"There was only one of them who was sanguine of success. He was an old man, an English poet…"
"Ah!" interjaculated Norman.
"… He had lived for many years, apparently without means of subsistence, in a broken attic, where he said he was composing a great Ode to the Sun. Sforelli, it seems, knew the old man well, and often declared to incredulous company that the supposed old imbecile was the most intelligent man in Alsander and perhaps in England. The Old Poet, as I said, swore he would succeed."
"Ah!" said Norman, "he has failed!"
"He has not failed," said Arnolfo, rising and laying his hands on Norman's shoulder. "He found you selling biscuits in an English village, and he swears that his feet were pulled to the village against his will at least seven miles on a hot summer afternoon, and all by the power of the Jinn! And now, though we feigned to reject you yesterday, you are the man we are going to make King of Alsander. And if we have to torture you into acceptance, King of Alsander you shall be."
Gently pronouncing the strange threat, the boy stood over Norman and looked down into his face and smiled. The world went unreal for Norman at that moment: he wondered if he were alive.
"I cannot believe a word of it," Norman said slowly, after a time. "But, no, I cannot! If you really wanted a man to rule this country – let us not say a King – it sounds too foolish – you would not choose an English grocer, examine his flesh as though he were a prize pig, thrash him before the eyes of his future subjects, and drive him out like a dog?"
"It was really necessary to see the physique of the man who is to found a dynasty. I fear, though, the Doctor took his duties himself too seriously. I fear, too, the whimsicality of the situation got hold of us: we were inclined to make the most of it. It is not every day one examines a man for the post of King. And as for the rest – we had to frighten you – into secrecy, and if possible into a belief if not of our sincerity at least of our power. We had to be able to command your silence, and it was obvious you were not ready to believe our good faith."
"Then show me your good faith!" rejoined Norman. "Surely I have a right to demand that? I only claim the just equivalent – that I should deal with you as you dealt with me."
"Ah, you do not know," said Arnolfo, paling, "what you ask of me. On the day I make you Bang you may do with me what you will – I promise you. You will rule me then; but I could not accept the dishonour from you now. If you think me a coward – I am a coward, but I can overcome my cowardice. That is not my reason," the boy went on, holding out his hands to Norman with a wan smile. "There – take my hands – torment me as you will; but not till the day you are crowned in the Cathedral of Alsander shall you have your full revenge."
Norman rose and took the delicate hand, and shook hands with a smile. "I cannot help it," he said. "I do not care if you want to make me your jest again, or if you want to kill me, but I am yours to command. I can even forgive you. But as for your plan it is plainly impossible."
"I think I do not care if it is, so long as I have your friendship," said Arnolfo, with strange warmth. "However, I admit there are many difficulties and many dangers in our plot, but what are those that strike you specially?"
"Do I look like an Alsandrian, first of all! Or must I be made up to look like one?"
"Heavens, we will not stoop to disguise. Besides, I have a touch of the artist, sir, in my composition, and never would I have your features altered, your colour changed, or a hair of your head displaced. In any case, the Royal Family were always fair. Kradenda was a Viking. Remember, also, you have only to deceive the ignorant mob. All the intelligent men of Alsander are in the plot."
"But I have been here for weeks!" objected Norman. "Every one knows me as the mad Englishman."
"You have been playing Haroun Al Rashid, and spending the first days of your return to Alsander spying out the land. It is a very pretty story, and will greatly enhance your popularity. Besides, the Old Poet instructed you to weave a mystery round your movements, and I learn from a sure source that you obeyed him."
"Then all this they tell me," gasped Norman, "that the King was sent abroad to be cured was got up on purpose for the plot?"
"Of course, and the announcement that his return and his cure are expected. Not a detail has been forgotten by Sforelli. There were guards at the palace, a closed carriage, a special train."
"And the Consul?" gasped Norman.
"The Consul is an agent of the British Government, and the British Government, tired of wanting a strong Turkey, happens at this moment to want a strong Alsander."
"And Vorza?"
"Vorza is a fool," said the young man, but with less conviction than usual.
"And the King himself. What shall we do with him?" pursued Norman.
"What of him? One of the guards knows of a little tap invented by the Japanese, as simple as the Jiu-jitsu trick with which I felled you in the shop the other day. The King really is the last person to be considered."
"But, really, if you want me to have anything to do with it," cried Norman, in horror, "I cannot touch murder."
"Not murder, but removal. What use is the poor devil's life to him or to the world?" So saying, Arnolfo sat down in the armchair facing his interlocutor and eyed him with interest.
"I am not an Alsandrian. In England we view these things differently," said Norman, pompously, shocked that his gentle companion should be capable of designing such an atrocious outrage. But Arnolfo answered unperturbed:
"In England I believe on one occasion you gave a King a mock trial and then beheaded him under circumstances of inconceivable barbarity. Ah! you're an Englishman, and mad like all of them, as mad as Andrea. Come, I love argument; let's have it out. One life, one rotten, miserable life to buy the happiness of a country, and you won't spend it. You call it principle. When you go to war, what do you care for life? You are not religious in the matter. It's just that fetish you call law. I did not ask you to kill the imbecile yourself; it will be done quietly."
"I will have nothing to do with any filthy, cold-blooded murder. It isn't fetish: it's simply because I won't."
"And if we deal with you instead of with him?"
"Try. I do not like your cynicism."
"I am sorry. But it is unreason on your part, or else sheer cowardice. By what code of ethics in the world do you justify yourself? You are just frightened to do something that would make your conscience uncomfortable. On what do you base your morality?"
"On feeling."
"Would your feelings let you kill a man who was just going to kill some one else?"
"Certainly."
"Then why not a man whose existence does harm to others?"
"Others might think my existence did harm to them."
"But a life that is worthless to itself?"
"May not the poor fool's life be happier than yours or mine?" said Norman, who was always fond of abstract argument and apt to grow eloquent in the realm of ideas. "He lives with his ideal. His cobwebbed, cracked-plaster room is for him a most elegant palace; he sees the phantom courtiers all day long; they bring him presents of fruits and flowers and spices and gold. He is for himself the great Emperor of the World, for all we know."
"Then you will not justify a political assassination?"
"No. It's not so easy as you think, nor are my reasons so trumpery, Arnolfo – for you're as shallow as you are clever. Murder cuts at the source of all society – which war, which is organized killing, does not. Unorganized killing means death not to one man here or there but to society. That is why we English, who think society a good thing, hate murder. Let it loose, unpunished, and if but twenty people are killed the law unheeding, it's worse for society than if twenty thousand perish in war or plague. I will not touch it."
"Your reasoning is powerful, Norman, but it's not your reason that influences your action. Your act is, as you said before, in accordance with your feelings. I might combat your reason, but I cannot change your convictions. What can we do?"
"Well, it's not so terribly urgent to get rid of him."
"What can possibly be done with him?"
"Why, send him to a lunatic asylum, of course."
"What a ghastly piece of perverted common sense. O, you Englishmen; you have never realized that the French Revolution has occurred. You are still a hundred years behind the Continent. But I am Alsandrian, my friend, I am Southern; I have all the Southern weakness."
"And some of the Southern charm," added Norman. Though he had recovered under the stress of the ethical argument from the hypnotic fascination to which he had succumbed, he began to be not so sure that he did not like this strange and gracious person.
"But none of the Southern faithlessness," Arnolfo rejoined. "Trust me, Norman. Trust me and I will be faithful to you to death. I – we all of us need you so desperately. This about the murder was only nonsense – to hear what you had to say, though I'm afraid the good Sforelli suggested it in earnest. There is good work, man's work, an Englishman's work to be done here. Once the fantastic stuff – the mummery – is over, you may achieve true greatness."
"I shall become a thief," said Norman. "Do you want to argue that?"
"You are right to remember it. That repugnance you must sacrifice: you are going to seize an all but worthless property and make it fine land for corn and olive."
"Yet what I said of murder applies to theft: I am helping to cut at the basis of society."
"But to found a new one. Come, in this objection you will not persist. You have not the same emotion, you do not really mind."
"Or, rather, you wake in me such emotions – such schoolboy emotions – that I cannot control them. It's a game – but it's worth playing. I don't care what awaits me – discovery-disaster – death! I don't care if you're fooling me. I follow you, Arnolfo. What are your orders?"
"Continue to play the part the Poet assigned to you, that is all. Hint of the mystery. I will prepare the rest as quickly as I can. About the King, I will arrange something to please you. And now, good-bye."
Norman held out his hand, but Arnolfo, under the stress of subdued emotion, laid his hands on Norman's shoulders and kissed him.
"A Southern way," he said, half laughing, half ashamed. "One more thing, remember, I had almost forgotten," he added, as he opened the door for Norman. "That is, beware of women."
CHAPTER XI
A VISIT TO VORZA
"Norman, you must be awfully rich."
So the guileless Peronella to him on his return, breathlessly emerging from the room to greet him.
"Have you only just found that out?" said Norman, assuming the slight modest smile of a man who has been hiding his infinite superiority.
"Yes. Why, of course, the buckle you gave me was very beautiful, but I had no idea… I put it on this morning and went for a walk in it, and all the jewellers came running out of their shops to praise it and ask about it and offered thousands of francs for it. And, O Norman, I wouldn't sell your buckle for anything, but if you would get me one of those lovely big hats the Frenchwoman sells in the High Street, just to go with it."
"You are much finer as you are, my lass, with a kerchief round your head."
"Oh, but do, Norman, dear! It seems that buckle of yours is worth enough to buy a new hat for every girl in Alsander."
Norman was about to surrender when he suddenly remembered he had rather less than a napoleon left in the world. "Well, I am in a foolish fix," thought he. "If I don't follow up the buckle, I shall be accused of having stolen it." (He surmised correctly; Alsandrian cunning was already suspicious of him.) "And my clothes are dreadful: a millionaire or Prince, even in disguise, would not wear shiny blue trousers: a Prince in rags is all right, but not a Prince in bags. I wish I had given a hint to that marvellous Arnolfo, but somehow I expected him to know everything without being told. And perhaps it was all a dream and he a phantom."
So he shut himself up in his room for the rest of the day.
"I have important letters to write," he said, impassively. "You must be content with the buckle, Peronella. Wait a little while, and I'll dress you in gold from head to foot."
He retired, not to write, but to think and meditate. He had supper in his room, and for the first time in his life disliked cabbages. Then he went to bed. As he was falling asleep he wondered whether he had not been raving in his mind for the last few days: whether he was not being fooled: whether he would succeed, what he would do when a King. There was plenty to do: the town was very dirty. An ecstatic vision of having all the drains up flitted across his mind. Succeeded a vision of fine mountain roads with cunning wriggles, and the royal motor car sliding up them. Then the vision of a Court ball with more-than-Oriental splendour. Then the perplexing vision of a little fool of a girl, damned pleasant to see and touch, crying her stupid heart out.
However, he slept. He was awakened by a scrubby postman, who handed him a registered letter. Norman opened it hastily, and was delighted to find that it contained English banknotes for a hundred pounds – delighted but not surprised, for Arnolfo had by now deadened his sense of wonder. He gave the postman twopence, and had breakfast in bed on the strength of his opulence. Indeed he rose so late that at the bank to which he directed his footsteps a five-pound note was changed only with the greatest reluctance, five minutes before noon, the Alsandrian closing time. However, after a lot of little sums had been worked out by a lot of little desks and after the five-pound note had been bitten, crackled and held up to the light, and after Norman had executed a lot of complicated moves and marked time strenuously in front of grilled windows and "caisses" (all Continental banks seem to work on the supposition that you have come there to pass a forgery or rob the till), he was released with a large number of silver coins bulging in his trouser pockets.
He stood for a moment on the threshold blinking at the sun, his contentment tempered by annoyance at the reflection that all the shops were closed and would not be opened again for another three hours, so that he could not buy so much as a pocket handkerchief for his personal adornment, when he heard a whirring clangorousness, and there appeared a motor car crawling and puffing along the ruinous cobbles, followed by a little crowd of admirers, for a motor was as strange in Alsander as an aeroplane (shall I add "a year ago"?) above Upper Tooting. Norman would have known that the car was a London taxi had he ever been to London. The driver, smartly uniformed, stopped opposite him, and Arnolfo dressed in his invariable silk and gold stepped out, and bowed to Norman with a very ostensible deference. "I hope, Sir," he said suavely, "you will do me the honour of stepping into my car and coming to lunch with me at a little place I know of?"
"Why, how did you find me here?" cried Norman. "You are as bewildering as the Cheshire cat."
"It's not hard to find a suspicious fellow like you in a gossipy town like Alsander!" laughed Arnolfo. "Some other day, moreover, you shall tell me who the Cheshire cat was; but jump in now; we have no time to lose."
"I ought to hesitate," said Norman, but he stepped in at once.
"We are going to continue playacting on the lines laid down by the Poet," said Arnolfo, as soon as they were ensconced in the car and being jolted softly and slowly over the atrocious roads. "But you must forsake the proletariat for the aristocracy, and therefore I am going to take you round the town after lunch and dress you up like a Jew on a racecourse. For your story is to be that you are a rich English nobleman (any eccentricity will be swallowed in Alsander if you say you are a rich English nobleman), but that you find that you have Alsandrian blood on your mother's side from the fifteenth century. You see, the story you must tell at present should be a suspicious and extraordinary one, as you are soon going to disavow it when you proclaim yourself King: nevertheless it ought not to be so foolish as to be instantly found out."
Arnolfo continued to explain in great detail, as the car bumped gently on, the exact coat of arms, the exact relationship, the name of the Alsandrian family (a cadet of which had actually disappeared in England in the wars) and various other minute details.
When the car stopped they descended, and entered a curious and neat restaurant of which they seemed to be the only habitues, for it had only one table: there they had an excellent meal. Norman would have sworn it was a private house had not Arnolfo paid the bill and tipped the waiter. He would have sworn correctly, for it was. They then drove to a tailor, a haberdasher, a shoemaker, a hatter, at all of which places Arnolfo took the shopman aside and whispered that the order was for a very distinguished English nobleman, and should be executed without delay. Sometimes he would also let drop as a confidential favour that the nobleman "havas sango Alsandra en la venai," or that "Milord had come to dwell in the country of his ancestors." The Grand Tour Englishman of fabulous wealth and high distinction remained traditional in Alsander, since the Polytechnic Englishman, neither wealthy, nor distinguished, nor fabulous, had not yet arrived; and an Englishman with Alsandrian blood was a prize for the avaricious.
Norman was ostentatiously deposited at his garden door by the car, and for the rest of the day refused to answer any questions, and remained suggestive, impressive, mysterious and aloof, to the great discomposure of the Widow Prasko and her daughter. Cesano came in (I think by the widow's invitation, who hoped to inflame the obviously cooling Englishman with jealousy), but Norman offered no remonstrance to his taking Peronella for a walk. (Not that Cesano had much joy of the moonlight: the girl was moody and returned I to cry herself to sleep within the hour.) Our hero then had to fly before the onset of the widow, who told him – so closely does Alsandrian correspond to English idiom – that he owed it to her, positively owed it to her, to reveal his identity and regularize his position.
"Give me a week," said Norman, shuffling away from her and feeling more like a grocer and less like a King every instant.
As he undressed before the tarnished mirror the marks of the whip, which still stood clear across his back, seemed to rebuke his conceit; his dreams, too, were more humble; he dreamt he was married to the Widow Prasko and kept a boarding-house at Margate.
The next morning a messenger, who looked preposterously discreet, brought a letter from Arnolfo, making an appointment at the British Consulate, and certain ready-made clothes which, as a temporary measure, had been skilfully and swiftly adapted to his form.
Norman at the hour of his appointment found himself once more ensconced in the great armchair in the Consul's black-papered study, listening to Arnolfo. The Consul was not present.
"We have a difficult and dreary task on hand to-day," Arnolfo began. "I am going to take you to visit all the important people of Alsander. We will take Sforelli with us in order to make our movements look suspicious on recapitulation. It will be much more natural for you to become King if you have already obviously moved in aristocratic circles. Your few weeks among the people will be readily credited provided that it is known that you came afterwards to visit the upper classes as well. Some of those whom we shall visit are in the secret: but we have not entrusted the secret to their wives. Some of them may be clever enough to guess that you really are the King; indeed, we are going to spread a few hints to that effect: it will pave the way for future demands on the credulity of Alsander. Of course (as I have already hinted) the presence of the Doctor as your companion will be looked upon as remarkable and invite the sort of comment we desire.
"Remember, Norman, to be most distinguished – and at times a little strange. You are, so to speak, paying official visits incognito. And the last visit we shall pay will be to Count Vorza. O beware of that man: he is a fool as I said before – but he is a clever fool. Come, let us be going!"
"But surely," exclaimed Norman with a glance at Arnolfo's magnificent attire, flashing at the side of his dark frockcoat, "you cannot call on the best people in that costume!"
"Can I not!" replied Arnolfo as they descended the interminable stairs. "There is a tradition in Alsander which it is at once unusual, distinguished and meritorious to preserve, that the Alsandrian national costume lis sufficient and full dress for any Alsandrian or any occasion."
Sforelli was waiting for them in the car, and they went motoring round together to the Papal Legate, the bank manager, nobles, consuls – there was not even a minister in Alsander – and so forth. Norman, chiefly by preserving as far as possible a discreet silence, did well, and was complimented by Arnolfo.
"The ladies thought you most distinguished, my friend," he said. "But you have now the harder task I told you of. There is the gate of Vorza's city mansion. Once more, beware! What men say of the old man is true. The aged reactionary is as polite as an Italian and as cunning, as treacherous and as wicked as Abdul Hamid the Turk. So be careful."
It was a needful warning. The old man, very picturesque in his velvet skull cap, received them with great cordiality, and having expressed his great friendship for all Englishmen and referred half-a-dozen to a dozen times to the fact that he had been to London for three days in his youth, contrived that his wife, a colourless person, should take away Arnolfo and Sforelli to a recess and show them photographs. He thereby had a chance of seeing Norman alone, and extracting as much information from him as possible without the intervention of his companions.
"I am always so delighted to meet an Englishman," began the old minister, as soon as they were both ensconced in comfortable chairs, "especially as I have been to London myself. It is true I was there only for a short time, and that many years ago – you see I am old – but I have a vivid memory of it all. I remember the policemen – marvellous! But we see very few Englishmen here. May I ask how you came here, or was it just that curiosity of Englishmen that always drives them round the world? But you speak Alsandrian and between us I have even heard that you have a touch of the Alsandrian in you?"
"It is the attraction of my blood that brought me here, undoubtedly. I have a great interest in my ancestry."
"But you are obviously all English. You cannot have much Alsandrian blood. Tell me of what family you are. Between us – I know all the families in Alsander."
Norman endured the most searching scrutiny with regard to his ancestry. He made hardly a mistake. There was little that Vorza did not know about the old families of Alsander.
"Really," he said, genially, "your visit is as interesting as it is delightful. The visit of an English nobleman to Alsander is not an everyday occurrence. Your visit to the common people and interest in their daily life – that was most characteristically English of you. Yes, your visit, sir, is a great surprise and it coincides with another surprise for us Alsandrians. You know events are rare here, but this will be a great one."
"You mean the cure of the King?"
"Yes. I don't believe it. Sforelli, you know one of those Jews, between us – just a little bit too clever! Wonderful how he picked you up: I should drop him if I were you, by the way. And I had always heard that his poor Majesty was quite, quite mad. I never went to see. I dislike madmen as much as Jews. Arnolfo should not have introduced you to Sforelli, but the boy is so kind to every one! And I'm sure the King cannot be quite recovered – there will be something a little wrong. And a relapse – what a tragedy! Of course, I shall be delighted. I am an old man, and (between us) tired of ruling a thankless country. It would have been too long to wait for the Princess to grow up: now she'll be out of it, poor girl!"
"Which Princess?" interjaculated Norman, innocently.
"Don't you know? His Majesty's cousin, the heir to the throne. She lives with her mother's family far away in Ulmreich. They say she is mad also, and there is no holding her. Old blood, old blood! She was to have come here this year to be introduced to Alsander, but the idea fell through till the possibility of the King's cure had been established one way or another. I have not seen her since she was a girl. She is under the guardianship of the father of that charming young man, your friend Arnolfo. I am sorry I shall not be able to see her again."
"Bring her here and marry her to her cousin," said Norman.
He was quite detached at the time from all thought of his plot.
"A very good idea. But I don't know," replied the old man. "Between us, two mad people! Would it be good for the future of Alsander?"
"You are fond of the country?" inquired Norman.
"Passionately. I love its beauty. Between us, I want it just to remain as it is – a lovely and peaceable place, untouched by the world."
"You don't believe in progress?"
"Not for Alsander. They want me to repair the roads. Never, said I. Saving your friend's presence, I hate automobiles. They would soon be roaring all over the country and spoiling it absolutely. Our roads were made for carts and mules: and the people are quite happy with them. Your friend has one: just as a curiosity, it doesn't matter. Your friend," he added in a low voice, "was an infant when I last saw him before his return to Alsander. I knew his father years ago. A delightful man, but of advanced views. Now, Monsieur Arnolfo has no views at all, but almost anything can be forgiven him for keeping up the old traditions of the national costume, and he's a great acquisition to our little society. Between us, have you known him long?"
"I? No. I should very much like to know more of him. I brought a letter of introduction to him from a relative in England, who had met him and his father in Ulmreich. As you said, he is charming: there is no other word."
"Is he not? Charming: of course restless, but not like his father, who couldn't live in Alsander because it was what he called reactionary. Oh, if his father, old Arnolfo, got a chance, he'd run a funicular up the mountains and build a casino on the beach."
"Well, there's something to be said for being awake and something to be said for modernity," observed Norman.
"True, sir, but (between us)," said Vorza, with a more confidential tone than ever, "I have been, I admit, only a very short time in England, three days, in fact; and I am a bit of a judge, perhaps, in matters of taste – and I didn't see anything in London, among your latest buildings, at all events, that quite comes up to our Cathedral or our Castle."
"But your Cathedral and Castle weren't built by a people fast asleep, but by a people who had just awakened. If Kradenda had lived to-day he would have established an aeroplane service across the mountains.
"Well, well, and would we be happier for that? Ah, you're young and you're English, and I wouldn't think much of you if you weren't for all things new. At your age I was the devil! I may be more foolish now, but we old men want to think we have grown wise."
"You want to sift the question, Excellency; but that's a long, long matter. Perhaps happiness is not the best thing in the world. But here is Arnolfo."
And they took their leave.
"Curses!" said Vorza to himself, as he watched their departure from the window. "Ten million curses. Is this a surprise return? Is it the King? It's about the age. But he looks too British, too British altogether. But, then, so did his grandfather. There's not much madness in his eyes or talk. It cannot be. He might be cured, but he could not be intelligent. And that physique – it's impossible. But there's something up. Why did I trust Sforelli? In the old days I would have burnt him, gaberdine and all! Curses on him, at all events, and on me! How am I to know whether he is the King or no? If it's a plot – it may succeed – it is so simple. Perbacco! how simple it is! Well, we shall see!"