CHAPTER XXVI
THE AWFUL CERTITUDE
Then all at once she understood!
There at the further end of the room, against the rich gold of the curtain, she saw Gaston de Stainville standing beside his wife and one or two other women, the centre of a gaily chattering crowd, he himself chattering with them, laughing and jesting, whilst from time to time his white and slender hand raised a gold-rimmed glass to his eye, with a gesture of fatuity and affectation.
Something in her look, though it had only lasted a few seconds, must then and there have compelled his own, for he suddenly dropped his glass, and their eyes met across the room; Lydie's inquiring, only just beginning to doubt, and fearful, as if begging for reassurance! his, mocking and malicious, triumphant too and self-flattering, whilst la belle Irène, intercepting this exchange of glances, laughed loudly and shrugged her bare shoulders.
Lydie was not that type of woman who faints, or screams at moments of acute mental agony. Even now, when the full horror of what she had so suddenly realized, assailed her with a crushing blow that would have stunned a weaker nature, she contrived to pull herself together and to continue the dance to the end. The King—beginning to feel bored in the company of this silent and obviously absent-minded woman—made no further effort at conversation. She had disappointed him; for Monsieur le Comte de Stainville's innuendoes had led him to hope that the beautiful marble statue had at last come to life and would henceforth become a valuable addition to the light-hearted circle of friends that rallied round him, helping to make him forget the ennui of his matrimonial and official life.
Thus the dance was concluded between them in silence. Louis was too dull and vapid to notice the change in his partner's attitude, the icy touch of her fingers, the deathly whiteness of her lips. But presently he, too, caught sight of Gaston de Stainville and immediately there crept into his face that malicious leer, which awhile ago had kindled Lydie's wrath.
Whether she noted it now or not, it were difficult to say. Only a great determination kept her from making a display before all these indifferent eyes, of the agonizing torture of her mind and heart.
With infinite relief, she made her final curtsey to her partner, and allowed him to lead her back to her official place beside the royal daïs. She could not see clearly, for her eyes had suddenly filled with burning tears of shame and bitter self-accusation. She bit her lips lest a cry of pain escaped them.
"You are ill, my dear! Come away!"
The voice—gentle and deeply concerned—was that of her father. She did not dare look at him, lest she should break down, but she allowed him to lead her away from the immediate noise and glare.
"What is it, Lydie?" queried M. le Duc again, more anxiously, as soon as they had reached a small and secluded alcove. "Has anything further happened? Par Dieu, if that man has again dared . . ."
"What man, father?" she interrupted.
Her voice had no tone in it, she wondered even if M. le Duc would hear, but he was talking ambiguously and she had had enough of misunderstandings to-day.
"What man?" rejoined Monsieur le Duc d'Aumont irritably. "Your husband of course. I have heard rumours about his behaviour to you, and by all the heathen gods . . ."
He paused, astonished and almost awed, for Lydie had laughed suddenly, laughed loudly and long, and there was such a strange ring in that unnatural mirth, that Monsieur le Duc feared lest excitement had been too much for his daughter's brain.
"Lydie! what is it? You must tell me . . . Lydie . . ." he urged, "listen to me . . . do you hear me, Lydie?"
She seemed to be collecting her scattered senses now, but great sobs of hysterical laughter still shook her from head to foot, and she leaned against her father's arm almost as if she feared to fall.
"Yes, father dear," she said fairly coherently, "I do hear you, and I pray you take no heed of me. Much hath occurred to-day to disturb me and my nerves seem to be on the jar. Perhaps I do not see quite clearly either. Father, tell me," she added with a voice almost steady, but harsh and trenchant, and with glowing eyes fixed on the Duke's face, "did I perceive Gaston de Stainville in the crowd just now?"
"You may have done, my dear," he replied with some hesitation. "I do not know."
She had been quick enough to note that, at mention of Gaston's name, his eyes suddenly wore a curious shamefaced expression and avoided meeting her own. She pressed her point more carelessly, feeling that there was something that he would only tell her, if she was perfectly calm and natural in her questionings.
"Then he is here?" she asked.
"Yes . . . I believe so . . . why do you ask?"
"I thought him gone," she said lightly, "that was all. Methought there was an errand he had meant to perform."
"Oh! there is no immediate hurry for that!"
Monsieur le Duc d'Amont, never a very keen observer, was feeling quite reassured by her calmer mood. His daughter had been overwrought. Events had crowded in upon her, thick and fast, some of them of an unpleasant nature: her final surrender to Gaston de Stainville could not have occurred without a wrench; sentiment—he supposed—having conquered friendship and loyalty, no doubt remorse had held sway for awhile. He certainly thought his daughter quite at one with him and his confederates in the treacherous plan; it never entered his head for a moment to blame her for this volte-face, nor did he realize that Gaston's attitude had been one of lying infamy. He knew her for a pure-minded and exceptionally proud woman and his paternal heart had no fear that she would stoop to a vulgar intrigue, at the same time he had no reason to doubt that she had yielded to the persuasive powers of a man whom she had certainly loved at one time, who and of necessity would still exercise a certain influence over her.
And now she was no doubt anxious to know something of future plans she had probably not heard what had been decided with regard to the expedition, and perhaps fretted as to how her own actions had been interpreted by her father and the King. It was with a view to reassuring her on all these points that he now added:
"We are not thinking of sending Le Monarque."
"Ah? I thought that she would have been the most likely vessel. . ."
"Le Levantin will be safer," he explained, "but she will not be ready to put to sea for five or six days, so Gaston will not start until then; but you need have no fear, dear; the orders together with the map and the precious letter, which you have given him, are quite safe in his hands. He is too deeply concerned in the success of the expedition to think of betraying you, even if his regard were less genuine. . . . And we are all deeply grateful to you, my dear . . . It was all for the best. . ."
He patted her hand with kindly affection, much relieved now, for she seemed quite calm and the colour even was coming back to her cheeks: all the afternoon he had been dreading this meeting with his daughter, for he had not seen her since he learned from Gaston that she had yielded to his entreaties, and given him the map and letter which would help the King of France to betray his friend: now he was glad to find that—save for an unusual hysterical outburst—she took the whole matter as coolly as he did himself.
There is no doubt that there are moments in life when a crisis is so acute, a catastrophe so overwhelming, that all our faculties become completely deadened: our individuality goes out of us, and we become mere dolls moving automatically by muscular action and quite independently of our brain.
Thus it was with Lydie.
Her father's words could not be misunderstood. They left her without that last faint shadow of doubt which, almost unbeknown to herself, had been her main support during the past few minutes of this intense agony. Now the tiny vestige of hope had vanished. Blank despair invaded her brain and she had the sensation as if sorrow had turned it into a pulpy mass, a great deal too bulky for her head, causing it to throb and to ache intolerably. Beyond that, the rest of herself as it were, became quite mechanical. She was glad that her father said nothing more about the scheme. She knew all that she wanted to know: Gaston's hideous, horrible treachery, the clumsy trap into which she had fallen, and above all the hopeless peril into which she had plunged the very man whom she had wished to save.
She had been the most perfidious traitor amongst them all, for the unfortunate prince had given her his friendship, and had trusted her more fully than he had others.
And then there was her husband!
Of him she would not think, for that way lay madness surely!
She managed to smile to her father, and to reassure him. Presently she would tell him all . . . to-morrow perhaps, but not just yet . . . She did not hate him somehow. She could not have hated him, for she knew him and had always loved him. But he was weak and easily misguided.
Heavens above! had anyone been more culpably weak, more misguided than she herself?
Monsieur le Duc, fully satisfied in his mind now by her outward calm, and the steady brilliance of her eyes, recalled her to her official duties.
"Dancing is over, Lydie," he said, "have you not a few presentations to Her Majesty to effect?"
"Oh yes!" she said perfectly naturally, "of a truth I had almost forgotten . . . the first time for many years, eh? my dear father. . . How some people will gossip at this remissness of Madame la Grande Maréchale de la Cour . . . will you conduct me straight away to Her Majesty? . . . I hope she has not yet noticed my absence."
She leaned somewhat heavily on her father's arm, for she was afraid that she could not otherwise have walked quite straight. She fully realized what it meant when men talked of drunkenness amongst themselves. Copious libations must produce—she thought—just this same sensation of swaying and tottering, and hideous, painful giddiness.
Already Monsieur de Louvois, Her Majesty's Chamberlain, was waiting, whilst the ladies, who were to receive the honour of special presentation, were arraigned in a semi-circle to the left of the dais. Beneath the canopy the King and Queen were standing: Louis looking as usual insufferably bored, and the Queen calmly dignified, not a little disdainful, and closely scrutinizing the bevy of women—more or less gorgeously apparelled, some old, some young, mostly rather dowdy and stiff in their appearance—who were waiting to be introduced.
Quickly, and with a respectful curtsey indicative of apology, Lydie now took her stand beside her Royal mistress and the ceremony of presentations began. The chamberlain read out a name; one unit thereupon detached itself from the feminine group, approached with sedate steps to the foot of the throne, and made a deep obeisance, whilst Madame la Grande Maréchale said a few appropriate words, that were meant to individualize that unit in the mind of the Queen.
"Madame de Balincourt. Your Majesty will deign to remember the brave General who fought at Fontenoy. Madame has eschewed country life momentarily for the honour of being presented to your Majesty."
"Enchantée, Madame," the Queen would reply graciously, offering her hand for a respectful kiss.
"Madame Helvetius, the wife of our renowned scientist and philosopher. Your Majesty is acquainted with his works."
"Enchantée, Madame!"
"And Mademoiselle Helvetius, striving to become as learned as her distinguished father, and almost succeeding so 'tis said."
The Queen deigned to say a few special words to this shy débutante and to her mother, both primly clad in badly-fitting gowns which proclaimed the country dressmaker, but in their simplicity and gaucherie peculiarly pleasing to Her Majesty.
And thus the procession filed past. Elderly women and young girls, some twenty in all, mostly hailing from distant parts of France, where the noise and frivolity of the Court of Versailles had not even roused an echo. The Queen was very gracious. She liked this select little circle of somewhat dowdy provincials, who she felt would be quite at one with her in her desire for the regeneration of social France. The uglier and less fashionable were the women, the more drabby and ill-fitting their clothes, the sweeter and more encouraging became Her Majesty's smile. She asked lengthy questions from her Grande Maréchale, and seemed to take a malicious delight in irritating the King, by protracting this ceremony, which she knew bored him to distraction, until he could scarcely manage to smother the yawns which continually assailed his jaws.
Suddenly Lydie felt her limbs stiffen and her throat close as if iron fingers had gripped it. She had been saying the usual platitudes anent the wife, sister or aunt of some worthy general or country squire, when Monsieur de Louvois called out a name:
"Madame la Comtesse de Stainville."
And from out the group of dowdy country matrons and starchy-looking dévotes a brilliant figure now detached itself and glided forward with consummate grace. Irène de Stainville was approaching for presentation to the Queen, her eyes becomingly cast down, a rosy flush on her cheeks, for she was conscious that she was beautiful and that the King's wearied eyes had lighted up at sight of her.
There was something almost insolent in the gorgeousness of her gown: it was of a rich turquoise blue, that stood out, glaring and vivid against the buttercup-coloured hangings of the room. Her stiff corslet was frankly décolleté, displaying her fine shoulders and creamy bosom, on which reposed a delicately wrought turquoise necklet of exquisite design. Her hair was piled up over her head, in the monumental and outré style lately decreed by Dame Fashion, and the brocade of her panniers stood out in stiff folds each side of her, like balloon-shaped supports, on which her white arms rested with graceful ease. It seemed as if a gaudy, exotic butterfly had lost its way, and accidentally fluttered into an assembly of moths.
Gaston de Stainville stood a little behind his wife. Etiquette demanded that he should be near her, when she made her obesiance to the Queen. He, too, somehow, looked out of place among these more sedate cavaliers: there had always been a very distinct difference between the dress worn by the ladies and gentlemen of the Queen's entourage, and the more ornate style adopted by the gayer frequenters of the Court of Versailles. This difference was specially noticeable now, when this handsome young couple stood before Her Majesty, she not unlike a glittering jewel herself, he in a satin coat of pale mauve, that recalled the delicate shades of a bank of candytuft in mid-June.
The Queen no longer looked down from her daïs with an indulgent, somewhat melancholy smile. Her eyes—cold and gray as those of King Stanislaus had been—regarded with distinct disapproval these two people, who, in her rigid judgment, were naught but gaudily decked-out dolls, and who walked on high-heeled shoes that made an unpleasant noise on the polished floor.
Lydie had during the last agonizing half-hour wholly forgotten Irène de Stainville and the presentation which, on an impulse of gratitude toward Gaston, she had promised to bring about, and she certainly had not been prepared for this meeting, face to face, with the man who, for the second time in her life, had so bitterly and cruelly wronged her.
Gaston did not seem anxious to avoid her gaze. There was insolent triumph and mockery in every line of his attitude: in the head thrown a little to one side; in the eyes narrowed until they were slits, gazing at her over the barrier of his wife's elaborate coiffure: in the slender, well-kept hand toying with the gold-rimmed eyeglass, and above all in the sensual, sneering mouth, and the full lips parted in a smile.
Lydie was hardly conscious of Irène's presence, of any one in fact, save of Gaston de Stainville, of whom she had dreamed so romantically a few hours ago, speeding him on his way, praying—God help her!—that he might be well and safe. An intense bitterness surged up in her heart, a deadly contempt for him. Awhile ago she would not have believed that she could hate anyone so. She would at this moment have gladly bartered her life for the joy of doing him some awful injury. All softness, gentleness, went out of her nature, just while she looked at Gaston and caught his mocking smile.
It was the mockery that hurt her so! The awful humiliation of it all!
And there was also in Lydie that highly sensitive sense of loyalty, which revolted at the sight of these traitors approaching, with a smile of complacency on their lips, this proud Queen who was ignorant of their infamy.
Women have often been called petty in their hates: rightly perhaps! but let us remember that their power to punish is limited, and therefore they strike as best they can. Lydie, in spite of her influence and her high position, could do so little to punish Gaston, now that by his abominable treachery he had filched every trump card from her.
She had been such an unpardonable fool—and she knew it—that her very self-abasement whipped up her sense of retaliation, her desire for some sort of revenge, into veritable fury; and thus, when la belle Irène, triumphant in the pride of her universally acknowledged beauty, came to the foot of the Royal daïs, when—through some unexplainable and occult reason—a hush of expectancy descended on all spectators, Lydie's voice was suddenly raised, trenchant and decisive:
"This is an error on Monsieur le Chambellan's part," she said loudly, so that everyone in the vast audience-chamber might hear. "There is no one here to present this lady to Her Majesty!"
A gasp went round the room, a sigh of astonishment, of horror, of anticipation, and in the silence that immediately followed, the proverbial pin would have been heard to drop: every rustle of a silken gown, every creak of a shoe sounded clear and distinct, as did the quickly-suppressed sneer that escaped Gaston de Stainville's lips and the frou-frou of his satin coat sleeve as he raised the gold-rimmed glass to his eye.
What were the joys of gossip in comparison with this unexpected sensation, which moreover would certainly be the prelude to an amazing scandal? Anon everyone drew instinctively nearer. All eyes were fixed on the several actors of this palpitating little scene.
Already Irène had straightened her graceful figure, with a quick jerk as if she had been struck. The terrible affront must have taken her completely unawares, but now that it had come, she instantly guessed its cause. Nevertheless there was nothing daunted or bashful about her attitude. The colour blazed into her cheeks, and her fine dark eyes responded to Lydie's scornful glance with one of defiance and of hate.
The Queen looked visibly annoyed. She disliked scenes and unpleasantness, and all incidents which disturbed the even placidity of her official life: the King, on the other hand, swore an unmistakable oath. Obviously he had already taken sides in favour of the gaily-plumaged butterfly against the duller moths, whilst Monsieur de Louvois looked hopelessly perturbed. He was very young and had only lately been appointed to the onerous position of Queen's Chamberlain. Though the post was no sinecure, a scandal such as threatened now, was quite unprecedented. He scented a violent passage of arms between two young and beautiful women, both of high social position, and manlike he would sooner have faced a charge of artillery than this duel between two pairs of rosy lips, wherein he feared that he might be called upon to arbitrate.
Lydie, alone among all those present, had retained her outward serenity. This was her hour, and she meant to press her triumph home to the full. All the pent-up horror and loathing which had well-nigh choked her during the whole of this terrible day, now rose clamouring and persistent in this opportunity for revenge. Though Gaston stood calm and mocking by, though Irène looked defiant and her cheeks flamed with wrath, they would glow with shame anon, for Lydie had deliberately aimed a blow at her vanity, the great and vulnerable spot in the armour of la belle brune de Bordeaux.
Lydie knew Marie Leszcynska well enough to be sure that the very breath of scandal, which she had deliberately blown on Gaston's wife, was enough to cause the rigid, puritanically-minded Queen to refuse all future intercourse with her. Rightly or wrongly, without further judgment or appeal, the Queen would condemn Irène unheard, and ban her and her husband for ever from her intimacy, thus setting the mark of a certain social ostracism upon them, which they could never live down.
Less than three seconds had elapsed whilst these conflicting emotions assailed the various actors of this drawing-room drama. The Queen now turned with a frown half-inquiring, wholly disapproving toward the unfortunate Louvois.
"Monsieur le Chambellan," she said sternly, "how did this occur? We do not allow any error to creep in the list of presentations made to our Royal person."
These few words recalled Irène to the imminence of her peril. She would not allow herself to be humiliated without a protest, nor would she so readily fall a victim to Lydie's obvious desire for revenge. She too was shrewd enough to know that the Queen would never forgive, and certainly never forget, the esclandre of this presentation; but if she herself was destined to fall socially, at least she would drag her enemy down with her, and bury Lydie's influence, power and popularity beneath the ruins of her own ambitions.
"Your Majesty will deign I hope to pause a moment ere you sweep me from before your Royal eyes unheard," she said boldly; "the error is on the part of Madame la Grande Maréchale. My name was put on Monsieur le Chambellan's list by her orders."
But Marie Leszcynska would not at this juncture take any direct notice of Irène; until it was made quite clear that Madame la Comtesse de Stainville was a fit and proper person to be presented to the Queen of France, she absolutely ignored her very existence, lest a word from her be interpreted as implying encouragement, or at least recognition. Therefore she looked beyond Irène, straight at Monsieur de Louvois, and addressed herself directly to him.
"What are the true facts, Monsieur le Chambellan?" she said.
"I certainly . . . er . . . had the list as usual . . . er . . . from Madame la Grande Maréchale . . . and . . ." poor Monsieur de Louvois stammered in a fit of acute nervousness.
"Then 'tis from you, Madame la Marquise, that we require an explanation for this unseemly disturbance," rejoined Her Majesty turning her cold, gray eyes on Lydie.
"The explanation is quite simple, your Majesty," replied Lydie calmly. "It had been my intention to present Madame la Comtesse de Stainville to your Majesty, but since then events have occurred, which will compel me to ask Madame la Comtesse to find some other lady to perform the office for her."
"The explanation is not quite satisfactory to us," rejoined Her Majesty with all the rigid hauteur of which she possessed the stinging secret, "and it will have to be properly and officially amplified to-morrow. But this is neither the place nor the moment for discussing such matters. Monsieur de Louvois, I pray you to proceed with the other names on your list. The Queen has spoken!"
With these arrogant words culled from the book of etiquette peculiar to her own autocratic house, the daughter of the deposed King of Poland waved the incident aside as if it had never been. A quickly repressed murmur went all round the room. Lydie swept a deep and respectful curtsey before Her Majesty, and indicated by her own manner that, as far as she was concerned, the incident was now closed by royal command.
But Irène de Stainville's nature was not one that would allow the matter to be passed over so lightly. Whichever way the Queen might choose to act, she felt that at any rate the men must be on her side: and though King Louis himself was too indolent and egotistical to interfere actively on her behalf, and her own husband could not do more than pick a quarrel with some wholly innocent person, yet she was quite sure that she detected approval and encouragement to fight her own battles in the looks of undisguised admiration which the masculine element there present freely bestowed upon her. Monsieur le Duc d'Aumont, for one, looked stern disapproval at his daughter, whilst Monsieur de Louvois was visibly embarrassed.
It was, therefore, only a case of two female enemies, one of whom certainly was the Queen of France—a prejudiced and obstinate autocrat if ever there was one, within the narrow confines of her own intimate circle—and the other exceptionally highly placed, both in Court favour and in official status.
Still Irène de Stainville felt that her own beauty was at least as powerful an asset, when fighting for social prestige, as the political influence of her chief adversary.
Therefore when the Queen of France chose to speak as if Madame la Comtesse de Stainville did not even exist, and Monsieur de Louvois diffidently but firmly begged her to stand aside, she boldly refused.
"Nay! the Queen shall hear me," she said in a voice which trembled a little now with suppressed passion; "surely Her Majesty will not allow a jealous woman's caprice . . ."
"Silence, wench," interrupted Marie Leszcynska with all the authority, the pride, the dictatorial will, which she had inherited from her Polish ancestors; "you forget that you are in the presence of your Queen."
"Nay, Madame, I do not forget it," said Irène, nothing daunted, and firmly holding her ground. "I remember it with every word I utter, and remember that the name of our Queen stands for purity and for justice. Your Majesty," she added, being quick to note the slightly yielding look which, at her cleverly chosen words, crept in Marie Leszcynska's eyes, and gracefully dropping on her knees on the steps of the throne, "will you at least deign to hear me? I may not be worthy to kiss your Majesty's hand; we none of us are that, I presume, for you stand infinitely above us by right of your virtues and your dignity, but I swear to the Queen of France that I have done nothing to deserve this public affront."
She paused a moment, to assure herself that she held the attention of the Queen and of every one there present, then she fixed her dark eyes straight on Lydie and said loudly, so that her clear, somewhat shrill young voice rang out triumphantly through the room:
"My husband was made a tool of by Madame la Marquise d'Eglinton, for the purpose of selling the Stuart prince to England."
Once more there was dead silence in the vast reception hall, a few seconds during which the loudly accusing voice died away in an almost imperceptible echo, but in one heart at least those seconds might have been a hundred hours, for the wealth of misery they contained.
Lydie stood as if turned to stone. Though she had realized Gaston's treachery she had not thought that it would mean all this. The utter infamy of it left her paralyzed and helpless. She had delivered her soul, her mind, her honour, her integrity to the vilest traitor that ever darkened the face of the earth. If a year ago she had humiliated him, if to-day she had tried to thwart all his future ambitions, he was fully revenged now.
She did not hear even the loyal Queen's protest:
"It is false!" for Marie Leszcynska, sickened and horrified, was loth to believe the truth of this terrible indictment against the one woman she had always singled out for royal trust and royal friendship.
"It is true, your Majesty," said Irène firmly, as she once more rose to her feet. "Deign to ask Madame la Marquise d'Eglinton if to-day in the loneliness of the Park of Versailles, she did not place in the hands of Monsieur le Comte de Stainville the secret of the Stuart prince's hiding place so that he might be delivered over to the English for a large sum of money. Madame is beautiful and rich and influential, Monsieur de Stainville being a man, dared not refuse to obey her orders, but Monsieur de Stainville is also handsome and young, Madame honoured him with her regard, and I the wife was to be publicly ostracised and swept aside, for I was in the way, and might have an indiscreet tongue in my mouth. That, your Majesty, is the truth," concluded Irène now with triumphant calm; "deign to look into her face and mine and see which is the paler, she or I."
Marie Leszcynska had listened in silence at the awful accusation thus hurled by one woman against the other. At Irène's final words she turned and looked at Lydie, saw the marble-like hue of the face, the rigidity of the young form, the hopeless despair expressed in the half-closed eyes. It is but fair to say that the Queen even now did not altogether believe Madame de Stainville's story: she instinctively was still drawing a comparison between the gaudily apparelled doll with the shrill voice, and the impudently bared shoulders, and the proud, graceful woman in robes of virginal white, of whom, during all these years of public life, unkind tongues were only able to say that she was cold, rigid, dull, uninteresting perhaps, but whose vestal robes the breath of evil scandal had never dared to pollute.
The Queen did not feel that guilt was written now on that straight, pure brow, but she had a perfectly morbid horror of any esclandre occurring in her presence or at one of her Courts. Moreover, Irène had certainly struck one chord, which jarred horribly on the puritanical Queen's nerves, and unfortunately at the very moment when Madame de Stainville made this final poisoned suggestion, Marie Lesczynska's eyes happened to be resting on the King's face. In Louis' expression she caught the leer, the smile, half-mocking, half indulgent which was habitual to him when woman's frailty was discussed, and her whole pride rose in revolt at contact with these perpetual scandals, which disgraced the Court of Versailles, and which she was striving so hard to banish from her own entourage.
Because of this she felt angered now with every one quite indiscriminately. A few years ago her sense of justice would have caused her to sift this matter through, to test for herself the rights or wrongs of an obviousl