El Dorado, Baroness Orczy [read the beginning after the end novel .TXT] 📗

his careless insouciance. He was even at this moment deeply engaged in flicking off a grain of dust from the immaculate Mechlin ruff at his wrist. The heavy lids had fallen over the telltale eyes as if weighted with fatigue, the mouth appeared ready for the laugh which never was absent from it very long.

It was only Ffoulkes’s devoted eyes that were sharp enough to pierce the mask of lighthearted gaiety which enveloped the soul of his leader at the present moment. He saw⁠—for the first time in all the years that he had known Blakeney⁠—a frown across the habitually smooth brow, and though the lips were parted for a laugh, the lines round mouth and chin were hard and set.

With that intuition born of wholehearted friendship Sir Andrew guessed what troubled Percy. He had caught the look which the latter had thrown on Armand, and knew that some explanation would have to pass between the two men before they parted tonight. Therefore he gave the signal for the breaking up of the meeting.

“There is nothing more to say, is there, Blakeney?” he asked.

“No, my good fellow, nothing,” replied Sir Percy. “I do not know how you all feel, but I am demmed fatigued.”

“What about the rags for tomorrow?” queried Hastings.

“You know where to find them. In the room below. Ffoulkes has the key. Wigs and all are there. But don’t use false hair if you can help it⁠—it is apt to shift in a scrimmage.”

He spoke jerkily, more curtly than was his wont. Hastings and Tony thought that he was tired. They rose to say good night. Then the three men went away together, Armand remaining behind.

XII What Love Is

“Well, now, Armand, what is it?” asked Blakeney, the moment the footsteps of his friends had died away down the stone stairs, and their voices had ceased to echo in the distance.

“You guessed, then, that there was⁠ ⁠… something?” said the younger man, after a slight hesitation.

“Of course.”

Armand rose, pushing the chair away from him with an impatient nervy gesture. Burying his hands in the pockets of his breeches, he began striding up and down the room, a dark, troubled expression in his face, a deep frown between his eyes.

Blakeney had once more taken up his favourite position, sitting on the corner of the table, his broad shoulders interposed between the lamp and the rest of the room. He was apparently taking no notice of Armand, but only intent on the delicate operation of polishing his nails.

Suddenly the young man paused in his restless walk and stood in front of his friend⁠—an earnest, solemn, determined figure.

“Blakeney,” he said, “I cannot leave Paris tomorrow.”

Sir Percy made no reply. He was contemplating the polish which he had just succeeded in producing on his thumbnail.

“I must stay here for a while longer,” continued Armand firmly. “I may not be able to return to England for some weeks. You have the three others here to help you in your enterprise outside Paris. I am entirely at your service within the compass of its walls.”

Still no comment from Blakeney, not a look from beneath the fallen lids. Armand continued, with a slight tone of impatience apparent in his voice:

“You must want someone to help you here on Sunday. I am entirely at your service⁠ ⁠… here or anywhere in Paris⁠ ⁠… but I cannot leave this city⁠ ⁠… at any rate, not just yet.⁠ ⁠…”

Blakeney was apparently satisfied at last with the result of his polishing operations. He rose, gave a slight yawn, and turned toward the door.

“Good night, my dear fellow,” he said pleasantly; “it is time we were all abed. I am so demmed fatigued.”

“Percy!” exclaimed the young man hotly.

“Eh? What is it?” queried the other lazily.

“You are not going to leave me like this⁠—without a word?”

“I have said a great many words, my good fellow. I have said ‘good night,’ and remarked that I was demmed fatigued.”

He was standing beside the door which led to his bedroom, and now he pushed it open with his hand.

“Percy, you cannot go and leave me like this!” reiterated Armand with rapidly growing irritation.

“Like what, my dear fellow?” queried Sir Percy with good-humoured impatience.

“Without a word⁠—without a sign. What have I done that you should treat me like a child, unworthy even of attention?”

Blakeney had turned back and was now facing him, towering above the slight figure of the younger man. His face had lost none of its gracious air, and beneath their heavy lids his eyes looked down not unkindly on his friend.

“Would you have preferred it, Armand,” he said quietly, “if I had said the word that your ears have heard even though my lips have not uttered it?”

“I don’t understand,” murmured Armand defiantly.

“What sign would you have had me make?” continued Sir Percy, his pleasant voice falling calm and mellow on the younger man’s supersensitive consciousness: “That of branding you, Marguerite’s brother, as a liar and a cheat?”

“Blakeney!” retorted the other, as with flaming cheeks and wrathful eyes he took a menacing step toward his friend; “had any man but you dared to speak such words to me⁠—”

“I pray to God, Armand, that no man but I has the right to speak them.”

“You have no right.”

“Every right, my friend. Do I not hold your oath?⁠ ⁠… Are you not prepared to break it?”

“I’ll not break my oath to you. I’ll serve and help you in every way you can command⁠ ⁠… my life I’ll give to the cause⁠ ⁠… give me the most dangerous⁠—the most difficult task to perform.⁠ ⁠… I’ll do it⁠—I’ll do it gladly.”

“I have given you an over-difficult and dangerous task.”

“Bah! To leave Paris in order to engage horses, while you and the others do all the work. That is neither difficult nor dangerous.”

“It will be difficult for you, Armand, because your head is not sufficiently cool to foresee serious eventualities and to prepare against them. It is dangerous, because you are a man in love, and a man in love is apt to run