The World Masters Read online

  CHAPTER X

  Within a week after the funeral Adelaide and Madame de Conde returnedto the late prince's hotel on the Ringstrasse in Vienna. They hadtaken most cordial leave of Lord Orrel and his son and daughter, and,in spite of all their prejudices of race and nation, Adelaide de Condehad brought something more away with her than the memory of a greatsorrow tempered by the kindness of those whom a strange freak offortune had made friends as well as enemies.

  Even the two or three days that she had spent in his society hadsufficed to show her that Shafto Hardress possessed in an infinitelygreater degree those qualities which go to make the rulers of humanitythan her big handsome Alsatian, whose utmost ambition was the commandof an army corps. He had the hard, keen, unemotional common-sensewhich enabled him to see even the tremendous possibilities of EmilFargeau's discovery in a purely practical and even commercial light,but at the same time he possessed sufficient imagination to enable himto see how far-reaching the moral and social effects of theworking-out of the scheme would be on the peoples of the world.

  She had herself said nothing of what had passed during that terriblenight. For all they knew, the prince had taken the secret with him tothe grave. Once Lord Orrel had very delicately led the conversation upas near to the edge of this supremely important subject as hisinstincts would let him go, but he had learnt nothing, and an hour orso later he said to his son:

  "My dear Shafto, it is perfectly certain that my dear old friend theprince died without giving her any inkling of the great secret whichhe took to the grave with him."

  "Either that, dad," he replied, "or she is the most perfectdiplomatist in Europe. I think I have heard you say that the firstessential of diplomacy is the ability to assume a perfect counterfeitof innocence and ignorance--in other words, to convey the impressionthat you know nothing when you know everything."

  "Well, if that is so in this case," replied his father, "the maskwhich mam'selle wears is as impenetrable as it is beautiful. Really,Shafto, I think that rumour did not exaggerate when it called her themost beautiful woman in Europe."

  "Yes," said Hardress, slowly; "she certainly is very lovely, and, fromthe little I've seen of her, she seems as gifted as she is beautiful."

  "Then, my dear boy, if you really think that," said Lord Orrel, "howwould it be if you were to repair this involuntary injustice which theFates have wrought upon her? The most beautiful woman in Europe, andperhaps the most nobly born, and you one of the masters of the world!Why not? There is the realisation of a dream even greater than theprince's; and if I have any skill in reading a woman's face or woman'seyes, it is a dream not very difficult for you to realise."

  Hardress laughed, and shook his head, and said:

  "No, dad; I'm afraid that's not difficult. It's impossible."

  The earl looked up sharply, and said:

  "Oh, then, of course, there is someone else in the case; and that canhardly be anyone but----"

  "You're quite right, dad; it's Chrysie Vandel. I meant to tell youbefore, but such a lot of things have happened since I got here, andI didn't really think it was of very much consequence for thepresent--because, after all, she's only accepted me conditionally--but,lovely and all as the marquise is, I think I would rather rule overthe Orrel estates with Chrysie than over the world with her."

  "Then that, of course, settles it," said the earl, with a certain noteof displeasure in his voice. "Miss Vandel is a most charming andfascinating girl, but you will perhaps pardon me, Shafto, if I saythat she no more compares with the daughter of the royal line ofFrance than----"

  "You needn't go on, dad," said Hardress, interrupting him with alaugh; "comparisons are always more or less unpleasant; and then, yousee, you're not in love with either of them, and I'm pretty badly inlove with one."

  "Well, well," said his father, "of course, if that's the case, there'san end of it, and there's nothing more to be said. Still, for morereasons than one, I must say that I wish you had met the marquisefirst. The Plantagenets and the Bourbons would have made a splendidstock."

  On the same day that this conversation took place in the gardens ofthe Hotel Wilhelmshof in Elsenau, a very different one was takingplace in the prince's hotel at Vienna between Adelaide de Conde andVictor Fargeau, who, on receipt of the news of the prince's death, hadobtained a few days' leave, and travelled post-haste from Petersburgto Vienna.

  It was after dinner, and Madame de Conde had retired to her own roomwith a slight attack of nerves. The marquise and Victor Fargeau weresitting on either side of the open fireplace, with a little table,holding coffee and liqueurs, between them. Adelaide had accepted acigarette from his case, and he had lit one too. For several minutesafter her aunt had left the room she puffed daintily at her cigarette,and looked across at him with intricately-mingled feelings. At lengthVictor broke the silence by saying, with a note of impatience in histone:

  "And now, Mam'selle la Marquise, or, if you like it better, my mostbeautiful Adelaide, I have possessed my soul in patience for nearlytwo hours. When are you going to tell me this wonderful news ofyours?"

  "Wonderful, my dear Victor? Alas, it is not only that; it is mostsorrowful as well." Then, bracing herself with a visible effort, shethrew her half-smoked cigarette into the fireplace, and, gripping thearms of the big chair in which she was sitting, she went on, staringstraight into his eyes: "It is nothing less than the story of how yourfather met his end, and what became of his great secret."

  "Nom de Dieu!" he cried, springing to his feet; "you know that, andfrom whom?"

  "From these English and Americans--or Anglo-Americans, as I suppose Iought to call them," she replied; "the people to whom the Fates gavethe secret with your father's dead and mutilated body; the people whoburied him--the man who might have been the saviour of France--in anameless English grave."

  She kept her voice as steady as she could while she was saying this;she even tried to speak coldly and pitilessly, for she had made up hermind that the reasons of state for her betrothal to this man no longerexisted. She had an even higher stake to play for now, and, in spiteof all her pride of blood and racial prejudice, this would not be asacrifice; on the contrary, it would be rather a victory--and so shehardened her voice, as she had done her heart.

  "Dead! mutilated!" he exclaimed again. "Yes; I knew he was dead, forhe told me in his letter from Paris that he would not, and could not,survive the failure of all his hopes. There were reasons why he shouldnot, but they are of no consequence now. He staked everything, andlost everything, and that is enough. It is not for me to be his judge,now that he has gone to the presence of the highest Judge of all."

  "That was said like a good son and a true man, Victor," replied themarquise, with a swift glance of something like admiration at hisflushed and handsome face. "But there is something more serious thaneven the death of one whom you have loved and I have most deeplyrespected. I heard enough from my own father, during the night hedied, to convince me that these people have not only got the secret,but that they are already devoting millions to convert your father'stheory into a terrible reality.

  "This Viscount Branston, Lord Orrel's son, has already been across toAmerica, and has leased the land about the Magnetic Pole from theCanadian Government. A syndicate has been formed, and even at thisvery moment the preliminaries of the work are being pushed forward asrapidly as possible. Within a few months they will have begun thestorage station itself, and then nothing can save the world from theirresistible power which will be theirs."

  While she was speaking, Victor was striding up and down thedining-room, his hands clasped behind his back, and his frowning eyesbent on the thick carpet. Suddenly he stopped and faced her, and said,in sharp, almost passionate accents:

  "Perhaps it is not too late after all. My father left me those papersin duplicate. I am weary--sick to death of playing this double game.In a few months war between France and Germany will be inevitable.Russia will side with us, and the prize of the victors will be--forFrance, the restoration of the
Lost Provinces, and a good fat slice ofChina, and for Russia the whole of Northern China and Korea. Germanyhasn't a friend on earth. The English hate her because she is beatingthem in trade rivalry; Austria has no more forgotten Sadowa than wehave forgotten Sedan. Italy is crippled for lack of money, and so isSpain. The rest don't matter; and England and America will be only tooglad to stand aside and see Europe tear itself to pieces. So Franceand Russia will win, and we shall crush our conqueror into the dust."

  "But how can that be?" she interrupted, "if your father's calculationswere correct--as these people have evidently found them to be--for ifthey had not done so they would not have risked their millions onthem. From what you and he have told me of his discovery, once theseworks are set in operation round the Magnetic Pole, fighting will beimpossible, save with the permission of those who own them. Metals, ashe proved in his last experiment, will become brittle as glass,cannons and rifles will burst at the first shot, even swords andbayonets will be no more use than icicles; steam-engines will cease towork, and the world will go back to the age of wood and stone.

  "Picture to yourself, my dear Victor, the armed millions of Europefacing each other, unable to fire a shot, or even to make a bayonetcharge. Fancy the fleets of Russia and France and Germany laid up likeso many worn-out hulks. No, no, my friend; there can be no talk ofserious war while these people possess the power of preventing it attheir will."

  "But war there must and shall be!" he exclaimed. "I have not been atraitor to my country even in appearance, I have not worn this Germanuniform--this livery of slavery--for nothing. I have not wormed my wayinto the confidence of my superiors, I have not risked something worsethan death to discover the details of Germany's next campaign againstFrance, to have all my work brought to nothing at the eleventh hour bythese English-Americans. No, there may be time even yet; I have riskedmuch, and I will risk more; and you, Adelaide, will you help me? Willyou keep the compact which your father made with mine?"

  She had been growing paler all the time he had been speaking, knowinginstinctively what was coming. She rose slowly from her chair, andsaid, almost falteringly:

  "What do you mean, Victor? How can I help you, when these peoplealready have the secret in their hands, and have been spending theirmillions for weeks? What can we do against them?"

  "We can do this," he replied, stopping again in his walk; "my fatherpledged his honour as well as everything else he had in the world toinsure the success of this scheme. I, his son, can do no less; I willpledge mine in the same cause. I am on leave, and I can wear plainclothes. To-morrow I will start for Paris and see if I cannot bringthat pig-headed Minister of War to something like reason. I think Ihave a suggestion which he will find worth working out, and certainlyhe will be interested in other things that I shall put before him.Germany I have done with. I have worn the livery of shame too long.Henceforth I am what I was born--a Frenchman. I will resign mycommission to-morrow, even if France lets me starve for it. I caneasily do that, for the son of a disgraced man cannot remain in theGerman army, and my poor father disgraced himself to make France themistress of the world. A miserable Jew in Strassburg holds the honourof our family in his hand. I have no money to redeem it, and so itmust go."

  She had almost said, "Victor, I am rich; let me redeem it," when sheremembered that she was no longer more loyal to him than he was toGermany. All the while that he had been talking she had been thinking,almost against her will, of Shafto Hardress, and comparing him onlytoo favourably with this man, who, however honourable his motivesmight seem to himself, was still a traitor and a spy. Instead of this,she said, rising and holding out her hand, "Well, Victor, so far as Ican help you I will. We are going to Paris ourselves in a few days,and, by the way, that reminds me I had a letter from Sophie Valdemaronly this morning, telling me that she and the count are going theretoo."

  "Ah yes," replied Victor; "a mixture of diplomacy and pleasure, I'veno doubt. I wonder what the fair Sophie would give to know what youand I know, Adelaide?"

  "A good deal, no doubt," smiled Adelaide, as they shook hands. "Of onething I'm quite certain; if Russia had the knowledge that you aregoing to give to France, Russia would find some means of making thosestorage works an impossibility."

  "And that is exactly what I propose to persuade France to do, ifpossible; but we can talk that over better when we meet in Paris. Andnow, my Adelaide, good-night."

  He clasped her hand and drew her towards him; for the fraction of asecond she drew back, and then she yielded and submitted to his kiss;but when the door had closed behind him, she drew the palm of her handacross her lips with a gesture almost of disgust, and said:

  "No, my Victor; that must be the last. You cannot afford a Princess ofBourbon now. I sold myself for statecraft which is craft no longer;and, besides, there is another now. Ah, well, I wonder what willhappen in Paris? And Sophie Valdemar, too, and the count! Altogether,I think we shall make quite an interesting little party when we meetin la Ville Lumiere."