Affairs of State - Burton E. Stevenson
"This is Mr. Rushford, isn't it?" he asked.
"Yes; that's my name," and the American looked him over in some
surprise.
"My name is Collins," went on the other. "I am secretary to Lord
Vernon."
"Glad to know you, Mr. Collins," and the American held out his hand. "I
hope Lord Vernon's getting along all right."
"As well as could be expected, thank you; but there has been a little
unforeseen--er--complication--"
"Nothing serious, I hope?"
"Well, yes; to be quite frank, Mr. Rushford, I think it decidedly
serious."
"I'm sorry to hear that," said Rushford, with genuine feeling. "We
Americans have always taken a special pride in Lord Vernon's career--his
mother was an American girl, you know--and his death would be almost a
personal loss to us."
"His death?" echoed Collins, staring.
"There's no immediate danger, then? I'm glad of that. Still, if the
complication is as serious as you think--"
"My dear sir," broke in the Englishman, "you have misunderstood me. Lord
Vernon's health is--er--quite satisfactory, all things considered. The
complication is in--er--a rather delicate affair of state,
which--which--"
"Anything I can do?" asked Rushford, encouragingly, as the other
stammered and broke down.
"Yes, there is, Mr. Rushford," answered Collins, quickly, taking his
courage in both hands. "Or, rather, there's something your daughters can
do."
"My daughters?" Rushford looked at him again, a growing suspicion in his
eyes. "I don't quite understand. You'll have to be more explicit, Mr.
Collins. I don't see how my daughters can have anything to do with your
affairs of state."
"I am going to be as explicit as I can," Collins assured him, "but it's
such an infernally delicate matter that one hardly knows where to begin.
Of course, what I have to tell you must be told in confidence."
"All right," said the American, with a little pucker of the brow which
told that he did not wholly like Mr. Collins. 'Fire ahead."
"First, if you don't mind," said the Englishman, looking about him, "I
think we'd better get out of this crowd."
"Suppose we go up to my rooms," suggested Rushford, rising. "We'll be
free from interruption there, and can thresh the whole thing out."
"Thank you," assented Collins. "Of course, I understand," he continued,
in a louder voice, as they started toward the door, "that the question
of stocks is always a very complicated one, and very difficult for a
layman to understand, but a man of your experience--"
The door of the elevator-car closed behind them, and he stopped.
"Whose benefit was that for?" asked Rushford.
"For the benefit of a French police spy, who was trying his best to
overhear our conversation."
"A police spy? Did you know him?"
"I know his class; it's impossible to mistake it. They all look
alike--it's a type which even the comic opera has been unable to
burlesque. You probably noticed him--all moustache, imperial, and
lavender gloves."
"Oh, him? Yes, I've seen him. And I've been rather itching to apply my
boot to his coat-tails. I thought he was a cheap actor--a ten, twenty,
thirty, as we say in America. Do you suppose Pelletan knows him?"
"Oh, undoubtedly! He's probably boarding him for nothing. These French
police have a way with them."
Rushford bit his moustache savagely and resolved to have an explanation
with Monsieur Pelletan.
The car stopped.
"Here we are," he said, stepping out into the corridor. "You see our
apartment is just over Lord Vernon's. I don't believe even a French
detective can disturb us here," and he locked the door after them as
they entered. "Besides, my daughters will be handy if we decide to call
them in."
Yet, in spite of the plural pronoun, it was quite evident that he was
the one who proposed to do the deciding.
"Thank you," said Collins, again. "I hope to show you the necessity of
calling them in. In fact, the principal favour I want to ask of you is
an introduction to them. They can, if they will, save Lord Vernon, and
incidentally the government, a lot of trouble."
Rushford looked at him with a little stare.
"In what way?" he asked, motioning him to a chair.
"It happens," answered Collins, "that, by chance, they hold in their
hands the key to a very important affair of state--nothing less than the
succession to Schloshold-Markheim. They could, if they wished, involve
the government in difficulties of the most serious nature."
Rushford stared at him yet a moment. Then he settled back in his chair.
"Have a cigar?" he asked. "No? You won't mind my smoking? I can think
better when I smoke. Now let's have the story; I'm anxious to hear what
those girls have been up to. I'm afraid they need a chaperon, after
all!"
CHAPTER VIII
Pride has a fall
Shortly before six o'clock that evening, the door of Lord Vernon's
apartment opened, and the Prince of Markeld appeared on the threshold,
bowed out in the politest manner possible by Blake, Collins, and Sir
John. He crossed the corridor, paused irresolutely at the stairhead,
then went on toward his own rooms, his head bent, his face expressing
the liveliest dissatisfaction: an expression which deepened to disgust
when, on opening his door, he perceived Tellier awaiting him within.
"He would come in," explained Glueck, after a glance at his master's
countenance. "He lied; he said Your Highness was expecting him. Shall I
throw him out?"
"No," said the Prince, "not yet," and Glueck retired to a convenient
distance, confident that his hour would yet arrive.
The detective, apparently, had no uneasiness concerning the result of
the interview, for his face was beaming with self-importance and he
greeted the Prince with a confidence born of certainty. His eyes asked
the question which his lips were too well-governed and discreet to
articulate.
"Tellier," began the Prince, abruptly, looking at him with a fiery
glance, "you are either a knave or a fool--a fool, doubtless, since you
seem too stupid to be a knave--and you very nearly made me appear
another!"
The detective's face dropped suddenly from triumph to humility.
"I do not understand," he faltered. "Does Your Highness mean--"
"I mean that that story of yours was a ridiculous lie!" responded the
Prince, brutally, being, indeed, greatly overwrought. "How do I know,"
he added, suddenly, "that you did not intentionally deceive me? I have
only your word--what is that worth? How do I know that it was not a
trick--a trick on the part of your government to involve me with
England? That would be like you!" and his hands clenched and unclenched
in a most threatening manner.
"I swear to Your Highness," protested Tellier, his cheeks livid, his
lips quivering convulsively, "that I told only the truth! On my heart, I
swear it--on my soul--on the grave of my mother. Otherwise, pardieu,
would I have been so imprudent as to remain here awaiting the return of
Your Highness?"
The Prince's face relaxed a little as he looked at him.
"No," he agreed, grimly, after a moment. "I don't believe you would.
Yes, you are a fool and not a knave. For I have just seen Lord Vernon
with my own eyes--he is truly ill--sneezing as though his head would
burst, gasping for breath, his eyes running water, cursing even the
friends who nurse him! It was some one else who kicked my dog away. You
have been deceived."
Tellier was walking up and down the room, tugging at his imperial, at
his hair, biting his nails, shaking his clenched hands at the ceiling in
a very ecstasy of bewilderment.
"Impossible!" he murmured, hoarsely. "Impossible!"
"How impossible!" cried the Prince, violently. "Do you presume to
contradict me? Do you dare to dispute my word when I tell you that I
myself have seen Lord Vernon; when I describe his condition to you? He
was most courteous, though he could not speak above a whisper--he
treated me more kindly than I deserved, when one considers the wording
of that note I sent to him, for which I was glad to apologise! One could
see he was in no condition to give me audience--to discuss business of
any kind! He could scarcely sit erect!"
"Oh, there is some knavery!" cried Tellier, his face purple. "I know it!
I scent it!"
"You are, then, infallible, I suppose!" retorted the Prince. "His
physician assured me that in a week Lord Vernon would be much
better--nearly well; he suggested that for a week I do not press my
business."
"But you did not agree!" screamed Tellier. "Your Highness did not
agree!"
"Most certainly I agreed. Not to agree would have been to insult them
yet a second time!"
"A week!" groaned Tellier, throwing up his hands, with a gesture of
despair. "Then all is lost!"
"How lost?" demanded Markeld, red with anger. "In what way lost? Have a
care of what you say!"
Tellier controlled himself by a mighty effort and managed to speak with
some approach to calmness.
"The German Emperor will not waste a week, Your Highness. That is not
his way, as you very well know. He will be at work every hour--every
minute!"
"What can he accomplish, if the British foreign office will do nothing?
Will he take the affair into his own hands? He will not dare!"
"He might dare, Your Highness; he has dared things more perilous than
that. But how do we know the British foreign office will do nothing?"
"I tell you," repeated the Prince, hotly, "that Lord Vernon is a
gentleman--something you do not seem to understand; that he is ill--
something you seem to doubt!"
"In diplomacy, Your Highness, even a gentleman may sometimes lie, or, at
least, disguise the truth. Perhaps even before this, he has hinted to
the Emperor that he will not interfere, if he acts promptly--perhaps
this illness is merely a ruse to avoid a situation the most awkward."
It was the Prince's turn to stride up and down, to pluck at his
moustache, to go red and white.
"If I thought so!" he murmured hoarsely. "If I thought so!"
"There is some underhand work in progress," cried Tellier, growing more
and more excited; "some trap, some piece of trickery--I know not
what--but I am certain--I will find out!"
"If I thought so!" said the Prince again, and his face was not pleasant
to look upon.
"For I repeat to Your Highness that I could not have been mistaken. It
is impossible that I should have been mistaken. I saw Lord Vernon leap
from his chair; I was as near it as I am to you at this moment; I saw
him return to it and hide himself behind his paper, when he saw you
approaching; I waited, and saw his lackeys come after him and lift him
to the invalid chair. If I had not been certain before, I was certain
then! I followed him back to the hotel. Yes!" he added, with sudden
excitement, "and there was another circumstance which will confirm me!"
"Go on!" commanded Markeld, yielding somewhat before this torrent of
proof.
"At the door he met the young ladies whom he had rescued--the Americans;
they recognised him--I could see their look of astonishment at
perceiving him in the chair of an invalid, buried in rugs. They stared
after him--the chair stopped--he wrote a few words on a piece of paper
and sent it back to them. They read it with eyes even more astonished."
"Did you, by any chance, read it also?" inquired the Prince, with a
deceptive calmness.
"No, Your Highness," Tellier replied, simply, quite unconscious of his
danger. "I saw no way of doing that, unfortunately. I thought of
snatching it away, but that would have created a turmoil, which is
always to be avoided if possible. But Your Highness might easily gain
possession of the note--"
The Prince stopped him with a fierce gesture of repugnance.
"Do you know what it is that you have the effrontery to propose to me?"
he demanded.
The Frenchman paused in mid-sentence and swallowed with difficulty, his
face very red.
"I am certain," he said, after a moment, "that those young ladies know
it was Lord Vernon who rescued them. They would no doubt confirm this,
if Your Highness would inquire--"
The Prince strode to the door and flung it open.
"Do not come back till you can speak without insulting me," he said,
sternly.
"One moment, Your Highness!" cried Tellier. "But a moment! I have
another proof. Oh, you are wrong not to believe me! You are wrong to
yield to your anger!"
"The proof!" broke in the Prince, sharply, realising, perhaps, the
justice of the reproach. "The proof! What is it? Speak quickly!"
"It is this, Your Highness," answered the detective, striving
desperately to steady his voice, to speak intelligibly. "But an hour
ago, the secretary of Lord Vernon was in conference with the father of
those young ladies. He approached him in the smoking-room; he introduced
himself; he sat down; he began a conversation. I should have overheard
everything, but that, unfortunately, he was more clever than I thought.
He suspected me. They went together to Monsieur Rushford's apartment--I
followed, I listened at the keyhole; but they went on into an inner
room, and the outer door was locked, so I could not--"
The Prince, who had listened to all this with blazing eyes, suddenly
raised his arm with a furious gesture.
"Glueck!" he shouted.
That faithful servitor appeared on the instant, his face alight with
anticipation.
"But if there should be a plot!" protested Tellier, hesitating, even
yet, on the threshold.
"If there is a plot," said the Prince, sternly, "someone shall suffer
for it, depend upon that! But against gentlemen, the proof must be
conclusive. Glueck, show him out," and he shut the door upon the unhappy
spy.
"It would have been well," observed Glueck, calmly, coming back after a
moment, "to have thrown him out in the first place."
"I agree with you," said his master. "You may do so whenever you find
him here again, my friend," and for an instant Glueck almost smiled.
"Will Your Highness dine in your apartment tonight?" he asked.
The Prince hesitated; then his face relaxed as at some pleasant thought.
"No, Glueck," he said, "I will dine downstairs. Get my bath ready."
CHAPTER IX
Pelletan's Skeleton
As he left the dining-room that evening, Rushford crooked an imperious
finger at Monsieur Pelletan.
"I want a word with you," he said in his ear.
"In private, monsieur?" asked the little Frenchman, with some
trepidation.
"Yes, I think it would better be in private--that is, if you can
accomplish it in this bedlam."
"Oh, I haf a place, monsieur, where no one will intrude," and Pelletan
led the way through the hotel office to a little door back of the desk.
"T'is iss my--vat you call eet in English?--my sty, my kennel--"
"Your den."
"Iss t'ere a difference?" asked Pelletan, fumbling with the lock.
"A sty is for pigs and a kennel for dogs," Rushford explained. "A den
is for wild beasts. These niceties of the English language are not for
you, Pelletan."
"Still," persisted Pelletan, "a man iss no more a wild beast t'an he iss
a dog or a pig."
"Not nearly so much so, very often," agreed Rushford, heartily. "You
have me there, Pelletan. Sty would undoubtedly be the right word in many
cases."
"Fery well, t'en," said Pelletan, proudly, opening the door, "pehold my
sty!" and he stood aside that his companion might enter.
It was a little square box of a room jammed with such a litter of
bric-a-brac as is to be picked up only on the boulevards--trifles in
Bohemian glass, a lizard stuffed with straw, carved fragments of jade
and ivory, a Sevres vase bearing the portrait of Du Barry, an Indian
chibook, a pink-cheeked Dresden shepherdess, a sabre of the time of
Napoleon, a leering Hindoo idol, a hideous dragon in Japanese bronze
grimacing furiously at a Barye lion--all of them huddled together
without order or arrangement, as they would have been in an auction room
or an antique shop. In one corner stood a low table of Italian mosaic,
bearing a somewhat battered statuette of Saint Genevieve plying her
distaff, and the walls were fairly covered with photographs--
photographs, for the most part, of women more anxious to display their
charms of person to an admiring world than to observe the rigour of
convention.
Rushford dropped into one of the two chairs, got out a cigar, lighted
it, and sat for some moments looking around at this wilderness of
gimcracks.
"Pelletan, you're a humbug," he said at last. "You came to me yesterday
and said your last franc was gone."
"Unt so it wass, monsieur."
"But this collection ought to be worth something."
"Monsieur means t'at it might pe sold?"
"Undoubtedly."
"But monsieur does not know--does not understand. Tis--all t'is--iss my
life; eet iss here t'at I liff--not out t'ere," with a gesture of
disgust toward the door. "I could no more liff wit'out t'is t'an wit'out
my head!"
Rushford, looking at him curiously, saw that he was in deadly earnest.
"Really," he said, "you surprise me, Pelletan. I had never suspected in
you such depth of soul."
"Besides, monsieur," added Pelletan, leaning forward, "t'ese t'ings are
not all what t'ey seem--t'is dragon, par exemple, ees not off bronze,
but off t'e plaster of Paris--yet I lofe eet none t'e less--more,
perhaps, because off t'at fery fact."
"And these--ah--females," said Rushford, and waved his hand at the
serried photographs, "I suppose even they are necessary to your
existence."
"I lofe to look at t'em, monsieur," confessed Pelletan.
"Personal acquaintances, perhaps."
"Not all of t'em, monsieur; but t'ey haf about t'em t'e flavour off
Paris--off t'at tear Paris off which I tream each night; t'ey recall t'e
tays off my yout'!"
"Oh, are you a Parisian? I should never have suspected it. Your
accent--"
"I am off Elsass, monsieur. It wass, perhaps, for t'at reason t'at Paris
so won my heart."
"If I were as fond of the place as all that," observed Rushford,
laughing, "I'd have stayed there."
"It proke my heart to leafe," murmured Pelletan. "T'at is why I lofe all
t'is," and he motioned to the walls, and kissed his hand to a
voluptuous siren with red hair. "T'at is Ernes tine. Tonight she will
take her part at t'e Alcazar; at t'e toor a friend will meet her unt
t'ey will go toget'er down t'e Champs-Elysees to t'e grand boulevard,
where t'ey sit in front of Pousset's and trink t'eir wine unt eau
sucree. T'ey will watch t'e crowds, t'ey will greet t'eir friends, t'ey
will exchange t'e tay's news. T'en t'ey will go to tinner--six or eight
of t'em toget'er--een a leetle room at Maxime's, where t'ey can make so
much noise as pleases t'em--only I will not pe t'ere--in all t'at great
city, nowhere will I pe! Unt I am missed, monsieur, no more t'an iss a
grain of sand from t'e peach out yonder!"
His voice trembled and broke, and he ran his hands through his hair in a
very agony of despair.
"There, there," said Rushford, soothingly, repressing an inclination to
laugh at the grotesque figure before him. "Don't take it so much to
heart. I dare say they drink your health oftener than you imagine."
"Do you really t'ink so, monsieur?" asked Pelletan, brightening.
"And, depend upon it, you'll get back to them some day," continued the
American. "Only stay here a year or two until you've made your fortune,
as you're certain to do now."
"Yess, monsieur," agreed Pelletan, huskily. "T'anks to you!"
"In the meantime," added Rushford, smiling, "keep the ladies, if you
like to look at them. Your little foibles are no affair of mine. What I
wanted to speak to you about was a matter of business. There's a
blatant, detestable French spy in the house who has got to get out. He
even had the impudence to ogle my girls at dinner this evening. Shall I
kick him out, or will you attend to the matter?"
Pelletan had grown paler at every word until he was fairly livid.
"Iss eet Monsieur Tellier to whom monsieur refers?" he stammered.
"I don't know his name, but he looks like a freak from the wax-works.
He's got to go--he's nearly as bad as Zeit-Zeit."
Pelletan mopped his shining forehead and groaned dismally.
"What is it, man?" demanded the American. "Don't tell me that this
rascal has a hold on you!"
Pelletan groaned again, more dismally than before.
"I was told this afternoon," added Rushford, grimly, "that he was
probably staying here at my expense."
"Eet iss not so!" cried Pelletan, his eyes flashing. "I pay for
heem--efery tay I charge myself mit' twenty franc for hees account."
"But what on earth for?" demanded Rushford. "What have you done--robbed
a bank or committed murder?"
Pelletan glanced around to assure himself that the door was tightly
closed, then drew his chair nearer to his patron.
"I haf a wife," he said, slowly, in a sepulchral tone.
"Well, what of it? Is that a crime in France? I could almost believe
it!"
"I could not liff mit' her no longer," continued Pelletan. "She wass a
teufel! I leafe her!"
"Oh, that's it--so you ran away?"
"Yess, monsieur, I ran avay--avay from Paris--avay from France--I
t'ought efen of going to Amerique."
"Was she so bad as all that?" asked Rushford, sympathetically.
For answer, Pelletan went to the statue of Saint Genevieve, lifted it,
and took from beneath it a photograph.
"T'is iss she, monsieur," he said, and handed the photograph to
Rushford.
The latter took one look at it and passed it back.
"Not guilty!" he said. "You have my profound sympathy, Pelletan. How did
you happen to get caught? You must have been exceedingly young!"
"I wass, monsieur," admitted Pelletan, with a sigh. "I wass just from
t'e province--my head wass full of treams. Unt she wass petter-looking,
t'en, monsieur; she wass almost slim. She wass a widow--unt besides she
had a leetle patisserie which her man had left her."
"I see--avarice was your undoing. And you caught a tartar!"
"A teufel!" repeated Pelletan. "A fiend! Oh, what an end to t'e tream! I
worked--oh, how hard I worked--sweating at t'e ovens, efery hour of t'e
twenty-four--for t'e ovens must not pe allowed to cool. She sat at t'e
money-drawer unt grows fat; I wass soon so weak t'at she tid not
hesitate to--to--"
The little man's face was bathed in sweat at the memory of that
degradation, which his tongue refused to describe.
"I endured eet to t'e last moment," he added, thickly. "T'en I fled!"
"You seem to have alighted on your feet," remarked Rushford.
"We had made a success of t'e pusiness," Pelletan explained, "unt I
brought mit me my share of t'e profits, which seemed only fair, since I,
py my labour, had earned t'em. Unt t'en I took a lease of t'is place,
unt did well until t'is year. T'at iss my whole history, monsieur. T'at
iss why I dare not return to Paris, efen for a small visit in winter
when pusiness here iss pad. Eef she so much as caught one leetle glimpse
of me, she would murder me!" and he mopped his face again.
"Still," said the American, "I don't see where Tellier comes in."
Pelletan carefully replaced the photograph under the statuette and then
reseated himself opposite his companion.
"Tellier knows her," he explained, simply.
"Met her professionally, perhaps," suggested Rushford. "Well, what of
it?"
"Eef I offend heem, he gifes her my attress!" continued Pelletan,
hoarsely, and his forehead glistened again at the thought. "He
t'reatened as much when he arrife here unt I tol' him t'e house wass
full."
"Hm!" commented Rushford. "I see. All right; I'll stand by you. I dare
say I can stomach Tellier for a day or two."
Pelletan breathed a deep sigh of relief.
"Tat iss kind," he stammered; "I--I--"
"There, there," and the American waved him to silence. "And you needn't
charge yourself with his keep. But I hope you haven't any more skeletons
in the closet, my friend."
"Skeletons, monsieur?"
"Such as Madame Pelletan."
"Oh," said the Frenchman, naively, "Madame Pelletan iss quite t'e
opposite off a skeleton, monsieur!"
* * * * *
Rushford paused at the hotel door and looked out along the Digue. It was
thronged with people hurrying toward the Casino, eager for the night's
excitement. But the American turned in the opposite direction, and
sauntered slowly along, breathing in the cool breeze from the ocean. At
last he paused, and, leaning against the balustrade, stood gazing out
across the moonlit water, smiling to himself at thought of Pelletan's
vicissitudes.
He was roused by the sound of voices on the beach below him. He looked
down mechanically, but for a moment saw no one. Then, deep in the shadow
of the wall, he descried two figures walking slowly side by side. One
was a man and the other a woman. They were talking in a French so rapid
and idiomatic that Rushford could distinguish no word of it, except
that the man addressed his companion as Julie.
There was something strangely familiar about the figure of the man, and
as Rushford stared down at him, his vision seemed suddenly too clear and
he perceived that it was the French detective.
"Tellier prosecutes his loves," he murmured, smiling grimly to himself,
and turned back toward the hotel. There he stopped, struck by a sudden
thought. "Julie," he repeated. "Julie--where have I heard that name
recently? Oh, I remember--Julie is our maid at the hotel. I wonder--"
He went back abruptly to the parapet and looked over, but Tellier and
his companion had disappeared.