Phroso: A Romance

‘What ails you? Is it not well that she should love you?’

‘Let me alone,’ I cried; ‘I’ll not answer your questions.’ Why was the fellow to cross-examine me? Ah, there’s the guilty man’s old question; he loves a fine mock indignation, and hugs it to his heart.

Kortes drew back a pace and bowed, as though in apology; but there was no apology in the glance he fixed on me. I would not look him in the face. I drew myself up as tall as I could, and put on my haughtiest air. If he could have seen how small I felt inside!

‘Enough, Kortes,’ said I, with a lordly air. ‘No doubt your intentions are good, but you forget what is becoming from you to me.’

He was not awed; and I think he perceived some of the truth – not all; for he said, ‘You made her love you; that does not happen unless a man’s own acts help it.’

‘Do girls never rush uninvited on love, then?’ I sneered.

‘Some perhaps, but she would not,’ he answered steadily.

He said no more. I nodded to him and set forward on my way. He bowed again slightly, and stood still where he was, watching me. I felt his eyes on me after we had parted. I was in a very tumult of discomfort. The man had humiliated me to the ground. I hoped against hope that he was wrong; and again, in helpless self-contradiction, my heart cried out insisting on its shameful joy because he was right. Right or wrong, wrong or right, what did it matter? Either way now lay misery, either way now lay a struggle that I shrank from and abhorred.

I was somewhat delayed by this interview, and when I arrived at the house I found Mouraki already at breakfast. He apologised for not having awaited my coming, saying, ‘I have transacted much business. Oh, I’ve not been in bed all the time! And I grew hungry. I have been receiving some reports on the state of the island.’

‘It’s quiet enough now. Your arrival has had a most calming effect.’

‘Yes, they know me. They are very much afraid, for they think I shall be hard on them. They remember my last visit.’

He made no reference to Constantine, and although I wondered rather at his silence I did not venture again to question him. I wished that I knew what had happened on his last visit. A man with a mouth like Mouraki’s might cause anything to happen.

‘I shall keep them in suspense a little while,‘ he pursued, smiling. ‘It’s good for them. Oh, by the way, Wheatley, you may as well take this; or shall I tear it up?’ And suddenly he held out to me the document which I had written and given to Phroso when I restored the island to her.

‘She gave you this?’ I cried.

‘She?’ asked Mouraki, with a smile of mockery. ‘Is there, then, only one woman in the world?’ he seemed to ask sneeringly.

‘The Lady Euphrosyne, to whom I gave it,’ I explained with what dignity I could.

‘The Lady Phroso, yes,’ said he, (‘Hang his Phroso!’ thought I.) ‘I had her before me this morning and made her give it up.’

‘I can only give it back to her, you know.’

‘My dear Wheatley, if you like to amuse yourself in that way I can have no possible objection. Until you obtain a firman, however, you will continue to be Lord of Neopalia and this Phroso no more than a very rebellious young lady. But you’ll enjoy a pleasant interview and no harm will be done. Give it back by all means.’ He smiled again, shrugging his shoulders, and lit a cigarette. His manner was the perfection of polite, patient, gentlemanly contempt.

‘It seems easier to get an island than to get rid of one,’ said I, trying to carry off my annoyance with a laugh.

‘It is the case with so many things,’ agreed Mouraki: ‘debts, diseases, enemies, wives, lovers.’

There was a little pause before the last word, so slight that I could not tell whether it were intentional or not; and I had learnt to expect no enlightenment from Mouraki’s face or eyes. But he chose himself to solve the mystery this time.

‘Do I touch delicate ground?’ he asked. ‘Ah, my dear lord, I find from my reports that in the account you gave me of your experiences you let modesty stand in the way of candour. It was natural perhaps. I don’t blame you, since I have found out elsewhere what you omitted to tell me. Yet it was hardly a secret, since everybody in Neopalia knew it.’

I smoked my cigarette, feeling highly embarrassed and very uncomfortable.

‘And I am told,’ pursued Mouraki, with his malicious smile, ‘that the idea of a Wheatley-Stefanopoulos dynasty is by no means unpopular. Constantine’s little tricks have disgusted them with him.’

‘What are you going to do with him?’ I asked, risking any offence now in order to turn the topic.

‘Do you really like jumping from subject to subject?’ asked Mouraki plaintively. ‘I am, I suppose, a slow-minded Oriental, and it fatigues me horribly.’

I could have thrown the cigarette I was smoking in his face with keen pleasure.

‘It is for your Excellency to choose the topic,’ said I, restraining my fury.

‘Oh, don’t let us have “Excellencies” when we’re alone together! Indeed I congratulate you on your conquest. She is magnificent; and it was charming of her to make her declaration. That’s what has pleased the islanders: they’re romantic savages, after all, and the chivalry of it touches them.’

‘It must touch anybody,’ said I.

‘Ah, I suppose so,’ said Mouraki, flicking away his ash. ‘I questioned her a little about it this morning.’

‘You questioned her?’ For all I could do there was a quiver of anger in my voice. I heard it myself, and it did not escape my companion’s notice. His smile grew broader.

‘Precisely. I have to consider everything,’ said he. ‘I assure you, my dear Wheatley, that I did it in the most delicate manner possible.’

‘It couldn’t be done in a delicate manner.’

‘I struggled,’ said Mouraki, assuming his plaintive tone again, and spreading out deprecatory hands.

Was Mouraki merely amusing himself with a little ‘chaff,’ or had he a purpose? He seemed like a man who would have a purpose. I grew cool on the thought of it.

‘And did the lady answer your questions?’ I asked carelessly.

‘Wouldn’t it be a treachery in me to tell you what she said?’ countered Mouraki.

‘I think not; because there’s no doubt that the whole thing was only a good-natured device of hers.’

‘Ah! A very good-natured device indeed! She must be an amiable girl,’ smiled the Pasha. ‘Precisely the sort of girl to make a man’s home happy.’

‘She hasn’t much chance of marriage in Neopalia,’ said I.

‘Heaven makes a way,’ observed Mouraki piously. ‘By-the-by, the device seems to have imposed on our acquaintance Kortes.’

‘Oh, perhaps,’ I shrugged. ‘He’s a little smitten himself, I think, and so very ready to be jealous.’

‘How discriminating!’ murmured Mouraki admiringly. ‘As a fact, my dear Wheatley, the lady said nothing. She chose to take offence.’

‘You surprise me!’ I exclaimed with elaborate sarcasm.

‘And wouldn’t speak. But her blushes were most lovely – yes, most lovely. I envied you, upon my word I did.’

‘Since it’s not true – ’

‘Oh, a thing may be very pleasant to hear, even if it’s not true. Sincerity in love is an added charm, but not, my dear fellow, a necessity.’

A pause followed this reflection of the Pasha’s. Then he remarked: