towards him
wistfully.
“Dear,” she whispered, “things will be altered with you now. I am not
fit to be the wife of an English peer—I am not noble.”
He laughed.
“I am afraid,” he assured her, “that I am democrat enough to think you
one of the noblest women on earth. Why should I not? Your life itself
has been a study in devotion. The modern virtues seem almost to ignore
patriotism, yet the love of one’s country is a splendid thing. But
don’t you think, Louise, that we have done our work—that it is time to
think of ourselves?”
She gave him her hand.
“Let us see,” she said. “Let us wait for a little time and see what
comes.”
That night another proof of the popular feeling, absolutely
spontaneous, broke out in one of the least expected places. Louise was
encored for her wonderful solo in a modern opera of bellicose trend,
and instead of repeating it she came alone on the stage after a few
minutes’ absence, dressed in Servian national dress. For a short time
the costume was not recognized. Then the music—the national hymn of
Servia, and the recollection of her parentage, brought the thing home
to the audience. They did not even wait for her to finish. In the
middle of her song the applause broke like a crash of thunder. From the
packed gallery to the stalls they cheered her wildly, madly. A dozen
times she came before the curtain. It seemed impossible that they would
ever let her go. Directly she turned to leave the stage, the uproar
broke out again. The manager at last insisted upon it that she should
speak a few words. She stood in the centre of the stage amid a silence
as complete as the previous applause had been unanimous. Her voice
reached easily to every place in the House.
“I thank you all very much,” she said. “I am very happy indeed to be in
London, because it is the capital city of the most generous country in
the world—the country that is always ready to protect and help her
weaker neighbors. I am a Servian, and I love my country, and
therefore,” she added, with a little break in her voice,—“therefore I
love you all.”
It was nearly midnight before the audience was got rid of, and the
streets of London had not been so impassable for years. Crowds made
their way to the front of Buckingham Palace and on to the War Office,
where men were working late. Everything seemed to denote that the
spirit of the country was roused: The papers next morning made immense
capital of the incident, and for the following twenty-four hours
suspense throughout the country was almost at fever height. It was
known that the Cabinet Council had been sitting for six hours. It was
known, too, that without the least commotion, with scarcely any
movements of ships that could be called directly threatening, the
greatest naval force which the world had ever known was assembling off
Dover. The stock markets were wildly excited. Laverick, back again in
his office, found that his return to his accustomed haunts occasioned
scarcely any comment. More startling events were shaping themselves.
His own remarkable adventure remained, curiously enough, almost
undiscussed.
He left the office shortly before his usual time, notwithstanding the
rush of business, and drove at once to the little house in Theobald
Square. Zoe was lying on the sofa, still white, but eager to declare
that the pain had gone and that she was no longer suffering.
“It is too absurd,” she declared, smiling, “my having this nurse here.
Really, there is nothing whatever the matter with me. I should have
gone to the theatre, but you see it is no use.”
She passed him the letter which she had been reading, and which
contained her somewhat curt dismissal. He laughed as he tore it into
pieces.
“Are you so sorry, Zoe? Is the stage so wonderful a place that you
could not bear to think of leaving it?”
She shook her head.
“It is not that,” she whispered. “You know that it is not that.”
He smiled as he took her confidently into his arms.
“There is a much more arduous life in front of you, dear,” he said.
“You have to come and look after me for the rest of your days. A
bachelor who marries as late in life as I do, you know, is a trying
sort of person.”
She shrank away a little.
“You don’t mean it,” she murmured.
“You know very well that I mean it,” he answered, kissing her. “I think
you knew from the very first that sooner or later you were doomed to
become my wife.”
She sighed faintly and half-closed her eyes. For the moment she had
forgotten everything. She was absolutely and completely happy.
Later on he made her dress and come out to dinner, and afterwards, as
they sat talking, he laid an evening paper before her.
“Zoe,” he declared, “the best thing that could has happened. You will
not be foolish, dear, about it, I know. Remember the alternative—and
read that.”
She glanced at the few lines which announced the finding of Arthur
Morrison in a house in Bloomsbury Square. The police had apparently
tracked him down, and he had shot himself at the final moment. The
details of his last few hours were indescribable. Zoe shuddered, and
her eyes filled with tears. She smiled bravely in his face, however.
“It is terrible,” she whispered simply, “but, after all, he was no
relation of mine, and he tried to do you a frightful injury. When I
think of that, I find it hard even to be sorry.”
There was indeed almost a pitiless look in her face as she folded up
the paper, as though she felt something of that common instinct of her
sex which transforms a gentle woman so quickly into a hard, merciless
creature when the being whom she loves is threatened.
Laverick smiled.
“Let us go out into the streets,” he said, “and hear what all this
excitement is about.”
They bought a late edition, and there it was at last in black and
white. An ultimatum had been presented at Berlin and Vienna. Certain
treaty rights which had been broken with regard to Austria’s action in
the East were insisted upon by Great Britain. It was demanded that
Austria should cease the mobilization of her troops upon the Servian
frontier, and renounce all rights to a protectorate over that country,
whose independence Great Britain felt called upon, from that time
forward, to guarantee. It was further announced that England, France,
and Russia were acting in this matter in complete concert, and that the
neutrality of Italy was assured. Further, it was known that the great
English fleet had left for the North Sea with sealed orders.
Laverick took Zoe home early and called later at Bellamy’s rooms.
Bellamy greeted him heartily. He was on the point of going out, and the
two men drove off together in the latter’s car.
“See, my dear friend,” Bellamy exclaimed, “what great things come from
small means! The document which you preserved for us, and for which we
had to fight so hard, has done all this.”
“It is marvelous!” Laverick murmured.
“It is very simple,” Bellamy declared. “That meeting in Vienna was
meant to force our hands. It is all a question of the balance of
strength. Germany and Austria together, with Russia friendly,—even with
Russia neutral,—could have defied Europe. Germany could have spread out
her army westwards while Austria seized upon her prey. It was a
splendid plot, and it was going very well until the Czar himself was
suddenly confronted by our King and his Ministers with a revelation of
the whole affair. At Windsor the thing seemed different to him. The
French Government behaved splendidly, and the Czar behaved like a man.
Germany and Austria are left _planté la_. If they fight, well, it will
be no one-sided affair. They have no fleet, or rather they will have
none in a fortnight’s time. They have no means of landing an army here.
Austria, perhaps, can hold Russia, but with a French army in better
shape than it has been for years, and the English landing as many men
as they care to do, with ease, anywhere on the north coast of Germany,
the entire scheme proved abortive. Come into the club and have a drink,
Laverick. To-day great things have happened to me.”
“And to me,” Laverick interposed.
“You can guess my news, perhaps,” Bellamy said, as they seated
themselves in easy-chairs. “Mademoiselle Idiale has promised to be my
wife.”
Laverick held out his hand.
“I congratulate you heartily!” he exclaimed. “I have been an engaged
man myself for something like half-an-hour.”