He put the note down on the table. Then snatched it up, and blushing furiously be crumpled it into his pocket as the maid-of-all-work entered with his breakfast tray.
He felt better when she had gone and began to think. He drew her note from his pocket and read it again. At the word “Aunt” he came to a full stop. It suggested a family. And with the suggestion came a sickening dread that her people — whoever they might be — should oppose their union. The anxiety was too awful to be borne. He must do something. Again his eye fell upon the note. “Will you write?” Yes, he would write at once. He got the necessary materials together, and, sitting down, he pondered deeply for perhaps half an hour. At last with a sigh he took up the pen and began. He worked assiduously for an hour, and the contents of his waste paper basket grew steadily during that time. But in the end his critical spirit was satisfied, and he appended his signature to one of the most richly tinted flowers of rhetoric that ever bloomed between the leaves of a parson’s blotting-pad. What he had written might have been summed up concisely into three sentences. “I love you. I shall never love anyone else. If your parents forbid our marriage I shall be disconsolate.”
But, as everyone versed in such matters must know, these three sentences afford very considerable scope for elaboration. It need not, therefore, cause great surprise that by a zealous regard for detail, Andrew was enabled to cover eight pages of notepaper with closely-written matter. Although there may be many who could do better, still, for a saint, Andrew did very well.
The reply came promptly, and set him in a fever of delight. She had no parents, and therefore no wishes but her own to consult. Her Aunt was better, and she hoped to return to Stollbridge in a day or two. She loved him, and she trusted that he was devoting a little of his thoughts to her. Then came the signature “Ella” — a name which Andrew kept uttering aloud, until the maid-of-all-work disgusted him into silence by putting her head into the room and inquiring whether he had called her.
Ella would return in a day or two! And here again those novels read in early youth came to his aid, and he remembered what was expected of him. He had no time to lose, he must run up to town at once and buy the ring.
He put his hat on — a trifle jauntily for a saint — and went round to the vicarage to obtain his superior’s sanction of the journey.
He had not seen the vicar since their somewhat unhappy parting of some three days ago, and it was not without a certain restlessness of mind that he entered the presence of that worthy man. The Reverend Mr. Ritson turned from the papers with which he had been occupied, to greet Andrew.
He was a man of medium height, with iron-grey hair and a rosy clean-shaven face. The levity suggested by a slight upward tilt of his nose was redeemed by the portly dignity of his figure.
“Ah, good morning, Andrew. Won’t you sit down?”
Andrew sat down and dangled his hat between his knees in a nervous fashion. “I have come to ask you whether it would be inconvenient if I were to run up to town for a day or two.”
“Certainly not,” the vicar answered with a kindly smile. “Go by all means if you—”
Mr. Ritson stopped abruptly, and the smile died from his good-humoured lips. He suddenly remembered having learnt that Miss de Vaud had left Stollbridge two days ago. He was a man of some insight and some worldly experience, and the conclusion he arrived at by a simple process of deduction, was not flattering to Andrew. He turned his clear hazel eyes sternly upon the young man.
“Might I inquire,” he said coldly, “what your motives are for going to London?”
“I was about to tell you, Sir.”
“Oh!” The vicar concluded from this disposition to confess, that his apprehensions were certainly unfounded and he hastened to relax the rigorous position of his facial muscles, being anxious to make up in kindness to Andrew for the slight his imagination had for a moment cast upon the young man.
“You see, Mr. Ritson, I was twenty-four years of age I last birthday. And — and — I have been thinking about getting married.” The vicar raised his eyebrows in surprise, and passing his hands under his coat tails, smiled again.
“You are thinking of marrying! Ah, well, well — a very praisewothy resolution.”
Being a bachelor, the vicar was in a position to make an assertion of this character without any qualms regarding its veracity.
Andrew gathered courage from the words and explained the motive of his visit to London.
“Of course, of course,” the vicar agreed, “but you haven’t said anything about the lady of your choice, yet. Come, what is she like? One of my parishioners?”
Andrew remembered their last conversation, and grew distinctly nervous.
“I think you know her, sir,” he answered, “I had the misfortune to disagree with you the other day, about the conversational topic I was affording Stolibridge. I have decided to set matters right by marrying Miss de Vaud, whom I very dearly — for whom I have a very deep regard.”
The vicar did not say much. But what he did say was pregnant with meaning of an eminently discourteous and even sinister character.
“But — but,” stammered Andrew, “I don’t understand.”
“Great Heavens, sir,” Mr. Ritson interrupted. “Have you taken leave of your senses, or has this woman ensnared you into—”
“Sir!” cried Andrew, rising indignant, and confronting him.
The vicar looked at him for a moment, then shook his head sorrowfully.
“So? It’s so bad as all that, is it?” he murmured. “Well, well, I’m sorry for you, Andrew — you are a young man of great promise. But — think it over carefully, and come to me again.”
“My mind is quite made up, sir.”
“Yes, but it may change. I hope it will, for although it would give me very great pain, if you persist in your mad intention of marrying an actress—”
“Marrying a WHAT?” ejaculated Andrew.
“An actress, I said.”
Andrew laughed curiously. “There is some misunderstanding, I didn’t mention an actress.”
He uttered the word “actress,” as if it were an improper expression which contaminated his saintly tongue. Mr. Ritson gazed at the young man in undisguised amazement, and began to entertain a very deep concern anent his sanity.
“Did you, or did you not say that you were going to marry Miss de Vaud; Miss Elialine de Vaud; to make myself plainer still — the Miss Ellaline de Vaud with whom you have been philandering on the river, much to every right-minded person’s disgust?”
Andrew might have taken objection at another time to the impropriety of the word “philandering.” But the season was inopportune for any subtle diagnosis of English vocables. He merely allowed his parched lips to murmur an assent.
“Well then—” the vicar stopped abruptly, as new light broke in upon his mind.
“Do you mean to tell me that you did not know she was an actress? That she was the very woman on whose account you changed your rooms?”
Andrew gasped beneath the load of this revelation. He glanced wildly about him, and out through the window. Someone passing at that moment riveted his attention. Springing across the room, he drew aside the curtains.
“Who’s that?” he asked excitedly.
The vicar looked out and beheld a woman crossing the road. She wore a gown of prismatic hues and her hair was of a golden yellow.
“That, I believe,” he answered slowly, “is Miss de Vaud’s maid, or dresser, or whatever they call such creatures.”
“It is the woman I fled from — I understand it all now.” And dropping into a chair, Andrew mopped his face.
Mr. Ritson laid his hand kindly upon the young man’s shoulder, and sought to console him.
“Fortunately there is no real harm done, Andrew,” he said presently. “I suppose you have not written to her?”
“Oh, but I have,” cried Andrew wringing his hands. “And such a letter.”
“Good Heavens, man! Oh, Andrew, how could you? T
hink — think of the disgrace to the cloth if this designing woman drags you into a breach of promise action!”
Andrew groaned, and the vicar — being unable to think of anything more appropriate — groaned to keep him company.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
A week went by without any fresh developments, saving the departure of the maid, which, the vicar contended, was a sign that Miss de Vaud was not returning to Stollbridge. Andrew received two letters from her. The first was a passionate appeal to his affections and a gentle chiding for his silence. He almost wept over it — and had not the vicar intervened in time, he might have gone the length of answering it.
The second one, which came four days later, was somewhat abusive, and contained a veiled menace. Andrew wept no more — he perspired.
Then another week followed, during which the poor errant saint lived day and night in a torture of apprehension.
His health was threatening to give way when at last the gods saw fit to turn their thumbs up, and his suspense was ended.
The vicar was the first to bring him the joyful and unexpected tidings that Miss de Vaud was Miss de Vaud no longer. She was married. Yes there was no doubt about it. Andrew read the announcement himself in the Telegraph, and the brief sketch of her career which was now supposed to have terminated.
He was able to smile, and to feel very thankful at his escape. The same day a letter bearing the London post-mark and in a familiar hand-writing was delivered to him. It ran: —
You will no doubt have learnt before this reaches you of the marriage of that woman for whom you professed such deep and lasting affection, and whom you were horrified afterwards to learn — as I gather from your silence — was nothing more than a designing, wicked actress. I am sorry if I have wounded your vanity or your heart, but I could not withstand the temptation of testing the mettle of the young curate who fled in pious horror from under the roof which had the misfortune to shelter an actress. I hope that I have succeeded in proving to you at least that the horror you felt was only inspired by a word, and that after all an actress may still be sufficiently a woman to cause even a saint to come down from his pedestal and woo her.
She concluded by informing him that she had told her husband everything there was to tell concerning their “flirtation” — he gnashed his teeth at the word — and she enclosed the passionate letter which he had written her and for which she had no further use.
He had not the courage to read his own letter over again. But he took the immediate precaution of burning the two epistles in the same fire.
He has since become an ardent advocate of the celibacy of the clergy, and a trite aphorism which he is never tired of uttering is that appearances are extremely deceptive.
THE FOOL’S LOVE STORY
The Ludgate, June 1899
Chapter I.
Kuoni von Stocken, the Hofknarr of Sachsenberg, heaves a weary sigh and a strange, half-sad, half-scornful expression sits upon his lean sardonic countenance, as, turning his back to the gay crowd of courtiers that fills the Ballroom of the Palace of Schwerlingen, he passes out on to the balcony, and bends his glance upon the sleeping town below.
Resting his elbows upon the cool stone and his chin upon his hands, he may breathe the free, unpolluted air of heaven, out here; he may permit his face to assume what expression it lists; in a word, he may rest — if rest there be for one whose soul is full of bitterness and gall, whose heart is well-nigh bursting with the hopeless passion it conceals.
He is sadly changed of late, this nimble-witted fool! Time was when his jests were bright and merry and wounded none save the arrogant and vain who deserved no better; but now, alas! he has grown morose and moody, and moves, listless and silent, deep in strange musings from which he but awakens at times, to give vent to such bursts of ghastly and even blasphemous mirth, as make men shudder and women cross themselves, deeming him possessed of devils.
His tongue, from which the bright and sparkling bon-mots were once listened to with avidity, is now compared, not inadequately, with the fangs of some poisonous snake. And many who have felt its stinging sarcasms, pray devoutly that his Majesty may soon deem fit to look about him for a new jester.
The young French nobleman, the Marquis de Savignon, in the honour of whose fiançailles with the lady Louisa von Lichtenau, to-night’s fête is held, seems to have become in particular the butt for the jester’s most biting gibes. This the Court thinks strange, for the young Frenchman has ever treated Kuoni kindly.
What is amiss? Some swear that he is growing old; but that is untrue, for he is scarce thirty years of age and in point of strength and agility — though but a jester — he has no equal in the army of Sachsenberg. Others jestingly whisper that he is in love, and little do they dream how near the truth they are!
Alas! Poor Kuoni! For ten years he has gloried in his suit of motley, but now of a sudden he seems to grow ashamed of his quaint black tunic with its cap and bells and pointed cape, and in his secret shame, at times he hangs his head; at times he curses bitterly to himself the fate which has made him the sport of courtiers, and which seems to forget that he is human, and that he has a heart.
As he stands upon the balcony, gazing aimlessly now up into the starlit summer sky, now down upon the sleeping city of Schwerlingen, his long, lithe figure bathed in a flood of light from the window behind him and his ears assailed by sounds of music and of revelry, the wretched jester feels — as he has never felt until to-night — the bitter ignominy of his position. In an agony rendered all the more terrible by the despair that fills his soul, he flings himself down upon a stone seat in a corner, and covers his face with his hands. Thus he sits for some few moments, his vigorous frame shaken by a fierce sobbing which no tears come to relieve, until a step close at hand bids him make an effort to overcome his emotion.
The tall, slim figure of a girl stands for a moment framed in the open casement, and as, raising his eyes, Kuoni beholds her, he springs suddenly to his feet and turns his pale countenance towards her, so that the light from the room beyond falls full upon it, revealing clearly the signs of the storm of agony that has swept across the jester’s soul.
An exclamation of wonder escapes the girl at the sight of that distorted face.
“Kuoni!” she cries, coming forward, “what is amiss? Have you seen a ghost?”
“Aye, Madame,” he answers, in accents full of bitter, bitter sadness, “I have indeed seen a ghost — the ghost of happiness.”
“And is the sight then so distressing as your face and tone would tell me? Why, I should have deemed it otherwise.”
“Yes, were it tangible, attainable happiness that I had beheld; but I said the ghost of happiness — in other words, the reflection of the joys of others — a shadow well calculated to strike despair into the hearts of those wretches who may not grasp the substance.”
“And are you one of those wretches, Kuoni?” enquires the girl, her tone full of an interest and sympathy such as a wise man might have misconstrued but which the fool does not. “Why, ’tis said,” she continues, “that a jester’s is a gay and careless life. I have even heard it said by some of those fine gentlemen yonder that it gives rise to envy in them.”
“I doubt it not, I doubt it not,” he answers with a laugh of scorn, “and I dare swear there are many of them whom a fool’s cap would fit better than it does me!”
Then abruptly changing his tone and becoming earnest —
“Fraulein von Lichtenau,” he says, scarce above a whisper, “this fête to-night is given in honour of your betrothal; will you deign to accept a poor jester’s deepest, sincerest wishes for your happiness.”
There is something so strange and curious in his tone that the girl feels herself unaccountably moved by it.
“I accept them and thank you, friend Kuoni, with all my heart,” she answers kindly, giving him her hand.
“You call me friend Kuoni,” he cries, drawing a step nearer. “You call the poor fool, friend! May
God bless you for that word!”
“Kuoni! Kuoni!” comes a voice from within; but he heeds it not as, stooping, he raises her hand to his lips and kisses the slender fingers, as one might kiss a sacred relic.
“May God bless you, Madame, and if ever it should be your lot to need a friend, I swear it, by the Mass, that he whom you now honour with that proud title will be at hand.”
Then, tearing himself away before she has time to answer, he enters the salon.
“Kuoni! Kuoni! Where are you?” cry a dozen voices.
“I am here,” he answers sourly; “what is amiss? Are there not fools enough assembled in one room, but that you must clamour for me to swell your number?”
He has worn a mask too long to forget the part he plays in life, and as he stands now before them, all traces of his late emotion have disappeared from his face, albeit the natural expression, half-melancholic, half-scornful, remains.
With his dark eyes he sweeps the glittering throng of Court beauties and gay gallants waiting for some one to take up his challenge.
Where are Felsheim, Altenburg, Briedewald, and the other witty triflers of ready tongue? Silent! All silent — for they know the jester’s virulence too well to expose themselves to its venom in open Court.
It is the débonnaire young foreigner, the Marquis de Savignon, who is rash enough to cross weapons with him.
“They tell me, Kuoni,” he remarks with a complacent laugh, and in excellent German tainted but slightly by a foreign accent, “that you are thinking of abandoning the motley and turning courtier instead.”
“That were easy,” answers the jester with a shrug, “for ‘twixt fool and courtier there lies but a difference of designation.”
“Aye, aye,” goes on de Savignon, “but ponder for a moment, my prince of fools, and think of what would become of Sachsenberg in your absence. His Majesty will never find such another fool!”
Collected Works of Rafael Sabatini Page 457
