Part 35 (1/2)
She bent over my shoulder, holding the parchment before me.
”What I want to do, but can't--what I want you to do is so small and simple a matter that it is almost amusing. I grow angry when I think that I cannot do so little a thing to help myself; but you see, Sir Karl, I tremble and my hand shakes to that extent I fear to mar the page. I simply want to make the letter 't' on this parchment and I can't. Will you do it for me?”
”Ay, gladly,” I responded, ”but where and why?” Then she pointed out to me the word ”nov” in the ma.n.u.script and said:--
”A letter 't,' if deftly done, will make 'not' instead of 'nov.' Do you understand, Sir Karl?”
I sprang to my feet as if I had been touched by a sword-point. The thought was so ingenious, the thing itself was so small and the result was so tremendous that I stood in wonder before the daring girl who had conceived it. I made no answer. I placed the parchment on the table, unceremoniously reached in front of the d.u.c.h.ess for the quill, and in less time than one can count three I made a tiny ink mark not the sixteenth part of an inch long that changed the destinies of nations for all time to come.
I placed the quill on the table and turned to Yolanda, just in time to catch her as she was about to fall. I was frightened at the sight of her pale face and cried out:--
”Yolanda! Yolanda!”
Margaret quickly brought a small goblet of wine, and I held the princess while I opened her lips and poured a portion of the drink into her mouth. I had in my life seen, without a tremor, hundreds of men killed, but I had never seen a woman faint, and the sight almost unmanned me.
Stimulated by the wine Yolanda soon revived; and when she opened her eyes and smiled up into my face, I was so joyful that I fell to kissing her hands and could utter no word save ”Yolanda, Yolanda.” She did not at once rise from my arms, but lay there smiling into my face as if she were a child. When she did rise she laughed softly and said, turning to the d.u.c.h.ess:--
”'Yolanda' is the name by which Sir Karl knows me. You see, mother, I was not mistaken in deeming him my friend.”
Then she turned suddenly to me, and taking my rough old hand in hers, lifted it to her lips. That simple act of childish grat.i.tude threw me into a fever of ecstasy so great that death itself could have had no terrors for me. He might have come when he chose. I had lived through that one moment, and even G.o.d could not rob me of it.
Yolanda moved away from me and took up the parchment.
”Don't touch it till the ink dries,” I cried sharply.
She dropped it as if it were hot, and the d.u.c.h.ess came to me, and graciously offered her hand:--
”I thank you with my whole heart, not only for what you have done, but for the love you bear the princess. She is the one I love above all others, and I know she loves me. I love those who love her. As the French say, '_Les amies de mes amies sont mes amies.'_ I am a poor helpless woman, more to be pitied than the world can believe. I have only my grat.i.tude to offer you, Sir Karl, but that shall be yours so long as I live.”
”Your Grace's reward is far too great for the small service I have rendered,” I replied, dropping to my knee. I was really beginning to live in my sixtieth year. I was late in starting, but my zest for life was none the less, now that I had at last learned its sweetness through these two gracious women.
When we had grown more composed, Yolanda explained to me her hopes regarding the French king's answer to the altered missive, and the whole marvellous possibilities of the letter ”t” dawned upon my mind. The princess bent over the parchment, watching our mighty ”t” while the ink was drying, but the process was too slow for her, so she filled her cheeks and breathed upon the writing. The color returned to her face while I watched her, and I felt that committing a forgery was a small price to pay for witnessing so beautiful a sight. Yolanda's breath soon dried the ink, and then we examined my work. I had performed wonders.
The keenest eye could not detect the alteration. Yolanda, as usual, sprang from the deepest purgatory of trouble to the seventh heaven of joy. She ran about the room, singing, dancing, and laughing, until the d.u.c.h.ess warned her to be quiet. Then she placed her hand over her mouth, shrugged her shoulders, walked on tiptoe, and spoke only in whispers.
Margaret smiled affectionately at Yolanda's childish antics and said:--
”I think the conspirators should disperse. I hope, Sir Karl, that I may soon meet you in due form. Meantime, of course, it is best that we do not know each other.”
After examining the missive for the twentieth time, Yolanda placed it in its pouch and turned to the d.u.c.h.ess.
”Take it, mother, to the iron box, and I will lead Sir Karl back to Uncle Castleman's,” she said.
The d.u.c.h.ess graciously offered me a goblet of wine, and after I had drunk, Yolanda led me down the stairway to the House under the Wall.
While descending Yolanda called my attention to a loose stone in the wall of the staircase.
”The other end of this stone,” she said, ”penetrates the wall of the room that you and Sir Max occupied the night before you were liberated.
The mortar has fallen away, and it was here that I spoke to you and told you not to fear.”
Here was another supernatural marvel all too easily explained.
CHAPTER XVI