Jack Hinton: The Guardsman

As we descended the stairs, I heard my mother’s carriage announced, and could just see her and my cousin handed to it by some Austrian officers as we entered the supper-room.

The incessant crash and din of the enormous banquet-ing-room, its crowd and heat, its gorgeous table-equipage and splendid guests, were scarce noticed by me as I followed O’Grady half mechanically towards the end of the room. For some time I remained stupidly unconscious of all around; and it was only after a very considerable time that I descried that immediately in front of where we stood Mrs. Paul Rooney was seated – the Emperor of Russia on her right, the King of Prussia on her left hand; Swartzenburg, Blucher, Talleyrand, Nesselrode, and many others equally distinguished occupying places along the board. Her jocund laugh and merry voice, indeed, first attracted my attention.

‘By Jove! she does it admirably,’ said O’Grady, who for full five minutes had been most critically employed scrutinising Mrs. Paul’s manner. ‘Do you remark the tact with which she graduates her attentions to the emperor and the king? And look at the hauteur of her bearing to old Blucher! But, hush! what’s coming?’

A kind of suppressed murmur buzzed along the crowded room, which, subsiding into a dead silence, the Emperor Alexander rose, and addressing the guests in a few but well-chosen words in English, informed them he had received permission from their amiable and captivating hostess to propose a toast, and he took the opportunity with unqualified delight to give the health of ‘the Prince Regent.’ A perfect thunder of applause acknowledged this piece of gracious courtesy, and a ‘hip! hip! hurrah!’ which astonished the foreigners, shook the very roof. While the deafening shouts rose on every side, Mrs. Paul wrote a line with her pencil hastily on her card, and turning round gave it to a Cossack aide-de-camp of the emperor to deliver into Mr. Rooney’s hands. Either from the excitement of the moment or his imperfect acquaintance with English, the unlucky Cossack turned for an explanation towards the first British officer near him, who happened to be O’Grady.

‘What does this mean?’ said he in French.

‘Ah,’ said Phil, looking at it, ‘this is intended for that gentleman at the foot of the table. You see him yonder – he’s laughing now. Come along, I’ll pilot you towards him.’

Suspecting that O’Grady’s politeness had some deeper motive than mere civility, I leaned over his shoulder and asked the reason of it.

‘Look here,’ said he, showing me the card as he spoke, on which was written the following words: ‘Make the band play “God Save the King “; the emperor wishes it.’

‘Come with us, Jack,’ whispered O’Grady; ‘we had better keep near the door.’

I followed them through the dense crowd, who were still cheering with all their might, and at last reached the end of the table, where Paul himself was amusing a select party of Tartar chiefs, Prussian colonels, Irish captains, and Hungarian nobles.

‘Look here,’ said Phil, showing me the card, which in his passage down the room he had contrived to alter, by rubbing out the first part and interpolating a passage of his own; making the whole run thus —

‘Sing the “Cruiskeen Lawn”; the emperor wishes it.’

I had scarcely time to thrust my handkerchief to my mouth and prevent an outbreak of laughter, when I saw the Cossack officer present the card to Paul with a deep bow. Mr. Rooney read it – surveyed the bearer; read it again – rubbed his eyes, drew over a branch of wax-candles to inspect it better, and then, directing a look to the opposite extremity of the table, exchanged glances with his spouse, as if interrogating her intentions once more. A quick, sharp nod from Mrs. Paul decided the question thus tacitly asked; and Paul, clearing off a tumbler of sherry, muttered to himself, ‘What the devil put the “Cruiskeen Lawn” into his Majesty’s head I can’t think; but I suppose there’s no refusing.*

A very spirited tapping with the handle of his knife was now heard to mix with the other convivial sounds, and soon indeed to overtop them, as Paul, anxious to fulfil a royal behest, cleared his throat a couple of times, and called out, ‘I’ll do the best I can, your Majesty’; and at once struck up —

‘Let the farmer praise his grounds,
Let the huntsman praise his hounds,
And talk of the deeds they had done;
But I more blest than they – ’

Here Paul quavered, and at last the pent-up mirth of the whole room could endure no more, but burst forth into one continuous shout of laughter, in which kings, dukes, ambassadors, and field-marshals joined as loudly as their neighbours. To hear the song was utterly impossible; and though from Mr. Paul’s expanded cheeks and violent gesticulation it was evident he was in full chant, nothing could be heard save the scream of laughing which shook the building – an emotion certainly not the less difficult to repress, as Mrs. Paul, shaking her hand at him with passionate energy, called out —

‘Oh, the baste! he thinks he’s on circuit this minit!’ As for myself, half choking and with sore sides, I never recovered till I reached the street, when O’Grady dragged me along, saying as he did so —

‘We must reach home at once. Nothing but a strong alibi will save my character.’

CHAPTER LIX. FRESCATI’S

I was not sorry when I heard the following morning that my mother would not appear before dinner-hour. I dreaded the chance of any allusion to Miss Bellow’s name requiring explanation on my part; and the more so, as I myself was utterly lost in conjectures as to the reason of her singular reception of me.

Julia, too, appeared more out of spirits than usual She pleaded fatigue; but I could see that something lay heavily on her mind. She conversed with evident effort, and seemed to have a difficulty in recalling her faculties to the ordinary topics of the day. A thought struck me that perhaps De Vere’s conduct might have given cause for her depression; and gradually I drew the conversation to the mention of his name, when I soon became undeceived on this point. She told me with perfect unconcern how my father had tracked out the whole line of his duplicity and calumny regarding me, and had followed the matter up by a representation to the duke at the head of the army, who immediately commanded his retirement from the Guards. Later on, his family influence had obtained his appointment as attaché to the embassy at Paris; but since their first rupture he had discontinued his visits, and now had ceased to be acknowledged by them when they met.

My cousin’s melancholy not being then attributable to anything connected with De Vere, I set myself to work to ascertain whence it proceeded; and suddenly the thought struck me that perhaps my mother’s surmise might have some foundation, and that Julia, feeling an affection for me, might have been hurt at my evident want of attention towards her since we met.

I have already begged of my reader to separate such suspicions from the coxcombry of the lady-killer, who deems every girl he meets his victim. If I did for a moment imagine that my cousin liked me, I did so with a stronger sense of my own unworthiness to merit her love than if I myself had sought her affection. I had felt her superiority to myself too early in life to outlive the memory of it as we grew older. The former feeling of dread which I entertained of Julia’s sarcasm still lived within me, and I felt keenly that she who knew the weaknesses of the boy was little likely to forget them in reflecting over the failures of the man; and thus, if she did care for me, I well knew that her affection must be checkered by too many doubts and uncertainties to give it that character of abiding love which alone could bring happiness. I perceived clearly enough that she disliked O’Grady. Was it, then, that, being interested for me, she was grieved at my great intimacy with one she herself did not admire, and who evidently treated her with marked coldness and reserve?

Harassed with these suspicions, and annoyed that those I had hoped would regard each other as friends avoided every opportunity of intimacy, I strolled forth to walk alone, my mind brooding over dark and disagreeable images, and my brain full of plans all based upon disappointed hopes and blighted expectations. To my mother’s invitation to dinner for that day O’Grady had returned an apology; he was engaged to his friend M. Guillemain, with whom he was also to pass the morning; so that I was absolutely without a companion.

When first I issued from the Place Vendôme, I resolved at all hazards to wait on the Rooneys, at once to see Miss Bellew, and seek an explanation, if possible, for her manner towards me. As I hastened on towards the Chaussée, however, I began to reflect on the impropriety of such a course, after the evident refusal she had given to any renewal of acquaintance. ‘I did know Mr. Hinton,’ were the words she used – words which, considering all that had passed between us, never could have been spoken lightly or without reason. A hundred vague conjectures as to the different ways in which my character and motives might have been slandered to her occupied me as I sauntered along. De Vere and Burke were both my enemies, and I had little doubt that with them originated the calumny from which I now was suffering; and as I turned over in my thoughts all the former passages of our hatred, I felt how gladly they would embrace the opportunity of wounding me where the injury would prove the keenest.

Without knowing it, I had actually reached the street where the Rooneys lived, and was within a few paces of their house. Strangely enough, the same scene I had so often smiled at before their house in Dublin was now enacting here – the great difference being, that instead of the lounging subs, of marching regiments, the swaggering cornets of dragoons, the overdressed and underbred crowds of would-be fashionables who then congregated before the windows or curvetted beneath the balcony, were now the generals of every foreign service, field-marshals glittering with orders, powdered diplomatists, cordoned political writers, savants from every country in Europe, and idlers whose bons mots and smart sayings were the delight of every dinner-table in the capital; all happy to have some neutral ground where the outposts of politics might be surveyed without compromise or danger, and where, amid the excellences of the table and the pleasures of society, intrigues could be fathomed or invented under the auspices of that excellent attorney’s wife, who deemed herself meanwhile the great attraction of her courtly visitors and titled guests.

As I drew near the house I scarcely ventured to look towards the balcony, in which a number of well-dressed persons were now standing chatting together. One voice I soon recognised, and its every accent cut my very heart as I listened. It was Lord Dudley de Vere, talking in his usual tone of loud assumption. I could hear the same vacant laugh which had so often offended me; and I actually dreaded lest some chance allusion to myself might reach me where I stood. There must be something intensely powerful in the influence of the human voice, when its very cadence alone can elevate to rapture or sting to madness. Who has not felt the ecstasy of some one brief word from ‘lips beloved,’ after long years of absence; and who has not experienced the tumultuous conflict of angry passions that rise unbidden at the mere sound of speaking from those we like not? My heart burned within me as I thought of her who doubtless was then among that gay throng, and for whose amusement those powers of his lordship’s wit were in all likelihood called forth; and I turned away in anger and in sorrow.

As the day wore on I could not face towards home. I felt I dare not meet the searching questions my mother was certain to ask me; nor could I endure the thought of mixing with a crowd of strangers, when my own spirits were hourly sinking. I dined alone at a small café in the Palais Royal, and sat moodily over my wine till past eleven o’clock. The stillness of the room startled me at length, and I looked up and found the tables deserted; a sleepy waiter lounged lazily on a bench, and the un-trimmed candles and disordered look of everything indicated that no other guests were then expected.

‘Where have they gone to?’ said I, curious to know what so suddenly had taken the crowd away.

‘To Frescati’s, monsieur,’ said the waiter; ‘the salon is filling fast by this time.’

A strange feeling of dislike to being alone had taken hold on me, and having inquired the way to the Rue Richelieu from the servant, I issued forth.

What a contrast to the dark and gloomy streets of Paris, with their irregular pavement, was the brilliantly lighted vestibule, with its marble pillars and spacious stair rising gracefully beyond it, which met my eyes as I entered Frescati’s! Mingling with the crowd of persons who pressed their way along, I reached a large antechamber where several servants in rich liveries received the hats and canes of the visitors who thronged eagerly forward, their merry voices and gay laughter resounding through the arched roof.

As the wide doors were thrown open noiselessly, I was quite unprepared for the splendour of the scene. Here were not only officers of rank in all the gala of their brilliant uniforms, and civilians in full dress, shining in stars and decorations, but ladies also, with that perfection of toilette only known to Parisian women, their graceful figures scattered through the groups, or promenading slowly up and down, conversing in a low tone; while servants passed to and fro with champagne and fruit-ices on massive silver salvers, their noiseless gesture and quiet demeanour in perfect keeping with the hushed and tranquil look of all around. As I drew closer to the table I could mark that the stillness was even more remarkable; not a voice was heard but of the croupier of the table, as with ceaseless monotony he repeated: ‘Faites le jeu, messieurs! Le jeu est fait. Noir perd, et couleur gagne.

Rouge perd, et la couleur – ’ The rattle of the rake and the chink of the gold followed, a low muttered ‘Sacre!’ being the only sound that mingled with them.

But I could mark, that, although the etiquette of ruin demanded this unbroken silence, passion worked in every feature there. On one side was an old man, his filmy eyes shaded by his hand from the strong glare of wax-lights, peering with eagerness and tremulous from age and excitement as the cards fell from the banker’s hands, his blanched lips muttering each word after the croupier, and his wasted cheek quivering as the chances inclined against him. Here was a bold and manly face, flushed and heated, whose bloodshot eye ranged quickly over the board, while every now and then some effort to seem calm and smile would cross the features, and in its working show the dreadful struggle that was maintained within. And then again a beautiful girl, her dark eye dilated almost to a look of wild insanity, her lips parted, her cheeks marked with patches of white and red, and her fair hands clenched, while her bosom heaved and fell as though some pent-up agony was eating at her very heart.

At the end of the table was a vacant chair, beside which an officer in a Prussian uniform was standing, while before him was a small brass-clasped box. Curious to know what this meant, I turned to see to which of those about me I might venture to address a question, when suddenly my curiosity became satisfied without inquiry. A loud voice talking German with a rough accent, the heavy tramp of a cavalry boot clanking with large spurs, announced the approach of some one who cared little for the conventional silence of the rooms; and as the crowd opened I saw an old man in blue uniform, covered with stars, elbow his way towards the chair. His eyebrows of shaggy grey almost concealed his eyes as effectually as his heavy moustache did his mouth. He walked lame, and leaned on a stick, which, as he took his place in the chair, he placed unceremoniously on the table before him. The box, which was opened the moment he sat down, he now drew towards him, and plunging his hand into it drew forth a handful of napoleons, and, without waiting to count, he threw on the table, uttering in a thick guttural voice the one word ‘Rouge.’ The impassive coldness of the croupier as he pronounced his habitual exordium seemed to move the old man’s impatience, as he rattled his fingers hurriedly among the gold and muttered some broken words of German between his teeth. The enormous sum he betted drew every eye towards his part of the table – of all which he seemed totally regardless, as he raked in his winnings, or frowned with a heavy lowering look as often as fortune turned against him. Marshal Blucher – for it was he – was an impassioned gambler, and needed not the excitement of the champagne, which he drank eagerly from time to time, to stimulate his passion for play.

As I turned from the rouge et noir table, I remarked that every now and then some person left the room by a small door, which, concealed by a mirror, had escaped my attention when I entered. On inquiry I found that this passage led to a secret part of the establishment, which only a certain set of players frequented, and where the tables were kept open during the entire day and night. Curious to see the interior of this den of greater iniquity, I presented myself at it, and on opening found myself in a narrow corridor, where a servant demanded my billet. Having informed him that I was merely there from motives of curiosity, I offered him a napoleon, which speedily satisfied his scruples. He conducted me to the end of the gallery, where, touching a spring, the door opened, and I found myself in a room considerably smaller than the salon, and, with the exception of being less brilliantly lighted, equally splendid in its decorations. Around on all sides were small partitions, like the cells in a London coffee-house, where tables were provided for parties to sup at. These were now unoccupied, the greater attraction of high play having drawn every one around the table, where the same monotonous sounds of the croupier’s voice, the same patter of the cards, and the same clinking of the gold continued unceasingly. The silence of the salon was as nothing to the stillness that reigned here. Not a voice save the banker’s was ever heard; each player placed his money on the red or black square of the table without speaking, and the massive rouleaus were passed backwards and forwards with no other sound save the noise of the rake. I remarked, too, that the stakes seemed far heavier; crumpled rolls of billets de banque were often thrown down, and from the muffled murmur of the banker I could hear such sums as ‘seven thousand francs,’ ‘ten thousand francs,’ called out.

It was some time before I could approach near enough to see the play; at last I edged my way to the front, and obtained a place behind the croupier’s chair, where a good view of the table was presented to me. The different nations, with their different costumes, tongues, and expressions so strangely congregated, were a study that might have amused me for a long time, had not a chance word of English spoken close by me drawn off my attention.

Immediately in front, but with their backs towards me, sat two persons, who seemed, as was often the habit, to play in concert. A large heap of gold and notes lay before them, and several cards, marked with pin-holes to chronicle the run of the game, were scattered about. Unable to see their faces, I was struck by one singular but decisive mark of their difference in condition and rank. The hands of one were fair and delicate almost as a woman’s – the blue veins circling clearly through them, and rings of great price and brilliancy glittering on the fingers; those of the other were coarse, brown-stained, and ill cared for – the sinewy fingers and strong bony knuckles denoting one accustomed to laborious exertions. It was strange that two persons, evidently so wide apart in their walks in life, should be thus associated; and feeling a greater interest from the chance phrase of English one of them had dropped, I watched them closely. By degrees I could mark that their difference in dress was no less conspicuous; for although the more humble was well and even fashionably attired, he had not the same distinctive marks which characterised his companion as a person of class and condition. While I looked, the pile of gold before them had gradually melted down to some few pieces; and as they bent down their heads over the cards, and concerted as to their play, it was clear that by their less frequent ventures they were becoming more cautious.

‘No, no I’ said he, who seemed to be the superior, ‘I’ll not risk it.’

‘I say yes, yes!’ muttered the other, in a deeper voice; ‘the rouge can’t go on for ever: it has passed eleven times.’

‘I know,’ said the former bitterly; ‘and I have lost seventeen thousand francs.’

‘You have lost!’ retorted the other savagely, but in the same low tone; ‘why not we? Am I for nothing in all this?’

‘Come, come, Ulick, don’t be in a passion!’

The name and the tone of the speaker startled me. I leaned forward; my very head reeled as I looked. It was Lord Dudley de Vere and Ulick Burke. The rush of passionate excitement that ran through me for a minute or two, to be thus thrown beside the two only enemies I had ever had, unnerved me so far that I could not collect myself. To call them forth at once, and charge them with their baseness towards me; to dare them openly, and denounce them before that crowded assembly – was my first rapid thought. But from this wild thrill of anger I was soon turned, as Burke’s voice, elevated to a tone of passion, called out —

‘Hold! I am going to bet!’

The banker stopped; the cards still rested in his hands.

‘I say, sir, I will do it,’ said Burke, turning to De Vere, whose cheek was now pale as death, and whose disordered and haggard air was increased by his having torn off his cravat and opened the collar of his shirt. ‘I say I will; do you gainsay me?’ continued he, laying on the words an accent of such contemptuous insolence that even De Vere’s eye fired at it. ‘Vingt mille francs, noir,’ said Burke, placing his last billet on the table; and the words were scarce spoken when the banker cried out —

‘Noir perd et passe.’