Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli (Illustrated) (Delphi Series Eight Book 22)

by Marie Corelli

  “All is well, thanks to you!” replied the gruff voice— “You have saved his life.”

  “Thank God!” — and she closed her eyes again wearily, while two slow tears trickled from under the shut white lids— “Thank God!”

  Professor von Glauben, placed in charge of her by the King’s command, gently relinquished the small white hand he held, and stepping noiselessly to a table near at hand, poured out from one of the various little flasks set thereon, a cordial the properties of which were alone known to himself, and held the glass to her lips.

  “Drink this off at once!” — he said authoritatively, yet kindly.

  She obeyed. He then, turning aside with the empty glass, sat down and watched her from a little distance. Soon a faint flush tinged her dead-white skin, and presently, with a deep sigh, she opened her eyes again. Then she became aware of a stiffness and smart in her right shoulder, and saw that it was tightly bandaged, and that the bodice of her dress was cut away from it. Lying perfectly still, she gradually brought her strong spirit of self-control to bear on the situation, and tried to collect her scattered thoughts. Very few minutes sufficed her to recollect all that had happened, and as she realised more and more vividly that she was in some strange and luxurious abode where she had no business or desire to be, she gathered all the forces of her mind to her aid, and with but a slight effort, sat upright. Professor von Glauben came towards her with an exclamation of warning — but she motioned him back with a very decided gesture.

  “Please do not trouble!” she said— “I am quite able to move — to stand — see!” And she rose to her feet, trembling a little, and steadying herself by resting one hand on the edge of the sofa. “I do not know who you are, but I am sure you have been most kind to me! And if you would do me a still greater kindness, you will let me go away from here at once!”

  “Impossible, Madame!” declared the Professor, firmly— “His Majesty, the King — —”

  “What of his Majesty, the King?” demanded Lotys with sudden hauteur— “Am I not mistress of my own actions?”

  The Professor made an elaborate bow.

  “Most unquestionably you are, Madame!” he replied— “But you are also for the moment, a guest in the King’s Palace; and having saved his life, you will surely not withhold from him the courteous acceptance of his hospitality?”

  “The King’s Palace!” she echoed, and a little disdainful smile crossed her lips— “I, — Lotys, — in the King’s Palace!” She moved a few steps, and drew herself proudly erect. “You, sir, are a servant of the King’s?”

  “I am his Majesty’s resident physician, at your service!” he said, with another bow— “I have had the honour of attending to the wound you so heroically received in his defence, — and though it is not a dangerous wound, it is an exceedingly unpleasant one I assure you, — and will give you a good deal of pain and trouble. Let me advise you very earnestly to stay where you are, and rest — do not think of leaving the Palace to-night.”

  She sighed restlessly. “I must not think of staying in it!” she replied. “But I do not wish to seem churlish — or ungrateful for your care and kindness; — will you tell the King—” Here she broke off abruptly, and fixed her eyes searchingly on his face. “Strange!” she murmured— “I seem to have seen you before, — or someone very like you!”

  The Professor was troubled with a sudden fit of coughing which made him very red in the face, and obliged him to turn away for a moment in order to recover himself. Still struggling with that obstinate catch in his throat he said:

  “You were saying, Madame, that you wished me to tell the King something?”

  “Yes!” said Lotys eagerly— “if you will be so good! Tell him that I thank him for his courtesy; — but that I must go away from this Palace, — that I cannot — may not — stop in it an hour longer! He does not know who it is that saved his life, — if he did, he would not wish me to remain a moment under his roof! He would be as anxious and willing for me to leave as I am to go! Will you tell him this?”

  “Madame, I will tell him,” replied the Professor deferentially, yet with a slight smile— “But — if it will satisfy your scruples, or ease your mind at all, — I may as well inform you that his Majesty does know who you are! The populace itself declared your name to him, with shouts of acclamation.” She flushed a vivid red, then grew very pale.

  “If that be so, then he must also be aware that I am his sworn enemy!” she said,— “And, that in accordance with the principles I hold, I cannot possibly remain under his roof! Therefore I trust, sir, you will have the kindness to provide me with a way of quick exit before my presence here becomes too publicly reported.”

  The Professor was slightly nonplussed. He considered for a moment; then rapidly made up his mind.

  “Madame, I will do so!” he said— “That is, if you will permit me first of all to announce your intention of leaving the Palace, to the King. Pardon me for suggesting that his Majesty can hardly regard as an enemy a lady who has saved his life at the risk of her own.”

  “I did not save it because he is the King,” she said curtly, “And you are at liberty to tell him so. Please make haste to inform him at once of my desire to leave the Palace, — and say also, that if he considers he owes me any gratitude, he will show it by not detaining me.”

  The Professor bowed and retired. Lotys, left alone, sat down for a moment in one of the luxuriously cushioned chairs, and pressed her left hand hard over her eyes to try and still their throbbing ache. Her right arm was bound up and useless, — and the pain from the wound in her shoulder caused her acute agony, — but she had a will of iron, and she had trained her mental forces to control, if not entirely to master, her physical weaknesses. She thought, not of her own suffering, but of the exciting incident in which mere impulse had led her to take so marked a share. It was by pure accident that she had joined the crowd assembled to see the King lay the foundation-stone of the proposed new Theatre. She had been as it were, entangled in the press of the people, and had got pushed towards the centre of the scene almost against her own volition. And while she had stood, — a passive and unwilling spectator of the pageant, — her attention had been singularly attracted towards the uneasy and restless movements of the youth who had afterwards attempted the assassination of the monarch. She had watched him narrowly; though she could not have explained why she did so, even to herself. He was a complete stranger to her, and yet, with her quick intuition, she had discerned a curious expression of anxiety and fear in his face, as though of the impending horror of a crime, — a look which, because it was so strained and unnatural, had aroused her suspicion. When she had sprung forward to shield the King, only one idea had inspired her, — and that idea she would not now fully own even to herself, because it was so entirely, weakly feminine. Nevertheless, from woman’s weakness has often sprung a hero’s strength — and so it had proved in this case. She did not, however, allow herself to dwell on the instinctive impulse which had thrown her on the King’s breast, ready to receive her own death-blow rather than that he should die; she preferred to elude that question, and to consider her action solely from the standpoint of those Socialistic theories with which she was indissolubly associated.

  “Had I not frustrated the attempt, the crime would have been set down to us and our Brotherhood,” she said to herself, “Sergius — or Paul Zouche — or I myself — or even Pasquin — yes, even he! — might, and doubtless would, have been accused of instigating it. As it is, I think I have saved the situation.” She rose and walked slowly up and down the room. “I wonder who is behind the wretched boy concerned in this business? He is too young to have determined on such a deed himself, — unless he is mad; — he must be a tool in the hands of others.”

  Here spying her long black cloak hanging across a chair, she took it up and threw it round her, — her face was reflected back upon her from a mirror set in the wall, round which a cluster of ivory cupids clambered, — and she looked critically
at her white drawn features, and the disordered masses of her hair. Loosening these abundant locks, she shook them down and gathered them into her one uncrippled hand, preparatory to twisting them into the usual knot at the back of her head, the while she looked at the little sculptured amorini set round the mirror, with a compassionate smile.

  “Such a number of mimic Loves where there is no real love!” she said half aloud, — when the opening of a door, and the swaying movement of a curtain pushed aside, startled her; and still holding her rich hair up in her hand she turned quickly, — to find herself face to face with, — the King.

  There was an instant’s dead silence. Dropping the silken gold weight of her tresses to fall as they would, regardless of conventional appearances, she stood erect, making all unconsciously to herself, a picture of statuesque and beauteous tragedy. Her plain black garments, — the long cloak enveloping her slight form, and the glorious tangle of her unbound hair rippling loosely about her pale face, in which her eyes shone like blue flowers, made luminous by the sunlight of the inspired soul behind them, all gave her an almost supernatural air, — and made her seem as wholly unlike any other woman as a strange leaf from an unexplored country is unlike the foliage common to one’s native land. The King looked steadfastly upon her; she, meeting his gaze with equal steadfastness, felt her heart beating violently, though, as she well knew, it was not with fear. She had no thought of Court etiquette, — nor had she any reason to consider it, his Majesty having himself deliberately trespassed upon its rules by visiting her thus alone and unattended. She offered no reverence, — no salutation; — she simply stood before him, quite silent, awaiting his pleasure, — though in her eyes there shone a dangerous brilliancy that was almost feverish, and nervous tremors shook her from head to foot. The strange dumb spell between them relaxed at last. With a kind of effort which expressed itself in the extra rigidity and pallor of his fine features, the King spoke:

  “Madame, I have come to thank you! Your noble act of heroism this afternoon has saved my life. I do not say it is worth saving! — but the Nation appears to think it is, — and in the name of the Nation, whose servant I am, I offer you my personal gratitude — and service!”

  He bowed low as he said these words gravely and courteously. Her eyes still searched his face wistfully, with the eager plaintive expression of a child looking for some precious treasure it has lost. She strove to calm her throbbing pulses, — to quiet the hurrying blood in her veins, — to brace herself up to her usual impervious height of composure and self-control.

  “I need no thanks!” she answered briefly— “I have only done my duty!”

  “Nay, Madame, is it quite consistent with your duty to shield from death one so hated by your disciples and followers?” he asked, with a tinge of melancholy in his accents— “You — as the famous Lotys — should have helped to kill, not to save!”

  She regarded him fearlessly.

  “You mistake!” she said— “As King, you should learn to know your subjects better! We are not murderers. We do not seek your life, — we seek to make you understand the need there is of honesty and justice. We live our lives among the poor; and we see those poor crushed down into the dust by the rich, without hope and without help, — and we endeavour to rouse them to a sense of this Wrong, so that they may, by persistence, obtain Right. We do not want the death of any man! Even to a traitor we give warning and time, ere we punish his treachery. The unhappy wretch who attempted your life to-day was not of our party, or our teaching, thank God!”

  “I am sure of that!” he said very gently, his face brightening with a kind smile, — then, seeing her swerve, as though about to fall, he caught her on one arm— “You are faint! You must not stand too long. I fear you are suffering from the pain of that cruel wound inflicted on you for my sake!”

  “A little—” she managed to say, with white lips— “But it is nothing — it will soon pass — —”

  She sank helplessly into the chair he placed for her, and mutely watched him as he walked to the window and threw it open, admitting the sweet, fresh, sea-scented air, and a flood of crimson radiance from the setting sun.

  “I am informed that you wish to quit the Palace at once,” he said, averting his gaze from hers for a moment;— “Need I say how much I regret this decision of yours? Both I and the Queen had hoped you would have remained with us, under the care of our own physician, till you were quite recovered. But I owe you too great a debt already to make any further claim upon you — and I will not command you to stay, if you desire to go.”

  She lifted her head; — the faint colour was returning to her cheeks.

  “I thank you!” she said simply;— “I do indeed desire to go. Every moment spent here is a moment wasted!”

  “You think so?” — and, turning from the window where he stood, he confronted her again;— “May I venture to suggest that you hardly do justice to me, or to the situation? You have placed me under very great obligations — surely you should endure my company long enough to tell me at least how I can in some measure show my personal recognition of your brave and self-sacrificing action!”

  She looked at him in musing silence. A strange glow came into her eyes, — a deeper crimson flushed her cheek.

  “You can do nothing for me!” she said, after a long pause, “You are a King — I, a poor commoner. I would not be indebted to you for all the world! I am prouder of my ‘common’ estate than you are of your royalty! What are ‘royal’ rewards? Jewels, money, place, title! All valueless to me! If you would serve anyone, serve the People; — do something to deserve their trust! If you would show me any personal recognition, as you say, for saving your life, make that life more noble!”

  He heard her without offence, holding himself mute and motionless. She rose from her seat, and approached him more closely.

  “Perhaps, after all, it is well that I was, — unconsciously and against my own volition, — brought here,” she said; “Perhaps it is God’s will that I should speak with you! For, as a rule none of your unknown subjects can, or may speak with you! — you are so much hemmed in and ringed round with slaves and parasites! In so far as this goes, you are to be pitied; though it rests with you to shake yourself free from the toils of vulgar adulation. Your flatterers tell you nothing. They are careful to keep you shut out of your own kingdom — to hide from you things that are true, — things that you ought to know; they fool you with false assurances of national tranquillity and content, — they persuade you to play, like an over-grown child, with the toys of luxury, — they lead you, a mere puppet, round and round in the clockwork routine of a foolish and licentious society, — when you might be a Man! — up and doing man’s work that should help you to regenerate and revivify the whole country! I speak boldly — yes! — because I do not fear you! — because I have no favours to gain from you, — because to me, — Lotys, — you, — the King — are nothing!”

  Her voice, perfectly tranquil, even, and coldly sweet, had not a single vibration of uncertainty or hesitation in it — and her words seemed to cut through the stillness of the room with clean incisiveness like the sweep of a sword-blade. Outside, the sea murmured and the leaves rustled, — the sun had sunk, leaving behind it a bright, pearly twilight sky, flecked with pink clouds like scattered rose-petals.

  He looked straight at her, — his clear dark grey eyes were filled with the glowing fire of strongly suppressed feeling. Some hasty ejaculation sprang to his lips, but he checked it, and pacing once or twice up and down, suddenly wheeled round, and again confronted her.

  “If, as a king, I fall so far short of kingliness, and am nothing to you,” — he said deliberately; “Why did you shield me from the assassin’s dagger a while ago? Why not have let me perish?”

  She shook back her gold hair, and regarded him almost defiantly.

  “I did not save you because you are the King!” she replied— “Be assured of that!”

  He was vaguely astonished.

  “Merely
a humane sentiment then?” he said— “Just as you would have saved a dog from drowning!”

  A little smile crept reluctantly round the corners of her mouth.

  “There was another reason,” she began in a low tone, — then paused— “But — only a woman’s reason!”

  Something in her changing colour, — some delicate indefinable touch of tenderness and pathos, which softened her features and made them almost ethereal, sent a curious thrill through his blood.

  “A woman’s reason!” he echoed; “May I not hear it?”

  Again she hesitated, — then, as if despising herself for her own irresolution she spoke out bravely.

  “You may!” — she said— “There is nothing to conceal — nothing of which I am ashamed! Besides, it is the true motive of the action which you are pleased to call ‘heroic.’ I saved your life simply because — because you resemble in form and feature, in look and manner, the only man I love!”

  A curious silence followed her words. The faint far whispering of the leaves on the trees outside seemed almost intrusively loud in such a stillness, — the placid murmur of the sea against the cliff below the Palace became well-nigh suggestive of storm. Lotys was suddenly conscious of an odd strained sense of terror, — she had spoken as freely and frankly as she would have spoken to any one of her own associates, — and yet she felt that somehow she had been over-impulsive, and that in a thoughtless moment she had let slip some secret which placed her, weak and helpless, in the King’s power. The King himself stood immovable as a figure of bronze, — his eyes resting upon her with a deep insistence of purpose, as though he sought to wrest some further confession from her soul. The tension between them was painful, — almost intolerable, — and though it lasted but a minute, that minute seemed weighted with the potentialities of years. Forcing herself to break the dumb spell, Lotys went on hurriedly and half desperately: —