“She arose angrily”
Phil went away, and Ethel remained alone. Within her there was something like a hurricane. What! those men, those man-monkeys who had been harassing her ever since she came to Paris,—it was all to make her buy their silence. How infamous! It humiliated her to see such obscure names mixed up with her life. And one of them was under obligations to her, living under her roof and sitting at her table! And it was he who offered her a book which might have been written by a drunken ape! Ah! if she had only known of his special talents, he would not be there now—that public malefactor, that little round-shouldered wretch, who dared to write her sonnets! What should she do with Caracal? Abandon him on a desert island? Or simply throw him into the water? No, not that. Hang him to the mast like a pirate? Come, now—she would not trouble her brain hunting condign punishments for him. She left the music-room, and walked on the deck; and at last, as if to wind up her long monologue with herself, she concluded: “Caracal is crazy!”
This idea, which put anger to one side and left room for pity, restored to Ethel her self-possession. “I will deal with him later on,” she said.
The immense distance between herself and such a man appeared to her all at once. Caracal seemed very little to her. And what moral wretchedness! All his energy was aimed at obtaining money, and he did not even succeed! And how punished he would be some day, when he should see his bad actions taking root and growing, and their poison doing its work.
Could she even understand the case? Who could ever know the extreme need, the passions which urge on a man like Caracal? Perhaps his was not consummate vice; perhaps he would repent some day. He was poor and alone, and she was powerful and rich, and perhaps might be a reigning duchess to-morrow—if she would only say yes with a nod. Yet here she was allowing herself to be embittered by the snarling of a poor fool. A queen, and she could not pardon! Phil had been more generous and humane than she!
She made a great effort to conquer her remorseless attitude—and won.
CHAPTER III
A CASTLE OF THE ADRIATIC
When the yacht moored in front of the ducal castle of Morgania, Morgana was surely absent, for no fantastic mirage welcomed their coming. Out of courtesy to the duke, a salvo of cannon was fired from the yacht; and the salute was returned, shot by shot, from the bastion.
“Poor duke!” said grandma. “We are making him waste his powder!”