An Uncrowned King Chapter 7 Part 5

“Because,” continued Cyril, “you are making exactly the same mistake as Miss O’Malachy. I believe she thinks that she can tire Caerleon out by snubbing him, and you intend to make use of the information you have gained, by dint of spying on her mother, to terrify the whole family into leaving the kingdom. Miss O’Malachy is as anxious to be out of Thracia as you are to get her out; but you had better not put that beautiful plan of yours into execution unless you want Caerleon to go after her. He will have his answer, and if you leave things to me I will arrange that he shall have it soon, so that the affair may be over.”

“You seem very certain of success, milord.”

“If I am to succeed, I must be absolutely free. The first thing to be done is to give Lieutenant O’Malachy a commission in the palace guard.”

“And why, milord?”

“To keep him out of mischief, and to prevent his mother’s perceiving that we have discovered her little game. This is my test of the extent of your confidence in me, monsieur. Is it to be accepted?”

“It shall be,” returned M. Drakovics, after a severe mental struggle. “The matter is so important that it is worth even a dangerous experiment.”

When his protracted interview with M. Drakovics was over and Cyril went in search of Caerleon, his first words on finding him were to suggest that it would be a graceful recognition of the sacrifices Louis O’Malachy had made in the cause of Thracia to appoint him at once to a lieutenancy in the palace guard, thus showing him special favour by placing him close to the sovereign’s own person. Caerleon looked surprised.

“I think it’s a very good idea,” he said; “but you have always been so suspicious of the poor fellow’s motives that I should not have expected you to propose it. I will have the commission made out at once. And as we are now on the subject of the O’Malachy family, I may as well remind you of something of which Drakovics apparently is not aware. He attacked me this morning about marrying; but you know, if he doesn’t, that I intend to marry Miss O’Malachy, and no one else.”

“I never imagined that you wanted to imitate the Grand Signior of Roum, and marry twenty or thirty ladies at once,” said Cyril; but seeing Caerleon’s face darken, he added hastily, “I beg your pardon, old man. I was only joking. Do you intend to make formal proposals at once to papa for the hand of mademoiselle?”

“Not yet,” said Caerleon. “You see,” he went on quickly, as if it was a relief to unburden himself to his brother, “I can’t tell a bit how she’ll take it. She has never given me the least encouragement, and last night she scarcely spoke to me. Unfortunately, I can’t help guessing that the kingdom would weigh pretty heavily with her parents in my favour, and I don’t want the poor girl worried into marrying me, nor her life made a burden to her because she won’t. Madame O’Malachy has promised me her support; but though it sounds a little ungrateful, I would rather manage the business without her interference.”

“I don’t think any amount of worrying would make Miss O’Malachy do a thing she had made up her mind not to do,” said Cyril. “But seriously, Caerleon, I can’t believe she means to marry you. She gave you the cold shoulder pointedly enough last night. Can’t you chuck up the business, old man? I don’t imagine you care for her very particularly.”

“Don’t you?” asked Caerleon, looking down on him with a smile. “My dear boy, you are very young still.”

“If you mean to insinuate that I haven’t had twice as much experience in affairs of the kind as you have,” began Cyril, with a great show of indignation, “I’ll——”

“I daresay—ten times as much. That accounts for your ignorance.”

“Well, don’t look so horribly superior. It’s awfully riling for the other fellow, don’t you know? Now, look here, you leave this thing to me, and I’ll do you a good turn. You want to find out the state of Miss O’Malachy’s feelings before approaching her father. I’ll manage to get you a chance of speaking to her alone.”

“Thanks, but I think I can look after my own opportunities.”

“No, you can’t; not as king, with Drakovics and his spies always prowling about after you. Do you know that we had a fellow shadowing us last night?”

“Yes, I felt sure at the time that we were being dogged.”

“But why didn’t you say so?”

“I didn’t want to make you nervous.”

“Stuff!” cried Cyril, ungratefully. “You were afraid I should consider it wiser to give up the expedition and go back. Keep your thoughtfulness for Miss O’Malachy in future. After that piece of cheek, you don’t deserve a good turn, but I will mention that I am going down to the O’Malachys’ this morning to tell them about dear Louie’s commission. Shall I take any message from you?”

“I’ll come too,” said Caerleon, promptly.

“No, you won’t. You are due at the Hôtel de Ville, to hear old Drakovics spout from the balcony. It would be ‘Hamlet’ with Hamlet left out if you weren’t there. Well, shall I take her a bouquet in your name? No, that would be too pronounced—might be regarded by the family as a declaration. Shall I say anything to her for you?”

“Yes; you can say that I mean to begin this very day the inquiry she suggested to me.”

“All right; nothing like setting to work at once. Now, off you go to uniform and duty. I am the best off this morning.”

Sauntering down to the hotel, Cyril came upon Louis and his father in the hall, waiting impatiently for Madame O’Malachy, who was going with them to hear the speeches in the market-place. Going up-stairs, he found Nadia in the sitting-room, arranging the flowers for the table, carefully and conscientiously, as she did everything, adding a spray here, and taking one away there, and holding up the vase to see the effect, then lifting everything out and beginning again.

Before her stood a glass in which her mother had placed carelessly two or three blossoms and a spray or two of feathery fern, which seemed to have arranged themselves, but of which the effect was perfect. By the table stood Madame O’Malachy, buttoning her long gloves and criticising freely her daughter’s work.

“You have no taste, Nadia. Surely it must be evident, even to you, that a brick is not the best model for a bouquet? Don’t pull the flowers about so much; you will ruin them, and I cannot afford any more to-day.”

“I am commissioned to say that the hothouses at the palace are at your disposal, madame, if you would honour my brother by allowing him to send you some flowers,” said Cyril, coming forward.

“His Majesty’s conduct is angelic,” returned Madame O’Malachy. “But of what use are all the flowers in Thracia if the artist’s eye for their arrangement is wanting?” She had taken the vase from Nadia and removed half its contents, then, with a twirl here and a poke there, she transformed the remainder into a thing of beauty. “I regret to perceive that the artistic instinct, the soul of poetry, is wanting in my daughter. She is very thorough, extremely conscientious, but what one may call—not heavy, that would be unkind—shall we say solid? I am perpetually worrying myself to discover why she bears no resemblance at all to me. ‘A reversion to an earlier type,’ I suppose the scientific gentlemen would call it; I say that she is one of the trials of my life. For me, I am not at all conscientious, I do nothing thoroughly; but I think I am not heavy?” She paused with her eyebrows uplifted in interrogation; and Cyril, though he had been reflecting what wretchedly bad form it was for a woman to try to make her daughter feel small in this way, had presence of mind enough to answer that such a word could never be mentioned in the same breath with the name of Madame O’Malachy.

“But I must hurry away,” the lady went on, “or O’Malachy will come up to look for me. I shall hear your news when I return, Milord Cyril.”