The Touchstone of Fortune Part 10

Presently the Duke of York arrived with the d.u.c.h.ess on his arm, and they took their places at the end of the room opposite the musicians' gallery.

Mary and I hastened to kiss their hands, and, withdrawing to a little distance, awaited Frances's arrival. After the others in the room had paid their respects to her Grace, she beckoned me to her chair and said:--

"Your cousin will arrive presently. I have just seen her. Look for a sensation when she comes. She is radiant, though her gown is as simple as a country girl's."

"I hear you have brought us a great beauty, baron," remarked the duke.

"Yes, your Highness. We who love her think so," I answered.

"You'll be wanting to be made an earl for your service in bringing her, eh, baron?" said the duke, laughing. Then bending toward me and whispering: "A word in your ear, Clyde. You may have it if you play your cards right and are persistent in importunity."

"No, your Highness. I ask for nothing save favor to my cousin," I replied.

"She is like to have enough of that and to spare, without asking, if she is half as beautiful as she is said to be," returned his Grace.

"Of that your Highness may now be your own judge," I returned. "Here she comes."

At that moment Frances entered on the arm of the Mother of the Maids, and the duke, catching sight of her, exclaimed:--

"G.o.d have pity on the other women! Half has not been told, baron. There is no beauty at court compared to hers. Earl? You may be a duke!"

While Frances and the Mother were making their way across the room to pay their respects to the duke and the d.u.c.h.ess, a buzz of admiration could be heard on every hand, and Mary whispered to me behind her fan:--

"If the king were unmarried, I would wager all I have that your cousin would be our queen within a month."

Count Grammont, who was standing behind me, leaned forward and whispered, "Your cousin, baron?"

"Yes, count," I answered.

"Mon Dieu!" he returned, shrugging his shoulders. "You will soon be a duke. We may not call her the queen of hearts, for already we have one, but surely she is the d.u.c.h.ess of hearts. I wish I might present her in Paris. Ah Dieu! She would make quickly my peace with my king!"

Poor Grammont's one object in life was that his peace might be made with his king. He lived only in the hope of a recall to Versailles.

Frances made a graceful courtesy, as she kissed their Highness's hands, and, when the brief ceremony of presentation to the duke was over, turned to Mary and me, glad to have a moment's respite beside us. She said nothing, but I could see that for the moment the gorgeous scene about us had bewildered her. The vast mouldings of gold, the frescoed cupids, nymphs and G.o.ddesses, the wonderful paintings, the brilliant tapestries, all fairly shone in the light of a thousand wax candles, while the polished floor of many-colored woods was a mirror under her feet, reflecting all this beauty.

The powdered and rouged courtiers, arrayed in silks, gold lace and jewels, seemed more like creatures from a land of phantasy than beings of flesh and blood. The men with their great curled wigs, their plumed, bejewelled hats and glittering gold swords, seemed to have stepped from the pages of a wonderful picture-book, and the women, whose gorgeous gowns exposed their bepowdered skin halfway to their waists, measuring from the chin, and whose lifted petticoats made a proportionate display, measuring from the feet, surely were brought from some fair land of folly and shame.

I touched Frances's hand to awaken her, and whispered: "Show neither wonder nor interest. See nothing, or these fools about us will laugh."

She laughed nervously, nodding her head to tell me that she understood.

"But I must look. I can't help it," she said.

"You must see it all without looking," I suggested, and Mary helped me out by saying:--

"It is all tinsel, not worth looking at. That is the quality of all you will see at court; gold foil, king and all."

Presently I saw the gentlemen removing their hats and tucking them under their arms, so I knew the king had entered, and felt sure he would soon come up to salute his hostess, the d.u.c.h.ess, near whom we were standing.

I told Frances that she was about to meet the king, and admonished her to keep a strong heart. She smiled as she answered:--

"I think I have met him already." Then she told us briefly of her encounter with the tipsy gentleman in the Stone Gallery.

She had entirely recovered her self-possession and was prepared to meet calmly the man who was a demiG.o.d to millions of English subjects.

The queen did not come with the king, so he loitered a moment among the courtiers before making his way to the d.u.c.h.ess, but the delay was short, and soon he presented himself. The d.u.c.h.ess rose when he approached, but hardly allowed him time to finish his bow till she took his arm, turned toward us, and smiled to Frances to approach. I touched my cousin's arm, gently thrusting her forward, and the next moment she was courtesying to the floor before the man who believed, in common with most of his subjects, that he owned by divine right the body and soul of every man in England, together with every man's ox and his a.s.s, his wife and his daughter, and all that to him belonged.

The king raised Frances, still retaining her hand, and bent most gallantly before her.

"I have met Mistress Jennings," said he, smiling, "and she told me to pay my compliments to the devil."

The king laughed, so of course the courtiers who heard him also laughed.

Instantly the news spread, and one might have heard on every hand, "The new maid told the king to go to the devil." But as the king seemed to be pleased, the courtiers were, too, and the new maid of honor became a person of distinction at once.

The king's unexpected remark disconcerted Frances for a moment, and her confusion added to her charm. In a moment she recovered herself, courtesied, and said:--

"I beg your Majesty not to remind me of my terrible mistake. I thought you were a bold cavalier, and of course did not know that I was speaking to my king. I offer my humble apology. Pray do not pay your compliments to the devil, but keep them for me, your Majesty's most devoted subject."

"Odds fis.h.!.+" exclaimed his Majesty. "I'm glad of the reprieve. I did not want to go to the devil, but Odds fis.h.!.+ I'd be willing to do so for a smile from my most devoted subject."

"Merci, sire!" answered Frances, with a courtesy and smiling as graciously as even a king could ask.

"If my most devoted subject will honor her king by asking him to dance the next coranto with her, he will do his best to make amends for his boldness earlier in the day, for he is naturally a modest king."

"A modest manner and a bold heart, I fear, your Majesty," returned Frances, making the most pleasing compliment she could have paid her sovereign. "May I be honored with your Majesty's hand for the next coranto?"

"It is my will," graciously answered the king.

The ball opened with a brantle which his Majesty danced with the d.u.c.h.ess, Frances remaining, meantime, with Mary and me, awaiting the coranto with the king, a royal favor which would win for her the envy of many a lady, as the king seldom danced.

When the brantle was finished, the king worked his way over to Frances, and when the bugle announced the coranto, she was saved the embarra.s.sment of seeking him, as she must have done had he not been by her side.

An altogether unexpected ordeal awaited Frances, for when the French musicians began to play and his Majesty led her out, she found herself and the king the only dancers on the floor except the Duke of York with Mistress Stuart, and the Duke of Monmouth with his father's friend, Lady Castlemain. Every one else stood by the wall, many of the ladies hoping to see the new maid fail, and all of the gentlemen eager to behold her and to comment.

The coranto is a difficult movement to perform gracefully. It consists of a step forward, a pause during which the dancer balances on one foot, holding the other suspended forward for a moment, then another step, followed by a bow on the gentleman's part and a deep courtesy by the lady.

I confess that I was uneasy, for Frances was a country girl, and the coranto was the most trying, though, if well done, the most beautiful of all dances.

Mary clasped my hand in alarm for Frances and whispered: "I do hope she dances well. The lack of grace in a woman is inexcusable. She had better not dance at all than poorly."

Mary's hopes were realized at once, for the king and Frances had not been on the floor three minutes till the gentlemen began to clap their hands softly, and in a moment a round of applause came from the entire audience, as often happened in those informal b.a.l.l.s.

The king turned to Frances, saying: "They are applauding your dancing.

Take your bow."

"No, it's all for your Majesty," she returned.

"No, no, my dancing is an old story to them. It is your grace they are applauding."