Читать книгу King Tommy - James Owen Hannay - Страница 9

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Troyte and I dined very comfortably and, being wise men, talked about nothing unpleasant until the business of eating was over. When I had finished my second glass of port we went into the library for our coffee. The library in Troyte’s house in Grosvenor Street is a comfortable, and, I think, a beautiful room. There are a couple of good pictures, but for the most part the walls are covered with bookcases. Troyte has spent a great deal on books during his life, rare books, exquisite examples of printing and books which have fine bindings. I do not know that he, or indeed any one, ever reads books of that kind. It is generally easier, and pleasanter, to buy a modern edition of an old author if you want to read him at all. But there is no doubt that the presence in a room of good books, good from a bibliophile’s point of view, creates an atmosphere which is very agreeable, especially after dinner.

A Persian carpet, one of the best I have ever seen, covers the floor of the library. Some good chairs, Chinese Chippendale, stand with their backs against the bookcases. But Troyte is too sensible a man to sacrifice comfort to artistic feeling. Round the fire he has deep leather-covered chairs of thoroughly satisfactory late Victorian design. A servant put a small table between us, set coffee, cognac and cigarettes on it and then went away.

I was just about to begin the tale of Emily’s lost curate when Troyte asked me an abrupt question.

“Do you know where Norheys is?”

“At this hour,” I said, “he’s generally in the Belvedere.”

The Belvedere is the theater in which Miss Temple dances. Norheys, unless he has some important engagement elsewhere, hangs about her dressing-room until her turn is over. Then he drives her home.

“He’s not at the Belvedere to-night,” said Troyte. “In fact, he’s not in town at all.”

“He didn’t say anything to me about going away,” I said, “but then I haven’t seen him for the last two days.”

“Nobody has seen him for the last two days,” said Troyte. “I wanted to speak to him to-day and I telephoned to his rooms. His man told me that he went away the day before yesterday. He left no address, so his letters aren’t being forwarded. I made inquiries at his clubs, but he left no address at any of them. All his man could tell me was that he went off with two suit-cases and the taxi man was ordered to take him to Charing Cross.”

It occurred to me at once that Norheys, goaded to exasperation by Cable’s conduct to Miss Temple, had gone off with her and got married somewhere.

“Did you,” I asked, “find out whether Miss Temple is in London or not?”

“No, I didn’t. You surely don’t think he’s gone off with her?”

“It might be worth while finding out whether she’s in London or not.”

I went over to the telephone and rang up the Belvedere Theater. I asked whether Miss Temple was there and at what hour she might be expected to dance. Some one who was either in a hurry or a bad temper replied that Miss Temple was unable to dance owing to indisposition. He added that if I had taken the trouble to look at the advertisements of his entertainment I should have seen that Miss Temple had not danced for two nights. In that way, so he said quite plainly, I should have avoided wasting his time with silly questions. That was a plain hint to me to ring off and hang up the receiver; but I ventured on another question.

“Do you happen to know if Miss Temple is at home in her flat?”

“No, I don’t,” came the reply, “and I shouldn’t tell you if I did. We don’t encourage strangers to run after our ladies.”

I told Troyte what I had heard.

“I suppose,” I said, “that putting two and two together in the usual way we arrive at four.”

“You mean that he’s gone off with her?”

“I should have expressed myself more plainly,” I said. “I should have said that putting one and one together we arrive at another one. ‘They twain,’ you know.”

“Married?”

“He told me he was perfectly determined to marry her, and I expect he was.”

My opinion was that Troyte had driven the boy into marrying rather sooner than he meant to by continuously pushing the Princess Calypso at him and worrying him about the crown of Lystria. Cable, with his attempt at bribery and his ill-timed threats, had settled the matter. But there was no use making things worse for Troyte by telling him that it was largely his own fault. I tried to soften the blow to him.

“I’m told,” I said, “that she’s a nice, lady-like girl. He might have done worse.”

Troyte sat sipping a glass of cognac without speaking. I went on:

“And, after all, it wouldn’t have been all joy marrying a Balkan princess. I don’t know this Calypso girl personally, but I can’t help feeling that a young woman brought up among bearded brigands, with snowy mountains all round, and heavy barbaric jewels given her for birthday presents, might turn out to be what the French call farouche. I don’t mean to hint that she isn’t a lady; but she may be a little lacking in serenity.”

“I don’t believe he’s gone off with Miss Temple,” said Troyte.

The thing seemed so obvious to me that I could see no reason for doubting it. But the next thing Troyte said startled me.

“The fact is,” he said, “that Norheys promised me three days ago that he’d go out to Lystria. He said he’d be ready to start to-morrow.”

“Did he say he’d marry the princess?”

“No. He didn’t. If you want his exact words, he said, ‘I’ll have a go at that jolly old crown, Uncle Ned, just to please you.’”

I have never known Norheys go back on his word. If he said that he certainly meant to do it.

“And he promised to start to-morrow?” I said.

“Yes. But he may have changed his mind and started the day before yesterday. I told him that everything was ready. As a matter of fact, Cable has had an agent from Lystria waiting in Berlin for a week, ready to make a dart across the frontier the very moment Norheys arrives. Every one in Lystria is prepared for the coup d’etat. The patriarch and most of the leading nobles are to be in the Schloss Amberg, one of the old royal palaces. Cable has poured money into the country and has got the whole thing thoroughly organized. In fact, he told me that he’d managed to bribe the President of the Megalian Republic and three of his cabinet ministers, so that they won’t make a fuss when Lystria declares its independence. I’ve settled things with the French, more or less, that is to say, they’ve agreed to leave it to the League of Nations.”

“Which means?”

Troyte smiled slightly.

“Talk,” he said, “and time.”

“So you really think that if Norheys has gone there——”

“Everything will go quite smoothly,” said Troyte. “But I wish he’d told me he was starting at once.”

“And it might have been better,” I said, “if he hadn’t taken Miss Temple with him.”

“I don’t believe he’s done that,” said Troyte. “Hang it all, the boy’s a gentleman. He wouldn’t go off to marry the princess with that other woman in attendance.”

I felt as sure as I could be about anything that Norheys had not gone off to marry the princess. But he might possibly have gone to Lystria to see if he could secure the crown without the princess. He told me he was anxious to please his uncle and to supply the empire with oil.

“What would happen,” I said, “if he asked for the crown and refused to marry the princess?”

“He wouldn’t get it,” said Troyte. “The Lystrians are legitimists to the backbone.”

“And if by any chance—I’m not saying that it is so, I’m only making a suggestion—if by any chance Miss Temple followed him there of her own accord, what would happen?”

“I should think,” said Troyte, “that the patriarch would probably hang Norheys and imprison Miss Temple. But that can’t have happened. The girl wouldn’t be such a fool as to go there on her own.”

Then a servant came in and murmured to Troyte that Mr. Cable wanted to see him on very important business.

“Show him in,” said Troyte.

I had never seen Procopius Cable. With Norheys’ description fresh in my mind I expected a repulsive-looking man. Norheys called him “a Semitic toad,” an “octopus,” and “a slimy money-lender.” I was agreeably surprised. He did not look like a gentleman, but there was no doubt about his being masterful and strong. I saw that he possessed ability of an uncommon kind. I could understand how it was that Troyte believed him to be an empire-builder. Clive and Warren Hastings, in earlier days Drake and Frobisher, later on perhaps Cecil Rhodes, must have been men of essentially the same sort of character. But looking at the man, it was tolerably certain that he was not by birth an Englishman. He had become English because England is the natural home of men of his type, the only country which has ever understood how to use them. But the foreign strain was unmistakable. It was not Semitic. It was not Latin. I do not think it was Slav. It was something that made him more excitable and more liable to display excitement than a man of our blood would be.

His eyes were sparkling. His face seemed to shine and his movements were jumpy when he walked into the room. When he saw me he stopped, half-way between the door and the fireplace.

Troyte introduced me formally, told him that he need not hesitate to speak in my presence and invited him to sit down. Cable still looked at me doubtfully. Troyte explained that I was Norheys’ godfather and knew all about the Lystrian business. Then Cable blurted out the news.

“I came round to tell you,” he said, “that I’ve just had a telegram from Casimir. You recollect, don’t you, Count Istvan Casimir is the most influential of the Lystrian nobles. He’s my agent in Berlin.”

“Yes,” said Troyte. “He was to receive Norheys there.”

“Everything has gone capitally so far,” said Cable. “Lord Norheys arrived in Berlin. Casimir met him. They crossed the Megalian frontier to-day.”

“To-day?” said Troyte. “Norheys and Casimir?”

“Lord Norheys and the princess,” said Cable. “Casimir couldn’t go with them. He wouldn’t have been allowed to cross the frontier. The patriarch is waiting for them in the Schloss Amberg. They ought to arrive there to-morrow evening. Next morning the wedding will be celebrated in the Royal Chapel. To-morrow afternoon the coronation will take place.”

Cable was excited, wildly excited. He stepped forward, took Troyte’s liqueur glass, filled it with cognac and raised it high above his head.

“God save the King of Lystria,” he said.

He swallowed the cognac, and, following the best precedents, threw down the glass. It ought no doubt to have emphasized the toast by being shivered to atoms. But Troyte’s Persian carpet is soft. The glass merely rolled about a little. I picked it up quite unharmed and set it on the tray.

“I suppose,” I said, “that there’s no possibility of a mistake about your news?”

“There can’t be a mistake,” said Cable. “Casimir is thoroughly reliable. The telegram is in my private code, so you couldn’t read it if I showed it to you. But you may take my word for it that it comes from Casimir. No one else has the code.”

“I don’t see any reason to suppose there is a mistake,” said Troyte. “Norheys told me he meant to go to Lystria, though I didn’t know he meant to start day before yesterday.”

“He started a week ago,” said Cable.

That puzzled me. I was quite certain that I had seen Norheys less than a week ago. Certainly Miss Temple was dancing in the Belvedere four days before. I saw her there myself. Whatever Norheys had done, she had certainly not left London a week ago.

“Does your telegram say whether there was any one else with Norheys and the princess?” I said. “You’ve told us that the Count Casimir couldn’t go with them. Did they go off to Lystria alone?”

“There was a lady with the princess,” said Cable.

“Who?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” said Cable.

“Some lady-in-waiting, of course,” said Troyte.

I was more puzzled than ever. I felt convinced that Miss Temple was with Norheys wherever he was. Unless he had succeeded in working out his plan for marrying both of them I failed to see what could have happened.

“I think,” said Troyte, “that we ought to follow Mr. Cable’s example, and drink the health of the King and Queen of Lystria.”

He rang the bell. In a few minutes we had a bottle of champagne on the table between us. Troyte filled three glasses. He and I stood up. Cable had not yet sat down.

“Long life to the king and queen,” said Troyte.

“The restored Monarchy of Lystria,” said Cable.

“Oil,” I said, “and plenty of it.”

Troyte drank. Cable hesitated, looking doubtfully at me. He suspected that I might be poking fun at him, and that kind of man always hates a joke. I held up my glass and smiled amiably.

Then—things occasionally happen in this dramatic way even in real life—Norheys and Viola Temple walked in.

“Hullo! Uncle Ned,” said Norheys, “just ran round, don’t you know, to tell you that Viola and I were married the day before yesterday. Did the trick in Dover and ran over to Paris for twenty-four hours. Excuse our not being dressed and that sort of thing. The train’s only just on.”

Troyte stared at him. So did Cable. Neither of them spoke. I felt it was my duty to break a silence that was becoming awkward.

“Oddly enough,” I said, “we were just drinking to your health when you came in.”

“Were you?” said Norheys. “Now how the devil did you know? I suppose it got into the papers somehow. What I always say is: It’s no use trying to keep things out of the papers. ‘The Marquis of Norheys and his beautiful bride leaving the church after the ceremony’ and all that sort of thing. What? With a photograph of some other fellow and quite a different girl grinning at you. I don’t know how it’s done; but there it is, you know. Anyhow, I’m glad it was broken to you, Uncle Ned. I was afraid it might be a bit of a facer at first. Not that I’m going to back out of Lystria. I always told you I was quite on for that. So’s Viola. Viola is as keen as I am and we’ll start to-morrow if you like.”

“Are you Lord Norheys?” gasped Cable.

“That exact man, and this is Lady Norheys.”

“If you’re Lord Norheys——” said Cable.

“I don’t blame you for not recognizing me,” said Norheys. “I expect the photographs you saw in the papers gave me a long white beard or something. But I’m the man, the actual and only original. Do tell him who I am, Uncle Bill. He doesn’t seem to believe me.”

“If you’re Lord Norheys, some one else must have gone off to Lystria with the princess.”

“Good old Calypso,” said Norheys. “Done a bolt on her own, I suppose. Family chauffeur perhaps. What I always say is this: If a girl has any spirit it’s a mistake to drive her up against the ropes, telling her she’s got to marry some fellow she’s never seen. They won’t stand it, and I don’t altogether blame them. Jolly independent, all of them, specially since the war.”

“If you’re Lord Norheys,” Cable said, “who has gone off to Lystria with the princess?”

He spoke in a dull flat tone. Troyte made no attempt to answer him. Norheys put his arm round his wife’s waist and winked vulgarly at me. There was a long and embarrassing silence. I broke it in the end with an idiotic answer to Cable’s question.

“Unless it’s my sister Emily’s lost curate, I don’t see who it can be.” Then I giggled nervously.