The Purchase Price by Emerson Hough (ebook reader screen .txt) 📕

wish you success, and there has been no jest in what I said about the support of Mr. Fillmore's family and his party. You know that there is honesty even in politics, sometimes; and there is silence, I promise that. Take my advice. Put her in a sack, drop her overboard in mid-ocean. In return, all I ask of you is not to throw overboard the sack anywhere close to this country's shore! It was done once before, on the Ohio River, but the sack was not tied tightly enough. Here she is again! Wherefore, have a care with your sack strings, I beseech you.

"Louis, my hat; and get my carriage! Have a second carriage waiting here at once."

CHAPTER XXVI THE DISTINGUISHED GENTLEMAN FROM NEW YORK

Meantime, the Countess St. Auban, innocent of these plans which had gone forward regarding her, completed her attendance at the entertainment which the evening was offering the elite of Washington, and in due time arrived at the entrance of her hotel. She found the private entrance to-night occupied by the usual throng, but hurried from the carriage step across the pavement and through the open door.

She made no ordinary picture now as she approached the brighter lights of the interior. Her garb, cut in that fashion which gave so scant aid to nature's outlines, was widely though not extremely hooped, the fabric of daintily flowered silk. As she pushed back the deep, double fronted dolman which served her for a wrap, her shoulders showed white and beautiful, as also the round column of her neck, shadowed only by one long drooping curl, and banded by a gleaming circlet of many colored gems. Her dark hair, though drawn low upon the temples in acknowledgment of the prevailing mode, was bound in fashion of her own by a gem-clasped, golden fillet, under which it broke into a riot of lesser curls which swept over ears and temples. Here and there a gleaming jewel confined some such truant lock, so that she glittered, half-barbaric, as she walked, surmounted by a thousand trembling points of light. Ease, confidence, carelessness seemed spoken alike by the young woman's half haughty carriage and her rich costuming. Midway in the twenties of her years, she was just above slightness, just above medium height. The roundness of shoulder and arm, thus revealed, bespoke soundness and wholesomeness beyond callowness, yet with no hint of years or bulk. Her hair certainly was dark and luxuriant, her eyes surely were large and dark, without doubt shaded by long and level brows. The nose was not too highly arched any more than it was pinched and meager—indeed, a triumph in noses, since not too strong, nor yet indicating a physique weak and ill nourished.

Vital, self-confident, a trifle foreign, certainly distinguished, at first there might have seemed a trace of defiance in the carriage, even in the glance of Josephine St. Auban. But a second look into the wide dark eyes would have found there rather a trace of pathos, bordering upon melancholy; and the lines of the mouth, strongly curved, would in all likelihood have gained that sympathy demanded by the eyes, betokening a nature warm and noble, not petty or mean, and certainly not insignificant.

Such was the woman of the hour in Washington, lately frowned on by the ladies as too beautiful, talked about by the gentlemen as too cold, discussed by some, adored by others, understood by none, dreaded by some high in power, plotted against by others yet more high in place.

She cast a hurried glance now at the clock which, tall and solemn, stood near by in the hall. It was upon the stroke of midnight only. Turning half questioningly to her maid, she heard a footfall. The manager of the hotel himself came to greet her, carrying a card in his hand, and with a bow, asking her attention.

"Well, then," began the young woman, in perfect English, glancing at the card. Her dark eyes rose to meet his. "It is impossible," she said. "You know my wishes very well."

"But, my dear Countess, have you noted this name?" began the manager.

"Of course, I know it. All the more reason there should be mistake."

"But I assure you, my dear Countess—"

A step sounded near by, and the curtains swung back, disclosing the entrance to one of the adjoining parlors of the hotel. The figure of a well-built and hale gentleman, past middle age, of dignified carriage and pleasant features, was revealed. Half hesitating, he advanced.

"My dear lady," he began, in a deep and melodious voice, "I come to you doubly handicapped, both as intruder and eavesdropper. I could not avoid hearing what you have said, and as listeners hear no good of themselves, I venture to interrupt. I am anxious that your first impression of me should be a good one, Madam!"

She dropped him a curtsy which was grace itself, her dark eyes looking straight into his face. Surprise brought a slightly heightened color to her cheek. Seeing her perturbation, the unbidden guest hastened to make what amends were possible.

[Illustration: She dropped him a curtsy.]

"You were saying it was a mistake, dear lady. But if so, the intrusion was on my part. I have wished to meet you quietly, if such may be your pleasure. I am alone. Opportunity has lacked for earlier announcement, for I have but reached town this evening."

She looked from one to the other still questioningly. The manager of the hotel, feeling discretion to be the best card to play, hurriedly bowed, and hastened away.

The Countess St. Auban hesitated for an instant, but guessed some errand here worth knowing. Having herself entered the inner room, with grace she signified that the elderly gentleman should first be placed; then, seating herself upon a divan somewhat nearer to the door and hence in shadow, she waited for him to go forward with the business which had brought him hither.

"Madam," he went on, "my dear Countess, I could but overhear you refer to my own name. If it has any reputation in your eyes, let that plead as my excuse for intruding in this manner. Believe me, nothing would induce me to take such a step except business of importance."

"It is, then, of business?" Her voice, as he noted once more, was clear and full, her enunciation without provincial slur, clean and highbred.

"I hope something not wholly outside your liking."

"Of course I do not understand." She sat still looking at him full, her hands, clasping her little fan, a trifle raised.

"Then let me hasten to make all plain. I am aware of a part of your history and of a part of your plans, Madam; I am not unaware of certain ambitions of your own—I am forced to be so frank in these conditions. You are interested in the cause of Hungary."

"Place it wider, Sir," she said. "In humanity!"

"Hence you have come to America to carry forward certain of your plans. Even now you have undertaken the greatest and most daring work of altruism this country ever knew."

She made no answer but to smile at him, a wide and half lazy smile, disclosing her white and even teeth. The jewels in her dark hair glistened as she nodded slightly. Emboldened, he went on:

"And you find all things at a deadlock in Washington to-day. Humanity is placed away in linen on the shelf in America, to-day. Dust must not filter through the protection of this mighty compromise which our two great parties have accomplished! We must not talk of principles, must not stir sedition, at this time. Whig and Democrat must tiptoe, both of them, nor wake this sleeping dog of slavery. Only a few, Madam, only a few, have the hardihood to assert their beliefs. Only a few venture to cast defiance even to the dictum of Webster himself. He says to us that conscience should not be above the law. I say to you, Madam, that conscience should be the only law."

"Are you for freedom, Sir?" she asked slowly. "Are you for humanity?"

"Madam, as I hope reward, I am! Those of us who dare say so much are few in numbers to-day. We are so few, my dear lady, that we belong together. All of us who have influence—and that I trust may be said of both of us, who now meet for the first time—we are so few that I, a stranger to you, though not, I trust, wholly unrecommended, dare come to you to-night."

"With what purpose, then. Sir?"

"With the immediate purpose of learning at first hand the truth of the revolutionary system in Europe. I have not been abroad of late, indeed not for some years. But I know that our diplomacy is all a-tangle. The reports are at variance, and we get them colored by partisan politics. This slavery agitation is simply a political game, at which both parties and all sides are merely playing. Party desirability, party safety—that is the cry in the South as much as in the North. Yet all the time I know, as you know, of the hundreds of thousands of men who are leaving Europe to come to this country. A wave of moral change is bound to sweep across the North. Madam, we dwell on the eve of revolution here in America as well as in Europe. Now do you see why I have come to you to-night? Have we not much in common?"

"I am glad," she said simply; "I am proud. Me you overrate, but my wishes and my hopes you do not overrate. Only,—" and she hesitated, "why to-night; why in this particular way?"

"I arrive at that. My own plans take me soon to Europe. I am determined to investigate upon the very ground itself this question of a national repression of the human conscience."

She sat a trifle more erect, a trifle more haughty. He seemed to read her thoughts.

"Let me hope that you also have planned an early return. We have much which we might discuss of common interest. There is much of interest in that country beyond, which we might see. I do not venture any suggestion for you, but only say that if it were within your own desires to travel in the company of a man whose former station at least ought to render your reputation safe, you and your servants will be welcome in my company. My party will have other gentlemen and ladies, not of mean station, I hope."

She looked at him, hesitating, studying. It was hardly a fair contest, this of youth and scant experience against suavity and shrewdness strengthened by years of public life.

"I am somewhat helpless, Sir," she said, at length. "To converse with one so able as yourself,—what woman of my ambitions would not be pleased with that? But I am a woman, and alone in the world. I am already denounced as careless. There already has been talk. Moreover, as you see, I am committed now fully to this great work of freeing and sending from America the negro slaves. Take them from this country. Replace them with three million men born closer to freedom and citizenship—"

"Yes. But you are here somewhat mysteriously; you come privately and secretly. What harm, then, if you return as privately and secretly as you have come to Washington? Let your agents carry on your work here. The mission on which I shall be engaged will have to do with Louis Kossuth."

"Ah!"

"Yes; and you know that noble patriot, I am told. Consider of what aid you might be to me. You speak his tongue, you know his history, you could supply me at once with information—Come, 'tis no idle errand. And, perhaps,—you will forgive me, since we both know how cruel is such gossip as this that has wronged you—the tongue of gossip wags the least when the eye of gossip has seen least. Tins is a most natural and proper—indeed, most convincing opportunity."

"That is precisely what I pondered, Sir." She nodded gravely.

"And let me add this," he continued: "every day you are here in Washington the tongue of rumor wags the more. Listen