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The Last Hope

H >> Henry Seton Merriman >> The Last Hope




"Then tell it, slowly. While I eat this _sole à la Normande_. I see
you've nearly finished yours, and I have scarcely begun."

It was a vague and disjointed enough story, as related by Septimus
Marvin. And it was the story of Loo Barebone's father. As it progressed
John Turner grew redder and redder in the face, while he drank glass
after glass of Burgundy.

"A queer story," he ejaculated, breathlessly. "Go on. And you bought this
engraving from the man himself, before he died? Did he tell you where he
got it? It is the portrait of a woman, you say."

"Portrait of a woman--yes, yes. But he did not know who she was. And I do
not know whether I gave him enough for it. Do you think I did, Jack?"

"I do not know how much you gave him, but I have no doubt that it was too
much. Where did he get it?"

"He thinks it was brought from France by his mother, or the woman who was
supposed in Farlingford to be his mother--together with other papers,
which he burnt, I believe."

"And then he died?"

"Yes--yes. He died--but he left a son."

"The devil he did! Why did you not mention that before? Where is the son?
Tell me all about him, while I see how they've served this _langue
fourrée_, which should be eaten slowly; though it is too late to remind
you of that now. Go on. Tell me all about the son."

And before the story of Loo Barebone was half told, John Turner laid
aside his knife and fork and turned his attention to the dissection of
this ill-told tale. As the story neared its end, he glanced round the
room, to make sure that none was listening to their conversation.

"Dormer Colville," he repeated. "Does he come into it?"

"He came to Farlingford with the Marquis de Gemosac, out of pure
good-nature--because the Marquis could speak but little English. He is a
charming man. So unselfish and disinterested."

"Who? The Marquis?"

"No; Dormer Colville."

"Oh yes!" said John Turner, returning to the cold tongue. "Yes; a
charming fellow."

And he glanced again at his friend, with a queer smile. When luncheon was
finished, Turner led the way to a small smoking-room, where they would be
alone, and sent a messenger to fetch Septimus Marvin's bag from
downstairs.

"We will have a look at your precious engraving," he said, "while we
smoke a cigar. It is, I suppose, a relic of the Great Monarchy, and I may
tell you that there is rather a small demand just now for relics of that
period. It would be wiser not to take it into the open market. I think my
client would give you as good a price as any; and I suppose you want to
get as much as you can for it now that you have made up your mind to the
sacrifice?"

Marvin suppressed a sigh, and rubbed his hands together with that forced
jocularity which had made his companion turn grave once before.

"Oh, I mean to drive a hard bargain, I can tell you!" was the reply, with
an assumption of worldly wisdom on a countenance little calculated to
wear that expression naturally.

"What did your friend in the print-shop on the Quai Voltaire mention as a
probable price?" asked Turner, carelessly.

"Well, he said he might be able to sell it for me at four thousand
francs. I would not hear of his running any risk in the matter, however.
Such a good fellow, he is. So honest."

"Yes, he is likely to be that," said Turner, with his broad smile. He was
a little sleepy after a heavy luncheon, and sipped his coffee with a
feeling of charity toward his fellow-men. "You would find lots of honest
men in the Quai Voltaire, Sep. I will tell you what I will do. Give me
the print, and I will do my best for you. Would ten thousand francs help
you out of your difficulties?"

"I do not remember saying that I was in difficulties," objected the
Reverend Septimus, with heightened colour.

"Don't you? Memory _is_ bad, is it not? Would ten thousand francs paint
the rectory, then?"

"It would ease my mind and sweeten my sleep at night to have half that
sum, my friend. With two hundred pounds I could face the world _aequo
animo_."

"I will see what I can do. This is the print, is it? I don't know much
about such things myself, but I should put the price down at ten thousand
francs."

"But the man in the Quai Voltaire?"

"Precisely. I know little about prints, but a lot about the Quai
Voltaire. Who is the lady? I presume it is a portrait?"

"It is a portrait, but I cannot identify the original. To an expert of
that period it should not be impossible, however." Septimus Marvin was
all awake now, with flushed cheeks and eyes brightened by enthusiasm. "Do
you know why? Because her hair is dressed in a peculiar way--_poufs de
sentiment_, these curls are called. They were only worn for a brief
period. In those days the writings of Jean Jacques Rousseau had a certain
vogue among the idle classes. The women showed their sentiments in the
dressing of their hair. Very curious--very curious. And here, in the
hair, half-concealed, is an imitation dove's nest."

"The deuce there is!" ejaculated Turner, pulling at his cigar.

"A fashion which ruled for a still briefer period."

"I should hope so. Well, roll the thing up, and I will do my best for
you. I'm less likely to be taken in than you are, perhaps. If I sell it,
I will send you a cheque this evening. It is a beautiful face."

"Yes," agreed Septimus Marvin, with, a sharp sigh. "It is a beautiful
face."

And he slowly rolled up his most treasured possession, which John Turner
tucked under his arm. On the Pont Royal they parted company.

"By the way," said John Turner, after they had shaken hands, "You never
told me what sort of a man this young fellow is--this Loo Barebone?"

"The dearest fellow in the world," answered Marvin, with eyes aglow
behind his spectacles. "To me he has been as a son--an elder brother, as
it were, to little Sep. I was already an elderly man, you know, when Sep
was born. Too old, perhaps. Who knows? Heaven's way is not always marked
very clearly."

He nodded vaguely and went away a few paces. Then he remembered something
and came back.

"I don't know if I ought to speak of such a thing. But I quite hoped, at
one time, that Miriam might one day recognise his goodness of heart."

"What?" interrupted Turner. "The mate of a coasting schooner!"

"He is more than that, my friend," answered Septimus Marvin, nodding his
head slowly, so that the sun flashed on his spectacles in such a manner
as to make Turner blink. Then he turned away again and crossed the
bridge, leaving the English banker at the corner of it, still blinking.




CHAPTER XVIII


THE CITY THAT SOON FORGETS

There are in humble life some families which settle their domestic
differences on the doorstep, while the neighbours, gathered hastily by
the commotion, tiptoe behind each other to watch the fun. In the European
congerie France represents this loud-voiced household, and Paris--Paris,
the city that soon forgets--is the doorstep whereon they wrangle.

The bones of contention may be pitched far and wide by the chances and
changes of exile, but the contending dogs bark and yap in Paris. At this
time there lived, sometimes in Italy, sometimes at Frohsdorf, a jovial
young gentleman, fond of sport and society, cultivating the tastes and
enjoying the easy existence of a country-gentleman of princely rank--the
Comte de Chambord. Son of that Duchesse de Berri who tried to play a
great part and failed, he was married to an Italian princess and had no
children. He was, therefore, the last of the Bourbons, and passed in
Europe as such. But he did not care. Perhaps his was the philosophy of
the indolent which saith that some one must be last and why not I?

Nevertheless, there ran in his veins some energetic blood. On his
father's side he was descended from sixty-six kings of France. From his
mother he inherited a relationship to many makers of history. For the
Duchesse de Berri's grandmother was the sister of Marie Antoinette. Her
mother was aunt to that Empress of the French, Marie Louise, who was a
notable exception to the rule that "Bon sang ne peut mentir." Her father
was a king of Sicily and Naples. She was a Bourbon married to a Bourbon.
When she was nineteen she gave birth to a daughter, who died next day. In
a year she had a son who died in twenty hours. Two years later her
husband died in her arms, assassinated, in a back room of the Opera House
in Paris.

Seven months after her husband's death she gave birth to the Comte de
Chambord, the last of the old Bourbons. She was active, energetic and of
boundless courage. She made a famous journey through La Vendée on
horseback to rally the Royalists. She urged her father-in-law, Charles X,
to resist the revolution. She was the best Royalist of them all. And her
son was the Comte de Chambord, who could have been a king if he had not
been a philosopher, or a coward.

He was waiting till France called him with one voice. As if France had
ever called for anything with one voice!

Amid the babel there rang out not a few voices for the younger branch of
the Royal line--the Orleans. Louis Philippe--king for eighteen years--was
still alive, living in exile at Claremont. Two years earlier, in the rush
of the revolution of 1848, he had effected his escape to Newhaven. The
Orleans always seek a refuge in England, and always turn and abuse that
country when they can go elsewhere in safety. And England is not one
penny the worse for their abuse, and no man or country was ever yet one
penny the better for their friendship.

Louis Philippe had been called to the throne by the people of France. His
reign of eighteen years was marked by one great deed. He threw open the
Palace of Versailles--which was not his--to the public. And then the
people who called him in, hooted him out. His life had been attempted
many times. All the other kings hated him and refused to let their
daughters marry his sons. He and his sons were waiting at Claremont while
the talkers in Paris talked their loudest.

There was a third bone of contention--the Imperial line. At this time the
champions of this morsel were at the summit; for a Bonaparte was riding
on the top of the revolutionary scrimmage.

By the death of the great Napoleon's only child, the second son of his
third brother became the recognised claimant to the Imperial crown.

For France has long ceased to look to the eldest son as the rightful
heir. There is, in fact, a curse on the first-born of France. Napoleon's
son, the King of Rome, died in exile, an Austrian. The Duc de Bordeaux,
born eight years after him, never wore the crown, and died in exile,
childless. The Comte de Paris, born also at the Tuileries, was exiled
when he was ten years old, and died in England. All these, of one
generation. And of the next, the Prince Imperial, hurried out of France
in 1870, perished on the Veldt. The King of Rome lies in his tomb at
Vienna, the Duc de Bordeaux at Göritz, the Comte de Paris at Weybridge,
the Prince Imperial at Farnborough. These are the heirs of France, born
in the palace of the Tuileries. How are they cast upon the waters of the
world! And where the palace of the Tuileries once stood the pigeons now
call to each other beneath the trees, while, near at hand, lolls on the
public seat he whom France has always with her, the _vaurien_--the
worth-nothing.

So passes the glory of the world. It is not a good thing to be born in a
palace, nor to live in one.

It was in the Rue Lafayette that John Turner had his office, and when he
emerged from it into that long street on the evening of the 25th of
August, 1850, he ran against, or he was rather run against by, the
newsboy who shrieked as he pattered along in lamentable boots and waved a
sheet in the face of the passer: "The King is dead! The King is dead!"

And Paris--the city that soon forgets--smiled and asked what King?

Louis Philippe was dead in England, at the age of seventy-seven, the
bad son of a bad father, another of those adventurers whose happy
hunting-ground always has been, always will be, France.

John Turner, like many who are slow in movement, was quick in thought. He
perceived at once that the death of Louis Philippe left the field open to
the next adventurer; for he left behind him no son of his own mettle.

Turner went back to his office, where the pen with which he had signed a
cheque for four hundred pounds, payable to the Reverend Septimus Marvin,
was still wet; where, at the bottom of the largest safe, the portrait of
an unknown lady of the period of Louis XVI lay concealed. He wrote out a
telegram to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, addressed to her at her villa near
Royan, and then proceeded to his dinner with the grave face of the
careful critic.

The next morning he received the answer, at his breakfast-table, in the
apartment he had long occupied in the Avenue d'Antin. But he did not open
the envelope. He had telegraphed to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, asking if
it would be convenient for her to put him up for a few days. And he
suspected that it would not.

"When I am gone," he said to his well-trained servant, "put that into an
envelope and send it after me to the Villa Cordouan, Royan. Pack my
portmanteau for a week."

Thus John Turner set out southward to join a party of those Royalists
whom his father before him had learnt to despise. And in a manner he was
pre-armed; for he knew that he would not be welcome. It was in those days
a long journey, for the railway was laid no farther than Tours, from
whence the traveller must needs post to La Rochelle, and there take a
boat to Royan--that shallow harbour at the mouth of the Gironde.

"Must have a change--of cooking," he explained to Mrs. St. Pierre
Lawrence. "Doctor says I am getting too stout."

He shook her deliberately by the hand without appearing to notice her
blank looks.

"So I came south and shall finish up at Biarritz, which they say is going
to be fashionable. I hope it is not inconvenient for you to give me a
bed--a solid one--for a night or two."

"Oh no!" answered Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, who had charming manners, and
was one of those fortunate persons who are never at a loss. "Did you not
receive my telegram?"

"Telling me you were counting the hours till my arrival?"

"Well," admitted Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, wisely reflecting that he
would ultimately see the telegram, "hardly so fervent as that--"

"Good Lord!" interrupted Turner, looking behind her toward the veranda,
which was cool and shady, where two men were seated near a table bearing
coffee-cups. "Who is that?"

"Which?" asked Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, without turning to follow the
direction of his glance. "Oh! one is Dormer Colville, I see that. But the
other--gad!"

"Why do you say gad?" asked the lady, with surprise.

"Where did he get that face from?" was the reply.

Turner took off his hat and mopped his brow; for it was very hot and the
August sun was setting over a copper sea.

"Where we all get our faces from, I suppose!" answered Mrs. St. Pierre
Lawrence, with her easy laugh. She was always mistress of the situation.
"The heavenly warehouse, one supposes. His name is Barebone. He is a
friend of Dormer's."

"Any friend of Dormer Colville's commands my interest."

Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence glanced quickly at her companion beneath the
shade of her lace-trimmed parasol.

"What do you mean by that?" she asked, in a voice suddenly hard and
resentful.

"That he chooses his friends well," returned the banker, with his
guileless smile. His face was bovine, and in the heat of summer apt to be
shiny. No one would attribute an inner meaning to a stout person thus
outwardly brilliant. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence appeared to be mollified,
and turned toward the house with a gesture inviting him to walk with her.

"I will be frank with you," she said. "I telegraphed to tell you that the
Villa Cordouan is for the moment unfortunately filled with guests."

"What matter? I will go to the hotel. In fact, I told the driver of my
carriage to wait for further orders. I half feared that at this time of
year, you know, house would be full. I'll just shake hands with Colville
and then be off. You will let me come in after dinner, perhaps. You and I
must have a talk about money, you will remember."

There was no time to answer; for Dormer Colville, perceiving their
approach, was already hurrying down the steps of the veranda to meet
them. He laughed as he came, for John Turner's bulk made him a laughing
matter in the eyes of most men, and his good humour seemed to invite them
to frank amusement.

The greeting was, therefore, jovial enough on both sides, and after being
introduced to Loo Barebone, Mr. Turner took his leave without farther
defining his intentions for the evening.

"I do not think it matters much," Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence said to her
two guests, when he had left. "And he may not come, after all."

Her self-confidence sufficiently convinced Loo, who was always ready to
leave something to chance. But Colville shook his head.

It thus came about that sundry persons of title and importance who had
been invited to come to the Villa Cordouan after dinner for a little
music found the English banker complacently installed in the largest
chair, with a shirt-front evading the constraint of an abnormal
waistcoat, and a sleepy chin drooping surreptitiously toward it.

"He is my banker from Paris," whispered Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence to one
and another. "He knows nothing, and so far as I am aware, is no
politician--merely a banker, you understand. Leave him alone and he will
go to sleep."

During the three weeks which Loo Barebone had spent very pleasantly at
the Villa Cordouan, Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence had provided music and light
refreshment for her friends on several occasions. And each evening the
drawing-room, which was not a small one, had been filled to overflowing.
Friends brought their friends and introduced them to the hostess, who in
turn presented them to Barebone. Some came from a distance, driving
from Saintes or La Rochelle or Pons. Others had taken houses for the
bathing-season at Royan itself.

"He never makes a mistake," said the hostess to Dormer Colville, behind
her fan, a hundred times, following with her shrewd eyes the gay and easy
movements of Loo, who seemed to be taught by some instinct to suit his
manner to his interlocutor.

To-night there was more music and less conversation.

"Play him to sleep," Dormer Colville had said to his cousin. And at
length Turner succumbed to the soft effect of a sonata. He even snored in
the shade of a palm, and the gaiety of the proceedings in no way
suffered.

It was only Colville who seemed uneasy and always urged any who were
talking earnestly to keep out of earshot of the sleeping Englishman. Once
or twice he took Barebone by the arm and led him to the other end of the
room, for he was always the centre of the liveliest group and led the
laughter there.

"Oh! but he is charming, my dear," more than one guest whispered to Mrs.
St. Pierre Lawrence, as they took their departure.

"He will do--he will do," the men said with a new light of hope in their
grave faces.

Nearly all had gone when John Turner at length woke up. Indeed, Colville
threw a book upon the floor to disturb his placid sleep.

"I will come round to-morrow," he said, bidding his hostess good night.
"I have some papers for you to sign since you are determined to sell your
_rentes_ and leave the money idle at your bank."

"Yes. I am quite determined," she answered, gaily, for she was before her
time inasmuch as she was what is known in these days of degenerate speech
as cock-sure.

And when John Turner, carrying a bundle of papers, presented himself at
the Villa Cordouan next morning he found Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence sitting
alone in the veranda.

"Dormer and his friend have left me to my own devices. They have gone
away," she mentioned, casually, in the course of conversation.

"Suddenly?"

"Oh no," she answered, carelessly, and wrote her name in a clear firm
hand on the document before her. And John Turner looked dense.




CHAPTER XIX


IN THE BREACH

The Marquis de Gemosac was sitting at the open window of the little
drawing-room in the only habitable part of the château. From his
position he looked across the courtyard toward the garden where stiff
cypress-trees stood sentry among the mignonette and the roses, now in the
full glory of their autumn bloom.

Beyond the garden, the rough outline of the walls cut a straight line
across the distant plains, which melted away into the haze of the
marsh-lands by the banks of the Gironde far to the westward.

The Marquis had dined. They dined early in those days in France, and
coffee was still served after the evening meal.

The sun was declining toward the sea in a clear copper-coloured sky, but
a fresh breeze was blowing in from the estuary to temper the heat of the
later rays.

The Marquis was beating time with one finger, and within the room, to an
impromptu accompaniment invented by Juliette, Barebone was singing:

C'est le Hasard,
Qui, tôt ou tard,
Ici-bas nous seconde;
Car,
D'un bout du monde
A l'autre bout,
Le Hasard seul fait tout.

He broke off with a laugh in which Juliette's low voice joined.

"That is splendid, mademoiselle," he cried, and the Marquis clapped his
thin hands together.

Un tel qu'on vantait
Par hasard était
D'origine assez mince;
Par hasard il plut,
Par hasard il fut
Baron, ministre et prince:
C'est le Hasard,
Qui, tôt ou tard,
Ici bas nous seconde;
Car,
D'un bout du monde
A l'autre bout,
Le Hasard seul fait tout.


"There--that is all I know. It is the only song I sing."

"But there are other verses," said Juliette, resting her hands on the
keys of the wheezy spinet which must have been a hundred years old. "What
are they about?"

"I do not know, mademoiselle," he answered, looking down at her. "I think
it is a love-song."

She had pinned some mignonette, strong scented as autumn mignonette is,
in the front of her muslin dress, and the heavy heads had dragged the
stems to one side. She put the flowers in order, slowly, and then bent
her head to enjoy the scent of them.

"It scarcely sounds like one," she said, in a low and inquiring voice.
The Marquis was a little deaf. "Is it all chance then?"

"Oh yes," he answered, and as he spoke without lowering his voice she
played softly on the old piano the simple melody of his song. "It is all
chance, mademoiselle. Did they not teach you that at the school at
Saintes?"

But she was not in a humour to join in his ready laughter. The room was
rosy with the glow of the setting sun, she breathed the scent of the
mignonette at every breath, the air which she had picked out on the
spinet in unison with his clear and sympathetic voice had those minor
tones and slow slurring from note to note which are characteristic of the
gay and tearful songs of southern France and all Spain. None of which
things are conducive to gaiety when one is young.

She glanced at him with one quick turn of the head and made no answer.
But she played the air over again--the girls sing it to this day over
their household work at Farlingford to other words--with her foot on the
soft pedal. The Marquis hummed it between his teeth at the other end of
the room.

"This room is hot," she exclaimed, suddenly, and rose from her seat
without troubling to finish the melody. "And that window will not open,
mademoiselle; for I have tried it," added Barebone, watching her
impatient movements.

"Then I am going into the garden," she said, with a sharp sigh and a
wilful toss of the head. It was not his fault that the setting sun,
against which, as many have discovered, men shut their doors, should
happen to be burning hot or that the window would not open. But Juliette
seemed to blame him for it or for something else, perhaps. One never
knows. Barebone did not follow her at once, but stood by the window
talking to the Marquis, who was in a reminiscent humour. The old man
interrupted his own narrative, however.

"There," he cried, "is Juliette on that wall overhanging the river. It is
where the English effected a breach long ago, my friend--you need not
smile, for you are no Englishman--and the château has only been taken
twice through all the centuries of fighting. There! She ventures still
farther. I have told her a hundred times that the wall is unsafe."

"Shall I go and warn her the hundred-and-first time?" asked Loo, willing
enough.

"Yes, my friend, do. And speak to her severely. She is only a child,
remember."

"Yes--I will remember that."

Juliette did not seem to hear his approach across the turf where the
goats fed now, but stood with her back toward him, a few feet below him,
actually in that breach effected long ago by those pestilential English.
They must have prized out the great stones with crowbars and torn them
down with their bare hands.

Juliette was looking over the vineyards toward the river, which gleamed
across the horizon. She was humming to herself the last lines of the
song:

D'un bout du monde
A l'autre bout,
Le Hasard seul fait tout.

She turned with a pretty swing of her skirts to gather them in her hand.

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