Book: 54 40 or Fight

E >> Emerson Hough >> 54 40 or Fight




"But, Madam," said I, at length, "you must not wrong your father and
your mother and yourself. These two loved each other devotedly. Well,
what more? You are the result of a happy marriage. You are beautiful,
you are splendid, by that reason."

"Perhaps. Even when I was sixteen, I was beautiful," she mused. "I have
heard rumors of that. But I say to you that then I was only a beautiful
animal. Also, I was a vicious animal I had in my heart all the malice
which my mother never spoke. I felt in my soul the wish to injure women,
to punish men, to torment them, to make them pay! To set even those
balances of torture!--ah, that was my ambition! I had not forgotten
that, when I first met you, when I first heard of--her, the woman whom
you love, whom already in your savage strong way you have wedded--the
woman whose vows I spoke with her--I--I, Helena von Ritz, with history
such as mine!

"Father, father,"--she turned to him swiftly; "rise--go! I can not now
speak before you. Leave us alone until I call!"

Obedient as though he had been the child and she the parent, the old man
rose and tottered feebly from the room.

"There are things a woman can not say in the presence of a parent," she
said, turning to me. Her face twitched. "It takes all my bravery to talk
to you."

"Why should you? There is not need. Do not!"

"Ah, I must, because it is fair," said she. "I have lost, lost! I told
you I would pay my wager."

After a time she turned her face straight toward mine and went on with
her old splendid bravery.

"So, now, you see, when I was young and beautiful I had rank and money.
I had brains. I had hatred of men. I had contempt for the aristocracy.
My heart was peasant after all. My principles were those of the
republican. Revolution was in my soul, I say. Thwarted, distorted,
wretched, unscrupulous, I did what I could to make hell for those who
had made hell for us. I have set dozens of men by the ears. I have been
promised in marriage to I know not how many. A dozen men have fought to
the death in duels over me. For each such death I had not even a
thought. The more troubles I made, the happier I was. Oh, yes, in time I
became known--I had a reputation; there is no doubt of that.

"But still the organized aristocracy had its revenge--it had its will of
me, after all. There came to me, as there had to my mother, an imperial
order. In punishment for my fancies and vagaries, I was condemned to
marry a certain nobleman. That was the whim of the new emperor,
Ferdinand, the degenerate. He took the throne when I was but sixteen
years of age. He chose for me a degenerate mate from his own sort." She
choked, now.

"You did marry him?"

She nodded. "Yes. Debauche, rake, monster, degenerate, product of that
aristocracy which had oppressed us, I was obliged to marry him, a man
three times my age! I pleaded. I begged. I was taken away by night. I
was--I was--They say I was married to him. For myself, I did not know
where I was or what happened. But after that they said that I was the
wife of this man, a sot, a monster, the memory only of manhood. Now,
indeed, the revenge of the aristocracy was complete!"

She went on at last in a voice icy cold. "I fled one night, back to
Hungary. For a month they could not find me. I was still young. I saw my
people then as I had not before. I saw also the monarchies of Europe.
Ah, now I knew what oppression meant! Now I knew what class distinction
and special privileges meant! I saw what ruin it was spelling for our
country--what it will spell for your country, if they ever come to rule
here. Ah, then that dream came to me which had come to my father, that
beautiful dream which justified me in everything I did. My friend, can
it--can it in part justify me--now?

"For the first time, then, I resolved to live! I have loved my father
ever since that time. I pledged myself to continue that work which he
had undertaken! I pledged myself to better the condition of humanity if
I might.

"There was no hope for me. I was condemned and ruined as it was. My life
was gone. Such as I had left, that I resolved to give to--what shall we
call it?-the _idee democratique_.

"Now, may God rest my mother's soul, and mine also, so that some time I
may see her in another world--I pray I may be good enough for that some
time. I have not been sweet and sinless as was my mother. Fate laid a
heavier burden upon me. But what remained with me throughout was the
idea which my father had bequeathed me--"

"Ah, but also that beauty and sweetness and loyalty which came to you
from your mother," I insisted.

She shook her head. "Wait!" she said. "Now they pursued me as though I
had been a criminal, and they took me back--horsemen about me who did as
they liked. I was, I say, a sacrifice. News of this came to that man who
was my husband. They shamed him into fighting. He had not the courage of
the nobles left. But he heard of one nobleman against whom he had a
special grudge; and him one night, foully and unfairly, he murdered.

"News of that came to the Emperor. My husband was tried, and, the case
being well known to the public, it was necessary to convict him for the
sake of example. Then, on the day set for his beheading, the Emperor
reprieved him. The hour for the execution passed, and, being now free
for the time, he fled the country. He went to Africa, and there he so
disgraced the state that bore him that of late times I hear he has been
sent for to come back to Austria. Even yet the Emperor may suspend the
reprieve and send him to the block for his ancient crime. If he had a
thousand heads, he could not atone for the worse crimes he has done!

"But of him, and of his end, I know nothing. So, now, you see, I was and
am wed, and yet am not wed, and never was. I do not know what I am, nor
who I am. After all, I can not tell you who I am, or what I am, because
I myself do not know.

"It was now no longer safe for me in my own country. They would not let
me go to my father any more. As for him, he went on with his studies,
some part of his mind being bright and clear. They did not wish him
about the court now. All these matters were to be hushed up. The court
of England began to take cognizance of these things. Our government was
scandalized. They sent my father, on pretext of scientific errands, into
one country and another--to Sweden, to England, to Africa, at last to
America. Thus it happened that you met him. You must both have been very
near to meeting me in Montreal. It was fate, as we of Hungary would say.

"As for me, I was no mere hare-brained radical. I did not go to Russia,
did not join the revolutionary circles of Paris, did not yet seek out
Prussia. That is folly. My father was right. It must be the years, it
must be the good heritage, it must be the good environment, it must be
even opportunity for all, which alone can produce good human beings! In
short, believe me, a victim, _the hope of the world is in a real
democracy_. Slowly, gradually, I was coming to believe that."

She paused a moment. "Then, one time, Monsieur,--I met you, here in this
very room! God pity me! You were the first man I had ever seen. God
pity me!--I believe I--loved you--that night, that very first night! We
are friends. We are brave. You are man and gentleman, so I may say that,
now. I am no longer woman. I am but sacrifice.

"Opportunity must exist, open and free for all the world," she went on,
not looking at me more than I could now at her. "I have set my life to
prove this thing. When I came here to this America--out of pique, out of
a love of adventure, out of sheer daring and exultation in
imposture--_then_ I saw why I was born, for what purpose! It was to do
such work as I might to prove the theory of my father, and to justify
the life of my mother. For that thing I was born. For that thing I have
been damned on this earth; I may be damned in the life to come, unless I
can make some great atonement. For these I suffer and shall always
suffer. But what of that? There must always be a sacrifice."

The unspeakable tragedy of her voice cut to my soul. "But listen!" I
broke out. "You are young. You are free. All the world is before you.
You can have anything you like--"

"Ah, do not talk to me of that," she exclaimed imperiously. "Do not
tempt me to attempt the deceit of myself! I made myself as I am, long
ago. I did not love. I did not know it. As to marriage, I did not need
it. I had abundant means without. I was in the upper ranks of society. I
was there; I was classified; I lived with them. But always I had my
purposes, my plans. For them I paid, paid, paid, as a woman must,
with--what a woman has.

"But now, I am far ahead of my story. Let me bring it on. I went to
Paris. I have sown some seeds of venom, some seeds of revolution, in one
place or another in Europe in my time. Ah, it works; it will go! Here
and there I have cost a human life. Here and there work was to be done
which I disliked; but I did it. Misguided, uncared for, mishandled as I
had been--well, as I said, I went to Paris.

"Ah, sir, will you not, too, leave the room, and let me tell on this
story to myself, to my own soul? It is fitter for my confessor than for
you."

"Let me, then, _be_ your confessor!" said I. "Forget! Forget! You have
not been this which you say. Do I not know?"

"No, you do not know. Well, let be. Let me go on! I say I went to Paris.
I was close to the throne of France. That little Duke of Orleans, son of
Louis Philippe, was a puppet in my hands. Oh, I do not doubt I did
mischief in that court, or at least if I failed it was through no lack
of effort! I was called there 'America Vespucci.' They thought me
Italian! At last they came to know who I was. They dared not make open
rupture in the face of the courts of Europe. Certain of their high
officials came to me and my young Duke of Orleans. They asked me to
leave Paris. They did not command it--the Duke of Orleans cared for that
part of it. But they requested me outside--not in his presence. They
offered me a price, a bribe--such an offering as would, I fancied, leave
me free to pursue my own ideas in my own fashion and in any corner of
the world. You have perhaps seen some of my little fancies. I imagined
that love and happiness were never for me--only ambition and unrest.
With these goes luxury, sometimes. At least this sort of personal
liberty was offered me--the price of leaving Paris, and leaving the son
of Louis Philippe to his own devices. I did so."

"And so, then you came to Washington? That must have been some years
ago."

"Yes; some five years ago. I still was young. I told you that you must
have known me, and so, no doubt, you did. Did _you_ ever hear of
'America Vespucci'?"

A smile came to my face at the suggestion of that celebrated adventuress
and mysterious impostress who had figured in the annals of Washington--a
fair Italian, so the rumor ran, who had come to this country to set up a
claim, upon our credulity at least, as to being the descendant of none
less than Amerigo Vespucci himself! This supposititious Italian had
indeed gone so far as to secure the introduction of a bill in Congress
granting to her certain Lands. The fate of that bill even then hung in
the balance. I had no reason to put anything beyond the audacity of this
woman with whom I spoke! My smile was simply that which marked the
eventual voting down of this once celebrated measure, as merry and as
bold a jest as ever was offered the credulity of a nation--one
conceivable only in the mad and bitter wit of Helena von Ritz!

"Yes, Madam," I said, "I have heard of 'America Vespucci.' I presume
that you are now about to repeat that you are she!"

She nodded, the mischievous enjoyment of her colossal jest showing in
her eyes, in spite of all. "Yes," said she, "among other things, I have
been 'America Vespucci'! There seemed little to do here in intrigue, and
that was my first endeavor to amuse myself. Then I found other
employment. England needed a skilful secret agent. Why should I be
faithful to England? At least, why should I not also enjoy intrigue with
yonder government of Mexico at the same time? There came also Mr. Van
Zandt of this Republic of Texas. Yes, it is true, I have seen some sport
here in Washington! But all the time as I played in my own little
game--with no one to enjoy it save myself--I saw myself begin to lose.
This country--this great splendid country of savages--began to take me
by the hands, began to look me in the eyes, and to ask me, '_Helena von
Ritz, what are you? What might you have been?_'

"So now," she concluded, "you asked me, asked me what I was, and I have
told you. I ask you myself, what am I, what am I to be; and I say, I am
unclean. But, being as I am, I have done what I have done. It was for a
principle--or it was--for you! I do not know."

"There are those who can be nothing else but clean," I broke out. "I
shall not endure to hear you speak thus of yourself. You--you, what have
you not done for us? Was not your mother clean in her heart? Sins such
as you mention were never those of scarlet. If you have sinned, your
sins are white as snow. I at least am confessor enough to tell you
that."

"Ah, my confessor!" She reached out her hands to me, her eyes swimming
wet. Then she pushed me back suddenly, beating with her little hands
upon my breast as though I were an enemy. "Do not!" she said. "Go!"

My eye caught sight of the great key, _Pakenham's key_, lying there on
the table. Maddened, I caught it up, and, with a quick wrench of my
naked hands, broke it in two, and threw the halves on the floor to join
the torn scroll of England's pledge.

I divided Oregon at the forty-ninth parallel, and not at fifty-four
forty, when I broke Pakenham's key. But you shall see why I have never
regretted that.

"Ask Sir Richard Pakenham if he wants his key _now!_" I said.




CHAPTER XXXIV

THE VICTORY

She will not stay the siege of loving terms,
Nor bide the encounter of assailing eyes,
Nor ope her lap to soul-seducing gold ...
For she is wise, if I can judge of her;
And fair she is, if that mine eyes be true;
And true she is, as she hath proved herself.
--_Shakespeare_.


"What have you done?" she exclaimed. "Are you mad? He may be here at any
moment now. Go, at once!"

"I shall not go!"

"My house is my own! I am my own!"

"You know it is not true, Madam!"

I saw the slow shudder that crossed her form, the the fringe of wet
which sprang to her eyelashes. Again the pleading gesture of her
half-open fingers.

"Ah, what matter?" she said. "It is only one woman more, against so
much. What is past, is past, Monsieur. Once down, a woman does not
rise."

"You forget history,--you forget the thief upon the cross!"

"The thief on the cross was not a woman. No, I am guilty beyond hope!"

"Rather, you are only mad beyond reason, Madam. I shall not go so long
as you feel thus,--although God knows I am no confessor."

"I confessed to you,--told you my story, so there could be no bridge
across the gulf between us. My happiness ended then."

"It is of no consequence that we be happy, Madam. I give you back your
own words about yon torch of principles."

For a time she sat and looked at me steadily. There was, I say, some
sort of radiance on her face, though I, dull of wit, could neither
understand nor describe it. I only knew that she seemed to ponder for a
long time, seemed to resolve at last. Slowly she rose and left me,
parting the satin draperies which screened her boudoir from the outer
room. There was silence for some time. Perhaps she prayed,--I do not
know.

Now other events took this situation in hand. I heard a footfall on the
walk, a cautious knocking on the great front door. So, my lord Pakenham
was prompt. Now I could not escape even if I liked.

Pale and calm, she reappeared at the parted draperies. I lifted the
butts of my two derringers into view at my side pockets, and at a glance
from her, hurriedly stepped into the opposite room. After a time I
heard her open the door in response to a second knock.

I could not see her from my station, but the very silence gave me a
picture of her standing, pale, forbidding, rebuking the first rude
exclamation of his ardor.

"Come now, is he gone? Is the place safe at last?" he demanded.

"Enter, my lord," she said simply.

"This is the hour you said," he began; and she answered:

"My lord, it is the hour."

"But come, what's the matter, then? You act solemn, as though this were
a funeral, and not--just a kiss," I heard him add.

He must have advanced toward her. Continually I was upon the point of
stepping out from my concealment, but as continually she left that not
quite possible by some word or look or gesture of her own with him.

"Oh, hang it!" I heard him grumble, at length; "how can one tell what a
woman'll do? Damn it, Helen!"

"'Madam,' you mean!"

"Well, then, Madam, why all this hoighty-toighty? Haven't I stood flouts
and indignities enough from you? Didn't you make a show of me before
that ass, Tyler, when I was at the very point of my greatest coup? You
denied knowledge that I knew you had. But did I discard you for that? I
have found you since then playing with Mexico, Texas, United States all
at once? Have I punished you for _that?_ No, I have only shown you the
more regard."

"My lord, you punish me most when you most show me your regard."

"Well, God bless my soul, listen at that! Listen at that--here, now,
when I've--Madam, you shock me, you grieve me. I--could I have a glass
of wine?"

I heard her ring for Threlka, heard her fasten the door behind her as
she left, heard him gulp over his glass. For myself, although I did not
yet disclose myself, I felt no doubt that I should kill Pakenham in
these rooms. I even pondered whether I should shoot him through the
temple and cut off his consciousness, or through the chest and so let
him know why he died.

After a time he seemed to look about the room, his eye falling upon the
littered floor.

"My key!" he exclaimed; "broken! Who did that? I can't use it now!"

"You will not need to use it, my lord."

"But I bought it, yesterday! Had I given you all of the Oregon country
it would not have been worth twenty thousand pounds. What I'll have
to-night--what I'll take--will be worth twice that. But I bought that
key, and what I buy I keep."

I heard a struggle, but she repulsed him once more in some way. Still my
time had not come. He seemed now to stoop, grunting, to pick up
something from the floor.

"How now? My memorandum of treaty, and torn in two! Oh, I see--I see,"
he mused. "You wish to give it back to me--to be wholly free! It means
only that you wish to love me for myself, for what I am! You minx!"

"You mistake, my lord," said her calm, cold voice.

"At least, 'twas no mistake that I offered you this damned country at
risk of my own head. Are you then with England and Sir Richard Pakenham?
Will you give my family a chance for revenge on these accursed
heathen--these Americans? Come, do that, and I leave this place with
you, and quit diplomacy for good. We'll travel the continent, we'll go
the world over, you and I. I'll quit my estates, my family for you.
Come, now, why do you delay?"

"Still you misunderstand, my lord."

"Tell me then what you do mean."

"Our old bargain over this is broken, my lord. We must make another."

His anger rose. "What? You want more? You're trying to lead me on with
your damned courtezan tricks!"

I heard her voice rise high and shrill, even as I started forward.

"Monsieur," she cried, "back with you!"

Pakenham, angered as he was, seemed half to hear my footsteps, seemed
half to know the swinging of the draperies, even as I stepped back in
obedience to her gesture. Her wit was quick as ever.

"My lord," she said, "pray close yonder window. The draft is bad, and,
moreover, we should have secrecy." He obeyed her, and she led him still
further from the thought of investigating his surroundings.

"Now, my lord," she said, "_take back_ what you have just said!"

"Under penalty?" he sneered.

"Of your life, yes."

"So!" he grunted admiringly; "well, now, I like fire in a woman, even a
deceiving light-o'-love like you!"

"Monsieur!" her voice cried again; and once more it restrained me in my
hiding.

"You devil!" he resumed, sneering now in all his ugliness of wine and
rage and disappointment. "What were _you?_ Mistress of the prince of
France! Toy of a score of nobles! Slave of that infamous rake, your
husband! Much you've got in your life to make you uppish now with me!"

"My lord," she said evenly, "retract that. If you do not, you shall not
leave this place alive."

In some way she mastered him, even in his ugly mood.

"Well, well," he growled, "I admit we don't get on very well in our
little love affair; but I swear you drive me out of my mind. I'll never
find another woman in the world like you. It's Sir Richard Pakenham asks
you to begin a new future with himself."

"We begin no future, my lord."

"What do you mean? Have you lied to me? Do you mean to break your
word--your promise?"

"It is within the hour that I have learned what the truth is."

"God damn my soul!" I heard him curse, growling.

"Yes, my lord," she answered, "God will damn your soul in so far as it
is that of a brute and not that of a gentleman or a statesman."

I heard him drop into a chair. "This from one of your sort!" he half
whimpered.

"Stop, now!" she cried. "Not one word more of that! I say within the
hour I have learned what is the truth. I am Helena von Ritz, thief on
the cross, and at last clean!"

"God A'might, Madam! How pious!" he sneered. "Something's behind all
this. I know your record. What woman of the court of Austria or France
comes out with _morals?_ We used you here because you had none. And now,
when it comes to the settlement between you and me, you talk like a nun.
As though a trifle from virtue such as yours would be missed!"

"Ah, my God!" I heard her murmur. Then again she called to me, as he
thought to himself; so that all was as it had been, for the time.

A silence fell before she went on.

"Sir Richard," she said at length, "we do not meet again. I await now
your full apology for these things you have said. Such secrets as I have
learned of England's, you know will remain safe with me. Also your own
secret will be safe. Retract, then, what you have said, of my personal
life!"

"Oh, well, then," he grumbled, "I admit I've had a bit of wine to-day. I
don't mean much of anything by it. But here now, I have come, and by
your own invitation--your own agreement. Being here, I find this treaty
regarding Oregon torn in two and you gone nun all a-sudden."

"Yes, my lord, it is torn in two. The consideration moving to it was not
valid. But now I wish you to amend that treaty once more, and for a
consideration valid in every way. My lord, I promised that which was
not mine to give--myself! Did you lay hand on me now, I should die. If
you kissed me, I should kill you and myself! As you say, I took yonder
price, the devil's shilling. Did I go on, I would be enlisting for the
damnation of my soul; but I will not go on. I recant!"

"But, good God! woman, what are you asking _now?_ Do you want me to let
you have this paper anyhow, to show old John Calhoun? I'm no such ass as
that. I apologize for what I've said about you. I'll be your friend,
because I can't let you go. But as to this paper here, I'll put it in my
pocket."

"My lord, you will do nothing of the kind. Before you leave this room
there shall be two miracles done. You shall admit that one has gone on
in me; I shall see that you yourself have done another."

"What guessing game do you propose, Madam?" he sneered. He seemed to
toss the torn paper on the table, none the less. "The condition is
forfeited," he began.

"No, it is not forfeited except by your own word, my lord," rejoined the
same even, icy voice. "You shall see now the first miracle!"

"Under duress?" he sneered again.

"_Yes_, then! Under duress of what has not often come to surface in you,
Sir Richard. I ask you to do truth, and not treason, my lord! She who
was Helena von Ritz is dead--has passed away. There can be no question
of forfeit between you and her. Look, my lord!"

I heard a half sob from him. I heard a faint rustling of silks and
laces. Still her even, icy voice went on.

"Rise, now, Sir Richard," she said. "Unfasten my girdle, if you like!
Undo my clasps, if you can. You say you know my past. Tell me, do you
see me now? Ungird me, Sir Richard! Look at me! Covet me! Take me!"

Apparently he half rose, shuffled towards her, and stopped with a
stifled sound, half a sob, half a growl.

I dared not picture to myself what he must have seen as she stood
fronting him, her hands, as I imagined, at her bosom, tearing back her
robes.

Again I heard her voice go on, challenging him. "Strip me now, Sir
Richard, if you can! Take now what you bought, if you find it here. You
can not? You do not? Ah, then tell me that miracle has been done! She
who was Helena von Ritz, as you knew her, or as you thought you knew
her, _is not here!_"

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