Part 37 (2/2)

I will tell you why: it was because I had a sort of instinct that G.o.d, whom I serve continually with tears and prayers, would not fail in His day to show me her face: and to-day you are here. Do you suppose, Frankl, that you will go away without telling me where she is? And in order to hurry you, listen to what I say to your warders--”

He touched a b.u.t.ton in the bal.u.s.trade, and to the warders said: ”If at any time this man should demand pencil and paper, supply them, and take to your Admiral what he writes. To-day his food shall be fare from your own table; to-morrow three loaves and water; from the third day one loaf and water; till further orders”.

Up shot Frankl's s.h.i.+vering arms, while Hogarth, training his ermines and purples, paced away.

That was on the day following the Manifesto.

XL

THE WEDDING

By the time Frankl's three loaves had become one, that amazement with which men received the Manifesto had commenced to give place to more coherent impressions.

He was not a ”Monster”! that was the first realization--no pirate, nor lurid Anti-Christ, nor vainglorious Caesar! And in two days, the first astonishment over, there arose a noise in the world: for the Lord of the Sea had given to the nations one month only in which to do that thing: and the peoples took pa.s.sionately to meetings.

In England Land Leagues, Chambers of Agriculture, Restoration Leagues, Nationalization Leagues, many Leagues, were organizing furiously, stretching the right arm of oratory; deputations, pet.i.tions in wagons, demonstrations _en bloc_, party cannonades, racket heaven-high.

Sir Moses Cohen, the Jew-Liberal Leader, appealing to the strongest prejudice in Englishmen, spoke one night at Newcastle of ”the interference of a foreign prince in the affairs of Britain”; used the word: ”_Never!_”, and on this cry secured an enormous following: so that, within a week, he was instrumental in forming the formidable League of Resistance--destined to prove so tragic for Hogarth, and for England.

It was in the midst of this world-turmoil that--on the third day--the marriage-morning of Miss Cecil Stickney dawned; and that same evening Rebekah Frankl, convalescent from influenza, was seated over a bedroom fire in Hanover Square, a cashmire round her shoulders, her sickness cured by herbs, her physician then hobbling with a stick down the stairs--Estrella of Lisbon--her back almost horizontal now with age.

And as Rebekah mused there, two newsboys below, whose shouts pursued each other, went proclaiming through November gloom as it were the day of doom, crying, even in that uproar of Europe, a private event:

MARRIAGE OF

LORD ALFRED COWERN

AND MISS CECIL STICKNEY

APPALLING TRAGEDY

And soon a girl ran in, gasping: ”Miss Frankl!--this is too awful--your father--”

The news, having been flashed to Paris by Mackay-Bennett cable, now appeared in detail after the _New York Herald's_ French edition, and Rebekah's eyes ran wildly over details as to the ”bevy of beauty”, daughters of ”the Thirty-four”, and the church of waiting ladies, the carpeted path between palms and exotics, and how the ticket-holders heard the organ tell the Cantilenet Nuptiale and Bennett's Minuet; and then the mult.i.tudinous stir: behold the bridegroom cometh!--the little necessary bridegroom of no importance, and then the white entry of bride and bridal train, while the choir knelt to sing ”O Perfect Love”.

Perfect love, however, was hardly the order of that day, but rather perfect hate: for in Madison Square--the church being at the upper end of Fifth Avenue--a mob was being harangued on the subject of this very wedding: and when they heard and realized the thing that was being done before their eyes they were swept as by a wind of fire, and under its impulse set out like some swollen Rhone with a rus.h.i.+ng sound to pounce upon the church, full of perfect hate: and the choir sang ”O perfect love”.

What happened now was described as a nightmare. The same elemental instincts of the Stone Age which had exhibited themselves in the $500-worth of food wrought in another form, but with no less savagery, in a.s.sa.s.sins as in victims: and a ma.s.sacre ensued, bride and bridegroom pa.s.sing away like bubbles, of ”the Thirty-four” five only escaping. The report ended with the words: ”The ringleaders have been arrested; quiet reigns through the city”; then a list of the guests, with asterisks indicating those killed.

Rebekah searched for her father's name, and when she became certain that it was not there, her lips moved in thanksgiving.

But since Frankl was not at the wedding, where, then, was Frankl? She counted the days on her fingers: he could not have been late.

Unless there had been an accident to his s.h.i.+p....

Her brows knit a little; she peered into the fire: and thought of the _Boodah_....

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