No one notices her, however. Every eye is bent upon the approaching procession. There comes the band of the White Guards,—how soul-stirring its music!—and there, too, is the milk-white charger Saladin, with arching neck and proud carriage; for does he not bear a precious charge indeed, in the person of Gloria de Lara?
The sun gleams down upon her gilded helmet, and lights with a living blaze the gold braiding upon her uniform. How beautiful she looks as she rides along with the glance of eager thousands upon her! How she loves the people! How they return that love! Surely none in that wildly enthusiastic crowd would seek to harm her?
Yes, one would though, and we know who. The madness in Victoire Hester’s brain is increased by the scene before her. More than ever she questions the right of this woman to be happy, to be the idol of thousands, while she is doomed to be friendless and miserable.
Will no one stay her hand? Will no one arrest and strike down the engine of death which she is steadily raising and bringing to bear full on Gloria’s breast? Ah! can no one in this moment of wild excitement see the danger that threatens the idol of the people? See! Victoire’s finger is on the trigger! God! can no one see and stay it?
Yes, one can see it, though she cannot stay it—one whose glance has faithfully swept the crowd ahead of Gloria all the way along. Only a pair of dark grey faithful eyes, with a wondrous wealth of lashes shading their intelligent depths, only a girl in years, yet with the light of genius stamped on the beautiful forehead above them. She sees and recognises Victoire Hester in spite of her changed aspect and the mad look in her eyes. Léonie Stanley sees the revolver raised and the assassin’s finger on the trigger. Deep into her horse’s flanks she drives her spurs. He springs furiously forward, brushes roughly against Saladin and his rider, and covers like a shield the person of Gloria de Lara.
Only just in time though! The revolver’s note rings forth, speeding from its lips the messenger of death; yet another note, and it claims two victims for its own. One is a wild, pale, haggard woman stretched out upon the street, from whose temple blood is flowing, the other a young officer of the White Guards’ Regiment, who has fallen forward on the grey neck of her horse, and whose blood is staining his dappled well-groomed coat. Dear little Léonie, she has not lived in vain; she has proved her love and gratitude at last; she has shown how ill-fitting was the cloak of Judas, in which the wicked had striven to clothe her. She has lived to prove her gratitude, and is faithful unto death.
CHAPTER X.
1999. It is a lovely scene on which that balloon looks down,—a scene of peaceful villages and well-tilled fields, a scene of busy towns and happy working people, a scene of peace and prosperity, comfort and contentment, which only a righteous Government could produce and maintain.
The balloon is passing over London, a London vastly changed from the London of 1900. Somehow it wears a countrified aspect, for every street has its double row of shady trees, and gardens and parks abound at every turn. This London, unlike its predecessor, is not smoke-begrimed, nor can it boast of dirty courts and filthy alleys like the London of 1900. Every house, great and small, bears the aspect of cleanliness and comfort, for poverty and misery are things no longer known.