His Majesty certainly looked far less bored than he usually did on his royal consort's reception evenings. He entered the room with a good-natured smile on his face, which did not leave him, even whilst he kissed the frigid Queen's hand, and nodded to her entourage, every one of whom he cordially detested.
But when he caught sight of Lydie, he positively beamed at her, and astonished all the scandal-mongers by the surfeit of attentions which he bestowed on her. Directly after he had paid his respects to his wife and received the young scions of ancient aristocratic houses, that were being presented to him, he turned with great alacrity to Lydie and engaged her in close conversation.
"Will you honour us by stepping the pavane with us, Marquise?" he asked in sugary tones. "Alas! our dancing days should be over, yet par ma foi! we could yet tread another measure beside the tiniest feet in France."
Lydie would perhaps have been taken aback at the King's superlative amiability, but instinctively her mind reverted to the many occasions when he had thus tried to win her good graces, in the hope of obtaining concessions of money from the virtual chief of the Department of Finance. She saw that inquisitive eyes were watching her over-keenly as—unable to refuse the King's invitation—she placed a reluctant hand in his, and took her position beside him for the opening of the pavane.
She was essentially graceful even in the studied stiffness of her movements; a stiffness which she had practised and then made entirely her own, and which was somehow expressive of the unbendable hauteur of her moral character.
The stately pavane suited the movements of her willowy figure, which appeared quite untrammelled, easy and full of spring, even within the narrow confines of the fashionable corslet. She was dressed in white to-night and her young shoulders looked dazzling and creamy beside the matt tone of her brocaded gown. She never allowed the ridiculous coiffure, which had lately become the mode, to hide entirely the glory of her own chestnut hair, and its rich, warm colour gleamed through the powder, scantily sprinkled over it by an artist's hand.
She had not forgotten even for a moment the serious events of this never-to-be-forgotten day; but amongst the many memories which crowded in upon her, as, with slow step she trod the grave measure of the dance, none was more vivid than that of her husband's scorn, when he spoke of her own hand resting in that of the treacherous and perfidious monarch, who would have sold his friend for money. She wondered how he would act if he could see her now, her fingers, very frequently meeting those of King Louis during the elaborate figures of the dance.
Strangely enough, although everything milor had said to her at that interview had merely jarred upon her mood and irritated her nerves, without seemingly carrying any conviction, yet now, when she was obliged to touch so often the moist, hot palm of King Louis, she felt something of that intolerable physical repugnance which her husband had, as it were, brought to actuality by the vigour of his suggestions.
Otherwise she took little heed of her surroundings. During the preliminary movement of the dance, the march past, with its quaint, artificial gestures and steps and the slow majesty of its music, she could not help seeing the looks of malevolent curiosity, of satisfied childish envy, and of sarcastic triumph which were levelled at her from every corner of the room.
The special distinction bestowed on her by the King—who as a rule never danced at his wife's soirées—seemed in the minds of all these gossip-lovers to have confirmed the worst rumours, anent the cause of Lord Eglinton's unexpected resignation. His Majesty did not suffer like his wife from an unconquerable horror of frisky matrons; on the contrary, his abhorrence was chiefly directed against the starchy dowagers and the prudish dévotes who formed the entourage of the Queen. The fact that he distinguished Lydie to-night so openly, showed that he no longer classed her among the latter.
"His Majesty hath at last found a kindred spirit in the unapproachable Marchioness," was the universal comment, which thoroughly satisfied the most virulent disseminator of ill-natured scandal.
Lydie knew enough of Court life to guess what would be said. Up to now she had been happily free from Louis's compromising flatteries, save at such times when he required money, but his attentions went no further—and they invariably ceased the moment he had obtained all that he wanted. But to-night he was unswerving in his adulation; and, in the brief pause between the second and third movement of the dance, he contrived to whisper in her ear:
"Ah, Madame! how you shame your King! Shall we ever be able to adequately express the full measure of our gratitude?"
"Gratitude, Sire?" she murmured, somewhat bewildered and rather coldly, "I do not understand . . . why gratitude?"
"You are modest, Madame, as well as brave and good," he rejoined, taking one more opportunity of raising her hand to his lips. He had succeeded in gradually leading her into a window embrasure, somewhat away from the rest of the dancers. He did not admire the statuesque grace of Lydie in the least, and had always secretly sneered at her, for her masculine strength of will and the rigidity of her principles, but it had been impossible for any man, alive to a sense of what was beautiful, not to delight in the exquisitely harmonious picture formed by that elegant woman, in her stiff, white brocaded gown and with her young head crowned by its wreath of ardent hair, standing out brilliantly against the pale, buttercup colour of the damask curtain behind her. There was nothing forced therefore in the look of admiration with which the King now regarded Lydie; conscious of this, she deeply resented the look, and perhaps because of it, she was not quite so fully alive to the hidden meaning of his words as she otherwise might have been.
"And as beautiful as you are brave," added Louis unctuously. "It is not every woman who would thus have had the courage of her convictions, and so openly borne witness to the trust and loyalty which she felt."
"Indeed, Sire," she said coldly and suddenly beginning to feel vaguely puzzled, "I am afraid your Majesty is labouring under the misapprehension, that I have recently done something to deserve special royal thanks, whereas——"
"Whereas you have only followed the dictates of your heart," he rejoined gallantly, seeing that she had paused as if in search of a word, "and shown to the sceptics in this ill-natured Court that, beneath the rigid mask of iron determination, this exquisitely beautiful personality hid the true instincts of adorable womanhood."
The musicians now struck the opening chords to the third and final measure of the pavane. There is something dreamy and almost sad in this movement of the stately dance, and this melancholy is specially accentuated in the composition of Rameau, which the players were rendering with consummate art to-night. The King's unctuous words were still ringing unpleasantly in Lydie's ears, when he put out his hand, claiming hers for the dance.
Mechanically she followed him, her feet treading the measure quite independently of her mind, which had gone wandering in the land of dreams. A vague sense of uneasiness crept slowly but surely into her heart, she pondered over Louis's words, not knowing what to make of them, yet somehow beginning to fear them, or rather to fear that she might after all succeed in understanding their full meaning. She could not dismiss the certitude from her mind that he was, in some hidden sense, referring to the Stuart prince and his cause, when he spoke of "convictions" and of her "courage"; but at first she only thought that he meant, in a vague way, to recall her interference of this morning, Lord Eglinton's outburst of contempt, and her own promise to give the matter serious consideration.
This in a measure re-assured her. The King's words had already become hazy in her memory, as she had not paid serious attention to them at the time, and she gradually forced those vague fears within her to subside, and even smiled at her own cowardice in scenting danger where none existed.
Undoubtedly that was the true reason of the rapacious monarch's flatteries to-night; truth to tell, her mind had been so absorbed with actual events, her quarrel with her husband, the departure of Gaston, the proposed expedition of Le Monarque, that she had almost forgotten the promise which she had made to the King earlier in the day, with a view to gaining time.
"How admirably you dance, Madame," said King Louis, "the poetry of motion by all the saints! Ah! believe me, I cannot conquer altogether a feeling of unutterable envy!"
"Envy, Sire, of whom?—or of what?" she asked, forced to keep up a conversation which sickened her, since etiquette did not allow her to remain silent if the King desired to talk. "Methinks fate leaves your Majesty but little to wish for."
"Envy of the lucky man who obtained a certitude, whilst we had to be content with vague if gracious promises," he rejoined blandly.
She looked at him keenly, inquiringly, a deep line of doubt, even of fear now settling between her brows.
"Certitude of what, Sire?" she asked suddenly pausing in the dance and turning to look him straight in the eyes. "I humbly crave your Majesty's pardon, but meseems that we are at cross-purposes, and that your Majesty speaks of something which I, on the other hand, do not understand."
"Nay! nay! then we'll not refer to the subject again," rejoined Louis with consummate gallantry, "for of a truth we would not wish to lose one precious moment of this heavenly dance. Enough that you understand, Madame, that your King is grateful, and will show his gratitude, even though his heart burn with jealousy at the good fortune of another man!"
There was no mistaking the sly leer which appeared in his eye as he spoke. Lydie felt her cheeks flaming up with sudden wrath; wrath, which as quickly gave way to an awful, an unconquerable horror.
Still she did not suspect. Her feet once more trod the monotonous measure, but her heart beat wildly against the stiff corslet; the room began to whirl round before her eyes; a sickening sense of dizziness threatened to master her. Every drop of blood had left her cheeks, leaving them ashen pale.
She was afraid; and the fear was all the more terrible as she could not yet give it a name. But the sense of an awful catastrophe was upon her, impending, not yet materialized, but which would overwhelm her inevitably when it came.