Delphi Works of Ford Madox Ford (Illustrated) (489 page)

She set off for Southampton, where the yacht was lying at ten o’clock of the morning of the second. The yacht was to sail at eleven that night, and they took their farewells on the station platform. Macdonald went round to his bank with the notes that Messrs. Zimmermann had given him as the remainder. Whilst he was filling up the pay-in slip it suddenly occurred to him to apply to the bank- manager for that eight hundred and ninety-seven pounds, two shillings.

He found the manager in a remarkably cheerful frame of mind. Indeed, that gentleman said that he had been going to write to ask Macdonald for an interview for some days. A client of theirs was interested in Macdonald’s property which the bank held in mortgage. The manager would be able to propose a transaction that would probably be satisfactory to all the three parties in common. What it amounted to was that the bank’s client was ready to pay a large sum for the mining rights of eleven thousand acres of land in the Urals. The manager said that this property was a little encumbered by a law suit which was being brought against Macdonald by some of the other heirs and his mother. But the manager said that these heirs were ready to be bought out for a small sum in cash. Macdonald didn’t pay much attention to what the manager had to say. He exclaimed himself:

“Look here, Goodge, is it worth two thousand pounds to me in half an hour?”

The manager smiled with an inward but benevolent expression.

“It’s worth five thousand to you in ten minutes,” he said, “if you’ll just sign a power of attorney to us. It ought to be worth a hundred thousand in two years, if you leave it quite in our hands and don’t squander the lot in three weeks, which I suppose is what you’ll do. You haven’t the least idea what your property is worth. Perhaps it’s a good thing that you haven’t known. But if you leave it in our hands we can do something for you.”

Macdonald really hadn’t time to think, it just came into his head that he had always considered himself to be a wealthy man, and that, in spite of everything, he had been perfectly justified in behaving as such. It was the last thing that was wanted entirely to restore his self-respect.

He began an extraordinary gallop, of which he remembered precious little afterwards. Inside of ten minutes he was running down the steps of the bank with a sheaf of notes fluttering insecurely in his hands. The Resiliens’ garage was just round the comer, and in a very few minutes he had signed a contract to hire the highest powered of the Resiliens’ cars for three months, together with the services of the chief chauffeur, whom he knew very well. Inside of half an hour he was in the Chancellery of the Russian Embassy.

They had naturally mislaid the ukase itself, but by dint of looking up the form in dictionaries they provided him with a certified copy in somewhat less than three hours. During these three hours Macdonald was packing his luggage into the car and looking for a pope. It was rather difficult to get one to start with him, because most of the popes in London, whether they were connected with the Embassy or with one or other of the three Greek Churches, had a wholesome fear for their skins. At last, however, he found in Bayswater a priest who was not actually attached to either of these institutions, but was visiting London as a spy in Government Service, because he was personally acquainted with many revolutionaries. And this gentleman, happening fortunately to be very drunk, consented to accompany Macdonald amidst the perils of the counter-revolution, for the first piece of Russian territory that they would come across would be the Ministry of Flores. Towards five in the afternoon they had reached Aldershot on the way to Southampton, when Macdonald remembered that he had forgotten the copy of the ukase, so that it was six o’clock before they really left London. They were three times held up by police traps, and once a tyre burst. But just before eight o’clock it occurred to Macdonald to wire to Emily that he was coming, and that the yacht had better be brought up against a quay so that they could get the car on board. The telegram, however, was never delivered, because in his hurry Macdonald had written the name of the yacht rather badly, and it was taken on board a cutter called the
Smaragda
that was lying in Hythe harbour. Thus it was only with some difficulty that towards ten-thirty they discovered the
Esmeralda,
which was lying out in mid-stream. And the pope being by now helpless with drink, they had to sling him on board tied into a chair. Ten minutes afterwards the
Esmeralda
started.

CHAPTER I
I

AND after that there were two days of sunshine and sea, and two nights of darkness and harbours, until they came to sitting alone on the captain’s bridge with the yacht seeming all asleep beneath them. But a little after twelve there began to be footsteps on the decks and the muffled sounds of a large steamer waking in. the night. At about twelve-thirty the captain came on the bridge, and with him the other Macdonald, who was called El Rey de Batalha. He was a red-whiskered, rather sleepy- looking Scotchman, with only one eye. He would have preferred to talk about the Church politics of the town of Auchtermuchtie in Scotland, for to tell the truth they were all of them a little bit tired of talking about the machined-like affairs of the counter-revolution. But they did talk it over once more to make certain.

At a quarter to one on the following day the King was to be proclaimed from the Town Hall, the Palace, and the Customs Buildings of Batalha. Each of these buildings was to be surrounded by a crowd of Lady Aldington’s Cornish miners. The troops were to be disarmed, and telegrams were to be sent to every city in Galizia announcing the peaceful accession of Dom Pedro II. El Rey de Batalha anticipated no trouble of any kind whatever. Who was there to make any trouble? In Batalha there was no republican soldiery. The troops would lay down their arms and then, a quarter of an hour later, at his command, they would take them up and fire a volley in salute of the King’s reign. They were to allow an hour for the telegraphing of the news to Flores and for the circulating through the streets of enormous newspaper placards — which had been already printed by Dom Carrasco — announcing the fall of the republic in Batalha and the King’s accession. At a quarter to two the battleship
Admiral Trogoff II
would pass between the headlands of Flores. The ministers of the republic were to come to the palace at four o’clock to surrender their portfolios to the King, who would confer them on his new ministry. This ministry were all ready on board the
Admiral Trogoff II.
They consisted entirely of Galizian refugees whom the King had met and tested in London.

The President of the Republic alone remained firm to the republican ideal. But in purely theoretic conversations Dom Carrasco had extorted from him the promise that, supposing the royalist party could give a show of force sufficiently overpowering, the President would command his Republican Guards to lay down their arms.

The
Admiral Trogoff II,
with Kintyre and the crew of filibusters on board, was just at that moment signalling by Marconigram to the yacht that she was a hundred and twenty miles to the westward, and that, although a slight defect had shown itself in her machinery, by easy steaming they would reach the city of Flores well upon the time. All the hands were reported to be in good spirits and perfectly sober.

The clicking and flashing of the Marconi instrument ceased; the captain said: “Now, Mr. Macdonald!’ The Scotchman went down the companion; there were some soft cries as his boat was cast loose; a heavy rumble of the powerful engines commenced; some large sparks went from the funnels and dropped slowly on to the black waters; the
Esmeralda’s
searchlight lit up palely the old forts at the harbour mouth, and they steamed out into the blackness of the sea. They sat there all night, hand in hand, watching the silhouette of the captain and one of the seamen as they moved above the illuminated disc of the bridge compass.

By seven-thirty of the next morning the King’s motor car was being slung on to the quay of Flores harbour. Mr. and Mrs. Pett got into the car, which was a very big one, and then came Lady Aldington and Macdonald. As she got in Lady Aldington looked at the footman who sat beside Mr. Salt in a chauffeur’s cap and goggles.

“Why, that’s the King!” she said.

The car itself was surrounded by twenty seamen of the
Esmeralda
in white duck with red sashes. They carried stretchers with which to open a way through the crowd in case it should be very dense. As their car moved off they were met by an open landau surrounded by republican soldiers. It was coming to fetch, with six guards of honour, the Marquis da Pinta, who was to preside at the great bull fight that the republic of Galizia was giving that day in honour of the immortal Alexandre Dumas. They were all going to this bull fight, for it was deemed indispensable, if the counter-revolution was to succeed in the hearts of the people, that they should give this sign of courage, and pay this tribute of respect to the immortal poet.

In the streets there was very little crowd, and the car jolted equably over the very rough cobbles of the pavement. The principal street of Flores, which ran down to the quay, itself almost exactly resembled Regent Street, except that it was much broader. The houses along it were all of white painted stucco with square windows, and upon both sides of the street the sun-blinds were already down, though it was not yet eight o’clock. The sun fell straight on their faces. There were hardly any idlers in the street; there were hardly any people at all; and there were no vehicles, so that the car might have gone at any pace it pleased except for the mountainous unevenness of the roadway. This reduced them to a mere walk, with the sailors walking behind, whilst a little way further back came the landau containing the Marquis da Pinta, surrounded by its soldiers in their old blue uniforms with epaulettes of pink and white worsted. The town appeared to be absolutely silent and at rest.

It took them about a quarter of an hour to get from end to end of this long street. Then they came upon a broad plaza, and here for the first time they saw the republican flag, drooping listlessly above the long white palace that had rusty streaks here and there from roof to pavement where the gutters had failed to act. In the centre of the roof of this palace of the Annunciation was the inevitable woman holding out a bay wreath from a three-horsed chariot. This lady represented Galizia, and above her the folds of the yellow, green, and white flag drooped against the bright blue sky. The palace itself was on the north of the square; facing it were the several ministries of Galizia and the consulates and ministries of Foreign Powers, whilst on the east of the square was a dusty brick building with a green dome. This served for housing the Parliament by day and the theatre at night. In the centre of the square was a fountain representing Vincente Garcilasso, the celebrated Galizian explorer. He was represented as being clothed in a blanket, and extending one hand straight to heaven from decoratively treated waves of marble, for he had been drowned off Cape Horn in 1541. From four sides of the pedestal dribbled little streams of water that fell into an immense basin that they hardly wetted. In the square itself there was not a soul to be seen; even the sentry boxes that were still painted with the royal colours, and that stood in front of all of the Government buildings — even these were empty; and the motor with its sailors, and the landau with its guard of honour, went, as if they were very lonely, over the great empty space.

They came immediately into a long, pleasant avenue of palm trunks. On each side there were villas hidden amongst olive and orange trees. And this lasted perhaps three-quarters of a mile. Here there were a good many people all walking in the same direction as themselves, most men in black broadcloth trousers of immense breadth, with short coats resembling Eton jackets, and huge straw hats with flat stiff brims. The women wore mostly stiff black skirts of silk coming down to their stout ankles, that were clad in white cotton stockings. Their shoes all had high heels with large brass buckles, and each woman had a black coarse lace shawl over her head and carried a red paper fan, because it was the day of the bull fight. Gradually this crowd upon the side-walks between the pallid grey trunks of the palace trees grew more and more dense, until, looking from the driver’s seat of the car, the young King could see what almost resembled an ordered pattern — two walls of black, picked out with the cream colour of the great straw hats and the vivid red of the paper fans. And Dom Pedro exclaimed to Mr. Salt:

“These are my people.”

Mr. Salt, gazing straight in front of him, said with a fixed expression:

“They appear to be very creditable and respectable. But I wouldn’t talk about it if I were you, Mr. Spenlow.”

Mr. Salt was rather pale, and noticeably anxious.

As they slipped along the crowd became more and more dense, though the roadway was open and of rather good macadam. In places there were stalls for oranges and grapes. Some had large water-melons and others great polished cans of copper.

“Yes, these are my people,” the King said; and behind his motor spectacles his eyes became suffused with tears.

Then suddenly from among the booths there began to go up mutters of cheering. Mr. Salt started so violently that had the car been travelling at any speed it would have jerked the wheel so as to send it into the side-walk. He said suddenly:

“Damn!” And then to the King: “Look round the comer of the car and see if the road is still clear behind us. We might be able to make a dash for it if I can get room to turn.”

The King obediently looked round the comer of the car.

“No,” he said. “The crowd is filling up behind the landau.”

Again Mr. Salt said: “Damn!” very energetically, and Dom Pedro observed that his chauffeur was trembling as much as if the car had been travelling at fifty miles an hour.

“I said I’d never lay down my life for you,” Mr. Salt said. “But oh, hell, this is the same as doing it. We’re in the lion’s den!”

The King laid his hand upon Mr. Salt’s. “It is heroic of you,” he said. “But my people are very gentle. There is no danger. See how they all smile.”

“You’ve changed, Mr. Spenlow,” the chauffeur said. “When I first entered your service, you didn’t care any more for your kingdom than you did for marbles.”

“Oh,” Dom Pedro said, “that was because I was coming away then. Now I’m coming back. For me there may be some danger, but I like it. For I would rather be killed in this country than die in my bed in exile.”

Mr. Salt exclaimed: “My aunt! What picture postcard talk!”

“But for you,” the King said, “there is no danger at all. For you are a foreigner, and it is well known that the Galizians are good and kind to all foreigners, such is the veneration for the laws of hospitality. They will not hurt any hair of your head; but they will bear you on the palms of their hands as if you were a pigeon’s egg. That is what the proverb says.”

“Good Lord, how you’ve changed! How you’ve changed!” Mr. Salt said.

“No, I haven’t changed,” Dom Pedro said. “It was always in me, but your fogs did not allow it to blossom. In this sunlight it is different.”

“Well, that’s a very ordinary sentiment,” Mr. Salt commented. “They talk like that in every novel, but I’ve no doubt it does Your Majesty credit. It’s the sort of thing that’s wanted of you.”

“It’s the true way to feel,” the King said.

“No doubt it is,” Mr. Salt answered.

He was beginning to feel a little more composed, because it was perfectly true that in all that crowd which now surrounded them densely he could see nothing but smiles. It was like driving through a wilderness of happy children.

There began to appear different costumes. Women with white veils, as if they had been Mooresses; and men with red cloaks, and black round hats like soup plates.

“Those are the women from Sarragonza, and those are the men from Alpiorge. Every one of them is fitted by birth to meet the bulls.”

“Who’d have thought it?” Mr. Salt said, and he repeated: “Who’d have thought it?” He was thinking not of the women from Sarragonza, or of the men from Alpiorge in their red cloaks, but of the fact that he, the son of the Wesleyan Minister of Stoke Pogis, should be there, driving a car, and grimly enthusiastic, in a bad-tempered way, for the cause of a little Papist boy. For whenever he had driven a car in Roman Catholic countries Mr. Salt had been conscious of lasting disapproval. He relieved himself by saying bitterly:

“I suppose I ought to kiss Your Majesty’s hand?”

“You may do that to-morrow, Mr. Salt,” the King said. “And I will give you an order of knighthood.”

“Gracious and everything!” Mr. Salt exclaimed bitterly; and then, seeing a break in the crowd that forked out into two paths, Mr. Salt, whose nerves couldn’t stand any longer the slowness, called to the sailor in front of him to get out of the way, and hooting energetically, pressing his foot hard upon the lever and pulling the brakes, he shot towards the bodies of men and out into the blinding sunlight of a dusty field. It was closed in front of them by an immense wall of mouldering masonry. He spun the car swiftly and dexterously over the hundred yards of sunlit space and brought it up with a sharp curve exactly in front of a body of dusty soldiery that were waiting before a ruined arch in the wall. He had always taken trouble to master details, and he exclaimed — for he had taken the trouble to ask Lady Aldington’s courier all about it — he exclaimed to the officer in blue and pink who barred their way: