Mrs. Fitz Part 32

"I have a piece of news for you, my child. Now, you must not laugh."

"Oh, no, Sonia, I will not laugh."

The somewhat exaggerated note of Mrs. Arbuthnot's obedience was not unlike that of the model girl of the cla.s.s being examined by the head mistress.

"Now, Irene, be quite good. Not even a smile." The Princess held up a finger of mock imperiousness. "Dis is most serious. Shall I tell you now, or shall I to-morrow tell you?"

"Oh, please, please," piped Mrs. Arbuthnot, "please tell me at once.

Is it those absurd Republicans?"

"Oh no, my child; it is something much more interesting. My father is on his way to England."

In sheer exultation Mrs. Arbuthnot gave a little leap into the air.

"O-oh!" she gasped.

"Think of it, my child! The royal and august one coming to this funny little island, where everything is according to Perrault. He is coming with old Schalk."

"O-oh!" gasped Mrs. Arbuthnot.

"You don't know Schalk. Wait till you have seen Schalk and then you will die. He will kill you quite. He looks like dis, and he walks so."

Her Royal Highness made a face that was really comic and took a few steps across the carpet in imitation of Schalk going to the House of Deputies.

"Are they _really_ coming?"

"On Thursday they arrive at Southampton."

"They will go straight to Windsor, of course?"

"Oh no, my child; it is not a visit of state. It is quite a secret, what you call _incognito_. The king is coming to make obedient his wicked daughter. _Helas!_"

With tragic suddenness the Princess dropped her voice and the laughter died in her eyes. But Mrs. Arbuthnot was too far deeply engrossed in her own wild and extravagant thoughts to pay heed to the change.

"But if the King does not go to Windsor, where else can he go?" said she. "An hotel doesn't seem right, somehow, although, of course, there are some rather nice ones in London."

"I think, my child," said the Princess, "it were best that my father came to us. They have anarchists in London. Besides, I insist that you see Schalk. He will make you laugh until you shed tears."

It was as much as ever Mrs. Arbuthnot could do to keep herself in hand.

"Oh, Sonia," she cried, "do you really think the King will come to us?"

"_Mais oui, certainement_, that is his intention. But it is a secret, a grand secret, you must not fail to remember. _Le bon roi Edouard_ must not know he is in this country. His name will be Count Zhygny; and perhaps our good Odo here will be able to find him a little shooting. Hares, partridges, anything that goes on four legs will amuse him; and you must never forget, my good Odo, that he is the best player at _Britch_ in Illyria. Now mind you don't play very high, or he will ruin you. And so will Schalk."

"I thank you, ma'am, for the information," said I, gravely.

CHAPTER XX

A LITTLE DIPLOMACY

The announcement that Ferdinand the Twelfth, accompanied by his famous minister, Baron von Schalk, was on his way to this country and that he was coming straight to Dympsfield House can only be described as a blow to one confirmed in the habit of mediocrity. Had I had only myself to consult in the matter, I should have urged, with all the vigour of which my nature is capable, that it would be quite impossible for us to put them up. The lack of accommodation that was afforded by our modest establishment; the obscurity of our social state; our radical unfitness for the honour that was to be thrust upon us; all these disabilities and many another surged through my brain, while I laved my tired limbs and struggled into a "boiled" s.h.i.+rt, and tied my "white tie for royalty" in accordance with the sumptuary decree of Joseph Jocelyn De Vere. So acute, indeed, became the conviction that something must be done to turn the tide of events that I was fain to go next door to Fitz. That worthy was in the act of brus.h.i.+ng his hair.

"You've heard the news, I suppose?" said I, and as I spoke I caught a glimpse of my own gloomy and s.h.i.+rt-sleeved apparition in a looking-gla.s.s.

"What news, old son?" said the Man of Destiny, negligently shaking something out of a bottle on to his scalp. "Not been shootin' at Sonia, have they? Police are devilish vigilant. I'm hanged if we haven't had a couple of mounted detectives with us all day. They rode like it, anyway."

"Do you mean to say you haven't heard?" said I, positively hating the man for his coolness. "Hasn't the Princess told you that her father is on his way to this country, and that he is coming straight to us?"

Fitz laid down his hair-brushes and turned round to face me.

"Get out!" he said. "Ferdinand coming here!"

"Yes; she had a letter this evening to that effect."

Fitz betrayed astonishment. And under the mask of his habitual indifference I thought he also betrayed something else.

"That poisonous old swine coming here!" he muttered.

"Yes; he is coming with Baron von Schalk."

"They generally hunt in couples. He never goes anywhere without his familiar. But I don't like your news at all."

"I like the news as little as you do," said I. "Really, we can hardly do with them here."

Fitz stroked his chin pensively, and then shook his head.

"It looks as though we shall have to put up with them, I'm afraid. If they are really on the way, I don't quite see how we can s.h.i.+rk them.

Ferdinand is coming as a private person, I presume?"

"So I gather. But what do you suppose is his motive in making this sudden pilgrimage to see his daughter?"

Fitz did not answer the question immediately.

"It admits of only one explanation," he said at last. "His other scheme having failed, he has the audacity to take the thing in hand himself. But that is his way. Whatever may be thought of his policy and the style in which it is carried out, it can't be denied that he is a very remarkable man. But I wish to G.o.d he would keep away from England!"

The son-in-law of Ferdinand the Twelfth ended with an abrupt outburst.

Evidently the prospect of coming to grips with his august relation was not to be viewed lightly.

"But it hardly seems right," he said, "for him to take pot-luck at the Coach and Horses. I shall be immensely grateful, Arbuthnot, if you will put him up here, and of course it is quite understood that I stand the shot."

"The question of the shot, my dear fellow, doesn't enter into the case at all. But, you see, we are just simple, ordinary folk, and we are not quite up to this sort of thing; and then again, our accommodation is limited."

"Oh, that will be all right. If you can squeeze in Ferdinand and old Schalk here, their people can stay in the village."

I am not often troubled by anything in the nature of an inspiration, but desperation has been known to quicken the most lethargic minds.