Swords Reluctant

by Max Pemberton

I

Maryska had been out and about London with Harry Lassett upon more than one occasion, and this had been to the knowledge and with the approval both of Silvester and of Gabrielle. Both had known Harry for many years, and he had become almost as the son of the house. Their own duties carried them so much abroad during the terrible days that they were well content when the young man did what he could to amuse the child during the long hours; and they used to hear of the mutual escapades with the interest they would have bestowed upon two children come home from school and eager for the holidays.

Here their trust went out wholly upon their own plane of honor and convention. The boy had been to a public school and to Cambridge. He was of a type which three hundred years of a great tradition have moulded finally and left as a corner-stone of the national society. A firm faith in the blessings of domestic freedom had always been characteristic of Silvester's teaching. Trust your sons, and they will not fail you, he had said.

But, if he knew that Harry had taken Maryska to such places as a young woman of her age (and one who was a stranger to the City) might visit, he would have been astounded and dismayed had he known that she had gone to Harry's lodgings, and latterly had made a practice of visiting him there. This was concealed by both as a secret between them of which no whisper must be heard. It was the first scene of an act of drama speedily to follow. Maryska would never forget that day. They had been to Madame Tussaud's, where a wretched group of people were sheltered from the cold, and tried to forget the shadow which lay upon the City. Returning towards five o'clock, Maryska had told him that she knew the truth about England at last, and that it was the arctic land of which her dead father had told her.

"They come here in little ships," she said, "and it is to find le Pôle Nord. There was a café of that name in Dijon, and once when we were very poor I danced there and got money for him. He beat me when he found it out, and that night I hated him, and went back to dance once more. That is what a girl should do when a man beats her! Ah! I shall run away from you yet, bête sauvage."

He laughed in a great boyish way, and drew her arm the tighter within his own. How good it seemed to have these bright eyes looking up into his own, to hear the little savage prattling, and to know that she was happy. Though the kingdom of England had perished that night, these two would not have cared a scudo. The eternal voice of youth called them, and they bent to it as "marigolds to the sun."

"Do you think I shall beat you, Maryska? Is that in your head? You are a rum little devil, I must say!"

She took it rather as a compliment.

"I do not know what you will do when you are angry. The English are difficult to understand. I think they are afraid of women. Mr. Silvester runs away when I stamp my foot. I have heard him shut his door when I come down the stairs. Bon Dieu! what a cat of a man—and he is a priest, and the people do not know that he is afraid of women! Shall we go to your lodgings, Harry—shall I make you some coffee there? It will be ripping,—and they would be so angry if they knew. Let us hurry on, for it is late—to your lodgings, I say."

He was a good deal taken aback, and argued with her while she trotted by his side; all her strength returned, all her youth triumphant. To his rooms! That was a new proposition, to be sure. And what would Gabrielle say if she knew of it?