"The sneers. First you'd hate them. Then you'd hate and despise me."

She grew serious. "Calme-toi, my dearest. Just consider things practically. Who is going to sneer at a great man?"

"I the first," replied Paul bitterly, his self-judgment warped by the new knowledge of the vanities and unsubstantialities on which his life had been founded. "I a great man, indeed!"

"A very great man. A brilliant man I knew long ago. A brave man I have known, in spite of my pride, these last two or three awful weeks. But last night I knew you were a great man--a very great man. Ah, mon Paul.

La canaille, whether it lives in Whitechapel or Park Lane, what does it matter to us?"

"The riff-raff, unfortunately," said Paul, "forms the general judgment of society."

The Princess drew herself up in all her aristocratic dignity. "My Paul well-beloved," said she, "you have still one or two things to learn.

People of greatness and rank march with their peers, and they can spit upon the canaille. There is canaille in your House of Lords, upon which, the day after to-morrow, you can spit, and it will take off its coronet and thank you--and now," she said, resuming her seat on the sofa, among the cushions, "let us stop arguing. If there is any more arguing to be done, let us put it off to another occasion. Let us dismiss the questions of marriage and Ionian islands altogether, and let us talk pleasantly like dear friends who are reconciled."

And with the wit of the woman who loves and the subtlety of the woman of the world she took Paul in her delicate hands and held him before her smiling eyes and made him tell her of all the things she wanted to know. And so Paul told her of all his life, of Bludston, of Barney Bill, of the model days, of the theatre, of Jane, of his father; and he showed her the cornelian heart and expounded its significance; and he talked of his dearest lady, Miss Winwood, and his work on the Young England League, and his failure to grip in this disastrous election, and he went back to the brickfield and his flight from the Life School, and his obsessing dream of romantic parentage and the p.a.w.ning of his watch at Drane's Court; and in the full tide of it all a perturbed butler appeared at the door.

"Can I speak a word to Your Highness?"

She rose. The butler spoke the word. She burst out laughing. "My dear,"

she cried, "it's past nine o'clock. The household is in a state of agitation about dinner. We'll have it at once, Wilkins."

The butler bowed and retired.

The Princess laughed again. "Of course you'll stay. I left Stephanie at Morebury."

And Paul stayed to dinner, and though, observing the flimsy compact, they dismissed the questions of Ionian islands and marriage, they talked till midnight of matters exceedingly pleasant.

CHAPTER XXIII

SO the lovers were reconciled, although the question of marriage was farther off than ever, and the Princess and Miss Winwood wept on each other's shoulders after the way of good women, and Paul declared that he needed no rest, and was eager to grapple with the world. He had much to do. First, he buried his dead, the Princess sending a great wreath and her carriage, after having had a queer interview with Jane, of which neither woman would afterwards speak a word; but it was evident that they had parted on terms of mutual respect and admiration. Then Paul went through the task of settling his father's affairs. Jane having expressed a desire to take over the management of a certain department of the business, he gladly entrusted it to her capable hands. He gave her the house at Hickney Heath, and Barney Bill took up his residence there as a kind of old watch-dog. Meanwhile, introduced by Frank Ayres and Colonel Winwood, he faced the ordeal of a chill reception by the House of Commons and took his seat. After that the nine-days' wonder of the scandal came to an end; the newspapers ceased talking of it and the general public forgot all about him. He only had to reckon with his fellow-members and with social forces. His own house too he had to put in order. He resigned his salary and position as Organizing Secretary of the Young England League, but as Honorary Secretary he retained control. To a.s.sure his position he applied for Royal Letters Patent and legalized his name of Savelli, Finally, he plunged into the affairs of Fish Palaces Limited, and learned the many mysteries connected with that outwardly unromantic undertaking.

These are facts in Paul's career which his chronicler is bound to mention. But on Paul's development they exercised but little influence.

He walked now, with open eyes, in a world of real things. The path was difficult, but he was strong. Darkness lay ahead, but he neither feared it nor dreamed dreams of brightness beyond. The Vision Splendid had crystallized into an unconquerable purpose of which he felt the thrill.

Without Sophie Zobraska's love he would have walked on doggedly, obstinately, with set teeth. He had proved himself fearless, scornful of the world's verdict. But he would have walked in wintry gloom with a young heart frozen dead. Now his path was lit by warm sunshine and the burgeon of spring was in his heart. He could laugh again in his old joyous way; yet the laughter was no longer that of the boy, but of the man who knew the place that laughter should hold in a man's life.

On the day when he, as chairman, had first presided over a meeting of the Board of Directors of Fish Palaces Limited, he went to the Princess and said: "If I bring with me 'an ancient and fish-like smell, a kind of, not of the newest, Poor-John,' send me about my business."

She bade him not talk foolishly.

"I'm talking sense," said he. "I'm going through with it. I'm in trade.

I know to the fraction of a penny how much fat ought to be used to a pound of hake, and I'm concentrating all my intellect on that fraction of a penny of fat."

"Tu as raison," she said.

"N'est-ce-pas? It's funny, isn't it? I've often told you I once thought myself the man born to be king. My dreams have come true. I am a king.

The fried-fish king."

Sophie looked at him from beneath her long lashes. "And I am a princess. We meet at last on equal terms."

Paul sprang forward impulsively and seized her hands. "Oh, you dear, wonderful woman! Doesn't it matter to you that I'm running fried-fish shops?"

"I know why you're doing it," she said. "I wouldn't have you do otherwise. You are you, Paul. I should love to see you at it. Do you wait at table and hand little dishes to coster-mongers, ancien regime, en emigre?"

She laughed deliciously. Suddenly she paused, regarded him wide-eyed, with a smile on her lips.

"Tiens! I have an idea. But a wonderful ideal Why should I not be the fried-fish queen? Issue new shares. I buy them all up. We establish fish palaces all over the world? But why not? I am in trade already.

Only yesterday my homme d'affaires sent me for signature a dirty piece of blue paper all covered with execrable writing and imitation red seals all the way down, and when I signed it I saw I was interested in Messrs. Jarrods Limited, and was engaged in selling hams and petticoats and notepaper and furniture and b.u.t.ter and--remark this--and fish. But raw fish. Now what the difference is between selling raw fish and fried fish, I do not know. Moi, je suis deja marchande de poissons, voila!"

She laughed and Paul laughed too. They postponed, however, to an indefinite date, consideration of the business proposal.

As Paul had foreseen, Society manifested no eagerness to receive him.

Invitations no longer fell upon him in embarra.s.sing showers. Nor did he make any attempt to pa.s.s through the once familiar doors. For one thing, he was proud: for another he was too busy. When the Christmas recess came he took a holiday, went off by himself to Algiers. He returned bronzed and strong, to the joy of his Sophie.

"My dear," said Miss Winwood one day to the curiously patient lady, "what is to come of it all? You can't go on like this for ever and ever."

"We don't intend to," smiled the Princess. "Paul is born to great things. He cannot help it. It is his destiny, I believe in Paul."

"So do I," replied Ursula. "But it's obvious that it will take him a good many years to achieve them. You surely aren't going to wait until he's a Cabinet Minister."

The Princess lay back among her cushions and laughed. "Mais non. It will all come in woman's good time. Laissez-moi faire. He will soon begin to believe in himself again."

At last Paul's opportunity arrived. The Whips had given him his chance to speak. His luck attended him, in so far that when his turn came he found a full House. It was on a matter of no vital importance; but he had prepared his speech carefully. He stood up for the first time in that strangely nerve-shaking a.s.sembly in which he had been received so coldly and in which he was still friendless, and saw the beginning of the familiar exodus into the lobbies. A sudden wave of anger swept through him and he tore the notes of his speech across and across, and again he metaphorically kicked Billy Goodge. He plunged into his speech, forgetful of what he had written, with a pa.s.sion queerly hyperbolic in view of the subject. At the arresting tones of his voice many of the withdrawing members stopped at the bar and listened, then as he proceeded they gradually slipped back into their places.

Curiosity gave place to interest. Paul had found his gift again, and his anger soon lost itself completely in the joy of the artist. The House is always generous to performance. There was something novel in the spectacle of this young man, who had come there under a cloud, standing like a fearless young Hermes before them, in the ring of his beautiful voice, in the instinctive picturesqueness of phrase, in the winning charm of his personality. It was but a little point in a Government Bill that he had to deal with, and he dealt with it shortly.

But he dealt with it in an unexpected, dramatic way, and he sat down amid comforting applause and circ.u.mambient smiles and nods. The old government hand who rose to reply complimented him gracefully and proceeded of course to tear his argument to tatters. Then an ill-conditioned Socialist Member got up, and, blundering and unconscious agent of Destiny in a fast-emptying House, began a personal attack on Paul. Whereupon there were cries of "Shame!" and "Sit down!"

and the Speaker, in caustic tones, counselled relevancy, and the sympathy of the House went out to the Fortunate Youth; so that when he went soon afterwards into the outer lobby--it was the dinner hour--he found himself surrounded by encouraging friends. He did not wait long among them, for up in the Ladies' Gallery was his Princess. He tore up the stairs and met her outside. Her face was pale with anger.

"The brute!" she whispered. "The cowardly brute!"

He snapped his fingers. "Canaille, canaille! He counts for nothing. But I've got them!" he cried exultingly, holding out clenched fists. "By G.o.d, darling, I've got them! They'll listen to me now!"

She looked at him and the sudden tears came. "Thank G.o.d," she said, "I can hear you talk like that at last."

He escorted her down the stone stairs and through the lobby to her car, and they were objects of many admiring eyes. When they reached it she said, with a humorous curl of the lip, "Veux-tu m'epouser maintenant?"

"Wait, only wait," said he. "These are only fireworks. Very soon we'll get to the real thing."

"We shall, I promise you," she replied enigmatically; and she drove off.

One morning, a fortnight later, she rang him up. "You're coming to dine with me on Friday, as usual, aren't you?"

"Of course," said he. "Why do you ask?"

"Just to make sure. And yes--also--to tell you not to come till half-past eight."

She rang off. Paul thought no more of the matter. Ever since he had taken his seat in the House he had dined with her alone every Friday evening. It was their undisturbed hour of intimacy and gladness in the busy week. Otherwise they rarely met, for Paul was a pariah in her social world.

On the Friday in question his taxi drew up before an unusual-looking house in Berkeley Square. An awning projected from the front door and a strip of carpet ran across the pavement. At the sound of the taxi, the door opened and revealed the familiar figures of the Princess's footmen in their state livery. He entered, somewhat dazed.