CHAPTER XXXI
THE FINAL DISAPPOINTMENT
Lydie waited a few moments while her father's brisk steps died away along the stone-flagged corridors. In the silence of the evening, the quietude which rested on this distant portion of the palace, she could hear his brief word of command to the valet who had been stationed in the antechamber; then the Duke's quick, alert descent down the marble staircase, and finally the call for his coach oft repeated, when he reached the terrace and began skirting the building on his way to the main paved yard, where, no doubt, his horses were awaiting his return.
When everything in and around the palace seemed quiet again, Lydie rang for her maid.
"A dark hood and cloak," she ordered as soon as the girl appeared, and speaking very rapidly.
"Madame la Marquise goes out again?" asked the maid a little anxiously, seeing that the hour was late and she herself very sleepy.
"Only within the palace," replied Lydie. "Quick, girl! the cloak!"
Within two or three minutes she was enveloped from head to foot in a cloak of dark woollen material, that effectually hid the beautiful gown beneath. Then she bade the girl wait for her in her boudoir, and, not heeding the latter's anxious protestations, she walked quickly out of the room.
The corridors and reception halls were now quite deserted. Even from the main building of the palace, where the King himself was wont to sup copiously and long, there no longer came the faintest echo of revelry, of laughter or of music. The vast château built at the cost of a nation's heart's blood, kept up at the cost of her tears and her humiliation, now lay wrapped in sleep.
In this remote West Wing the silence was almost oppressive. From her own apartments Lydie could reach those occupied by milor, without going through the ante-chamber and corridors, where a few night-watchmen were always stationed. Thus she could pass unperceived; a dark, ghost-like figure, silent and swift, gliding through an enchanted castle, inhabited mayhap only by a sleeping beauty and her Court. From outside not a sound, save the occasional hoot of an owl or the flap of a bat's wings against the projecting masonry.
Lydie drew her cloak closely round her figure; though the August night was hot and heavy with the acrid scent of late summer flowers she felt an inward shivering, whilst her temples throbbed and her eyes seemed made of glowing charcoal. A few more rooms to traverse, a few moments longer wherein to keep her trembling knees from giving way beneath her, and she would be in milor's rooms.
She was a little astonished to find them just as deserted as the rest of the palace. The great audience chamber with its monumental bed, the antechamber wherein M. Durand's wizened figure always sat enthroned behind the huge secrétaire, and the worthy Baptiste himself was wont to hold intrusive callers at bay, all these rooms were empty, silent and sombre.
At last she reached the octagonal room, out of which opened the study. Here, too, darkness reigned supreme save for a thin streak of light which gleamed, thin and weird, from beneath the study door. Darkness itself fought with absolute stillness. Lydie came forward, walking as if in her sleep.
She called to milor's valet: "Achille!" but only in a whisper, lest milor from within should hear. Then as there was no sound, no movement, she called once more:
"Achille! is milor still awake? Achille! are you here?"
She had raised her voice a little, thinking the man might be asleep. But no sound answered her, save from outside the cry of a bird frightened by some midnight prowler.
Then she walked up to the door. There behind it, in that inner sanctum hung with curtains of dull gold, the man still sat whom she had so often, so determinedly wronged, and who had wounded her to-night with a cruelty and a surety of hand which had left her broken of spirit, bruised of heart, a suffering and passionate woman. She put her hand on the knob of the door. Nothing stirred within; milor was writing mayhap! Perhaps he had dropped asleep! And Gaston preparing to ride to Le Havre in order to send the swiftest ship to do its deed of treachery!
No! no! anything but that!
At this moment Lydie had nerved herself to endure every rebuff, to suffer any humiliation, to throw herself at her husband's feet, embrace his knees if need be, beg, pray and entreat for money, for help, anything that might even now perhaps avert the terrible catastrophe.
Boldly now she knocked at the door.
"Milor! milor! open! . . . it is I! . . . ! Lydie. . . . !"
Then as there was no answer from within she knocked louder still.
"Milor! Milor! awake! Milor! in the name of Heaven I entreat you to let me speak with you!"
At first she had thought that he slept, then that obstinate resentment caused him to deny her admittance. She tried to turn the knob of the door, but it did not yield.
"Milor! Milor!" she cried again, and then again.
Naught but silence was the reply.
Excitement grew upon her now, a febrile nervousness which caused her to pull at the lock, to bruise her fingers against the gilt ornaments of the panel, whilst her voice, hoarse and broken with sobs, rent with its echoes the peace and solemnity of the night.
"Milor! Milor!"
She had fallen on her knees, exhausted mentally and physically, the blood beating against her temples until the blackness around her seemed to have become a vivid red. In her ear was a sound like that of a tempestuous sea breaking against gigantic rocks, with voices calling at intervals, voices of dying men, loudly accusing her of treachery. The minutes were speeding by! Anon would come the dawn when Gaston would to horse, bearing the hideous message which would mean her lifelong infamy and the death of those who trusted her.
"Milor! milor! awake!" She now put her lips to the keyhole, breathing the words through the tiny orifice, hoping that he would hear. "Gaston will start at dawn . . . They will send Le Monarque, and she is ready to put to sea . . . Milor! your friend is in deadly peril. . . ! I entreat you to let me enter!"
She beat her hands against the door, wounding her delicate flesh. She was not conscious of what she was doing. A mystic veil divided her reasoning powers from that terrible mental picture which glowed before her through the blood-red darkness. The lonely shore, the angry sea, the French ship Le Monarque flying the pennant of traitors!
Then suddenly an astonished and deeply horrified voice broke in upon her ears.
"Madame la Marquise, in the name of Heaven! Madame la Marquise!"
She heard quick footsteps behind her, and left off hammering against the door, left off screaming and moaning, but she had not the power to raise herself from her knees.
"Madame la Marquise," came in respectful, yet frightened accents, "will Madame la Marquise deign to allow me to raise her—I fear Madame la Marquise is not well!"
She recognized the voice of Achille, milor's valet, yet it never entered her mind to feel ashamed at being found by a lacquey, thus kneeling before her husband's door. The worthy Achille was very upset. Etiquette forbade him to touch Madame la Marquise, but could he leave her there? in that position? He advanced timidly. His behaviour was superlatively correct even in this terrible emergency, and there was nothing in his deferential attitude to indicate that he thought anything abnormal had occurred.
"I thought I heard Madame la Marquise calling," he said, "and I thought perhaps Madame la Marquise would wish to speak with milor . . ."
But at the word she quickly interrupted him; rising to her feet even as she spoke.
"Yes! yes . . . ! milor . . . I do wish to speak with him . . . open the door, Achille . . . quick . . ."
"The door is locked on the outside, Madame la Marquise, but I have the key by me," said M. Achille gravely. "I had fortunately recollected that mayhap milor had forgotten to put out the lights, and would in any case have come to see that all was safe . . . if Madame la Marquise will deign to permit me . . ."
It was a little difficult to reconcile utmost respect of movement and demeanour with the endeavour to open the door against which Madame la Marquise was still standing. However, everything that was deferential and correct was possible to Monsieur Achille; he fitted the key in the lock and the next moment had thrown the door wide open, whilst he himself stood immediately aside to enable Madame la Marquise to enter.
Four candles were burning in one of the candelabra; milor had evidently forgotten to extinguish them. Everything else in the room was perfectly tidy. On the secrétaire there were two or three heavy books similar to those Monsieur Durand usually carried about with him when he had to interview milor, also the inkpot and sand-well, with two or three quills methodically laid on a silver tray. One window must have been open behind the drawn curtains, for the heavy damask hangings waved gently in the sudden current of air, caused by the opening of the door. The candles too, flickered weirdly in the draught. In the centre of the room was the armchair on which Lydie had sat a while ago, the cushion of red embroidery which milor had put to her back, and below the little footstool covered in gold brocade on which her foot had rested . . . a while ago.
And beside the secrétaire his own empty chair, and on the table the spot where his hand had rested, white and slightly tremulous, when she proffered her self-accusation.
"Milor?" she murmured inquiringly, turning glowing eyes, dilated with the intensity of disappointment and despair on the impassive face of Achille, "milor . . . ? where is milor?"
"Milor has been gone some little time, Madame la Marquise," replied Achille.
"Gone? Whither?"
"I do not know, Madame la Marquise . . . Milor did not tell me . . . Two gentlemen called to see him at about ten o'clock; as soon as they had gone milor asked for his outdoor clothes and Hector booted and spurred him . . . whilst I dressed his hair and tied his cravat . . . Milor has been gone about half an hour, I think."
"Enough . . . that will do!"
That is all that she contrived to say. This final disappointment had been beyond the endurance of her nerves. Physically now she completely broke down, a mist gathered before her eyes, the candles seemed to flicker more and more weirdly until their lights assumed strange ghoul-like shapes which drew nearer to her and nearer; faces in the gloom grinned at her and seemed to mock, the walls of the room closed in around her, her senses reeled, her very brain felt as if it throbbed with pain, and without a cry or moan, only with one long sigh of infinite weariness, she sank lifeless to the ground.