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The Great Prince Shan, a novel by E. Phillips Oppenheim |
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Chapter 15 |
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_ CHAPTER XV There was a half reluctant admiration in Prince Shan's eyes as he sat back in the dim recesses of his box and scrutinised his visitor. La Belle Nita had learnt all that Paris and London could teach her. "You are very beautiful, Nita," he said. "Many men tell me so," she answered. "Life has gone well with you since we met last?" he asked reflectively. "The months have passed," she replied. "You have been faithful?" "Fidelity is of the soul." He paused, as though pondering over her answer. A famous French comedian was holding the stage, and the house rocked with laughter. "You have the same apartment?" She pressed the clasp of a black velvet bag which rested on the edge of the box, opened it, and passed him a key. "It is the same." He held the key in his fingers for a moment, but he had the air of a man to whom the action had no significance. "You have enough money?" he asked. "I have saved a million francs," she told him. "I am waiting for my lord to speak of things that matter. The woman in the box over there--who is she?" "An English spy," he answered calmly. She lowered her eyes for a moment, as though to conceal the sudden soft flash. "An English spy," she repeated. "My rival in espionage." "You have no rival, Nita," he replied, "and she is in the opposite camp." Her two red lips were distorted into a pout. "Is it over, my task?" she asked. "I am weary of Paris. I love it over here better. I am weary of French officers, of these solemn officials who come to my room like guilty schoolboys, and who speak of themselves and their importance with bated breath, as though their whisper would rock the world. My master has enough information?" "More than enough," he assured her. "You have done your work wonderfully." "Shall I now deal with her?" she continued, with a slight, eager movement of her head towards the opposite box. He smiled. "She is harmless, she and her entourage," he replied. "Some stroke of good fortune brought them word of the meeting between myself and Immelan, and beyond that they guessed at its significance. They were at the shed to watch my arrival. Now, with their mouths open, they sit and wait for the information which they hope will drop in. They are very ingenuous, these Anglo-Saxons, but they are not diplomats." She turned her head and looked across the auditorium. Maggie was talking to a man whom Nigel had just brought in, and who was bending over her in obvious admiration. Nita, with her wealth of cosmetics, her over-red lips, stared curiously at this possible rival, with her clear skin, her beautiful neck and shoulders, her hair dressed close to her head, her air of quiet, almost singular distinction. "The young lady," she confessed, "wears her clothes well for an English woman. She is _bien soignee_, but she looks a little difficult." His eyes followed the direction of hers, and her object was achieved. She read correctly the light that gleamed in them. "I may come to-night?" she asked quietly. He shook his head. "Not again," he replied. A violinist now held the stage, a Pole newly come to London. La Belle Nita closed her eyes. For a few minutes her sorrow seemed to throb to the minor music to which she was listening. "For all my work, then," she said presently, "for the suffering and the risk, there is to be nothing?" "Is it nothing for you to be invited to live in whatsoever manner you choose?" he remonstrated. "It is little," she replied steadily. "There are a dozen who would do this for me, who pray every day that they may do so. What are all these things beside the love of my master?" He looked at her a little sadly, yet without any sign of real feeling. To him she represented nothing more than a doll with brains, from whose intelligence he had profited, but of whose beauty he was weary. "You know what our poet says, Nita," he reminded her. "'Love is like the rustling of the wind in the almond trees before dawn.' We cannot command it. It comes to us or leaves us without reason." She looked across the auditorium once more and spoke with her head turned away from her companion. "There is no one in the East," she said, "because those who write me weekly send news of my lord's doings. There is no one in the East, because there they give the body who know nothing of the soul. And so my Prince is safe amongst them. But here--these western women have other gifts. Is that she, master of my life and soul?" "I met her this evening for the first time," he replied. She laughed drearily. "Eyes may meet in the street without speech, a glance may burn its way into the soul. Once I thought that I might love again, because a stranger smiled at me in the Bois, and he had grey eyes, and that look about his mouth which a woman craves for. He passed on, and I forgot. You see, my lord was still there.--So this is the woman." "Who knows?" he answered. Immelan came into the box a little abruptly. There was a cloud upon his face which he did his best to conceal. Almost simultaneously, a messenger from behind the scenes arrived for Nita. She rose to her feet and wrapped her green cloak closely around her lissom figure. "In a quarter of an hour," she said, "I have to appear again. It is to be good-night, then?" She raised her eyes to his, and for a moment the appeal which knows no nationality shone out of their velvety depths. She stood before him simply, like a slave who pleads. Not a muscle of Prince Shan's face moved. "It is to be good-night, Nita," he answered calmly. Her head drooped, and she passed out. She had the air of a flower whose petals have been bruised. Immelan looked after her curiously, almost compassionately. "It is finished, then, with the little one, Prince?" he enquired. "It is finished," was the calm reply. Immelan stroked his short moustache thoughtfully. "Is it wise?" he ventured. "She has been faithful and assiduous. She knows many things." Prince Shan's eyes were filled with mild wonder. "She has had some years of my occasional companionship," he said. "It is surely as much as she could hope for or expect. We are not like you Westerners, Immelan," he went on. "Our women are the creatures of our will. We call them, or we send them away. They know that, and they are prepared." "It seems a little brutal," Immelan muttered. "You prefer your method?" his companion asked. "Yet you practise deceit. Your fancy wanders, and you lie about it. You lose your dignity, my friend. No woman is worth a man's lie." Immelan was leaning back in his chair, gazing steadfastly across the crowded theatre. "Your principles," he said, "are suited to your own womenkind. La Belle Nita has become westernised. Are you sure that she accepts the situation as she would if she dwelt with you in Pekin?" "I am her master," Prince Shan declared calmly. "I have made no promises that I have not fulfilled." "The promise between a man and a woman is an unspoken one," Immelan persisted. "You have not been in Europe for five months. All that time she has awaited you." "Something else has happened," Prince Shan said deliberately. "Since your arrival in London?" "Since my arrival in London, since I stepped out of my ship last night." Immelan was frankly incredulous. "You mean Lady Maggie Trent?" "Certainly! I have always felt that some day or other my thoughts would turn towards one of these strange, western women. That time has come. Lady Maggie possesses those charms which come from the brain, yet which appeal more deeply than any other to the subtle desires of the poet, the man of letters and the philosopher. She is very wonderful, Immelan. I thank you for your introduction." Immelan ceased to caress his moustache. He leaned back in his chair and gazed at his companion. For many years he and the Prince had been associates, yet at that moment he felt that he had not even begun to understand him. "But you forget, Prince," he said, "that Lady Maggie and her friends are in the opposite camp. When our agreement is concluded and known to the world, she will look upon you as an enemy." "As yet," Prince Shan answered calmly, "our agreement is not concluded." Immelan's face darkened. Nothing but his awe of the man with whom he sat prevented an expression of anger. "But, Prince," he expostulated, "apart from political considerations, you cannot really imagine that anything would be possible between you and Lady Maggie?" "Why not?" was the cool reply. "Lady Maggie is of the English nobility," Immelan pointed out. "Neither she nor her friends would be in the least likely to consider anything in the nature of a morganatic alliance." "It would not be necessary," Prince Shan declared. "It is in my mind to offer her marriage." Immelan dropped the cigarette case which he had just drawn from his pocket. He gazed at his companion in blank and unaffected astonishment. "Marriage?" he muttered. "You are not serious!" "I am entirely serious," the Prince insisted. "I can understand your amazement, Immelan. When the idea first came into my mind, I tore at it as I would at a weed. But we who have studied in the West have learnt certain great truths which our own philosophers have sometimes missed. All that is best of life and of death our own prophets have taught us. From them we have learnt fortitude and chastity: devotion to our country and singleness of purpose. Over here, though, one has also learnt something. Nobility is of the soul. A Prince of the Shans must seek not for the body but for the spirit of the woman who shall be his mate. If their spirits meet on equal terms, then she may even share the throne of his life." Immelan was speechless. There was something final and convincing in his companion's measured words. His own protest, when at last he spoke, sounded paltry. "But supposing it is true that she is already engaged to Lord Dorminster?" Prince Shan smiled very quietly. "That," he said, "can easily be disposed of." "But do you seriously believe that you would be able to induce her to return with you to Pekin?" Immelan persisted. At that moment it chanced that Maggie turned her head and looked across at the two men. Prince Shan leaned a little forward to meet her gaze. His face was expressionless. The lines of his mouth were calm and restful, yet in his eyes there glowed for a single moment the fire of a man who looks upon the thing he covets. "I seriously believe it," he answered under his breath. _ |
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