Mademoiselle Selpdorf placed her hand within the Baron's ready arm.
'Later, Anthony,' she answered. 'His Excellency deserves a consolation prize, since my reading of "Good Luck" is not in the German language.'
She turned away, and with her the group parted and scattered.
'You are very much interested; is it not so?'
Rallywood started. The Countess spoke petulantly.
'Do you not know,' she added, 'that the custom in Révonde holds you to the partner with whom you find yourself when midnight rings? Valerie Selpdorf is embarrassed with partners – my cousin Anthony Unziar, who desires perhaps herself, but most certainly her fortune, and our delightful German Minister, who uses all means that come to hand to win Maäsau for his master! But I should not say these foolish things to you, who are of the other party.'
They were dancing by this time, her head near his shoulder, her voice soft in his bending ear.
'Of the other party?' he repeated. 'I flattered myself that you said something else just now.'
'Yes, a friend; but I made a mistake – I have none – no, not one true friend!' the voice said passionately in his ear, 'and my husband – '
Rallywood almost lifted her clear of some crowding couples, and then gently released her. In a vague way he felt the force of her appealing beauty as he had felt it intermittently for some months past. It touched him for the moment, but he was apt to forget both it and the very existence of the woman herself directly he parted from her.
'Count Sagan is colonel-in-chief of the Guard?' he asked, and the question seemed to fit in with her train of thought.
She made no immediate response, but with a light touch on his arm led him to a flower-banked apartment, about which a few couples were scattered in various convenient nooks. She sank upon a sequestered settee, and made room for him beside her.
'Yes, he is colonel-in-chief of the Guard because they think him too old to act any longer as its real commandant. He was the first soldier in Maäsau and the most unequalled sportsman. He was all these things, and I am proud of them! But look at me!'
She rose languidly and stood before him. Rallywood saw a slight woman, tall and exquisitely fair, who carried her small head with its gleaming coronet royally. Her skin and her soft flushed cheeks had the pure, evanescent quality of a child's complexion. Moreover, her chief charm was perhaps her air of child-like innocence. Isolde of Sagan had seldom looked more lovely; she was honestly touched by self-pity, and was posing as the proud yet disillusioned wife of a man hopelessly older than herself, and for the time being she believed earnestly in that view of her lot.
'All these things have been,' she added softly, her eyes filling with tears, 'but I am! Can I ever be satisfied with what only was?' Rallywood's face altered. Like any other man in such a position he felt immensely sorry for her. She saw the advantage she had gained, and at once the coquette awoke in her.
'Captain Rallywood,' she sank down beside him again, 'I need a friend in whom I can trust, who will ask nothing of me, but who will give me all the things I most want.'
The interpretation of this enigmatical speech was left to the ear, for the young Countess was gazing at her big black fan, where luminous fireflies hung tangled amongst the dusky feathers. Quickly with some dissatisfaction she became aware that Rallywood was not looking at her – as he should have been doing – but staring in front of him with a grave expression. Well, she knew she could make him look at her as she desired – yet. It was but a matter of time.
'I think you may count upon me,' said Rallywood at last. He believed in her, which was good; moreover, he meant what he said; yet the speech was wholly lacking in the flavour which to the Countess Sagan was the flavour of life.
'After all, it is little to promise, and I may not need your friendship for very long,' she replied, plucking a glittering firefly from her fan and laying it on his sleeve with her sweet light laugh. 'Like a firefly I shall dance out my short night, and die quickly before life grows stale!'
Rallywood took out his cigarette case of Alfaun leather-work, and dropped the firefly with its sparkle of diamond-dust into it.
'I don't like to hear you say that,' he said in his quiet way, which the listener decided might mean so much or so little. 'We must all go out some time, I suppose, but one always wants the beautiful things to live for ever… Meanwhile, can you spare me another dance?'
CHAPTER VI
THE CLOISTER OF ST. ANTHONY
The night was drawing to a close. The long supper room was almost deserted. Amongst the lingerers were a few officers in the uniform of the Guard, who stood talking together in one corner.
'The fellow has given you no chance,' Adolf was saying gloomily.
'Have him in here! Kick him in here, if necessary!' said Colendorp.
'I don't think you will find him reluctant, drawled Unziar. 'I have spoken with him already this evening, and I – ah – rather liked what he said.'
'Then why haven't you arranged it? To-morrow he joins – and he must never be permitted to join the Guard! We might have asked Abenfeldt to remove him, but the Guard has up to the present day been able to set its own house in order,' added Colendorp with a sour glance at Unziar. 'Has his Excellency the Chancellor thrown out too powerful a hint about the fellow? – I saw Mademoiselle dancing with him this evening – I mean a hint too powerful to be disregarded by those who wish to retain the good opinion of M. Selpdorf!'
Unziar scowled.
'I permit no one – not one of my own regiment – to insult me,' he rejoined with a white blaze of anger on his pale face, and the wine in his hand trembled.
Adolf suddenly stretched across to take up a decanter, and catching the glass with the edge of his heavy epaulet, knocked it from Unziar's fingers.
'We are losing sight of the main question,' he said. 'May I suggest, sir,' to Colendorp, who happened to be the captain of his own squadron, 'that it is unusual to be obliged to act so carefully as we have been advised to do in this case?'
Colendorp's dark face grew darker, but the honour of the Guard over-rode all personal considerations.
'I have been hasty, Unziar,' he said in a stifled voice after a slight pause.
Unziar bowed and continued as if the interlude with its covert allusions had not taken place.
'It has been difficult to get at Rallywood this evening. Yet let us see how he shoots before we conclude that he has any rooted objection to handling a pistol. I agree with Captain Colendorp, that the affair should be brought off to-night. I will go and find the Englishman.'
He had already walked towards the broad arched doorway, when among the palms and the hangings which shrouded it two men appeared. One was Counsellor, in his blazing red uniform, beside him Rallywood's tall figure, clad in soft brown tones of velveteen, looked almost black.
Behind them again appeared other faces.
Rallywood took in the meaning of the situation at a glance. Without any perceptible pause he held out his hand to Counsellor.
'Well, good-bye, Major, since you are going. I will turn up to-morrow as early as I can,' he said.
Counsellor understood also. In his position it was impossible to do anything for Rallywood. As an agent secretly accredited by the Court of St. James's, he must hold aloof and neutral in all personal quarrels. He appreciated the tact with which Rallywood dismissed him from a scene which promised to be distinctly awkward, but his hand itched to shoot down the flower of the Guard of Maäsau for the insolence that dared to doubt the worthiness of an Englishman of birth to hold a place among them.
'Good-bye, Rallywood,' he said gruffly, and turned on his heel to find himself face to face with Baron von Elmur and one or two officers of the Frontier Cavalry.
'There is about to be a storm, Major, observed Elmur, passing Counsellor with a cool nod.
'So it seems. A storm in a teacup!' retorted the Major derisively.
Meanwhile