The Mystery of a Turkish Bath
She was a beautiful woman, proud, cold, queenly--he had acquired
strength of character, loftier ideals, and a sense of the value of
intellectual gifts, which had kept him singularly free from and
indifferent to, the temptations of the senses. He had learnt to drink
mental stimulants with avidity. He had made one or two brilliant
successes in literature, and was looked upon as a supremely "odd fish,"
by his brother officers.
That third meeting decided his fate. He spoke out his love, spurred on
by a rivalry he had good cause to dread, but spoke to no purpose.
Calmly, though with a sorrow she did not attempt to disguise, she told
her old playmate and friend that her choice was made. She was going to
marry the old, vicious, and fabulously wealthy Russian Prince, Fedor
Ivanovitch Zairoff. She made no pretence of caring for the man whom,
out of a host of suitors, she had selected to wed. When her young lover
stormed and upbraided her she only raised those wonderful stag-like eyes
to his face and said:
"I have a reason, Julian. I cannot explain it. I dare not say more.
Believe me I could not make you happy, _it would not be permitted_."
And having long ago learnt that arguments were utterly useless before
_that_ formula, he had to stand aside--to crush back a strong and
unconquerable passion--to see her pass from his sight and knowledge--and
to bear his life as best he could, with that feeling in his heart of
having staked all on one throw, and lost, that makes so many men
desperate and vicious. That it did not make Julian Estcourt so was
entirely due to great strength of moral character, and a belief in the
responsibilities with which life is charged, and for the abuse of which
it is destined to suffer in future states or conditions, as well as in
its present.
If such belief were universally accepted and pursued, we should soon
cease to hear those ridiculous and humiliating phrases with which
popular favourites are extenuated for the reckless and disgraceful waste
of mind, energy, and usefulness, occasioned by some trifling
disappointment or misfortune. There would be no more sins glossed over
as "sowing wild oats," and "having his fling," or "driven to the bad,"
because once an individual feels he is responsible to _himself_ for
undue physical indulgences--for laws of natural life set at naught, and
spiritual impulses disregarded--he will try to emerge from the slough of
evil, and he will learn with startling rapidity to value all joys of the
senses less and less. There can be no high order of morality without
this sense of responsibility, for when a man feels he is moulding his
own character, forming, as it were, fresh links in the chain of
endurance, adding by every act and thought and word to that personality
he is bound to confront as _himself_, to re-inhabit as himself, and to
judge as himself, then life rises into an importance that words cannot
convey, but which the soul alone recognises and feels in those better
moments that are mercifully granted to each and all of us.
So Julian Estcourt took up his burden--saddened, aged, embittered
perhaps, but not one whit more inclined to squander the gifts of life or
the fruits of discipline than he had been in his dreamy, studious youth.
He neither sought distraction in evil and dissipated courses, nor death
by any of those foolhardy and rash exploits which have far too often
been glorified as "courage" or "pluck."
He was graver, more reticent, more studious than of yore, and he found
his reward, though few even of his intimate associates were aware of his
abnormal gifts, or his superior knowledge. Such was the man who, still
in the prime of life's best years, still with thirst unslaked for that
one divine draught of love which, once at least, is offered to mortal
lips, stood now in the soft December moonlight by the side of the woman
he had worshipped for long in secret and in pain, and cried aloud in
triumph to his heart, "At last happiness is mine!"
His whole consciousness was pervaded with a sense of ecstasy that seemed
to make all past pain and regret sink into utter insignificance. To
stand there by her side, to drink in that wonderful beauty of face and
form, was a joy that brought absolute forgetfulness of everything
outside and apart from its new and magical acquisition. The world was
forgotten. Even the possibility of a formal and imperative ceremonial
by which his newly-won treasure must be secured to himself at last,
barely flashed across his consciousness. He did not trouble himself to
put it into words. He listened to the brief disjointed fragments of her
speech--fragments which gave a dim picture of her life in these empty
years of division. Now and then he spoke of himself. She listened.
Once she turned to him with an impulse of tenderness strange in one so
cold and self-possessed.
"Ah!" she cried, softly, "I have made you suffer... but it was not my
will... Oh, always believe that... And I will give you compensation.--
I can promise it--now."
They seemed to him the sweetest words that ever fell from mortal lips,
and no less sweet--though infinitely puzzling--was that exquisite
humility with which she crowned the wonder of her self-surrender. Yet
even as he heard his brain grew bewildered--his senses seemed to reel.
Strange thoughts and shapes seemed to hover around him, and all the
soft, dim space of night appeared a black and peopled horror. For a
moment he felt that consciousness was forsaking him... that the shock of
this unexpected joy was beyond his strength to bear. Dizzy and sick he
swayed suddenly forwards.--A cool hand touched his brow--a voice reached
his ear. With a mighty effort he shook off the paralysing weakness, and
sank down by the side of his enchantress.
"Is it a dream?" he murmured, vaguely; "shall I wake to-morrow and know
you have mocked me again?"
"Nay, my beloved," she whispered; "this--is no dream... Never again
shall I mock you. I am but a woman now who loves. Earth holds no
weaker thing."
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When Julian Estcourt entered the public drawing-room, nearly two hours
after he had left it, several curious eyes turned towards him. The
card-players had finished their game and broken up into various groups.
A few men were yawning and apparently meditating a retreat to the
smoking-room. No one seemed particularly energetic, but the entrance of
that tall soldierly figure struck a new note of interest in the languid
assemblage. He seemed to bring--as it were--a breeze of vitality, a
sense of freshness and energy along with him from the starlit air and
the pine-scented woods. His head was erect, his eyes shone with the
radiance of happiness, a certain sense of pride--of triumph--and yet of
deep intense content, was in his aspect and his smile.
Mrs Ray Jefferson, her spirits still unimpaired by losses at "poker,"
was the first to remark audibly on the change.
"Why, Colonel!" she said. "Have _you_ been having a Turkish Bath?
Guess you look as fresh and perky as if you'd taken a new lease of
life."
He laughed. "The only bath I have taken," he said, "is one of
moonlight. You should all be out on the terrace. Far healthier and
more enjoyable than these hot, gas-lit rooms, I assure you."
"The terrace," said Mrs Jefferson, looking at him with a sudden stern
accusing glance. "Ladies and gentlemen, what did I tell you? I--do--
believe--"
She paused dramatically, every eye turned fully and searchingly upon the
handsome face and erect figure so calmly and easily confronting this
sudden criticism.
"Well?" he said at last. "What is it you believe?"
"You've seen--her," burst out Mrs Jefferson eagerly. "Now Colonel, no
tricks--plain yes or no; I'm certain sure you've seen her--my Mystery.
Haven't you?"
"I will not pretend," he said, "to misunderstand you. I have met an old
friend, and I hope soon to have the pleasure of introducing her to you
all. Not with any mystery about her, as our American friend seems
determined to suppose, but simply as the Princess Zairoff--of whom you
may have heard before this."
There was a buzz--a stir--a confused murmur. "Heard of her--I should
think so. You never mean to say she's _here_? I thought she was in
Russia--"
"Gracious!" almost shrieked Mrs Jefferson. "Why it was her husband who
died so mysteriously, on the eve of that awful conspiracy. You never
mean to say, Colonel Estcourt, that you know her. Why she's one of the
celebrities of Europe, and to come here, to this quiet place--and
_incognito_?"
"Do you not think," he said, "that the fact of being quiet and unknown
would just be the one fact she would appreciate? I hope I am not
claiming too much from your courtesy when I say that the privilege of
her society can only be obtained by a due regard to her wishes in that
respect. She wishes only to be known as Madame Zairoff, here."
"I'm sure," exclaimed Mrs Jefferson eagerly, "I'm only too willing to
promise anything for the privilege of seeing her. Isn't that the
general opinion also?"
There was a murmur of assent, specially eager on the part of the men.
"I can only assure you," continued Colonel Estcourt gravely, "that you
will not regret the slight inconvenience of repressing personal
curiosity, for Madame Zairoff is a woman whose gifts and graces are of a
marvellous nature and calculated to delight the most critical society.
As Mrs Jefferson told us, she is here for her health. It is an
incident we cannot deplore if we are to benefit by her society."
"You'd better all look out for your hearts, gentlemen," laughed Mrs
Jefferson gaily and excitedly. "I assure you I don't believe there's
another woman in the world like her. I've seen her under trying
circumstances, and I give you my word of honour that a woman who can
preserve any charm of personal appearance under the ordeal of a Turkish
Bath--"
There came a discreet little cough from the neighbourhood of Mrs
Masterman. The little American stopped abruptly.
"I'd best say no more," she said. Then she laughed. "All the same, if
you only could see us--"
CHAPTER SEVEN.
CURIOSITY.
There was suppressed but general excitement throughout the hotel all the
next day.
Someone had caught sight of the Princess Zairoff, who had driven out
after luncheon in a low open carriage with three horses harnessed
abreast in Russian fashion, that went like the wind. Colonel Estcourt
was beside her, and curiosity was rife as to how he should have known
her, and whether accident only was responsible for the meeting of two
people, one of whom had come from Russia, and the other from India, to
this prosaic English nook, _for their health_.
Mrs Masterman sniffed ominously, as one who scents scandal and
impropriety in facts that do not adapt themselves to every-day rules of
life. A few other women, suffering from one or other of the fashionable
complaints in vogue at this season, agreed with her, that "it certainly
looked very odd." They did not specify the "it," but they were quite
convinced of the oddity. It did not occur to them to reflect that there
was not the slightest reason for any mystery on the part of the
Princess, she being perfectly free and untrammelled, or that Colonel
Estcourt had been singularly gloomy and depressed before Mrs
Jefferson's graphic description of the mysterious beauty attracted his
notice.
There is a certain class of people who always shake their heads, and
purse up their lips, at the mere suggestion of "chance," or "accident,"
having a fortunate or happy application. They do not apply the same
train of reasoning to the reverse side of the picture; the bias of their
nature is evidently suspicious. These are the minds that refuse to