Books: The Elusive Pimpernel
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Baroness Emmuska Orczy [Full name] >> The Elusive Pimpernel
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Yet, strangely enough, Lady Blakeney felt repelled and chilled by this
sombrely-dressed young person: an instinct, which she could not have
explained and which she felt had no justification, warned her that
somehow or other, the sadness was not quite genuine, the appeal for
the poor not quite heartfelt.
Nevertheless, she took out her purse, and dropping some few
sovereigns into the capacious reticule, she said very kindly:
"I hope that you are satisfied with your day's work, Madame; I fear
me our British country folk hold the strings of their purses somewhat
tightly these times."
The woman sighed and shrugged her shoulders.
"Oh, Madame!" she said with a tone of great dejection, "one does
what one can for one's starving countrymen, but it is very hard to
elicit sympathy over here for them, poor dears!"
"You are a Frenchwoman, of course," rejoined Marguerite, who had
noted that though the woman spoke English with a very pronounced
foreign accent, she had nevertheless expressed herself with wonderful
fluency and correctness.
"Just like Lady Blakeney herself," replied the other.
"You know who I am?
"Who could come to Richmond and not know Lady Blakeney by
sight."
"But what made you come to Richmond on this philanthropic errand
of yours?"
"I go where I think there is a chance of earning a little money for the
cause which I have at heart," replied the Frenchwoman with the same
gentle simplicity, the same tone of mournful dejection.
What she said was undoubtedly noble and selfless. Lady Blakeney felt
in her heart that her keenest sympathy should have gone out to this
young woman--pretty, dainty, hardly more than a girl --who seemed
to be devoting her young life in a purely philanthropic and unselfish
cause. And yet in spite of herself, Marguerite seemed unable to shake
off that curious sense of mistrust which had assailed her from the
first, nor that feeling of unreality and staginess with which the
Frenchwoman's attitude had originally struck her.
Yet she tried to be kind and to be cordial, tried to hide that coldness
in her manner which she felt was unjustified.
"It is all very praiseworthy on your part, Madame," she said
somewhat lamely. "Madame ...?" she added interrogatively.
"My name is Candeille--Desiree Candeille," replied the
Frenchwoman.
"Candeille?" exclaimed Marguerite with sudden alacrity, "Candeille ...
surely ..."
"Yes ... of the Varietes."
"Ah! then I know why your face from the first seemed familiar to
me," said Marguerite, this time with unaffected cordiality. "I must
have applauded you many a time in the olden days. I am an ex-
colleague, you know. My name was St. Just before I married, and I
was of the Maison Moliere."
"I knew that," said Desiree Candeille, "and half hoped that you would
remember me."
"Nay! who could forget Demoiselle Candeille, the most popular star
in the theatrical firmament?"
"Oh! that was so long ago."
"Only four years."
"A fallen star is soon lost out of sight."
"Why fallen?"
"It was a choice for me between exile from France and the
guillotine," rejoined Candeille simply.
"Surely not?" queried Marguerite with a touch of genuine sympathy.
With characteristic impulsiveness, she had now cast aside her former
misgivings: she had conquered her mistrust, at any rate had relegated
it to the background of her mind. This woman was a colleague: she
had suffered and was in distress; she had every claim, therefore, on a
compatriot's help and friendship. She stretched out her hand and took
Desiree Candeille's in her own; she forced herself to feel nothing but
admiration for this young woman, whose whole attitude spoke of
sorrows nobly borne, of misfortunes proudly endured.
"I don't know why I should sadden you with my story," rejoined
Desiree Candeille after a slight pause, during which she seemed to be
waging war against her own emotion. "It is not a very interesting one.
Hundreds have suffered as I did. I had enemies in Paris. God knows
how that happened. I had never harmed anyone, but someone must
have hated me and must have wished me ill. Evil is so easily wrought
in France these days. A denunciation --a perquisition--an accusation--
then the flight from Paris ... the forged passports ... the disguise ... the
bribe ... the hardships ... the squalid hiding places. ... Oh! I have gone
through it all ... tasted every kind of humiliation ... endured every
kind of insult. ... Remember! that I was not a noble aristocrat ... a
Duchess or an impoverished Countess ..." she added with marked
bitterness, "or perhaps the English cavaliers whom the popular voice
has called the League of the Scarlet Pimpernel would have taken
some interest in me. I was only a poor actress and had to find my way
out of France alone, or else perish on the guillotine."
"I am so sorry!" said Marguerite simply.
"Tell me how you got on, once you were in England," she continued
after a while, seeing that Desiree Candeille seemed absorbed in
thought.
"I had a few engagements at first," replied the Frenchwoman. "I
played at Sadler's Wells and with Mrs. Jordan at Covent Garden, but
the Aliens' Bill put an end to my chances of livelihood. No manger
cared to give me a part, and so ..."
"And so?"
"Oh! I had a few jewels and I sold them. ... A little money and I live
on that. ... But when I played at Covent Garden I contrived to send
part of my salary over to some of the poorer clubs of Paris. My heart
aches for those that are starving. ... Poor wretches, they are
misguided and misled by self-seeking demagogues. ... It hurts me to
feel that I can do nothing more to help them ... and eases my self-
respect if, by singing at public fairs, I can still send a few francs to
those who are poorer than myself."
She had spoken with ever-increasing passion and vehemence.
Marguerite, with eyes fixed into vacancy, seeing neither the speaker
nor her surroundings, seeing only visions of those same poor
wreckages of humanity, who had been goaded into thirst for blood,
when their shrunken bodies should have been clamouring for healthy
food,--Marguerite thus absorbed, had totally forgotten her earlier
prejudices and now completely failed to note all that was unreal,
stagy, theatrical, in the oratorical declamations of the ex-actress from
the Varietes.
Pre-eminently true and loyal herself in spite of the many deceptions
and treacheries which she had witnessed in her life, she never looked
for falsehood or for cant in others. Even now she only saw before her
a woman who had been wrongfully persecuted, who had suffered and
had forgiven those who had caused her to suffer. She bitterly accused
herself for her original mistrust of this noble-hearted, unselfish
woman, who was content to tramp around in an alien country,
bartering her talents for a few coins, in order that some of those, who
were the originators of her sorrows, might have bread to eat and a
bed in which to sleep.
"Mademoiselle," she said warmly, "truly you shame me, who am also
French-born, with the many sacrifices you so nobly make for those
who should have first claim on my own sympathy. Believe me, if I
have not done as much as duty demanded of me in the cause of my
starving compatriots, it has not been for lack of good-will. Is there
any way now," she added eagerly, "in which I can help you? Putting
aside the question of money, wherein I pray you to command my
assistance, what can I do to be of useful service to you?"
"You are very kind, Lady Blakeney ..." said the other hesitatingly.
"Well? What is it? I see there is something in your mind ..."
"It is perhaps difficult to express ... but people say I have a good
voice ... I sing some French ditties ... they are a novelty in England, I
think. ... If I could sing them in fashionable salons ... I might perhaps
..."
"Nay! you shall sing in fashionable salons," exclaimed Marguerite
eagerly, "you shall become the fashion, and I'll swear the Prince of
Wales himself shall bid you sing at Carlton House ... and you shall
name your own fee, Mademoiselle ... and London society shall vie
with the elite of Bath, as to which shall lure you to its most
frequented routs. ... There! there! you shall make a fortune for the
Paris poor ... and to prove to you that I mean every word I say, you
shall begin your triumphant career in my own salon to-morrow night.
His Royal Highness will be present. You shall sing your most
engaging songs ... and for your fee you must accept a hundred
guineas, which you shall send to the poorest workman's club in Paris
in the name of Sir Percy and Lady Blakeney."
"I thank your ladyship, but ..."
"You'll not refuse?"
"I'll accept gladly ... but ... you will understand ... I am not very old,"
said Candeille quaintly, "I ... I am only an actress ... but if a young
actress is unprotected ... then ..."
"I understand," replied Marguerite gently, "that you are far too pretty
to frequent the world all alone, and that you have a mother, a sister
or a friend ... which? ... whom you would wish to escort you to-
morrow. Is that it?"
"Nay," rejoined the actress, with marked bitterness, "I have neither
mother, nor sister, but our Revolutionary Government, with tardy
compassion for those it has so relentlessly driven out of France, has
deputed a representative of theirs in England to look after the
interests of French subjects over here1"
"Yes?"
"They have realised over in Paris that my life here has been devoted
to the welfare of the poor people of France. The representative whom
the government has sent to England is specially interested in me and
in my work. He is a stand-by for me in case of trouble ... in case of
insults ... A woman alone is oft subject to those, even at the hands of
so-called gentlemen ... and the official representative of my own
country becomes in such cases my most natural protector."
"I understand."
"You will receive him?"
"Certainly."
"Then may I present him to your ladyship?"
"Whenever you like."
"Now, and it please you."
"Now?"
"Yes. Here he comes, at your ladyship's service."
Desiree Candeille's almond-shaped eyes were fixed upon a distant part of
the tent, behind Lady Blakeney in the direction of the main entrance to
the booth. There was a slight pause after she had spoken and then
Marguerite slowly turned in order to see who this official representative
of France was, whom at the young actress' request she had just agreed to
receive in her house. In the doorway of the tent, framed by its gaudy
draperies, and with the streaming sunshine as a brilliant background
behind him, stood the sable-clad figure of Chauvelin.
Chapter VII : Premonition
Marguerite neither moved nor spoke. She felt two pairs of eyes fixed
upon her, and with all the strength of will at her command she forced the
very blood in her veins not to quit her cheeks, forced her eyelids not to
betray by a single quiver the icy pang of a deadly premonition which at
sight of Chauvelin seemed to have chilled her entire soul.
There he stood before her, dressed in his usual somber garments, a look
almost of humility in those keen grey eyes of his, which a year ago on the
cliffs of Calais had peered down at her with such relentless hate.
Strange that at this moment she should have felt an instinct of fear. What
cause had she to throw more than a pitiful glance at the man who had
tried so cruelly to wrong her, and who had so signally failed?
Having bowed very low and very respectfully, Chauvelin advanced
towards her, with all the airs of a disgraced courtier craving audience
from his queen.
As he approached she instinctively drew back.
"Would you prefer not to speak to me, Lady Blakeney?" he said humbly.
She could scarcely believe her ears, or trust her eyes. It seemed
impossible that a man could have so changed in a few months. He even
looked shorter than last year, more shrunken within himself. His hair,
which he wore free from powder, was perceptibly tinged with grey.
"Shall I withdraw?" he added after a pause, seeing that Marguerite made
no movement to return his salutation.
"It would be best, perhaps," she replied coldly. "You and I, Monsieur
Chauvelin, have so little to say to one another."
"Very little indeed," he rejoined quietly; "the triumphant and happy have
ever very little to say to the humiliated and the defeated. But I had hoped
that Lady Blakeney in the midst of her victory would have spared one
thought of pity and one of pardon."
"I did not know that you had need of either from me, Monsieur."
"Pity perhaps not, but forgiveness certainly."
"You have that, if you so desire it."
"Since I failed, you might try to forget."
"That is beyond my power. But believe me, I have ceased to think of the
infinite wrong which you tried to do to me."
"But I failed," he insisted, "and I meant no harm to YOU."
"To those I care for, Monsieur Chauvelin."
"I had to serve my country as best I could. I meant no harm to your
brother. He is safe in England now. And the Scarlet Pimpernel was
nothing to you."
She tried to read his face, tried to discover in those inscrutable eyes of
his, some hidden meaning to his words. Instinct had warned her of
course that this man could be nothing but an enemy, always and at all
times. But he seemed so broken, so abject now, that contempt for his
dejected attitude, and for the defeat which had been inflicted on him,
chased the last remnant of fear from her heart.
"I did not even succeed in harming that enigmatical personage,"
continued Chauvelin with the same self-abasement. "Sir Percy Blakeney,
you remember, threw himself across my plans, quite innocently of course.
I failed where you succeeded. Luck has deserted me. Our government
offered me a humble post, away from France. I look after the interests of
French subjects settled in England. My days of power are over. My
failure is complete. I do not complain, for I failed in a combat of wits ...
but I failed ... I failed ... I failed ... I am almost a fugitive and I am quite
disgraced. That is my present history, Lady Blakeney," he concluded,
taking once more a step towards her, "and you will understand that it
would be a solace if you extended your hand to me just once more, and
let me feel that although you would never willingly look upon my face
again, you have enough womanly tenderness in you to force your heart to
forgiveness and mayhap to pity."
Marguerite hesitated. He held out his hand and her warm, impulsive
nature prompted her to be kind. But instinct would not be gainsaid: a
curious instinct to which she refused to respond. What had she to fear
from this miserable and cringing little worm who had not even in him the
pride of defeat? What harm could he do to her, or to those whom she
loved? Her brother was in England! Her husband! Bah! not the enmity
of the entire world could make her fear for him!
Nay! That instinct, which caused her to draw away from Chauvelin, as
she would from a venomous asp, was certainly not fear. It was hate!
She hated this man! Hated him for all that she had suffered because of
him; for that terrible night on the cliffs of Calais! The peril to her husband
who had become so infinitely dear! The humiliations and self-reproaches
which he had endured.
Yes! it was hate! and hate was of all emotions the one she most despised.
Hate? Does one hate a slimy but harmless toad or a stinging fly? It
seemed ridiculous, contemptible and pitiable to think of hate in
connection with the melancholy figure of this discomfited intriguer, this
fallen leader of revolutionary France.
He was holding out his hand to her. If she placed even the tips of her
fingers upon it, she would be making the compact of mercy and
forgiveness which he was asking of her. The woman Desiree Candeille
roused within her the last lingering vestige of her slumbering wrath.
False, theatrical and stagy--as Marguerite had originally suspected--she
appeared to have been in league with Chauvelin to bring about this
undesirable meeting.
Lady Blakeney turned from one to another, trying to conceal her
contempt beneath a mask of passionless indifference. Candeille was
standing close by, looking obviously distressed and not a little puzzled.
An instant's reflection was sufficient to convince Marguerite that the
whilom actress of the Varietes Theatre was obviously ignorant of the
events to which Chauvelin had been alluding: she was, therefore, of no
serious consequence, a mere tool, mayhap, in the ex-ambassador's hands.
At the present moment she looked like a silly child who does not
understand the conversation of the "grown-ups."
Marguerite had promised her help and protection, had invited her to her
house, and offered her a munificent gift in aid of a deserving cause. She
was too proud to go back now on that promise, to rescind the contract
because of an unexplainable fear. With regard to Chauvelin, the matter
stood differently: she had made him no direct offer of hospitality: she had
agreed to receive in her house the official chaperone of an unprotected
girl, but she was not called upon to show cordiality to her own and her
husband's most deadly enemy.
She was ready to dismiss him out of her life with a cursory word of
pardon and a half-expressed promise of oblivion: on that understanding
and that only she was ready to let her hand rest for the space of one
second in his.
She had looked upon her fallen enemy, seen his discomfiture and his
humiliation! Very well! Now let him pass out of her life, all the more
easily, since the last vision of him would be one of such utter abjection as
would even be unworthy of hate.
All these thoughts, feelings and struggles passed through her mind with
great rapidity. Her hesitation had lasted less than five seconds: Chauvelin
still wore the look of doubting entreaty with which he had first begged
permission to take her hand in his. With an impulsive toss of the head,
she had turned straight towards him, ready with the phrase with which
she meant to dismiss him from her sight now and forever, when suddenly
a well-known laugh broke in upon her ear, and a lazy, drawly voice said
pleasantly:
"La! I vow the air is fit to poison you! Your Royal Highness, I entreat,
let us turn our backs upon these gates of Inferno, where lost souls would
feel more at home than doth your humble servant."
The next moment His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales had entered
the tent, closely followed by Sir Percy Blakeney.
Chapter VIII : The Invitation
It was in truth a strange situation, this chance meeting between Percy
Blakeney and ex-Ambassador Chauvelin.
Marguerite looked up at her husband. She saw him shrug his broad
shoulders as he first caught sight of Chauvelin, and glance down in his
usual lazy, good-humoured manner at the shrunken figure of the silent
Frenchman. The words she meant to say never crossed her lips; she was
waiting to hear what the two men would say to one another.
The instinct of the grande dame in her, the fashionable lady accustomed
to the exigencies of society, just gave her sufficient presence of mind to
make the requisite low curtsey before His Royal Highness. But the
Prince, forgetting his accustomed gallantry, was also absorbed in the little
scene before him. He, too, was looking from the sable-clad figure of
Chauvelin to that of gorgeously arrayed Sir Percy. He, too, like
Marguerite, was wondering what was passing behind the low, smooth
forehead of that inimitable dandy, what behind the inscrutably good-
humoured expression of those sleepy eyes.
Of the five persons thus present in the dark and stuffy booth, certainly Sir
Percy Blakeney seemed the least perturbed. He had paused just long
enough to allow Chauvelin to become fully conscious of a feeling of
supreme irritation and annoyance, then he strolled up to the ex-
ambassador, with hand outstretched and the most engaging of smiles.
"Ha!" he said, with his usual half-shy, half-pleasant-tempered smile, "my
engaging friend from France! I hope, sir, that our demmed climate doth
find you well and hearty to-day."
The cheerful voice seemed to ease the tension. Marguerite sighed a sigh
of relief. After all, what was more natural than that Percy with his
amazing fund of pleasant irresponsibility should thus greet the man who
had once vowed to bring him to the guillotine? Chauvelin, himself,
accustomed by now to the audacious coolness of his enemy, was scarcely
taken by surprise. He bowed low to His Highness, who, vastly amused at
Blakeney's sally, was inclined to be gracious to everyone, even though
the personality of Chauvelin as a well-known leader of the regicide
government was inherently distasteful to him. But the Prince saw in the
wizened little figure before him an obvious butt for his friend Blakeney's
impertinent shafts, and although historians have been unable to assert
positively whether or no George Prince of Wales knew aught of Sir
Percy's dual life, yet there is no doubt that he was always ready to enjoy a
situation which brought about the discomfiture of any of the Scarlet
Pimpernel's avowed enemies.
"I, too, have not met M. Chauvelin for many a long month," said His
Royal Highness with an obvious show of irony. "And I mistake not, sir,
you left my father's court somewhat abruptly last year."
"Nay, your Royal Highness," said Percy gaily, "my friend Monsieur ... er
... Chaubertin and I had serious business to discuss, which could only be
dealt with in France. ... Am I not right, Monsieur?"
"Quite right, Sir Percy," replied Chauvelin curtly.
"We had to discuss abominable soup in Calais, had we not?" continued
Blakeney in the same tone of easy banter, "and wine that I vowed was
vinegar. Monsieur ... er ... Chaubertin ... no, no, I beg pardon ...
Chauvelin ... Monsieur Chauvelin and I quite agreed upon that point.
The only matter on which we were not quite at one was the question of
snuff."
"Snuff?" laughed His Royal Highness, who seemed vastly amused.
"Yes, your Royal Highness ... snuff ... Monsieur Chauvelin here had--if I
may be allowed to say so--so vitiated a taste in snuff that he prefers it
with an admixture of pepper ... Is that not so, Monsieur ... er ...
Chaubertin?"
"Chauvelin, Sir Percy," remarked the ex-ambassador drily.
He was determined not to lose his temper and looked urbane and
pleasant, whilst his impudent enemy was enjoying a joke at his expense.
Marguerite the while had not taken her eyes off the keen, shrewd face.
Whilst the three men talked, she seemed suddenly to have lost her sense
of the reality of things. The present situation appeared to her strangely
familiar, like a dream which she had dreamt oft times before.
Suddenly it became absolutely clear to her that the whole scene had been
arranged and planned: the booth with its flaring placard, Demoiselle
Candeille soliciting her patronage, her invitation to the young actress,
Chauvelin's sudden appearance, all, all had been concocted and arranged,
not here, not in England at all, but out there in Paris, in some dark
gathering of blood-thirsty ruffians, who had invented a final trap for the
destruction of the bold adventurer, who went by the name of the Scarlet
Pimpernel.
And she also was only a puppet, enacting a part which had been written
for her: she had acted just as THEY had anticipated, had spoken the very
words they had meant her to say: and when she looked at Percy, he
seemed supremely ignorant of it all, unconscious of this trap of the
existence of which everyone here present was aware, save indeed himself.
She would have fought against this weird feeling of obsession, of being a
mechanical toy would up to do certain things, but this she could not do;
her will appeared paralysed, her tongue even refused her service.
As in a dream she heard His Royal Highness ask for the name of the
young actress who was soliciting alms for the poor of Paris.
That also had been prearranged. His Royal Highness for the moment was
also a puppet, made to dance, to speak and to act as Chauvelin and his
colleagues over in France had decided that he should. Quite mechanically
Marguerite introduced Demoiselle Candeille to the Prince's gracious
notice.
"If your Highness will permit," she said, "Mademoiselle Candeille will
give us some of her charming old French songs at my rout to-morrow."
"By all means! By all means!" said the Prince. "I used to know some in
my childhood days. Charming and poetic. ... I know. ... I know. ... We
shall be delighted to hear Mademoiselle sing, eh, Blakeney?" he added
good-humouredly, "and for your rout to-morrow will you not also invite
M. Chauvelin?"
"Nay! but that goes without saying, your Royal Highness," responded Sir
Percy, with hospitable alacrity and a most approved bow directed at his
arch-enemy. "We shall expect M. Chauvelin. He and I have not met for
so long, and he shall be made right welcome at Blakeney Manor."
Chapter IX : Demoiselle Candeille
Her origin was of the humblest, for her mother--so it was said-- had been
kitchen-maid in the household of the Duc de Marny, but Desiree had
received some kind of education, and though she began life as a dresser
in one of the minor theatres of Paris, she became ultimately one of its
most popular stars.
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