Pemberton The Garden of Swords

1. Auflage 2018
ISBN: 978-3-96454-215-1
Verlag: Aeterna Classics
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 145 Seiten

Old Père Bonot, sunning himself before the doors of a café by the minster, held the Courrier du Bas-Rhin in his hand, and vouchsafed to Rosenbad, the brewer, and to Hummel, the vintner, such particulars of the forthcoming wedding as he found to be good. A glass of coffee stood at Père Bonot's elbow; his blue spectacles rested high upon a forehead where no wrinkles sat; the smoke from his cigarette hung in little white clouds about his iron-grey hair. He sat before the great cathedral of Strasburg; but the paper and its words carried him away to a little village of the mountains where, forty years ago, he had knelt at the altar with Henriette at his side, and an old priest had blessed him, and he had gone out to the sunny vineyards, hand in hand with his girl-wife to their home in a forest of the Vosges. There were tears in old Bonot's eyes when he took up the Courrier again.

Sir Max Pemberton (19 June 1863 - 22 February 1950) was a popular British novelist, working mainly in the adventure and mystery genres. He was educated at St Albans School, Merchant Taylors' School, and Caius College, Cambridge. A clubman, journalist and dandy (Lord Northcliffe admired his 'fancy vests'), he frequented both Fleet Street and The Savage Club.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Pemberton, Max

Leseproben

CHAPTER II
AT THE PLACE KLEBER

There had been a vast throng at the cathedral, but when the service was done, and the organist had played Mendelssohn’s “Wedding March” as a tribute to the English bride, and the congregation streamed again through the great western doors, only the very privileged and those who claimed some kinship with Madame Hélène were invited to her great house on the Place Kleber.

“It is a family wedding,” the old lady had said. “I have known Edmond so long that he is as my own son. Beatrix is more than a daughter to me. I do not want the whole world to see my tears. We will be alone my children—and I—when that ‘good-bye’ is said.”

Such was her resolution, but the heart prevailing over the will, many persuaded her and claimed kinship with the house of Görsdorf; and there were others, portly canons from the minster, sleek presbyters from the Lutheran churches, officers of the garrison, the mayor of the city—even the governor, the great General Uhrich himself, with his splendid cocked hat and his dainty “imperial,” and his glory in the city of Strasburg and her wondrous past. All these came to felicitate the young people; all remembered that it was a soldier’s wedding. The people declared that an army had gone to the Place Kleber. Lancers in their light blue tunics, with a word of regret for the kurtkas they had lost last year; hussars, whose spurs clattered over the splendid parquet flooring of the salon; cuirassiers, whose breastplates shone as silver; officers of Turcos fresh from Africa; gunners, engineers—a very deputation from that glorious army of France in which, Beatrix said, in her own pretty way, she had now a place. Henceforth, all that concerned the army of France must be dear to her. For France had given her Edmond—and she was his wife.

The day had been as a day of dreams to her. Now that it was nearly done, and she stood at grandmère Hélène’s side in the great room of the old house, she had but few memories of all its momentous happenings. She knew not why—but yesterday seemed as a day of remote years. She could recollect waking that morning and hearing the voice of old Hélène, who kissed her many times, and seemed already to be saying “good-bye.” She remembered her clumsiness when she had put on her splendid dress, and the coiffeur had come to weave the sprays of blossom into her rebellious hair; how her hands had trembled when she had clasped the diamond bracelet which was Edmond’s gift to her! And afterwards—what a whirl of sights and sounds and of familiar faces! “Felicitations!” All the city, surely, had come to the Place Kleber with that word on its lips.

Men and women, friends and strangers, they had striven one with another to be the first in kindnesses to Strasburg’s guest, the daughter of Madame Hélène’s daughter, the wife of one of the best of their soldiers. She asked herself if this was not, in one moment, the compensation for a girlhood which had earned many compensations; for a destiny which had bequeathed to her but a fitful memory of her father’s face, and had left her motherless when first she had learned to read the book of life through her mother’s eyes. What a pride of happiness that the bells should ring and the city should feast for her sake! She was no longer alone in the world, then. Ever the words “wife, you are his wife” echoed in her ears above the buzz of talk and the noises of the street without. Some change, indefinite, exquisite, seemed wrought within her mind. She heard no other voice but this—the voice of her heart telling her that the years of girlhood were for ever passed. She saw the future as through a mist of glad tears. The figures about her were shadowy figures moving, as it were, in some room of her dreams. Friends held her hand and spoke to her of the great ceremony in the cathedral. She answered them; yet knew not what she said. They called her “Madame Lefort.” How odd it seemed! “Madame, Madame!” She was Beatrix Hamilton no more. The hour had placed a great gulf between her and the old time. She did not mourn her girlhood nor regret it.

Notwithstanding Madame Hélène’s scruples, it was a brilliant gathering. All Strasburg bore witness to that. The city made the success of it an affair of its own, and sent a guard of honour to the Place Kleber, and the lancers’ band to play all the afternoon before the great house. Abbés and canons, generals and colonels raised their glasses and nodded their heads to the rhythm of the music. Sleeker Lutherans found dark corners wherein they could anticipate hunger without observation. Social leaders scanned the bride’s dress through critical glasses, and admitted that it was très bien.

“Her father was an English artist, hein? She has ideas, and they will help her by-and-by. If she were not so tall!—how can one be anything but gauche with a figure like that? And she wants style; certainly, she has a pretty gown, and that is something.”

The old lady who spoke, a wizened dame, who had buried two husbands, raised her pince-nez and appealed for assent to a fat abbé who held a glass of sparkling wine in his hand. But the abbé answered her with a perpetual smile, and a voice which repeated again and again—

“Ah, how pretty she is—how pretty!”

Other men took up her cause and pleaded it with courage.

Women assented grudgingly, and gathered together in shaded alcoves to remind each other of the mystery which had attended the life of her father, Sir Richard Hamilton. He had been a monster, as tradition said; yet few knew more or could add to the scant particulars which served for gossip in the salons of the city. They loved the suggestion of a scandal—as all the world loves it—these jewelled crones of Strasburg, and they feasted upon it and found it to be good, and sought therein a recompense for a beauty they could but half deny, and for a charm to which they would not submit.

Beatrix herself, standing by her husband’s side, heard none of these words. When she could forget the past and the future, and remember where she was and what the day meant to her, it was a pleasure to see how many of her friends had come to the old house on the Place Kleber. Colot, the aged abbé, who loved her as a father; the merry General de Failly, who had sworn to make a little Frenchwoman of her; pretty gossiping little Thérèse Lavencourt, who had schemed so incessantly to bring Edmond to Strasburg; Georgine, the friend of her girlhood, who thought so often of the young Englishman, Brandon North. Where was Brandon now, she asked? She saw him alone near the long windows of the balcony. Why was he not at Georgine’s side? He had been a year in Strasburg and yet had found no eyes to see how pretty Georgine was. That must be her business by-and-by when she had a house of her own, Beatrix thought. She realised her friendship for one of her own countrymen in that hour. Great as was the kindness which these people of Strasburg showed her, nevertheless she was a stranger among them. The fifteen years of her life she had spent in England had made her an Englishwoman beyond hope of change. She loved French things, yet did not love her own country the less because of them.

She beckoned Brandon to her side, and he came with reluctant steps. His strange and truly English dislike of any self-assertion had followed him to Madame Hélène’s house. Silently, in a corner by the window, he had listened to the parrot-like chatter of the women and the silly persiflage which passed among the men for the wit of Paris. When Beatrix beckoned him, he set down his cup and crossed the room slowly. He was one of the few there who wore a plain black coat and had no wealth of star and ribbon to apologise for a tongue but ill-equipped. He came and stood by her, with his fair hair tumbled upon his forehead and his hands ill at ease, and a strange, almost sardonic smile about his lips.

“Well,” she said, and her splendid dress rustled as she spoke, “are you the only one—”

He held her hand a moment in his. An odour of flowers and rare scents hovered about the place. He did not look into her eyes, but knew that hers were upon him.

“The only one in a black coat—yes; that’s my qualification, Madame Lefort.”

“Madame Lefort.” How odd it sounded! Yesterday he would have called her Mademoiselle Beatrix as the others did. He was one of her few friends. She would not have been cross if he had said “Beatrix,” as sometimes he had done when they went picnicing to the woods above Görsdorf.

“You do not congratulate me,” she said, withdrawing her hand quickly. “I don’t believe you were at the church.”

He turned and plucked a blossom of white rose from a vase. The petals were crumpled in his hand and scattered upon the carpet while he answered her.

“Of course I congratulate you,” he said slowly, “if the congratulations of a man in a frock coat are worth anything. There are so many important persons in colours here that you must excuse me if I have my doubts.” And then he asked suddenly, “What made you think that I was not at the church?”

She nodded her head to a fierce Turco on the other side of the room, and then said, as if it were a thing of no importance—

“I did not see you there.”

He continued to crumple the rose leaves.

“I was hidden by the splendour of Thérèse Lavencourt and of Colonel Poittevin. She spent her time saying her prayers and in begging him to stand upon a chair and tell her the names of the generals in the choir. I have learnt half the scandals of Strasburg this morning, and I shall learn...