Stanief winced ever so slightly; there were times when the formal t.i.tle fell like a drop of acid on his nerves.
"Madame la d.u.c.h.esse?" he retorted.
Iria laughed out in her surprise, all unconscious of his meaning.
"Monseigneur, are you going to send Marya away from me?"
"I! What have I to do with your ladies? Keep or dismiss them as you choose, Iria."
"Marya cried this morning, telling me that last night the Baron Dalmorov warned her of your intention. He said that the Emperor would object to the sister of Count Ormanof remaining at court, so you would dismiss her. But I told Marya that you knew how much I cared for her, and would explain that to the Emperor."
"Some day Dalmorov will learn discretion," Stanief commented, almost too indolently. "It is nearly time. The Emperor did speak to me of the Countess Marya, and I pointed out to him that her brother"s misconduct did not affect the matter in the least; since we are not living in China and visiting faults upon entire families. Also I explained that you rule your own household."
"But you govern us all, monseigneur," said the Gentle Princess, most naturally. "I was sure it would be right somehow; I told Marya that no one who belonged to you need be afraid."
He paused abruptly in front of her.
"Then you are not sorry that you trusted me with yourself, Iria? You are not sorry any longer that chance placed you in my keeping?"
She leaned forward across the m.u.f.f, her eyes suddenly wet in their sincerity.
"Oh, no," she denied with energy. "No, monseigneur. Ah, we do not call such things chance, we women of the South, but a higher name! I have never been sorry since that first day on the winter balcony when you spoke to me so wonderfully. You--you are so good, so kind, monseigneur."
Stanief looked into those clear eyes for a long moment, his own glance veiled. Then he gently took one of the little gloved hands and lifted it to his lips.
"I seem to have been born just for that," he said, the sadness of his voice masked by its even control, "to guard what is mine. I am glad if I do it pa.s.sably well, Iria. I wish I could hope that my other ward would tell me as much, some day. Come, let us go to the Emperor."
She rose, softly flushed and smiling, yet vaguely troubled by his manner.
"The Emperor?" she ventured. "He is a shadow, monseigneur! You are not satisfied with him?"
"What do you know of shadows, who are all sunshine? If I imagine a cloud on the imperial horizon, it is still no larger than that bit of lace in your hand. Also, the question is rather if he is satisfied with me, than if I am satisfied with him. Adrian is--Adrian."
Together they moved to the door.
CHAPTER XII
THE TURN IN THE ROAD
It was a few weeks later, when the tardy spring was awaking reluctantly from its long sleep, that Stanief"s cloud drew nearer and gained darker substance. Adrian"s increasing restiveness took the form of active interference with the government, and not wisely. All that was possible Stanief was willing to yield, if he might keep peace, but finally the impossible was asked.
It was a question of taxes which made the first rift between the cousins, a question with which the young Emperor had nothing to do. The tax had been imposed during the period of readjustment; now, owing to the Regent"s skilled government, it was no longer necessary and he proposed to remove it. To the amazement of all concerned, Adrian chose to object.
Plainly enough Stanief saw Dalmorov"s influence behind the opposition, and saw himself bound to persistence both by policy and an implied promise to the people. Not as yet had the tax been removed, but he most courteously had reminded Adrian that no one possessed the power of interference with the measure. The result had been inevitable; Adrian sulked and the Regent"s enemies furtively rejoiced.
So opened the last year of the regency. If on the first night of the first year Stanief had claimed check of his opponent, now, gazing across the half-cleared board, Dalmorov could return the cry.
Meanwhile the suite of the sullen young sovereign suffered much from his caprices; until finally Iria and Allard were the only two his caustic tongue spared and his ill humor pa.s.sed by. They alone did not dread the honor of attending him. And at last he even contrived to give Allard the sting of many rewakened memories.
"Allard," he remarked one morning, "you never told me more than just that you were an American. From what state are you?"
They were alone together, two learned and exhausted professors having just taken leave of as trying a listener as could well be conceived.
Across the book-strewn table Adrian contemplated the other, meditatively at ease.
"I am a Californian, sire," was the reply.
"Come show me where in this atlas, _pour s"amuser_. Your California is not small, if I recollect."
Allard came over obediently and found the map, pointing out the city remembered so well and so sadly.
"There, sire, near that little bay. Our place lay beyond the town; we called the house Sun-Kist."
"The house was near the bay?"
"Very near. We used to sail and fish there. Just here lay the yacht club, where Robert kept his motor-boat--" He broke off and turned away more abruptly than strict etiquette allowed.
Adrian deliberately drew his pencil through the name on the map.
"Robert?" he queried.
"Robert Allard, sire, my younger brother. He died two years ago."
"Soon after you came here, then?"
"While I was on the _Nadeja_, sire, making the voyage."
"Have you no other relatives there?"
"Yes; my aunt, Mrs. Leslie, and my cousin, her daughter."
Adrian studied his companion"s pallor with a certain scientific interest, idly scribbling on the margin of the atlas without regarding what he wrote.
"You regret your home?" he inquired.
Allard bit his lip to steady its quiver, fiercely unwilling to bare his old pain for the diversion of this coldly ennuied inquisitor.
"There is nothing to call me home, sire," he replied. "My brother is not living, and my cousin, who was betrothed to him, has no wish or need of me. I think I never want to see the place as it is now. My life is here."
"You loved her," Adrian said calmly. "How much you give one another, you quiet, gray-eyed people! Do not look like that, Allard;" he actually smiled. "I am too used to my intricate and intriguing subjects to fail in reading your truthfulness. And I have not watched you with the ladies of the court without learning that some woman, one that you loved, sat at the door of your heart."
Allard wavered between exasperation and helpless dismay at the other"s acuteness; there were occasions when his Imperial Majesty was almost uncanny. But he ended by remaining silent, as usual. Adrian at fourteen had been anything but a child; now, at sixteen, he was fairly matched with Stanief himself, and the lesser players stood back at a distance from the contest of wills. From those players Allard had learned the wise habit of drawing aside to let the Emperor"s moods sweep past.
"You and Iria," Adrian added, after a moment during which his thin, high-bred face hardened strangely and not happily, "you two at least are transparent, and free from under-thoughts. What time is it?"
Allard glanced at his watch.