CHAPTER XXVI. THE SLEEPER
The Ry of Rys sat in his huge armchair, his broad-brimmed hat on hisknee in front of him. One hand rested on the chair-arm, the otherclasped the hat as though he would put it on, but his head was fallenforward on his breast.
It was a picture of profound repose, but it was the repose of death.It was evident that the Ry had prepared to leave the house, had felt asudden weakness, and had taken to his chair to recover himself. As wasevident from the normal way in which his fingers held his hat, and hishand rested on the chair-arm, death had come as gently as a beam oflight. With his stick lying on the table beside him, and his hat on hisknee, he was like one who rested a moment before renewing a journey.There could not have been a pang in his passing. He had gone as mostmen wish to go--in the midst of the business of life, doing the usualthings, and so passing into the sphere of Eternity as one would gofrom this room to that. Only a few days before had he yielded up histemporary position as chief constable, and had spent almost every hoursince in conference with Rhodo. What he had planned would never be knownto his daughter now. It was Rhodo himself who had found his master withhead bowed before the Master of all men.
Before Fleda entered the room she knew what awaited her; a mercifulintuition had blunted the shock to her senses. Yet when she saw the Ryon his throne of death a moan broke from her lips like that of one whosees for the last time someone indelibly dear, and turns to face strangepaths with uncertain feet. She did not go to the giant figure seated inthe chair. In what she did there was no panic or hysteria of laceratedheart and shocked sense; she only sank to her knees in the room a fewfeet away from him, and looked at him.
"Father! Oh, Ry! Oh, my Ry!" she whispered in agony and admiration, too,and kept on whispering.
Fleda had whispered to him in such awe, not only because he was herfather, but because he was so much a man among men, a giant, witha great, lumbering mind, slow to conceive, but moving in a large,impressive way when once conception came. To her he had been more thanfather; he had been a patriarch, a leader, a viking, capable of the furyof a Scythian lord, but with the tenderness of a peasant father to hisfirst child.
"My Ry! My father! Oh, my Ry of Rys!" she kept murmuring to herself.
On either side of her, but a few feet behind, stood Rhodo and Ingolby.
Presently in a low, firm voice Rhodo spoke.
"The Ry of Rys is dead, but his daughter must stand upon her feet, andin his place speak for him. Is it not well with him? He sleeps. Sleep isbetter than pain. Let his daughter speak."
Slowly Fleda arose. Not so much what Rhodo had said as the meaning inhis voice, aroused her to a situation which she must face. Rhodo hadsaid that she must speak for her father. What did it mean?
"What is it you wish to say to me, Rhodo?" she asked.
"What I have to say is for your ears only," was the low reply.
"I will go," said Ingolby. "But is it a time for talk?" He made a motiontowards the dead man. "There are things to be said which can only besaid now, and things to be done which can only be done according to whatis said now," grimly remarked Rhodo.
"I wish you to remain," said Fleda to Ingolby with resolution in herbearing as she placed herself beside the chair where the dead man sat."What is it you want to say to me?" she asked Rhodo again.
"Must a Romany bare his soul before a stranger?" replied Rhodo. "Must aman who has been the voice of the Ry of Rys for the long years have nowords face to face with the Ry's daughter now that he is gone? Must thesecret of the dead be spoken before the robber of the dead--"
It was plain that some great passion was working in the man, that it waswise and right to humour him, and Ingolby intervened.
"I will not remain," he said to Fleda. To Rhodo he added: "I am not arobber of the dead. That's high-faluting talk. What I have of his wasgiven to me by him. She was for me if I could win her. He said so. Thisis a free country. I will wait outside," he added to Fleda.
She made a gesture as though she would detain him, but she realized thatthe hour of her fate was at hand, and that the old life and the new wereface to face, Rhodo standing for one and she for the other. When theywere alone, Rhodo's eyes softened, and he came near to her. "You askedme what I wished to tell you," he said. "See then, I want to tell youthat it is for you to take the place of the dead Ry. Everywhere in theworld where the Romanys wander they will rejoice to hear that a Druserules us still. The word of the Ry of Rys was law; what he wished to bedone was done; what he wished to be undone was undone. Because of youhe hid himself from his people; because of you I was for ever wandering,keeping the peace by lies for love of the Ry and for love of you."
His voice shook. "Since your mother died--and she was kin of mine--youwere to me the soul of the Romany people everywhere. As a barren womanloves a child, so I loved you. I loved you for the sake of your mother.I gave her to the Ry, who was the better man, that she might be greatand well placed. So it is I would have you be ruler over us, and I wouldserve you as I served your father until I, also, fall asleep."
"It is too late," Fleda answered, and there was great emotion in hervoice now. "I am no longer a Romany. I am my father's daughter, but Ihave not been a Romany since I was ill in England. I will not go back; Ishall go with the man I love, to be his wife, here, in the Gorgio world.You believed my father when he spoke; well, believe me--I speak thetruth. It was my father's will that I should be what I am, and do what Iam now doing. Nothing can alter me."
"If it be that Jethro Fawe is still alive he is free from the Sentenceof the Patrin, and he will become the Ry of Rys," said the old man withsudden passion.
"It may be so. I hope it is so. He is of the blood, and I pray thatJethro has escaped the sentence which my father passed," answered Fleda."By the River Starzke it was ordained that he should succeed my father,marrying me. Let him succeed."
The old man raised both hands, and made a gesture as though he woulddrive her from his sight.
"My life has been wasted," he said. "I wish I were also in death besidehim." He gazed at the dead man with the affection of a clansman for hischief.
Fleda came up close to him. "Rhodo! Rhodo!" she said gently and sadly."Think of him and all he was, and not of me. Suppose I had died inEngland--think of it in that way. Let me be dead to you and to allRomanys, and then you will think no evil."
The old man drew himself up. "Let no more be said," he replied. "Let itend here. The Ry of Rys is dead. His body and all things that arehis belong now to his people. Say farewell to him," he added, withauthority.
"You will take him away?" Fleda asked.
Rhodo inclined his head. "When the doctors have testified, we will takehim with us. Say your farewells," he added, with gesture of command.
A cry of protest rose from Fleda's soul, and yet she knew it was whatthe Ry would have wished, that he should be buried by his own peoplewhere they would.
Slowly she drew near to the dead man, and leaned over and kissed hisshaggy head. She did not seek to look into the sightless eyes; theillusion of sleep was so great that she wished to keep this picture ofhim while she lived; but she touched the cold hand which held the hatupon the knee and the other that lay upon the chair-arm. Then, with amist before her eyes, she passed from the room.
CHAPTER XXVII. THE WORLD FOR SALE
As though by magic, like the pictures of a dream, out of the horizon,in caravans, by train, on horseback, the Romany people gathered to theobsequies of their chief and king. For months, hundreds of them had notbeen very far away. Unobtrusive, silent, they had waited, watched, tillthe Ry of Rys should come back home again. Home to them was the openroad where Romanys trailed or camped the world over.
A clot of blood in the heart had been the verdict of the doctors; andLebanon and Manitou had watched the Ry of Rys carried by his own peopleto the open prairie near to Tekewani's reservation. There, in thehours between the midnight and the dawn, all Gabriel Druse's personalbelongings--the clothes, the chair in which he sat, the table at whichhe at
e, the bed in which he slept, were brought forth and made into apyre, as was the Romany way. Nothing personal of his chattels remainedbehind. The walking-stick which lay beside him in the moment of hisdeath was the last thing placed upon the pyre. Then came the match, andthe flames made ashes of all those things which once he called his own.Standing apart, Tekewani and his braves watched the ceremonial of firewith a sympathy born of primitive custom. It was all in tune with thetraditions of their race.
As dawn broke, and its rosy light valanced the horizon, a greatprocession moved away from the River Sagalac towards the East, to whichall wandering and Oriental peoples turn their eyes. With it, all thatwas mortal of Gabriel Druse went to its hidden burial. Only to theRomany people would his last resting-place be known; it would be asobscure as the grave of him who was laid:
"By Nebo's lonely mountain, On this side Jordan's wave."
Many people from Manitou and Lebanon watched the long procession pass,and two remained until the last wagon had disappeared over the crestof the prairie. Behind them were the tents of the Indian reservation;before them was the alert morn and the rising sun; and ever moving onto the rest his body had earned was the great chief lovingly attendedby his own Romany folk; while his daughter, forbidden to share in theceremonial of race, remained with the stranger.
With a face as pale and cold as the western sky, the desolation of thislast parting and a tragic renunciation giving her a deathly beauty,Fleda stood beside the man who must hereafter be, to her, father,people, and all else. Shuddering with the pain of this hour, yetresolved to begin the new life here and now, as the old life fadedbefore her eyes, she turned to him, and, with the passing of the lastRomany over the crest of the hill, she said bravely:
"I want to help you do the big things. They will be yours. The world isall for you yet."
Ingolby shook his head. He had had his Moscow.
His was the true measure of things now; his lesson had been learned;values were got by new standards; he knew in a real sense the thingsthat mattered.
"I have you--the world for sale!" he said, with the air of onediscarding a useless thing.
GLOSSARY OF ROMANY WORDS
Bosh----fiddle, noise, music. Bor----an exclamation (literally, a hedge).
Chal----lad, fellow. Chi----child, daughter, girl.
Dadia----an exclamation. Dordi----an exclamation.
Hotchewitchi----hedgehog.
Kek----no, none. Koppa----blanket.
Mi Duvel----My God.
Patrin----small heaps of grass, or leaves, or twigs, or string, laid at cross-roads to indicate the route that must be followed. Pral----brother or friend.
Rinkne rakli----pretty girl. Ry----King or ruler.
Tan----tent, camp.
Vellgouris----fair.
ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS FOR THE ENTIRE "WORLD FOR SALE":
Agony in thinking about the things we're never going to do I don't believe in walking just for the sake of walking It's no good simply going--you've got to go somewhere Most honest thing I ever heard, but it's not the most truthful Saw how futile was much competition They think that if a vote's worth having it's worth paying for When you strike your camp, put out the fires Women may leave you in the bright days You never can really overtake a newspaper lie
The World for Sale, Complete Page 28
