Robert Orange
now Reckage needs him and depends on Orange. Could he but know it,
Orange is the one creature who could pull him through his difficulties
with the Bond of Association. A man who has no personal ambition, who
desires nothing that any one can give, who fears nothing that any one
can do, who lives securely in the presence of God, is a power we must
not under-rate."
She spoke with enthusiasm--the enthusiasm which women seldom, if ever,
display for principle on its bare merits. By the deepening colour in her
eyes and sudden clearness in her cheeks, the Ambassador felt that he had
reached a point where the emotions would have to be considered, even
though they might not be counted on.
"I have not time to tell you all the nonsense Reckage said," he
answered. "So far as my own judgment can serve for a guide, I believe
that he would like to see Orange under the care and discipline of St.
Ignatius."
"He wishes him to become a Jesuit priest? How selfish!"
"Such is my impression. He wants so competent a colleague removed from
the political sphere. If his words and actions are of a piece, he will
certainly work hard to attain this object. He is saying everywhere,
'Orange is a born ecclesiastic. Orange is a mystic. Orange is under the
influence of Newman. Orange begins to see that marriage is not for him.'
Such remarks don't help outside the Church. Really, competition renders
the nicest people detestable."
Lady Sara could not conceal her agitation. But she baffled her companion
a little by saying--
"I suppose you want Orange to marry your inopportune Archduchess?"
"The lady in question is certainly inopportune. I have never called her
an Archduchess. I leave such audacities to her enemies! But tell me what
you think of _Mrs. Parflete_?"
"I have never seen her. Pensee Fitz Rewes insists that she is beautiful,
cold, determined, and uncommon."
"Generally, there is nothing so fatal to a woman's success in the world
as an early connection with a scoundrel. I have odd accounts of Mrs.
Parflete from Madrid--the Marquis of Castrillon and an upstart called
Bodava fought a duel about her in Baron Zeuill's gymnasium. A man called
William Caffle, who attended to their wounds, has given me fullest
particulars of the affair. I don't wish to injure the lady, but on
account of eventualities which might arise, I am obliged to look a
little about me."
"I understand," said Sara.
"The great point is not to let Parflete take the lead in the settlement.
His present course of action isn't quite decent or consistent. Will
Orange do nothing? It is wise to make peace whilst there is some faint
appearance of choice left on the subject, so there is no time to be
wasted."
"What ought Orange to do?"
"Reckage declares that he will not appeal to Rome. There he is
well-advised. But as he has already compromised Mrs. Parflete, surely
his present scruples are entirely new and unlooked for? We must both
despise him, if he should abandon her now."
"He has never compromised her," said Sara indignantly. "He has even been
ridiculed for his honour. I had no idea, Excellence, that you were so
wicked!"
"How else could I know all the news twenty-four hours before the rest of
the world? This, however, is no laughing matter. Parflete may ask his
wife to return to him. It may suit her purpose to agree."
"What! A woman who loves, or who has loved--Robert Orange? A few things
in human nature are still impossible."
Prince d'Alchingen shrugged his shoulders, and continued--
"Parflete has a good back-stairs knowledge of Alberian politics. We
never deny this, but we always add that he was dismissed, in disgrace,
from the Imperial Household."
"Is there much use in denying the fact that he married the Archduke's
daughter?"
"We meet the case by saying that the Archduke in his youth may not have
been exempt from manly follies. And Duboc was irresistible--she drove
one mad!"
"Then why all this fuss?"
"To avoid more fuss--on a large scale."
"But I have always heard that Mrs. Parflete has no intention of giving
trouble. They say she is an angel."
"You will find that she would far rather be an Archduchess! Orange may
discover that his Beatrice is nearly related to Rahab!"
"Oh, I cannot think you are right."
"Then you should hear Zeuill and General Prim on the subject. The
Marquis of Castrillon is in London. Our friend Parflete will soon be
labouring with copious materials for a divorce."
"How can you assume such horrors?" said Sara.
"The imagination," said His Excellency, "is always more struck by
likelihoods than the reason convinced by the examination of facts! My
dear friend, let us survey the position. Orange does not seem to have
the most distant idea of making Mrs. Parflete his--his _belle amie_.
Well and good. But ought he, at his age, so handsome, so brilliant, so
much a man, to renounce all other women for the sake of a little
adventuress? Can nothing be done? If he could have some convincing proof
of her treachery, would he not turn to others more beautiful, more
worthy----"
"To Lady Fitz Rewes," said Sara quickly.
"If you like," replied the Prince, in his gentlest voice.
For a second or two each of them looked away. Sara glanced toward her
canaries in their cage. Prince d'Alchingen leant forward to inhale the
perfume of some violets in a vase near him.
"Delicious!" he murmured, "delicious!"
"Mr. Disraeli," said Sara, still gazing at the birds, "has always wished
for the marriage with Lady Fitz Rewes. Yet what can we do? I cannot see
the end of it."
"The heroic are plotted against by evil spirits, comforted by good ones,
but in no way constrained," observed the Ambassador; "let us then
support Mr. Orange, and wait for his own decision. I doubt whether we
could drive him to Lady Fitz Rewes."
"To whom else?" asked Sara, fastening some flowers in her belt. They
were white camellias sent that morning from the infatuated, still
hopeful Duke of Marshire. "To whom else--if not Pensee?"
"I dare not answer such questions yet. Have patience and you shall see
what you shall see. Much will hinge on the events of the next few days."
"I will not believe," she insisted, "that Robert Orange has been
deceived by that woman."
"You may change your opinion. Come to Hadley Lodge next Saturday--I ask
no more."
"Really, sir," said Sara, with a mocking smile, "you frighten me. Am I
at last to fly through an intrigue on the wings of a conspiracy?"
The Prince smiled also, but he saw that the lady had risen to the
occasion and would not prove false to her Asiatic blood.
"Mrs. Parflete and Castrillon are cut out for each other," said he, "but
Orange has no business in that _galere_. He is reserved for a greater
fate."
"What do you mean?" said Sara.
"All now depends on you."
"On me?"
"Plainly. Reckage wishes Orange to get out of his way and become a
Religious. Can this be permitted?"
"It would be outrageous. It would be a crime."
"Ah, worse than that. It might prove a success. We don't want any more
strong men in the Church just now."
Sara agreed. She, too, was opposed to the Church. And she was glad of
the excuse this thought offered for the pains she would take to save
Orange from the Vatican grasp.
"Then we are allies," said His Excellency. "You will help me."
"Gladly, and what is more, as a duty. But how?"
"Keep the two men apart, and treat both of them--both--with kindness."
His Excellency then rose, kissed her hands once more, and took his
departure. Sara, when the door was closed, paced the floor with swift
and desperate steps, as though she were encircled by thoughts which,
linked together, danced round her way so that whether she retreated or
advanced, swayed to the right or to the left, they held her fast.
CHAPTER XIX
Lord Garrow, under his daughter's command, had issued invitations for a
dinner-party that same evening to a few friends, who, it was hoped,
would support the Meeting which Reckage was endeavouring to organise as
a protest against Dr. Temple's nomination. The guests included Reckage
himself, Orange, Charles Aumerle, the Dowager Countess of Larch, Hartley
Penborough, Lady Augusta Hammit, and the Bishop of Calbury's
chaplain,--the Rev. Edwin Pole-Knox.
Sara, arrayed in white satin and opals, sat at the piano playing the
_Faust_ of Berlioz, and wondering whether she had really arranged her
table to perfection, when the footman brought the following note--dashed
off in pencil--from Lord Reckage:--
ALMOUTH HOUSE.
An extraordinary thing has happened. Agnes has run away with David
Rennes. She seems quite broken and her letter is too touching, too
sacred to show. As for him, it is difficult to say what he could
give, or what I would accept, as an excuse. She, however, has my
full forgiveness, and perhaps good may come of so much sorrow and
duplicity. I must see you after the others have gone to-night. My
plan is to leave early--probably with Orange and Aumerle, but I
will return later. I need your counsel. B.
Sara, who was always in league with audacity, clapped her hands at the
tidings of Miss Carillon's bold move. She was not surprised, for, as we
have seen, she had read the girl's character truly, and warned Orange
that some event of the kind would happen. But the pleasure she took in
this confirmation of her own prophetic gifts was alloyed by the fear
that Reckage, now at liberty, would prove a masterful, jealous, and
embarrassing lover. Nor were her forebodings on this score lessened when
he arrived, evidently in a strange mood, a quarter of an hour before the
appointed time. His eyes travelled over her face with a consuming
scrutiny to which she was unaccustomed and for which she found herself
unprepared. For a moment she experienced the disadvantages of a guilty
conscience, and although she had, so far, merely considered various
plans for using his devotion without peril to her own independence, she
felt that the moment for deliberation was past, that the duel between
them had begun.
"You have my note," he said, "and I would rather not talk about Agnes
to-night. On that point I am in a stupor. I can't realise the disaster
at all. I might seem unfeeling, whereas I am insensible, or unconscious,
or mentally chloroformed--anything you like to call it."
"I can see that you have received a great blow," answered Sara, looking
down.
"I suppose so. And at present I am stunned. Wait a week, and I may be
able to grasp the case--I won't say calmly, for I couldn't be calmer
than I am at this very moment. But I will say, with understanding, with
justice. Give me no credit yet for either. To be frank, I don't
recognise myself in this crisis. As a rule, I have an impulse--more or
less violent--to some extreme measure.... I saw d'Alchingen this
afternoon," he added, abruptly.
He did not add that the Prince had given several striking reasons for
the Lady Sara's interest in Robert Orange. His Excellency, in so acting,
may not have been aware that he was pouring such confidences into the
ear of a jealous man, but he wished to divert gossip from himself, and
he was becoming afraid lest his intimacy with the brilliant, dangerous
girl might give rise to criticism. "She talks and writes incessantly
about Orange," he had said; "what a marriage it would be! I hope it may
be brought about." This suggestion drove Reckage's thoughts toward a
fatal survey of the past year. He discovered, as he believed,
irresistible proofs of Sara's infatuation, and, what was worse, clear
evidence of Robert's sly encouragement of that weakness. Why else had he
borne the severance from Mrs. Parflete with such astonishing fortitude?