The Missourian Part 43

"That poor gentleman whom you call a peasant," she returned with galling frankness, "was greater than any Hapsburg. He was fifty million people, and one million are still under arms. Your rebels know it. They still cry, 'Viva la Intervencion del Norte!' But go on, _sire_."

He chafed under her mockery in the t.i.tle. But sitting there, goading an imaginary shark, she was no less inciting than when he had ventured his caress.

"They are of no consequence," he burst forth, "neither the Americans, nor the dissidents. Your own countrymen, mademoiselle, will, and must, a.s.sure my empire."

"H'm'n," she e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, with a quick shrug. "Even the marshal, greatly against his will, has had to inform Your Majesty that we will shortly withdraw."

"Then I shall depend on my subjects alone!"

She contented herself with repeating, "Viva la Intervencion del Norte!"

That too, was ample comment as to the loyalty of his subjects. The Emperor paused in his walk. "Alas," he sighed wearily, "a Hapsburg sacrifices himself to regenerate a people, and--they do not appreciate it."

Jacqueline bent her head to hide a smile. She dreamily made rings in the water, and seemed to fall into his mood of poetic melancholy. "A comedietta of an empire," she mused sympathetically, "a harlequinade, nothing more. Grands dieux, I do not wonder that Your Highness finds it unworthy!"

There is no such incense to a man as when he imagines himself understood by a pretty woman.

Yet the temptress now found herself the harder to master. It was the thought of what she must yet do. But she gave her head an impatient toss, and the tears that had come were gone. The lines of her mouth tightened, and the dangerous glint shone in her eyes. "So," she added, almost in a whisper, "you did not mean it, sire, when you offered only a play-empire--to me."

She knew that he started violently, and was looking down at her. But she kept her gaze averted, that he might not see the hard expression there that was merciless for them both. He did see, though, the long lashes, and the warm pink of her forearm, so tantalizing for shark or man.

"These imperial gardens, they are beautiful," she went on softly, "but, helas, they are not the Schonbrunn. Nor is Chapultepec more than a feeble miniature of the Hofburg. Oh, the wretched farce! The wretched farce, sire, in your pretension to--to honor me! A wooer from the throne, indeed? A straw throne--no, no, I do not like it!"

Then she let him see her eyes. Half raised, half veiled; they held the daring suggestion hidden in her words.

"And if," he cried, "and if we _were_ in the Schonbrunn----"

"Yes, yes," and she clapped her hands with delight, "yes, where the heroic figures on the crest of the hill are silhouetted against the sky, where----"

"Never mind the heroic figures! But where I shall be really an emperor, _the_ Emperor over Austria, over Hungary. Then, what then?

Jeanne--Jacqueline, tell me!"

She had brought him to it. Yet her face clouded pitifully, as that day in the small boat, when she told Ney that a woman might only give. Such a woman too, would be lost for the reason that she would _not_ hesitate. Here was the errand of the Sphinx, and achievement at her hand. Dainty flower of France, yes! But in truth, what was she?

"And then?" she repeated, and the maddening promise in her voice thrilled him. "Why, sire, I suppose that I could not help but listen to you. Yet first," she hastened to add with subtle emphasis, "first, you would have to give up your play kingdom here."

His blue eyes flashed. "I will!" he cried. "It shall be mine, the Roman empire of Charles V. They are tired of my brother Franz. Already they cry out for me. Our mother made an uncle abdicate for him, I will do as much for myself. I will, Jeanne, I will!"

eloin behind his screen moved uneasily.

"The devil go with her!" the eavesdropper muttered. "She'll have him abdicating himself in another minute. She must be stopped, she must!"

He tiptoed back, and once out of hearing, he ran. He found Driscoll on a bench, slowly pa.s.sing his fingers through his hair, and staring fixedly at the ground.

"Coom," said eloin, "coom quick! He is alone. You find your chance. He is that happy, he say yes to anything."

Driscoll got heavily to his feet. There was his mission. For the sake of that, for the sake of comrades depending on him, he would go and once more offer succor to this libertine princelet.

"No, not that way," the Belgian directed. "The path here, it leads the more direct at the pond, so. Quick!" He knew that foliage would hide the couple until Driscoll should turn the corner of the hedge and burst on them squarely. The American hastened down the walk. "A nice surprise, mutual." eloin chuckled to himself.

Jacqueline did not falter before her victory. She knew that Maximilian rated the Mexican throne as a stepping-stone to another in Europe. She knew of a certain family pact among the Hapsburgs and how it rankled in Maximilian's breast. Therein he had, on accepting the Mexican throne, solemnly renounced all right of inheritance to that of Austro-Hungary.

But she knew also that he considered his oath as void, since Franz Josef had forced it on him. Craftily she pictured the Mexican enterprise, how instead of enhancing his prestige at home, it but turned him into a sorry and ridiculous figure. And so she won the child of Destiny. Yet, when in a sudden fervent outburst he came and sat beside her, and would have taken her hand, she still did not falter. Napoleon would have the glory, and she a shame unexplained, but for all that her country would have Mexico. Her country would have Mexico! Would have a vast expanse of empire, greater and more enduring than any won for her by Bonaparte himself.

Nevertheless, she brushed away the gallant's arm with more vigor than her coy role demanded. "No, no," she moaned faintly, "not yet!"

"But, _cruelle_----"

"Not yet, not until I know that you will try to win in Austria, not until--you abdicate here!"

"But, I shall sail this very month, I----"

"And never return, never to Mexico?"

"Never!"

Frankly, then, she placed her hands in his.

That moment Driscoll turned the corner of the hedge, and was before them. He fell back, and reddened as though himself caught in wrongdoing.

It was strange how he noted, at such a time, that she was clothed in light blue, in the very dress he had given her. But no, he perceived at once that it was of some delicate silk from j.a.pan. Yet the pattern was so nearly the same. She must have selected it--she had selected it!--with him in mind. And now, against a girl's love so quaintly, shyly revealed, to behold this contrast, her hands there, wantonly surrendered!

Instantly she tore herself free and confronted him.

"Oh, why, _why_," she cried fiercely, "did you not let them kill you?"

Suddenly her hands flew up to her hot face. "Then," she moaned, "then you would not have lived to see!"

The Emperor stepped between them. Tall, severe, he was cold in anger.

"It's the intrusion of a rowdy, mademoiselle." To Driscoll he said, "Now, go!"

Utterly confused, the trooper turned to obey. But at the first step he swung round, looking as he had never looked in the bloodiest of cavalry charges.

"I am here for your answer, sir," he said.

"Answer? What answer, fellow?"

Driscoll breathed once, he breathed twice, and yet again. It may be he counted them. Then he spoke.

"You understand, of course, that I might call you a puppy? Or break you over my knee? But I've got something harder on hand. It's to make you honor your promise. I've ridden forty miles for what you were to give me six hours ago at Chapultepec. Now then, shall I bring the men to save your empire? Think well. You need not take the question from me. Take it from them, from an army of fifty thousand men. Now, answer! And remember, you can save your empire."

"Save my empire?" Maximilian repeated the words.

There was a reluctant note in the query. Jacqueline heard. And the bravest act of her life was when she raised her head and faced her shame, with _him_ to see. She must begin her fight all over again.

"Yes, your play empire, sire," she said, wielding two weapons, the mockery in her voice, the seduction of her eyes.

Driscoll saw his cause forlorn against eyes like those.

"It's unfair!" he protested involuntarily.