They paid one or two visits, and left cards at several places. Madame Volkonsky had imagined that nothing could dull the exquisite pleasure of being a personage, of being followed, flattered, admired. She found out differently. The fame of her beauty and accomplishments had preceded her. Everywhere she received the silent ovation which is the right of a beautiful and charming woman—but her heart was heavy. At one place she passed Olivia and her father coming out as they were going in. Olivia, wrapped in furs, looked uncommonly pretty and free from care. As the two women passed, each, while smiling affably, wore that hostile air which ladies are liable to assume under the circumstances. The Colonel was all bows and smiles to Madame Volkonsky as usual, and refrained from calling her Eliza.
Nor did the presence of the Volkonskys in Washington conduce to Olivia’s enjoyment although it certainly did to her father’s. The Colonel was delighted. In the course of years, Eliza Peyton had afforded him great amusement. He was a chivalrous man to women, although not above teasing Madame Volkonsky, but he refrained from doing what poor Elise very much dreaded he would—telling of her American origin. She had admitted that her mother was an American—an admission necessary to account for the native, idiomatic way in which she spoke the English language, and Colonel Berkeley knowing this, did not hesitate to say that in years gone by, he had known Madame Volkonsky’s mother, and very cheerfully bore testimony to the fact that the mother had been of good family and gentle breeding. So instead of being a disadvantage to her, it was rather a help. But Olivia and herself were so distinctly antipathetic that it could scarcely fail to produce antagonism. And besides her whole course about Pembroke had shocked Olivia. Olivia was amazed—it was not the mere difference of conduct and opinion—it was the difference of temperament. Remembering that Madame Volkonsky had at least the inheritance of refinement, and was quite at home in the usages of gentle breeding, it seemed the more inexcusable. In all those years Olivia had been unable to define her feelings to Pembroke. She could easily have persuaded herself that she was quite indifferent to him except that she could not forget him. It annoyed her. It was like a small, secret pain, a trifling malady, of which the sufferer is ashamed to speak.
Not so Pembroke. The love that survives such a blow to pride and vanity as a refusal, is love indeed—and after the first tempest of mortification he had realized that his passion would not die, but needed to be killed—and after five years of partial absence, awkward estrangement, all those things which do most effectually kill everything which is not love, her presence was yet sweet and potent. The discovery afforded him a certain grim amusement. He was getting well on in his thirties. His hair was turning prematurely gray, and he felt that youth was behind him—a not altogether unpleasant feeling to an ambitious man. Nevertheless, they went on dining together at the Berkeleys’ own house, at the De Peysters’, at other places, meeting constantly at the same houses—for Pembroke went out more than he had ever done in Washington before, drawn subtly by the chance of meeting Olivia—although where once she was cool and friendly, she was now a little warmer in her manner, yet not wholly free from embarrassment. But neither was unhappy.
CHAPTER XVII.
A month—six weeks—two months passed after the Russian Minister’s ball. The Grand Duke had called informally on the President, accompanied of course by the Minister, but his visit to Washington was so brief that all formal courtesies were postponed until he returned from his travels in the Northwest, which would not be until spring. This was the time that Volkonsky looked forward to as deciding his fate. During the Grand Duke’s first brief visit, Pembroke did not know of Volkonsky’s diplomatic short-comings—nor until the last moment did he know that Volkonsky was Ahlberg. He was one of those intensely human men, who like fighting, especially if there is glory to be won—and he enjoyed a savage satisfaction in thinking that he would be the instrument of Ahlberg’s punishment—and the prospect of the catastrophe occurring during the Grand Duke’s visit, so there could be no misunderstanding or glozing over of the matter, filled him with what the moralists would call an unholy joy. He and Volkonsky had met often since the night of the ball, but never alone. The fact is, Volkonsky had his wife for a body guard. She was always with him in those days, sitting by his side in her carriage, or else close at his elbow. One day, however, as Volkonsky was coming out of the State Department, he met Pembroke face to face.
Pembroke had chafed with inward fury at the cleverness with which Volkonsky had managed to avoid him. Therefore when he passed the Russian Minister’s carriage with Madame Volkonsky sitting in it alone at the foot of the steps, he was certain that Volkonsky was in the State Department, and that he could catch him—for it had assumed the form of a flight and a pursuit. Pembroke took off his hat and bowed profoundly to Madame Volkonsky. She could not but fancy there was a glimmer of sarcasm in his manner—a sarcasm she returned by a bow still lower. Pembroke could have leaped up the steps in his anxiety to reach the building before Volkonsky left—but he controlled himself and mounted leisurely. Once inside the door, he started at a long stride down the corridor, and in two minutes he had, figuratively speaking, collared Volkonsky.
“I want to speak with you,” said Pembroke.
“With pleasure,” responded Volkonsky, “but I may ask you to be brief, as Madame Volkonsky awaits me in her carriage.”
“I will be brief. But I desire you to come to my club—here is my card—at six o’clock this evening.”
Volkonsky straightened himself up. He determined not to yield without making a fight for it.