Petticoat Rule by Baroness Orczy - HTML preview

CHAPTER XXXVIII
 THE HOME IN ENGLAND

The first words which milor uttered when presently consciousness returned were:

"The letter . . . Madonna . . . 'tis destroyed . . . I swear. . . ."

He was then lying in Jean Marie's best bed, between lavender-scented sheets. On his right a tiny open window afforded a glimpse of sea and sky, and of many graceful craft gently lolling on the breast of the waves, but on his left, when anon he turned his eyes that way, there was a picture which of a truth was not of this earth, and vaguely, with the childish and foolish fancy of a sick man who hath gazed on the dark portals, he allowed himself to think that all the old tales of his babyhood, about the first glimpse of paradise after death, must indeed be true.

He was dead and this was paradise.

What he saw was a woman's face, with grave anxious eyes fixed upon him, and a woman's smile which revealed an infinity of love and promised an infinity of happiness.

"Madonna!" he murmured feebly. Then he closed his eyes again, for he was weak from loss of blood and from days and nights of fever and delirium, and he was so afraid that the vision might vanish if he gazed at it too long.

The leech—a kindly man—visited him frequently. Apparently the wound was destined to heal. Life was to begin anew, with its sorrows, its disappointments, its humiliations, mayhap.

Yet a memory haunted him persistently—a vision, oh! 'twas a mere flash—of his madonna standing with her dear, white hand outstretched, betwixt him and death.

It was a vision, of course; such as are vouchsafed to the dying: and the other picture?—nay! that was a fevered dream; there had been no tender, grave eyes that watched him, no woman's smile to promise happiness.

One day M. le Duc d'Aumont came to visit him. He had posted straight from Paris, and was singularly urbane and anxious when he pressed the sick man's hand.

"You must make a quick recovery, milor," he said cordially; "par Dieu! you are the hero of the hour. Mortémar hath talked his fill."

"I trust not," rejoined Eglinton gravely.

M. le Duc looked conscious and perturbed.

"Nay! he is a gallant youth," he said reassuringly, "and knows exactly how to hold his tongue, but Belle-Isle and de Lugeac had to be taught a lesson . . . and 'twas well learned I'll warrant you. . . . As for Gaston. . . ."

"Yes! M. le Duc? what of M. le Comte de Stainville?"

"He hath left the Court momentarily . . . somewhat in disgrace . . . 'twas a monstrous encounter, milor," added the Duke gravely. "Had Gaston killed you it had been murder, for you never meant to shoot, so says de Mortémar."

The sick man's head turned restlessly on the pillow.

"De Mortémar's tongue hath run away with him," he said impatiently.

"The account of the duel . . . nothing more, on my honour," rejoined the Duke. "No woman's name has been mentioned, but I fear me the Court and public have got wind of the story of a conspiracy against the Stuart prince, and connect the duel with that event—hence your popularity, milor," continued the older man with a sigh, "and Gaston's disgrace."

"His Majesty's whipping-boy, eh? the scapegoat in the aborted conspiracy?"

"Poor Gaston! You bear him much ill-will, milor, no doubt?"

"I? None, on my honour."

M. le Duc hesitated a while, a troubled look appeared on his handsome face.

"Lydie," he said tentatively. "Milor, she left Paris that night alone . . . and travelled night and day to reach Le Havre in time to help you and to thwart Gaston . . . she had been foolish of course, but her motives were pure . . . milor, she is my child and . . ."

"She is my wife, M. le Duc," interrupted Lord Eglinton gravely; "I need no assurance of her purity even from her father."

There was such implicit trust, such complete faith expressed in those few simple words, that instinctively M. le Duc d'Aumont felt ashamed that he could ever have misunderstood his daughter. He was silent for a moment or two, then he said more lightly:

"His Majesty is much angered of course."

"Against me, I hope," rejoined Eglinton.

"Aye!" sighed the Duke. "King Louis is poorer by fifteen million livres by your act, milor."

"And richer by the kingdom of honour. As for the millions, M. le Duc, I'll place them myself at His Majesty's service. My château and dependencies of Choisy are worth that," added milor lightly. "As soon as this feeble hand can hold a pen, I'll hand them over to the crown of France as a free gift."

"You will do that, milor?" gasped the Duke, who could scarce believe his ears.

"'Tis my firm intention," rejoined the sick man with a smile.

A great weight had been lifted from M. le Duc's mind. Royal displeasure would indeed have descended impartially on all the friends of "le petit Anglais" and above all on milor's father-in-law, whose very presence at Court would of a surety have become distasteful to the disappointed monarch. Now this unparalleled generosity would more than restore Louis' confidence in a Prime Minister whose chief virtue consisted in possessing so wealthy and magnanimous a son-in-law.

Indeed we know that M. le Duc d'Aumont continued for some time after these memorable days to enjoy the confidence and gratitude of Louis the Well-beloved and to bask in the sunshine of Madame de Pompadour's smiles, whilst the gift of the château and dependencies of Choisy by Milor the Marquis of Eglinton to the crown of France was made the subject of a public fête at Versailles and of an ode by M. Jolyot Crébillon of the Institut de France, writ especially for the occasion.

But after the visit of M. le Duc d'Aumont at his bedside in the "auberge des Trois Matelots" the munificent donor of fifteen millions livres felt over-wearied of life.

The dream which had soothed his fevered sleep no longer haunted his waking moments, and memory had much ado to feed love of life with the rememberance of one happy moment.

Milor the Marquis of Eglinton closed his eyes, sighing for that dream. The little room was so still, so peaceful, and from the tiny window a gentle breeze from across the English Channel fanned his aching brow, bringing back with its soothing murmur the memory of that stately home in England, for which his father had so often sighed.

How peaceful it must be there among the hills!

The breeze murmured more persistently, and anon with its dreamlike sound there mingled the frou-frou of a woman's skirts.

The sick man ventured to open his eyes.

Lydie, his wife, was kneeling beside his bed, her delicate hands clasped under her chin, her eyes large, glowing and ever grave fixed upon his face.

"Am I on earth?" he murmured quaintly.

"Of a truth, milor," she replied, and her voice was like the most exquisite music he had ever heard; it was earnest and serious like her own self, but there was a tremor in it which rendered it unspeakably soft.

"The leech saith there's no longer any danger for your life," she added.

He was silent for awhile, as if he were meditating on a grave matter, then he said quietly:

"Would you have me live, Lydie?"

And as she did not reply, he repeated his question again:

"Do you wish me to live, Lydie?"

She fought with the tears, which against her will gathered in her eyes.

"Milor, milor, are you not cruel now?" she whispered through those tears.

"Cruel of a truth," he replied earnestly, "since you would have saved me at peril of your own dear life. . . . Yet would I gladly die to see you happy."

"Will you not rather live, milor?" she said with a smile of infinite tenderness, "for then only could I taste happiness."

"Yet if I lived, you would have to give up so much that you love."

"That is impossible, milor, for I only love one thing."

"Your work in France?" he asked.

"No. My life with you."

Her hands dropped on to the coverlet, and he grasped them in his own. How oft had she drawn away at his touch. Now she yielded, drawing nearer to him, still on her knees.

"Would you come to England with me, Lydie? to my home in England, amongst the hills of Sussex, far from Court life and from politics? Would you follow me thither?"

"To the uttermost ends of the world, good milor," she replied.

THE END