Читать книгу The Traitors - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 8

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Afternoon tea was brought in by an elderly man-servant in plain livery, and was probably the most unconventional meal which Reist had ever shared. They sat about promiscuously upon chairs and overturned boxes, and there was a good deal of lively conversation. Brand was a newspaper man, who had served as war correspondent with Erlito in the Egyptian campaign, Mr. Van Decht and his daughter were rich Americans, loitering about Europe. Hassen remained silent, and of him Reist learned nothing further. The little which he knew sufficed.

Brand came over and sat by Reist’s side. He was a tall, fair man, with keen eyes and weather-beaten skin—by no means unlike Erlito, save that his shoulders were not so broad, and he lacked the military carriage.

“I am interested in your country, Duke,” he said. “You are making history there. It seems to me that it may become European history.”

“Theos has fallen upon evil times,” Reist answered. “All that we pray of Europe is that we may be left alone. If that be granted us we shall right ourselves.”

Sara Van Decht looked across at him with frank interest.

“Do you come from Theos, Duke?” she asked.

Reist bowed.

“I have lived there all my life,” he said, “and I know it better than any other place.

“It is a very beautiful country,” he continued, “and very dear to its people. To strangers, though, and specially you who have been brought up in America, I must confess that we should probably seem outside the pale of civilization.”

“Tell me why,” she asked. “What are you so backward in?”

“Luxuries,” he answered. “We have no electric light.”

“It is detestable,” she exclaimed.

“No street cars.”

“They are abominable!”

Reist smiled quietly.

“We have scarcely any railways,” he said, “and the telephone is rare enough to be a curiosity.”

She laughed back at him, and gave her empty cup to Brand.

“Primitivism,” she declared, “is quite the most delightful thing in the world. Then your politics, too, must be most exciting. You have revolutions, and that sort of thing, do you not?”

“I do not understand you, Miss Van Decht,” he said, quietly. “Will you not tell me what you mean?”

“The papers are all so vague,” she answered, “but one gathers that Theos is in a state of political unrest. I believe in South America they would call that a revolution.”

Reist’s eyes flashed fire. A faint smile flickered upon Hassen’s lips.

“There is not any comparison,” he said, haughtily, “any possible comparison, between the affairs of one of the most ancient and historical countries in Europe and the mushroom States of South America. Theos, it is true, has made mistakes, and she will suffer for them—she is suffering now.”

“The Republic, for example,” Hassen remarked, quietly.

“Theos,” Reist answered, “is a country in which the Republican instinct is as yet unborn. Her sons are homely and brave, tillers of the soil, or soldiers. We have few cities to corrupt, and very little attempt at the education which makes shopkeepers and anarchists of honest men. Perhaps that is why we have kept our independence. Ay, kept it, although hemmed in with false friends and open enemies.”

Reist spoke with fervour, a fire in his dark eyes, a note of passion vibrating in his slow tones. The girl especially watched him with keen interest. To her all this was new and incredible. She was used to men to whom self-restraint was amongst the cardinal virtues, to the patriotism of torchlight processions and fire-crackers. This was all so different, it was as though some one had turned back for her the pages of history. … Reist surely was not of this generation? Erlito had averted his face, Hassen was busy lighting a cigarette, Mr. Van Decht was as bewildered as his daughter. Yet Reist’s words, in a way, had moved all of them. It was Hassen who answered.

“If the Republican instinct,” he remarked, quietly, “is as yet unborn in Theos, whence the banishment of the Tyrnaus family, and the establishment of a Republican government?”

Reist turned full upon him, and his eyes were like the eyes of an angry lion.

“Maurice of Tyrnaus,” he said, “was one of the degenerates of a noble race. I say no more against one whom, if alive, I should still acknowledge as my King.”

Hassen shrugged his shoulders.

“You are a long way from Theos, Count,” he remarked, pointedly. “You took, I presume, the oath of allegiance to the Republic when it was formed?”

“That is a false saying,” Reist answered, scornfully. “I neither took the oath nor recognized the government.”

“Yet they allowed you to remain in the capital city?” Hassen asked.

“There was no one,” Reist answered, “who would have dared to bid me depart. Of the ancient nobility of Theos we alone remain, alas, close dwellers in our native country. Else Metzger had been hung in the market-place with short shrift—he a merchant, a trafficker in coin, who dared to sit in the ancient Council House of Theos and weave his cursed treason. And listen, sir,” he continued, turning abruptly upon Hassen. “You would know whence sprang that evil weed of a Republic! I will tell you. It was the work of foreign spies working with foreign gold amongst the outcasts and scum of Theos. It was not the choice of the people. It was the word of sedition, of cunning bribery, the vile underhand efforts of foreign politicians seeking to weaken by treachery a country they dared not, small though it is, provoke to battle.”

There followed a strange, tense silence. No one thought of interruption. They held their breath and waited. The conversation which had started harmlessly enough had become a duel. The grim shadow of tragedy seemed suddenly to have stalked in amongst them. Hassen sprang to his feet, livid, his coal-black eyes on fire. Reist was facing him, his head thrown back, passionate, contemptuous, bitter. With a swift, threatening gesture he threw out his arm towards his adversary.

“Hassen Bey,” he said, “my private enemies I meet under the roof of my friends, and courtesy demands that I hold my peace and pass on. The enemies of my country I denounce at all times, and in all places. You are a Turkish spy, one of those of whom I have been speaking, who sought the hospitality of Theos only to scatter gold amongst the common people to plot and intrigue for your master, the Sultan. Oh, I know that you are also a soldier and a brave man, for I have met you face to face in battle, and may God grant that I do so again. Yet you are a spy and a treacherous rogue, and I am very thankful that I have come here to tell you so, and to order you to leave this roof.”

Hassen had recovered himself. He turned to Erlito.

“The Duke of Reist,” he said, quietly, “is a friend of yours. Perhaps it is better that I should go. I regret very much to have been the passive cause of such an outbreak. Miss Van Decht, you will accept my apologies.”

Erlito was very grave. He did not seem to see the hand which Hassen held out to him.

“Hassen,” he said, “we have been friends, but I do not understand these things which the Duke of Reist has said of you. You have spoken of yourself as a Frenchman—of Theos or of Turkey I have heard nothing. Have you any explanation to offer?”

Hassen shrugged his shoulders lightly.

“My dear Erlito,” he said, “the Duke of Reist is an honest man, but—he will forgive me—he is an anachronism. He should have lived two centuries ago—or, better still, he would have made an excellent crusader. The necessities of modern diplomacy are unknown to him. He has passed all his days in a semi-civilized country. He is not a fitting judge of the things which happen to-day.”

A sudden lightning flashed in Erlito’s blue eyes. He drew himself to his full height, and pointed towards the door.

“That semi-civilized country, sir, is mine also, and if you are one of those who have sought to corrupt it, I beg that you will leave this room while you may with a whole skin. At once, sir!”

The imperturbability of the man was clearly disturbed. He looked at Erlito in amazement. The face of Nicholas of Reist shone with joy.

“Your country?” Hassen repeated, incredulously. “What have you to do with Theos?”

Erlito hesitated—not so Reist. He stepped forward, and the leaping firelight threw a strange glow upon his pale, mobile features.

“After all,” he cried to Hassen, “it seems that you are but a poor fool of a conspirator. I will do you an honour which you ill deserve. I will present you to his Royal Highness, Prince Ughtred, of Tyrnaus.”

“Gracious!”

The single monosyllable—from Sara Van Decht—was the only speech which broke the amazed silence. She was leaning forward in her chair, gazing eagerly at the three men, her beautiful eyes eloquent with excitement—a crown of fire gleaming in her brown-gold hair. No one noticed her. Hassen, who had regained his composure, but in whose face was written a deep self-disgust, moved towards the door. With his fingers upon the handle he paused and looked back at the little group.

“You are both,” he said, in a low tone, “a little hard upon a soldier, and a servant of the Sultan, with whom obedience is forced to become an instinct. Of that—no more. But there is one thing which you may call me as often and as thoroughly as you will, for it is as true as the Koran, that I am an absolute—a blind fool!”

He passed out, and they heard him singing for the lift. Sara Van Decht looked up at Brand, who was sitting next to her. Her half-whispered remark dissolved the situation.

“I suppose that we are all awake,” she said. “I feel as though I wanted to pinch myself to be sure of it.”