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 Iría and Allard were the only two his caustic tongue spared and his ill humor passed 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 Iría," 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.
"Eleven o'clock, sire."
"You need not go when the Grand Duke arrives; I may want you afterward. Allard—"
"Sire?"
"I have been kind to you, if to no one else, I think. Kind, and constant. Perhaps I have guarded you from more pitfalls set by envy than you can conceive, or would credit. And you have served me, not Feodor or another. If you were forced to the choice now, would you follow the Regent or me?"
The question could not have been more unexpected or more difficult. Allard caught his breath, utterly at a loss. Deceive Adrian he would not. To forsake Stanief even in appearance was not to be considered, and yet to exasperate the jealous and exacting Emperor still further against his cousin was bitterly unnecessary.
"Sire—"
"Go on."
But he could not go on, his ideas in hopeless confusion.
"I am waiting."
"Sire, the Regent," he admitted with desperate candor.
Adrian laid his pencil carefully on the map and closed the atlas, saying nothing at all. Allard flushed to the roots of his fair hair.
"Not that I am ungrateful," he protested in hot distress. "Not that I do not remember, do not understand all that you have done for me, sire. And against you I would serve no one, not even him. I would hold my life a slight thing to give either of you. Sire," he took a step forward, his ardent gaze seeking the other's comprehension, "before the brother I loved, the woman I love, before any call, I would follow the Regent. He—I have no words for it. It is not that my loyalty to your Majesty is less, but that he claims me against the world."
"Happy Feodor," said Adrian coolly. "Do not distress yourself, Allard; if you had told me anything else I should not have believed you. Why," he suddenly lifted to the amazed American a glance all cordial, "it is pleasant to find that loyalty to any one still exists, to find one rock in this shaking quagmire. Here is the Regent; go down the room and find a book to read until we finish."
Dazed, Allard mechanically obeyed so far as to move down the apartment and pick up a book. But keen anxiety for the friend he could not aid kept his attention on the interview that followed, although it was beyond his hearing.
Stanief crossed to his ward with the dignified formality never relaxed between them, and bent over the offered hand. No shade of expression foretold the announcement both knew he was come to make, nor was Adrian on his part less impassive. The petulant boy of two years before had become a slim, self-contained youth, whose bearing, no less than his elaborate uniform, added much to his apparent age and height. If his dark young face did not resemble his cousin's except in feature, the difference was not in lack of equal firmness.
"Iría did not come to-day?" was the nonchalant greeting.
"No, sire. She was fatigued after last night's reception, and we did not understand your desire."
"Oh, I expressed none, except as it is always pleasant to see her. Madame was adorable last night, a very flower of her delicious South. It occurred to me that you yourself, cousin, did not appear to feel so well as usual."
"I was tired, sire," he replied simply.
Adrian frowned with some other emotion than anger, darting a swift regard at Stanief, who leaned back in his chair with a listlessness rare indeed in him. The Regent also had changed in the last two years; one does not mold a chaotic, struggling mass of conflicting elements into a ball to match the scepter without paying a price. Yet if the habit of command had curved a little more firmly the firm lips, if deep thoughts and watchful diplomacy had darkened calmness to gravity, some other and subtler influences had brought a singular underlying gentleness to his expression and kept hardness at bay. Adrian turned away his head half-impatiently, and did not speak at once.
"You devote too close an attention to state affairs, cousin," he rejoined. "Next year we will relieve you of them."
The accent was more than the words; together they brought Stanief's color.
"I shall resign my charge most willingly, sire," he answered, with dignity.
"I am glad to hear it; I fancied you might miss the regal game and find life monotonous. You have taken the task so completely from my hands that it causes no surprise to find you are wearied. I admit that you have spared me even the fatigue of consulting my wishes or opinions in regard to the government."
"The accusation is hardly just, sire. A suggestion of yours has never been disregarded nor has it failed of its serious effect."
"Ah?" drawled Adrian, with his most aggravating incredulity in the inflection.
Stanief raised his lashes and met the other's eyes steadfastly. Both comprehended the situation perfectly, comprehended the imminent break Adrian was forcing. And the Emperor did not soon forget the direct sorrow and reproach of that glance. But Stanief attempted no defense.
"Because," Adrian resumed, fixing his eyes on the table before him, "I have been told otherwise. I am rejoiced to learn the truth from you, cousin; especially as a rumor reached me this morning that a certain tax had been removed, against my wish. You doubtless know the measure of which I speak. I am glad to find it is not so."
"Pardon, sire; it is so," was the calm reply.
"The tax is removed?"
"Yes, sire."
The Adrian of two years before would have burst into furious passion; the one of to-day simply rose and walked to the nearest window. Stanief necessarily rose also, and stood by his chair, waiting. At the opposite end of the room Allard clenched his hands in helpless nervousness, forgetting to keep his pretense of reading. The low voices, the leisurely movements of the two, had not masked from him the crisis for the hopes and plans of years.
But Adrian made no scene. Probably no one realized less than the Regent himself how much the example of his own self-control had taught the same quality to his ward. When the young Emperor came back, only his extreme pallor betrayed the tempest within.
"Very well," he said resolutely. "Amuse yourself, my cousin; I can wait. Eleven months, is it not?"
The break, and the menace. Stanief saluted him quietly.
"A trifle less than eleven months, sire. May I assume your Imperial Majesty's permission to retire? I suppose it is scarcely worth while to reiterate the arguments as to the necessity of my action."
"Scarcely. Do not let me detain you from your many affairs, cousin. Ah, I believe Dalmorov is waiting out there; let me tax your courtesy so far as to ask you to send him to me."
He extended his hand carelessly; no longer as a sign of friendliness, but as a compulsion of homage.
"It is for you to command, sire," was Stanief's proudly unmoved response.
Adrian looked down at the bent head and put out his left hand in rapid, curious gesture, almost as if to touch caressingly the heavy ripples of dark hair,—the merest abortive movement, for the hand fell again at his side before even Allard saw.
"Thank you," he acknowledged composedly, and watched the other go.
Dalmorov entered presently, radiant with satisfaction, but Allard could have borne witness that the baron passed no pleasant hour with his irritable and irritating master. Like the fleck of a lash Adrian's tongue touched each weakness and stung each exposed hope of the courtier three times his age, until even the distrait American found himself compelled to amusement.
Stanief did not ride home that morning with the cheerful Vasili and bored Rosal, who awaited him. As he came down the wide steps between the usual parting, obsequious crowds, a girl leaned from a victoria that stood in the place of his own carriage,—Iría, opposite her the pale young Countess Marya.
"Will you ride with me, monseigneur?" invited the Gentle Princess, with her deliciously confiding glance and smile. "We were on the promenade, and I thought perhaps you would have finished—"
