Kophetua the Thirteenth

by Julian Stafford Corbett

He strode to the window to watch those that came and went at the palace gates, and so dissolve his thoughts. The beggars were crouching there as usual in the blazing sunlight, making deep-blue shadows under their broad hats and voluminous turbans and tattered cloaks. Here and there a leg or an arm, or a shaggy breast, baked to a ruddy brown, gave a glowing bit of colour amidst the grey of filth; and here and there in the blue shadows a forbidding face could be dimly seen distorted and screwed into deep-marked wrinkles, to keep out the fierce glare which beat on them from the parched roadway and the dusty walls.

Like all who pretended to any taste at that time, the King was an authority on chiaroscuro, and was never tired of studying the picture at his gates. But to-day it brought no sense of art. It only raised again the memory of Penelophon, and then all at once perfect purity and gentleness and the serenity of an unsullied soul seemed close within his grasp. It almost alarmed him to find how that which had been a mere fancy was growing in his mind to be a possibility. He began to think his senses must be strangely unhinged if for one moment he could harbour the preposterous thought that perhaps here after all was what he sought. The painting above the hearth seemed to be gaining over him the mystic influence which he had always permitted to the old knight's armour. In vain he recalled the beggar-maid in her dirt and ignorance; in vain he told himself it could never be as long as reason remained to him. Still the prospect would always be returning to him, and at each return it gained new strength.

He was turning away from the window that he might not see the beggars any longer, when a commotion amongst them attracted his attention. The bright lights and blue shadows and bits of warm colour broke up and intermingled into new combinations as they lazily scrambled together to pick up some coins that had been flung to them; and then he saw hurry by them the beautiful figure of Mlle de Tricotrin. She was coming for her morning walk, which she always took now, at his invitation, in the shady alleys of the palace gardens. He marked her downcast looks, the graceful folds of her clinging gown, gathered daintily at her breast with a flowing knot of ribbon, and the gentle refinement which her every movement told of. He watched her as she passed beneath his window, and felt his eyes dim at the sight of the marvellous beauty that could never be his.

Suddenly she raised her head to look up where he was, and ere he could withdraw their eyes had met. He had seen the sad, pleading look beneath the dark lashes; he had seen the soft flush that spread over the matchless face; he had seen the shapely head bowed again in deepest resignation down upon the troubled breast as she passed on from the cold, unanswering look he gave her; and now he was pacing the room again in strange agitation.

Could such beauty be the outward sign of the baseness which he had been taught to believe in? If one woman could be as good and pure and gentle as Penelophon, why should not another? Why should not this one? If she had jarred upon him so last night, did it not show that she was not the perfect schemer he had thought her? A knock at the door came to his relief. It was the Chancellor's hour of audience, and Turbo entered as calm and snarling and business-like as ever.

"Good morning, Chancellor," said the King, as usual. "Is there any business?"

"None, sire," answered Turbo—"at least, none of mine; but I believe General Dolabella has something to report."

"Why, what is that?" exclaimed the King.

"Oh, nothing, I fancy," said the Chancellor. "Some blunder of the officer in command of the party of gendarmes who arrived last night. There was a stupid brawl with the townsfolk, or something of that kind."