Jeanne of the Marshes Part 54

"Go on," she said. "What happened?"

"The game was up so far as we were concerned," he answered. "Cecil crumpled up before his brother, and gave the whole show away. There was nothing left for me to do but to wait and hear what they had to say, before I decided whether or no to make my graceful exit from the stage."

"Go on," she commanded. "What happened exactly?"

"We were kept there," he continued, "until this morning, waiting until Engleton was well enough to make up his mind what to do. The end is simple enough. Considering that but for that girl's intervention Engleton would have been in the sea by now, and he knows it, I suppose it might have been worse. I have signed a paper undertaking to leave England within forty-eight hours, and never to show myself in this country again. Further, I am not to play cards at any time with any Englishman."

"Is that all?" the Princess asked.

"Yes!" Forrest answered. "I suppose you would say that they have let me off lightly. I wish I could feel so. If ever a man was sick of those dirty disreputable foreign places, where one holds on to life and respectability only with the tips of one's fingernails, I am. I think I shall chuck it, Ena. I am tired of those foreign crowds, suspicious, semi-disreputable. There's something wrong with every one of them. Even the few decent ones you know very well speak to you because you are in a foreign country, and would cut you in Pall Mall."

"It isn't so bad as that," the Princess said calmly. "There are some of the places worth living in. You must live a quieter life, spend less, and find distractions. You used to be so fond of shooting and golf."

He laughed hardly.

"How am I to live," he demanded, "away from the card-tables? What do you suppose my income is? A blank! It is worse than a blank, for I owe bills which I shall never pay. How am I going to live from day to day unless I go on the same infernal treadmill. I am an adventurer, I know," he went on, "but what is one to do who has the tastes and education of a gentleman, and not even money enough to buy a farm and work with one's hands for a living?"

The Princess moved to the window and back again.

"I, too, Nigel," she said, "have had shocks. Jeanne has come back. She has been at Salthouse all the time."

"It was probably she, then, who sent for De la Borne," Forrest said wearily.

"Perhaps so," the Princess a.s.sented, "but listen to this. It will surprise you. She came back and she told De Brensault in this room only a short while ago that her supposed fortune was a myth. De Brensault took it like a lamb. He wants to marry her still."

Forrest looked up in amazement.

"And will he?" he asked.

"Oh, I do not know!" the Princess answered. "Nigel, I am sick of life myself. There are times when everything you have been trying for seems not worth while, when even one's fundamental ideas come tottering down.

Just now I feel as though every stone in the foundation of what has seemed to me to mean life, is rotten and insecure. I am tired of it.

Shall I tell you what I feel like doing?"

"Yes!" he answered.

"I have a little house in Silesia, where I am still a great lady, half-a-dozen servants, perhaps, farms which bring in a trifle of money.

I think I will go and live there. I think I will get up in the mornings as Jeanne does, and try to love my mountains, and go about amongst my people, and try to spell life with different letters. Come with me, Nigel. There is shooting and fis.h.i.+ng there, and horses wild enough for even you to find pleasure in riding. We have tried many things in life.

Let us make one last throw, and try the land of Arcady."

He looked at her, at first in amazement. Afterwards some change seemed to come into his face, called there, perhaps, by what he saw in hers.

"Ena," he said, "you mean it?"

"Absolutely," she answered. "Fortunately we are both free, and we can set our peasants an absolutely respectable example. You shall be farmer and I will be housewife. Nigel, it is an inspiration."

He bent over her fingers.

"I wonder," he murmured, "if there is good enough left in me to make it worth your while."

Late that afternoon another caller thundered at the door of the house in Berkeley Square. The Duke of Westerham desired to see Miss Le Mesurier. The butler was respectful but doubtful. Miss Le Mesurier had just arrived from a journey and was lying down. The Duke, however, was insistent. He waited twenty minutes in a small back morning-room and presently Jeanne came in to him.

He held out his hands.

"Little girl," he said, "you know what you promised. I am afraid that you have forgotten."

She smiled pitifully.

"No," she said, "I have not forgotten. I went away alone because I had to go, because I wanted to be quite alone and quite quiet. Now I have come home, and there is no one who can help me at all."

"Rubbis.h.!.+" he answered. "There was never trouble in the world where a friend couldn't help. What is it now?"

She shook her head.

"I cannot tell you," she said, "only I am going to marry the Count de Brensault."

"I'm hanged if you are!" the Duke declared vigorously. "Look here, Miss Jeanne. This is your stepmother's doing. I know all about it. Don't you believe that in this country you are obliged to marry any one whom you don't want to."

"But I do want to," Jeanne answered, "or rather I don't mind whom I do marry, or whether I marry any one or no one."

The Duke was grave.

"I thought," he said, "that my friend Andrew had a chance."

Her face was suddenly burning.

"Mr. Andrew," she said, "does not want me; I mean that it is impossible. Oh, if you please," she added, bursting into tears, "won't you let me alone? I am going to marry the Count de Brensault. I have quite made up my mind. Perhaps you have not heard that it is all a mistake about my having a great fortune. The Count de Brensault is very kind, and he is going to marry me although I have no money."

The Duke stared at her for several moments. Then he rang the bell.

"Will you tell your mistress," he said to the servant, "that the Duke of Westerham would be exceedingly obliged if she would spare him five minutes here and now."

The man bowed and withdrew. The Princess came almost at once.

"Madam," the Duke said, "I trust that you will forgive my sending for you, but I am very much interested in the happiness of our little friend Miss Jeanne here. She tells me that she is going to marry the Count de Brensault, that she has lost her fortune and she is evidently very unhappy. Will you forgive me if I ask you whether this marriage is being forced upon her?"

The Princess hesitated.

"No," she said, "it is not that. Jeanne told him of her loss of fortune. She told him, too, without any prompting from me, that she would marry him if he still wished it. That is all that I know."

The Duke bowed. He moved a few steps across towards the Princess.

"Princess," he said, "will you make a friend? Will you let me take your little girl to my sister's for say one week? You shall have her back then, and you shall do as you will with her."

"Willingly," the Princess answered. "I am only anxious that she should be happy."

The Duke marvelled then at the sincerity in her tone. Nevertheless, for fear she should change her mind, he hurried Jeanne out of the house into his brougham.