Scene Second THE CODICIL

I. AN IROQUOIS IN TROUVILLE.

From Liverpool Austin May went to London; from London to Paris; from Paris by the special mail to Constantinople; thence to Athens and Alexandria; and thence to Bombay and Calcutta and Hong Kong; and the impetus of his flight had almost carried him over the Pacific and back to America again, but that he held back on the shore of Japan. He travelled in that country, then in Thibet or in Turkestan. Three years were spent by him in the acquisition of strange drugs, curious pipes, and embroideries, wild songs, and odd languages. He lived in Damascus, Samarcand, Morocco, possibly in Timbuctoo. History records not nor does May Austin, how often he wrote to her. But the summer of 1879 saw him alight at the Gare de Lyon, in Paris. The heat and solitude of that city were equally oppressive, and he fled to the nearest coast. That evening he was seated, robed in soft cloth and starched linen, on the wide veranda of the great Hôtel des Rochers Noirs, at Trouville.

No one who pines for outdoor life, primitive conditions, and barbarism—and May was one of the wildest of these—but must admit that the trammels, conventions, and commodities which so annoy him are, after all, the result of infinite experiments of the human race, conducted through all time; and as such, presumably, each one was deemed successful when made, and adopted accordingly. No question but that men had flannel shirts before starched linen, women flowing robes and sandals before corsets and high-heeled shoes; and the prehistoric “masher” knocked down his lady-love with a club before he learned to court her with a monocle and a bunch of unseasonable roses. But all these changes were, at the time, deemed improvements; and one who has lived three years in Thibet or Crim-Tartary, and arrives suddenly at Trouville, is in a fair position to judge impartially. And it is not to be denied that May was conscious of a certain Capuan comfort, of an unmanly, hot-house luxury, as he sat before the little table with his carafe of ice, brandy, and seltzer, felt the cool stiffness of his linen shirt, smoked his pressed regalia, and watched the ladies with their crisp and colored dresses and their neat and silken ankles as they mounted in their landaus for their evening drive. A full string-orchestra was stationed among the electric lights near by, which dispensed, with much verve, the light-hearted rhythms of the latest opera bouffe; and beyond the planes and lindens shone the moonlit sea, as if it also were highly civilized, and part of the decoration of the place. May knocked the ashes from his cigar as who should say, “I, too, am a Parisian of the nineteenth century;” quaffed a few sparkles from the iced carafe and bottle, and pretended to be interested in the latest Faits-Paris of Figaro. He was beginning to realize the delights of youth and riches and free travel; he had been nothing but a school-boy in America, and a sort of wild man since.

And as he so sat, there came to a table next him two people, and sat down. One was a middle-aged man, with an iron-gray imperial, a tight white waistcoat, and the rosette of the legion of honor at his button-hole. The other was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. She was dressed in the most delicate and languorous cloud of violet and gray, strengthened here and there by black lace; no ribbon, jewel, or flower was on her lustrous black hair, or about the soft and creamy neck; and she was evidently much absorbed in what her companion was saying, for May could see that she clinched her fan in her hand that was beneath the table until the delicate ivory broke. They talked very rapidly, in French; but May, whose acquaintance with unknown oriental dialects was so manifold and various, knew hardly French enough “to last him over night.” And it is of especial importance that one’s French should last over night.

Whatever they were saying, they were reiterating it with continually increasing force. The man in the tight frock-coat began hissing it between his pointed teeth, and the pretty woman crushed the last fragment of the fan to ivory slivers on the floor. At last, the gentleman rose, and with a pardieu which even May’s untrained ear could recognize, upset a champagne glass, and strode hastily away; the lady eyed him until he disappeared, and then drooped her long lashes, and hid her eyes in her pretty hand. Her bosom rose and fell convulsively, and May’s chivalric heart beat sympathetically in the same time. Suddenly her deep eyes opened, and opened full on Austin May’s.

“Sir,” said she, in English, “you are a gentleman—save me!” Save her? Aye, Austin May would have saved her from the devil or the deep sea, and with no thought of salvage. All he said was, “Why, certainly.” It afterward occurred to him that he should have said, “Pray, command me, madam.” But this seemed to satisfy her, for she unbosomed herself directly.

“I know I may trust an American,” said she. “Listen—I will confide to you my true name. That man—that mouchard—with whom you saw me, sinks I am ze Comtesse Polacca de Valska. Well, I am ze Comtesse Polacca de Valska. Now you know all.”

Unfortunately, Austin May knew very little. But evidently the Comtesse Polacca de Valska was a personage of European reputation. He bowed.

“What can I do?” said he, earnestly. “Madam de Valska has but to command.” (This was better.)

“Hist!” said she, mysteriously. “Polacca de Valska—never mention ze name. Eet ees a spell, in Poland; even now my noble Polacco languishes in Siberia; but in France, in Russia—eet ees a doom. Say zat I—say zat I am your compatriot—Mrs. Walkers—anysing.” And the nerve which the unhappy countess had shown throughout the interview suddenly collapsed. She burst into tears. As she dissolved, the American congealed, all the blue blood of Boston rigid in his veins. When the little Frenchman appeared, May offered his arm to the countess; and together they swept proudly to the door of the hotel.

“Arrêtez,” cried the Frenchman. “Connaissez-vous—do you know, sare, who it is?”

“It is my friend—my friend, Mrs. Peter Faneuil, of Boston,” said May, with a readiness that charmed him at the time.

“Mais, monsieur——”

“Do you dare, sir, to——”

May glared at him for a moment, and the latter recoiled, like any Frenchman, before his Anglo-Saxon attitude. They entered the hall of the hotel; the countess pressed his arm convulsively in her gratitude, her heart too full for words. “Merci, chevalier,” said she, simply. May’s heart bounded at the compliment, and with satisfaction that he understood her French. “I have a carriage here,” said she; and they found the elegant landau still at the door.

“Where shall we go?”

“I will tell you later,” said she.

May got in, and a footman closed the door of the carriage. The liveried coachman whipped up the horses, and the pair rolled forth into the darkness of the summer night.

At this point in his recollections, May looked at his glass of claret and re-lit his cigar; and though he did not know it, this was precisely the course of action that had been adopted at the time by the Frenchman with the rosette. He drew his chair up to the table where the countess had been sitting, with a slight shrug of his padded shoulders, and more imperturbability of manner than would have flattered the valiant defender of oppressed beauty, had he been there to see it.

But at this period May was whirling along in the countess’s carriage, through the darkness of the night, close by the sea-beach and the pale shining of the long, slow surf.

II. THESEUS AND ARIADNE.

The next morning May rose after a sleepless night, and wandered pensively along the beach. His head was full of the Comtesse Polacca de Valska; perhaps a drop or two of that charming personage had brimmed over from his head into his heart. Their romantic drive had ended in no more romantic a locality than the railroad station; there he had parted from her, perhaps forever. For she had assured him that after her meeting with the rosetted Frenchman the air of Trouville would not be good for her, and she had taken the night mail for Paris. Her maid was to follow on the next day with luggage. As soon as she was safely established, and had, at least temporarily, thrown the enemies of her unhappy country off her track, she was to let May (her deliverer, as she entitled him) know, and he could see her again. But, alas! as she tearfully remarked, that might never be. The French republic was now seeking to curry favor with the despotism of the Czar, and even Prince Obstropski had had to leave Paris for Geneva. Austin wanted to kiss her hand as she departed, but feared lest this trivial homage should jar upon a heroine like her. The bell rang, the guard cried out; one last glance of her dark eyes, and all was over. She was gone, and May felt that perhaps the most romantic episode of his life was ended.

He went back to the hotel, but, unfortunately, none of the famous Eclipse claret was at hand. So he contented himself with brandy and soda. Visions of nihilistic fair ones, of Polish patriots and Italia irredenta kept him wakeful through the night. For the Comtesse had told him of her Italian descent, of her alliance with the great patriot Milanese house, the Castiglioni dei Cascadegli.... And the Count Polacco de Valski was immured for life in the Siberian mines.... Poor devil! May cut another cigar, and reflected upon the Count’s unhappy condition.

In a few days he received a letter from the countess. It was a mere line, incidentally telling him that she had not established herself at Paris, but at Baden-Baden; but it was principally filled with pretty thanks for his “heroic chivalry.” The expression had seemed a trifle too strong at the time, even to Austin May.

But when he arrived at Baden-Baden, and saw how charming the countess was in her now elaborate entourage, he made allowances. Man is generous by nature, especially to beautiful heroines with husbands in Siberian mines. May thought of the hapless Polacco de Valski as turning out polyform lead-pencils by the ribboned bunch, and marking them BBBB, and then, alternately, HHHH. May had been much exercised in mind how to explain his sudden trip to Baden-Baden, and had devised many plausible reasons for going, all of which proved superfluous. The countess did not seem in the least surprised. He found her weeping over a letter. “See,” said she, “it is from Serge.”

“The d—— Really?” said May.

The countess folded the letter, kissed it, and replaced it in her bosom. This was an extremely embarrassing proceeding to May, and he kept some time silent. With his Anglo-Saxon awkwardness at social comedy, he thought that Polacco might as well be kept out of the case.

“Shall we go for a drive?” said she, at last.

“Delighted,” said Austin May.

The drives about Baden-Baden are charming. You wind for miles upon the brows of castle-crowned hills, overhanging the gay little valley; and then you plunge into the ancient gloom of the Black Forest, and the eerie pines, and a delicious shiver of wildness and solitude, all the time with the feeling that the Kursaal and its band are close at hand, should the silence grow oppressive. There, if your heart do trouble you, you can look at pretty women; and, if the eternal verities beset your spirit, gamble for napoleons.

The countess drove two little cream-colored ponies, and encouraged May to smoke his cigarette most charmingly.... Bah! why go on with it? Even now, over the Eclipse claret, May could not but admit that he had spent in Baden-Baden three of the most charming weeks of his life. He would not mind passing three such weeks again, could he be sure they would be just three such weeks, and that they would end at the same time. But, que diable! because the play is amusing, we do not wish to stay in the theatre forever. And May nervously glanced at the window, as he thought he heard the sound of carriage-wheels again. He had smoked too much strong tobacco, probably; but, after all, it was even now only the middle of the afternoon—not sunset, or near it. He might have to come to stronger drugs than tobacco, to stronger deeds than tobacco-smoke, ere the evening was over. Hence that arsenal with which he had provided himself.

Well, to cut it short, he fell in love with her. Of course he did. He adored her. Possible! He wanted to marry her. This seemed impossible; but he had most certainly said so. He was barely twenty-five, and she—well, she was older than he was. And she had a husband in the Siberian mines. As May looked back upon it, this seemed her only advantage. But, after all, it was her patriotism that first attracted him—her heroism, her devotion to her unhappy cause, or causes. Italia irredenta! Poland! Nihilism! For May was not quite clear which one or more of these was chief in her mind; and nihilism was a new word then, but it sounded dangerous and attractive. Could he not be her chevalier, her lieutenant, her esquire? It was no more than Byron had done for Greece, after all. He was free, independent (for the next eight years)—broken-hearted, he was going to add, but stopped. After all, May Austin had not refused to marry him; and three of the eleven years were gone. At all events, there was nothing to prevent his attaching himself to a forlorn hope, if he chose. Eight years of chances were in his favor; and at the worst—if neither May Austin got married, nor Polacco died—he could make a rescue of the husband from Siberia and do the BB pencils himself. He lay awake many nights thinking of these things, and at last he was emboldened to speak of them to her.

How well he remembered the day he did so! The day—but no, it was evening. They had driven out after dinner, (did any man ever propose before breakfast?) and the scene was a moonlit glade in the Black Forest. The two ponies stood motionless; but their fair owner was much moved as he poured into her delicate ear his desires and devotions. It was so noble of him, she said, and was moved to tears. And then his devotion to her unhappy country! and she wiped away another tear for Poland or Italia irredenta. How she wished Serge could have met him, and could know of this! And she wiped away another tear for Serge. But no, my noble American—noble citizen of a free country! It could never be. Poland and she must bear their woes alone. They could never consent to drag down a brave young Bostonian in their wreck. And then, how could she ever reward him? With her friendship, said Austin. But the Comtesse seemed to think her friendship would be inadequate.

The scene was becoming somewhat oppressive; and May, at least, was conscious of a certain difficulty in providing for it a proper termination. In the excitement of the occasion, he had felt emboldened to take one of her hands, which he still retained; the other was holding the reins of the two cream-colored ponies. He could hardly simply drop it—the hand and the conversation—without more; and yet what suitable catastrophe could there be for the situation? Might he kiss it, and cut the conversation? It were a mere act of courtesy, no breach of respect to the absent Serge. As a boy of twenty-two he had never dared; but as a man of twenty-five——

She did not seem in the least surprised. Possibly she had thought him older than twenty-five. But May, after that little ceremony, had dropped the hand most unmistakably; and she turned the ponies’ heads away. May gave a last look to the forest-glade, as they drove out from it, and reflected that the place would be impressed upon his memory forever. It was really astonishing the number of places that were to be impressed upon his memory forever!

A restless week followed. He saw the Countess de Valska every day; but there was something uncomfortable in their relations—a certain savor of an unaccepted sacrifice, of an offering burned in vain.

The countess would not let him seek the Austrian foe on her own behalf, nor yet bedew the soil of Poland with his blood; and it was very difficult to say what he was to do for her in Baden-Baden, or, for matter of that, what the noble Polacco de Valski could do in Siberia. Poor Serge!

Yes, poor Serge! On the eighth day, Austin May, calling on the countess, found her in a lovely négligé, dissolved in tears. (He had been refused her door, at first, but finally, after a little pressing, had been admitted.) The countess did not look up when he entered; and Austin stood there, twisting his hat in sympathy, and looking at her. Suddenly she lifted her head, and transfixed his blue eyes with her dewy black ones.

“Dead!” said she.

“What?” responded May, anxiously. “Poland? Ital——”

“No, no!” she cried. “Serge—Serge!”

“Your husband?” cried he—“the Count Polacco——”

The countess dropped her lovely head in a shower of tears, as when a thick-leaved tree is shaken by the wind, just after rain.

“He has been dead a year and a half,” she moaned.

“A year and a half?”

“Nineteen months. He died on the 23d of February, 1877—three weeks after the last letter that I ever got from him.”

“But how—but how did you never know?” said May, wildly.

“Was it not cruel? The despotism of the White Czar! Sometimes they would keep his letters for a year, sometimes they would let them come directly. They would not let me know for fear that I—ah, God!” She sprang to her feet with a sweep of her long robe, and shook her jewelled finger at the chandelier.

“Can you blame us that we kill and die for such a despotism, such a tyranny, as that?” Then suddenly, as she crossed by a sofa, she straightened up to her full height, like a wave cresting, poised a brief second, then fell in a heap—a graceful heap—her head resting on the sofa in her hands.

Then the young man had to seek, not to console her, but to calm her, to lift her from the floor, to bring her ice-water, a fan, a feather, pour oil and salt upon the wound, toilet-vinegar, or other salads. May never knew exactly what he did; but it was like consoling an equinoctial gale. Hardly had she got fairly calm, and sobbing comfortably, and sitting in a chair, and he beside her—and he remembered patting her clasped hands, as one does a spoiled child’s—when she would dash upright, upsetting the chair, and swear her vengeance on the cruel Czar.... And at this point in his reminiscences May winced a little; for he had by no means a distinct recollection that he had not sworn his vengeance on the Czar with hers. And, when you come to think of it, the Czar’s injuries to Mr. May cried not as yet for deeds of blood.

III. DIDO AND ÆNEAS.

May repeated his visit of condolence every day for several weeks. At the end of that time the season at Baden-Baden was drawing to a close, and it became necessary that the countess should betake herself and her sorrowing heart to some other refuge. May knew this, and it troubled him.

For he now felt that he not only admired Mme. de Valska as a patriot, but that he loved her as an exceedingly beautiful and fascinating woman. Surely, here was the heroine of his youthful dreams—a life that were a poet’s ideal.

To link himself with her and her noble aims, to be a Byron without the loneliness, to combine fame in future history with present domestic bliss—what a career!

He loved the countess, he adored her; and he fancied that she deigned to be not indifferent to his devotion, to his sympathy. But—there was the shadow of the late count.

And the countess seemed much broken by his death. True, she no longer gave way to wild bursts of passion; she never wept; in fact, in Austin’s presence, she rarely mentioned him. But there was a sadness, a weak and lonely way about her, as if she could not live without her Serge’s protecting arm. It must have been a moral support, as he could have done but little from his Siberian mine; but, whereas she used to be brave, enterprising, facing the world alone, now she seemed helpless, confiding, less heroic, perhaps, but still more womanly. Austin only loved her the more for that And it emboldened him a little. After all, her husband had been dead a year and a half, though she had only known of it a few weeks. He determined to speak. Why should his life’s happiness—possibly hers—be wrecked upon a mere scruple of etiquette?

He took his opportunity, one day, when she spoke of Italy. (Now, that the count was dead, she seemed to think less of unhappy Poland, and more of unredeemed Italy; as was natural, she being a Cascadegli.) He took her hands at the same time, and begged that she would redeem him with Italy. His life, his fortune, were at her service, should she but give him the right to protect her, and fight her battles for her always. “I know,” he added earnestly, “how your heart still bleeds for your noble husband. But your duty is to your country, to yourself. And remember, though you heard of it but yesterday, the Count Polacco has been dead a year and a half.”

“Nineteen months,” sighed the countess, with a sob, going him four weeks better. And before he left the room they were engaged. He did not go to bed that night; but wandered in the moonlight, treading as on clouds. Favored young man!

In the morning, he noticed with delight that she had laid aside her long crape veil. Already, said she, her country called for her; she must recommence her labors, and the deep mourning would attract too much notice. May had vaguely fancied she would start at once for Milan or Warsaw, and after a few months’ delay he would meet her, and they would have a quiet marriage ceremony. But she explained to him that the true arena of her labors was in Paris. Here was the focus of conspiracies; here she must live and have a salon, and call together her devoted countrymen. Here she would need his protection, and, with his American passport, he could safely visit her oppressed fatherland, when events required action on the spot.

Obviously, as he recognized with joy, this plan made it necessary for them to be married immediately. But then he must speak to her of his uncle’s will. Not that it mattered much; he was quite ready to renounce fortune, even life, for her; but she must know that they would not be rich. It was a mere formality; but it must be done. So he told her of the curious will; and how, if he married before August the fourteenth, 1886, he was to lose all his uncle’s property, even to what remained of the celebrated Eclipse claret. But then, what was money? Particularly to them, who had no other aims than love and patriotism; both commodities not to be bought, or measured in sterling exchange or napoleons. But the countess seemed to attach much weight to May’s communication.

Money, alas! was in these sordid times necessary, even for patriotic revolutions. The wheels must be greased, even when Bucephalus drew the chariot. Still, this was not the essential. She was quite willing to share her small fortune with the man whom she loved; but how could she bear to ruin him—to make her alliance his sacrifice? Suppose he should ever repent his action? And here May began to make his oaths eternal; but she stopped him. Was there no other way? Could there be no escape, no legal device? Lawyers would do almost anything, if paid enough. But May shook his head, and pressed again her hand to his lips; and her dark eyes brimmed with tears.

She, for herself, would be willing to suffer him as her adorer, to trust him as her knight, her follower, as he once had proposed before. And, by that arrangement, he would not lose the fortune. But what would the world say—the cold and heartless world? And she looked at May imploringly, as if for advice.

And May had to admit, in answer, that the world would be likely to make itself as disagreeable as usual under similar circumstances—particularly, now that the unhappy count was dead, and could no longer defend his heroic consort from the spite of petty spirits. The moral support was something, after all. May had true Boston reverence for what the world said; and it never occurred to him that even a heroine, who had braved two emperors, might brave its verdict.

For some moments neither spoke. What was there to say? But the silence grew oppressive; and at last she broke it with a cry.

“Farewell, then,” said she.

But at this May broke out with a round oath. Farewell it should never be. What cared he for his uncle’s fortune, or for the estate in Brookline, when his future lay in Poland? He would have a little left; he could win more by his own exertions. For a moment his impetuosity almost overbore her resistance. But then the Paris salon was a necessity; and half of her own estate and all of poor Polacco’s had been seized by foreign despots. She would think it over. She would give him an answer that night. And then there came a lover’s parting; and May went back to his hotel, not wholly desperate, and got the engagement-ring he had ordered, and sent it to her. It was of small diamonds; but then there was a necklace, sent from Paris, of perfect Oriental pearls. A woman could afford to get engaged once a month, for such a necklace.

And he had gone back that evening, and he had found a letter. The countess had gone, leaving the note behind her. It was edged with deep black; and May took it now from his pocket-book, yellow and worn, with a smile that would have been cynical had it not been slightly nervous.

“Très-cher!” it began, “I cannot bear” (it was all in French, but we will make clumsy English of the countess’s delicate phrase, as did May, when he read it now) “that your love for me should be your ruin. It is too late for me to deny that you also have my heart; I can only fly. Otherwise my woman’s weakness would destroy either you or myself. I shall go by the morning train to Frankfurt, where I shall stop two days. If you do not wish to betray me, seek not my refuge out. I shall keep the ring as a pledge” (she says nothing about the necklace, it occurred to May, at this late date)—“a pledge that I shall be faithful to you, as, I hope, you to me. For what are six or seven years?” (At her age! thought May, with a shudder.) “I will devote them to my unhappy countrymen.” (Compatriotes was the original, which may be feminine.) “But wait for me until you are free; and perhaps, who knows? my Italy redeemed! I will join you, and be one with you forever. Meantime you will travel, possibly forget me! But on the fourteenth of August, 1886, you will be at home. On that day you will hear from me!”

May laid the letter down and shuddered. This was most unquestionably the fourteenth day of August in the year eighteen hundred and eighty-six. He seized nervously the glass of claret; but, as he raised it to his lips, looked through the blinds, in the direction of the house. His second glass of claret fell unheeded to the floor.

A carriage was standing before the front door, and beside it stood a footman in livery.