Charles Neville Buck

“ She had thrown a long, rough cape about her, but it had fallen open, leaving visible the black gown and a spot he knew to be a red rose on her breast.
He stood looking down, and she smiled up.
"Cara!" he exclaimed. "What are you doing here—alone?"
"Seeking freedom," she responded calmly. "It's not so good as the hobo's fire beside the track, but it's better than four walls. The moon has been wonderful, Sir Gray Eyes—as bright and dark as life; radiant a little while and hidden behind clouds a great deal. And the wind has been whispering like a troubadour to the tree-tops." ”

“ The Strangers' Club of Puntal sits high on a solid wall of rock and overlooks the sea. Its beauty is too full of wizardry to seem real, and what nature had done in view and sub-tropical luxuriance the syndicate which operates the ball rooms, tea gardens, and roulette wheels has striven to abet. To-night a moon two-thirds full immersed the grounds in a bath of blue and silver, and far off below the cliff wall the Mediterranean was phosphorescent. In the room where the croupiers spun the wheels, the color scheme was profligate. ”

“ His hands were gripping the chairback and when Lapas had taken two paces to the front, and Blanco had appraised the distance between, the chair left the floor. With the same lightning swiftness of motion that had brought salvos of applause from the bull-rings of Cadiz and Seville, he swung it above his head and brought down its cumbersome weight in an arc.
Lapas, his eyes fixed on the door, had no hint. A picture of serene sky and steady mountains was blotted from his brain. There was blackness instead—and unconsciousness. ”

“ Benton idled at one of the tables, his eyes searching the crowd in the faint hope of discovering some [Pg 119] thread which he might follow up to definite conclusion. Beyond the wheel, just at the croupier's elbow, stood a woman, audaciously yet charmingly gowned in red, with a scale-like shimmer of passementerie. A red rose in her black hair threw into conspicuous effect its intense luster.
She might have been the genius of Rouge et Noir. Her litheness had the panther's sinuous strength. The vivid contrast of olive cheeks, carmine lips and dark eyes, gave stress to her slender sensuousness. ”

“ After dinner, when the Captain had betaken himself to the bridge and the smoke from the Spaniard's cigarettes and Benton's pipe had begun to wreathe clouds against the ceiling-beams, Blanco broached his diplomacy.
In the dulled expressionlessness of the face opposite him and the stoop of the shoulders, Manuel read a need for an active antidote against the corrosive poison of despair.
"Where are we going now, Señor?"
Benton shrugged his shoulders.
"'Quien sabe!' as you say in Spain. We are simply cruising, drifting, keeping out of sight of land." ”

“ Karyl was himself unarmed. He raised a restraining hand to Von Ritz's shoulder, but before he could speak his head sagged forward under the impact of some sudden shock—some blow from behind—and things went dark about him as he crumpled to his knees and fell.
Von Ritz, struggling desperately with a broken blade in his hand was slowly overwhelmed by seeming swarms of men. Like a tiger caught in a net, his ferocity [Pg 240] gradually waned until, bleeding from scratch-wounds in a half-dozen places, he felt himself sinking into a haze. ”

“ With the sapphire bay of Puntal at his back, his knees clasped between interlacing fingers, Benton sat on the stone sea-wall and affected to whistle up a lightness of heart. Near at hand sprawled a picturesque city, its houses tinted in pea-greens, pinks and soft blues, or as white and decorative as though fashioned in icing on a cake.
Clinging steeply to higher levels and leaning on buttressing walls, lay outspread vineyards and cane fields and gardens. Splotching the whole with imperial and gorgeous purple, hung masses of bougonvillea between trellis and masonry. ”

“ Dear, this is 'again.' The Isis is a speck out there at sea awaiting a signal. Will you go? I have no throne to offer, but—"
"Don't," she cried, holding a hand over his lips. "For a minute—just for a little golden minute—let us forget thrones." Then as the furrow came back between her brows: "Oh, boy, it's my destiny to be always strong enough to resist happiness when I might have it by being less strong, and always too weak to bear bravely what must be borne—when it can't be helped." ”

“ Benton's face paled a little as he drew out the many pages covered with a woman's handwriting, but there was no one to see that or to notice the tremor of his fingers.
For a moment he held the pages off, seeing only the "Dearest" at the top, and the wild way the pen had raced, forming almost shapeless characters.
"Dearest," she said in part, "I write now because I must turn to someone—because my heart must speak or break. All day I must smile as befits royalty, and act as befits one whose part is written for her. Unless there be an outlet, there must be madness. ”

“ The King alone would suffice, but Kings are rarely found in solitude," reasoned the Andalusian. "For a brief moment Europe looks with eyes of interest on the feasting little capital. The King will not be alone. No, it must be—so one would surmise—at the coronation."
"Good God!" Benton gaspingly breathed the exclamation. "But, man, think of it—the women—the children—the utterly innocent people—the Queen!"
The Spaniard leaned back, balancing his chair on two legs, his hands spread on the table. "Si, Señor, it is regrettable. Yet nothing on earth appears so easy to supply as Kings—except Queens. ”

“ No, Señor. The Galavians are cattle. Karyl or Louis, it is one to them. Galavia is a key. The key cares not at what porter's belt it jingles. Europe cares who opens and closes the lock. Comprende? Spain cares, France cares, Italy cares, even the Northern nations care. The movement of pawns affects castles and kings."
Manuel suddenly halted in his flow of talk. "Blessed Saints!" he breathed softly. "When he comes nearer you will see him—the palms obscure him now. It is Colonel Von Ritz. He has just entered. He stands near Karyl and the throne. He is a great man wasted in a toy kingdom. ”

“ If the Galavian people led by a member of the Galavian Royal House revolts! Bien! More than bien—excellent!" Jusseret spread his palms. "But unless there is a leader, there can be no revolution. No, no, Louis should have kept out of custody."
The Countess leaned forward with sudden eagerness.
"And if I free him? If I devise a way?"
The Frenchman turned quickly from contemplation of the landscape to her face.
"Ah!" he exclaimed. "Once more you are yourself; the cleverest woman in Europe, as, always, you are the most charming!"
"Do you know where Monsieur Martin may be found?" ”

“ To me one thing always comes first. The House of Galavia is my gospel; has been my gospel since Karyl's father mounted its throne." He paused and added gravely: "Louis Delgado has reaped his reward—he is dead."
Benton's voice broke out in an explosive "Thank God!"
Von Ritz stood a moment silent, then, dropping to one knee, he took the fingers which fell listlessly over the arm of Cara's steamer-chair and raised them to his lips.
"Your Majesty is Queen of Galavia."
The American came to his feet, his hands clenched, but with quick self-mastery he stood back, breathing heavily. ”

“ Jusseret spread his hands in a gesture of disgust.
Lapas rose tensely from his chair. The veins on his temples stood out corded and deep-lined.
"This cannot be true, sir," he argued. "There must be some error. You wrong the King."
"Am I the man to wrong Louis?" questioned the Frenchman. "You have only to wait and see for yourself. The matter rests with you. She and I have put Louis on the throne. So much I did as the servant of my government. What I say to you I say as a man, and I had rather behold all my work undone than to stand by and see it bear such fruit. ”

“ There are bigger things at stake than individual wishes. I stand for the throne. Mr. Benton has played a daring game—and lost."
He paused, and she found herself watching with a strange fascination the face almost marble-like in its steadiness.
"Some day—perhaps soon," he went on, the arm unmoved, "you will be Queen of Galavia." She shuddered. "You can then strip away my epaulets if you choose. For the moment, however, I must regard you as a prisoner of war and ask your parole, as a gentleman and an officer, not to leave the car while I investigate the trouble with the motor. ”

“ Occasionally he would stop to look down, from some coign of vantage, at cascading threads of water tumbling into the gorge below, or at a châlet-like house perched far beneath in its trim patch of agriculture. Finally he stretched himself indolently on a carpet of pine needles at the brink of a drop to the valley. Then, with a sense of recognition, he saw the tumbled-down gate of the King's driveway below him to the left, and his face became set and miserable as memory began its work of tearing open wounds not yet old. ”

“ I have stationed men whom I can trust throughout Puntal and Galavia. They are men Karyl likewise thinks he can trust. The distinction is that I know—where he merely thinks."
"And these men—what have they done?" The Countess laid one gloved hand eagerly on the Frenchman's coat-sleeve.
"These men have gradually and quietly reorganized the army, the bureaucracy, the very palace Guard. We have undermined the government's power, until when the word is passed to strike the blow, a honey-combed system will crumble under its own weight. When Karyl calls on his troops, not one man will respond. ”

“ You pigs! You serpents!" he shrieked. "Your hearts shall be thrown to the buzzards! Your children dishonored! You have dared to attack the foreign Pashas, and you—Mohammed Abbas—!" The shopkeeper fell trembling to his knees. "Your filthy shop shall be pulled down about your ears. You make it a trap—your feet shall be bastinadoed until you are a cripple for life!" Then his rage choked him, and, wheeling, he walked over to Benton, contemptuously kicking the prostrate body of Martin Effendi as he went.
From every pore Abdul Said Bey exuded sympathy and commiseration. ”

“ Back in the town, Blanco had certain investigations to make. He knew Von Ritz's men had been too late to capture the Duke, and that the Countess Astaride had sailed by the steamer leaving for French and Italian ports. Wherever these two conspirators should meet would become the next point to watch.
Blanco felt sure that Louis would be willing to drop back into the routine of his life in Paris, freshly stocked with pessimistic memories of how a crown had slipped through his fingers. It would take driving to prevent him lagging into the inertia of sentimental brooding. ”

“ I see a throne, a life with all the confining littleness of a prison, with none of the breadth of an empire. I see the sacrifice of all I love. I see year upon year of purple desolation.... Purple is the color of mourning and royalty. ”

“ Two hours later, alighting from a rickety victoria by the landing-stage, Cara made her way between the two men, toward the waiting launch from the Isis. Filthy looking Arabs, to the number of a dozen, rose out of the shadows and crowded about the trio, pleading piteously for backshish in the name of Allah. The party found itself forced back towards the carriage, and Benton fingered the grip of the revolver in his pocket as the other hand held the girl's arm. At the same moment there was a sudden clamor of shouting and the patter of running feet. ”

“ If the panorama of Constantinople fades from a lurid silhouette to a sooty monotone by night, it at least makes amends by day. Then the sun, shining out of a sky of intense blue, on water vividly green, catches the tiled color-chips of the sprawling town; glints on dome [Pg 274] and minaret, and makes such a city as might be seen in a kaleidoscope.
Her insatiable appetite for beauty had brought Cara on deck early. ”

“ Blanco had come quietly, and his canvas shoes had made no sound. For a time he did not announce himself. He was not sure that Benton was awake, so he dropped noiselessly to the deck and sat with his hands clasped about his knees, his eyes moodily measuring the rise and fall of the glaringly white stanchions above and below the sky-line. At frequent intervals they swept back to the other man, who still lay motionless. ”

“ He seized Karyl by his shoulders and wheeled him so that they stood face to face. There was in his manner nothing of deference, nothing of the subordinate. Now he stood transformed, the man of action; the dominant, compelling force before whom littler men must wither. This was no longer Von Ritz the emotionless. It was Von Ritz the King-maker, burning with vitalizing passion.
"My God, boy, are you mad? Do you think other men have never loved and sacrificed themselves for duty—kept unuttered, locked in their hearts, things they were hungry to say?... ”

“ The toreador nodded. "True, I had not forgotten the other. Tall, black-haired, not unlike yourself in appearance, Señor, save for a heavier jaw and the mustache which points upward. He is an Englishman by birth, a native of the world by adoption. Once he bore a British army commission. Now he is seen in distinguished society"—Blanco laughed—"when distinguished society wants something done which clean men will not do. His name, just now, is Martin. In many quarters he is better known as the English Jackal. Where one sees him one may scent conspiracy." ”

“ Among the shreds of fragmentary information which Manuel had previously stored away in his memory was the fact that one José Reebeler was a capitalist. This was not exclusive information. Every guide and casual acquaintance hastened to sing for the newcomer the saga of Reebeler's importance. One was informed that this magnate owned the three tourist hotels and their acres of vine-covered gardens; that he controlled the half-humorous pretense of a street-railway company and that even the huge, dominating rock upon which perched the pavilions and casino of the Strangers' Club was his property. ”