Beaumanoir and Felix fortified the position
[Page 153]
Joan was the first to credit him. She ran to the window. "Oh, Alec, it is true!" she cried. "I was watching the crowd before you came, and it looks quite different now. Hundreds of men have gathered, and they are armed with knives and pistols. Something has made them angry, and the two soldiers are becoming alarmed. Oh, my dear, my dear! misfortune and I have come to you hand in hand!"
"It seems to me that you and Felix have saved my life," said Alec quietly. "Now, Beaumanoir, you and I must fortify the position. Joan, stand with your back to the wall between the windows. Felix, watch the houses opposite, and don't let the enemy take us in flank without warning. Thank goodness for an oak sideboard and a heavy table! Are you ready, Berty? Heave away, then! We shall occupy a box in the front row when Stampoff arrives with his hussars! By Jove! what a day! Twelve hours in that scorching sun and Joan waiting here all the time! Well, wonders will never cease! I wish we had one of those live shells we were experimenting with this morning. It would come in handy when the first panel gives way."
CHAPTER VIII
SHOWING HOW THE KING KEPT HIS APPOINTMENT
Joan's eyes could not leave Alec. She followed each movement of his lithe, strongly knit frame as he and Beaumanoir hauled the heavy pieces of furniture into position behind the door. She was not fully alive as yet to the real menace of the gesticulating mob surging in the street beneath, and her thoughts ran riot in the newly discovered paradise of being loved and in love.
For Alec had asked no questions, listened to no explanations. When he entered the room, he found her, half turned from the window, conscious that he was near, though trying to persuade her throbbing heart that Felix would not depart from an implied promise by sending him to her without warning. She strove to utter some words of greeting. Before she could speak, Alec's arms were around her, and he was kissing her lips, her forehead, her hair. She saw him as through a mist. Her first fleeting impression was that he had become older, sterner, more commanding. Kingship had set its seal on him. A short month of power had stamped lines on his face that would never vanish. But that sense of imperiousness was quickly dispelled by the enchantment of her presence.