“And the others, how did they take it?”
“Count Tarrocco said he'd retire, sir, that he could not dine where the host was too ill to receive him; but the Duc de Campo Stretto said it was impossible they could leave the room while a 'Royal Highness' continued to remain in it; and they all agreed with him.”
“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Upton, in a low tone. “I hope the dinner is a good one?”
“It is exquisite, sir; the Prince ate some of the caviare soup, and was asking a second time for the 'pain des ortolans' when I left the room.”
“And the wine, Pipo? have you given them that rare 'La Rose'?”
“Yes, your Excellency, and the 'Klausthaller cabinet;' his Royal Highness asked for it.”
“Go back, then, now. I want for nothing more; only drop in here by and by, and tell me how all goes on. Just light that pastil before you go; there—that will, do.”
And once more his Excellency was left to himself. In that vast palace,—the once home of a royal prince,—no sounds of the distant revelry could reach the remote quarter where he sat, and all was silent and still around him, and Upton was free to ruminate and reflect at ease. There was à sense of haughty triumph in thinking that beneath his roof, at that very moment, were assembled the great representatives of almost every important state of Europe, to whom he had not deigned to accord the honor of his presence; but though this thought did flit across his mind, far more was he intent on reflecting what might be the consequences—good or evil—of the incident. “And then,” said he, aloud, “how will Printing House Square treat us? What a fulminating leader shall we not have, denouncing either our insolence or our incompetence, ending with the words: 'If, then, Sir Horace Upton be not incapacitated from illness for the discharge of his high functions, it is full time for his Government to withdraw him from a sphere where his caprice and impertinence have rendered him something worse than useless;' and then will come a flood of petty corroborations,—the tourist tribe who heard of us at Berlin, or called upon as at the Hague, and whose unreturned cards and uninvited wives are counts in the long indictment against us. What a sure road to private friendships is diplomacy! How certain is one of conciliating the world's good opinion by belonging to it! I wish I had followed the law, or medicine,” muttered he; “they are both abstruse, both interesting; or been a gardener, or a shipwright, or a mathematical instrument maker, or—” Whatever the next choice might have been we know not, for he dropped off asleep.
From that pleasant slumber, and a dream of Heaven knows what life of Arcadian simplicity, of rippling streams and soft-eyed shepherdesses, he was destined to be somewhat suddenly, if not rudely, aroused, as Franchetti introduced a stranger who would accept no denial.
“Your people were not for letting me up, Upton,” cried a rich, mellow voice; and Harcourt stood before him, bronzed and weather-beaten, as he came off his journey.