A Splendid Hazard by Harold MacGrath

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SPLENDID HAZARD

By

HAROLD MACGRATH

AUTHOR OF

THE GOOSE GIRL, THE LURE OF THE MASK,
THE MAN ON THE BOX, ETC.

With Illustrations by

HOWARD CHANDLER CHRISTY

[Transcriber's note: All illustrations were missing from book.]

NEW YORK

GROSSET & DUNLAP

PUBLISHERS

COPYRIGHT 1910

THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

I A MEMORABLE DATE
II THE BUTTERFLY MAN
III A PLASTER STATUETTE
IV PIRATES AND SECRETARIES
V NO FALSE PRETENSES
VI SOME EXPLANATIONS
VII A BIT OF ROMANTIC HISTORY
VIII SOME BIRDS IN A CHIMNEY
IX THEY DRESS FOR DINNER
X THE GHOST OF AN OLD REGIME
XI PREPARATIONS AND COGITATIONS
XII M. FERRAUD INTRODUCES HIMSELF
XIII THE WOMAN WHO KNEW
XIV THE DRAMA BEGINS
XV THEY GO A-SAILING
XVI CROSS-PURPOSES
XVII A QUESTION PROM KEATS
XVIII CATHEWE ADVISES AND THE ADMIRAL DISCLOSES
XIX BREITMANN MAKES HIS FIRST BLUNDER
XX AN OLD SCANDAL
XXI CAPTAIN FLANAGAN MEETS A DUKE
XXII THE ADMIRAL BEGINS TO DOUBT
XXIII CATHEWE ASKS QUESTIONS
XXIV THE PINES OF AITONE
XXV THE DUPE
XXVI THE END OF THE DREAM

A SPLENDID HAZARD

CHAPTER I

A MEMORABLE DATE

A blurring rain fell upon Paris that day; a rain so fine and cold that
it penetrated the soles of men's shoes and their hearts alike, a
dispiriting drizzle through which the pale, acrid smoke of innumerable
wood fires faltered upward from the clustering chimney-pots, only to be
rent into fragments and beaten down upon the glistening tiles of the
mansard roofs. The wide asphalts reflected the horses and carriages
and trains and pedestrians in forms grotesque, zigzagging, flitting,
amusing, like a shadow-play upon a wrinkled, wind-blown curtain. The
sixteenth of June. To Fitzgerald there was something electric in the
date, a tingle of that ecstasy which frequently comes into the blood of
a man to whom the romance of a great battle is more than its history or
its effect upon the destinies of human beings. Many years before, this
date had marked the end to a certain hundred days, the eclipse of a sun
more dazzling than Rome, in the heyday of her august Caesars, had ever
known: Waterloo. A little corporal of artillery; from a cocked hat to
a crown, from Corsica to St. Helena: Napoleon.

Fitzgerald, as he pressed his way along the _Boulevard des Invalides_,
his umbrella swaying and snapping in the wind much like the sail of a
derelict, could see in fancy that celebrated field whereon this eclipse
had been supernally prearranged. He could hear the boom of cannon, the
thunder of cavalry, the patter of musketry, now thick, now scattered,
and again not unlike the subdued rattle of rain on the bulging silk
careening before him. He held the handle of the umbrella under his
arm, for the wind had a temper mawling and destructive, and veered into
the _Place Vauban_. Another man, coming with equal haste from the
opposite direction, from the entrance of the tomb itself, was also two
parts hidden behind an umbrella. The two came together with a jolt as
sounding as that of two old crusaders in a friendly just. Instantly
they retreated, lowering their shields.

"I beg your pardon," said Fitzgerald in French.

"It is of no consequence," replied the stranger, laughing. "This is
always a devil of a corner on a windy day." His French had a slight
German twist to it.

Briefly they inspected each other, as strangers will, carelessly, with
annoyance and amusement interplaying in their eyes and on their lips,
all in a trifling moment. Then each raised his hat and proceeded, as
tranquilly and unconcernedly as though destiny had no ulterior motive
in bringing them thus really together. And yet, when they had passed
and disappeared from each other's view, both were struck with the fact
that somewhere they had met before.

Fitzgerald went into the tomb, his head bared. The marble underfoot
bore the imprint of many shoes and rubbers and hobnails, of all sizes
and--mayhap--of all nations. He recollected, with a burn on his
cheeks, a sacrilege of his raw and eager youth, some twelve years
since; he had forgotten to take off his hat. Never would he forget the
embarrassment of that moment when the attendant peremptorily bade him
remove it. He, to have forgotten! He, who held Napoleon above all
heroes! The shame of it!

To-day many old soldiers were gathered meditatively round the heavy
circular railing. They were always drawn hither on memorable
anniversaries. Their sires and grandsires had carried some of those
tattered flags, had won them. The tides of time might ebb and flow,
but down there, in his block of Siberian porphyry, slept the hero.
There were some few tourists about this afternoon, muttering over their
guide-books, when nothing is needed on this spot but the imagination;
and that solemn quiet of which the tomb is ever jealous pressed down
sadly upon the living. Through the yellow panes at the back of the
high altar came a glow suggesting sunshine, baffling the drab of the
sky outside; and down in the crypt itself the misty blue was as
effective as moonshine.

Napoleon had always been Fitzgerald's ideal hero; but he did not
worship him blindly, no. He knew him to have been a brutal,
domineering man, unscrupulous in politics, to whom woman was either a
temporary toy or a stepping-stone, not over-particular whether she was
a dairy-maid or an Austrian princess; in fact, a rascal, but a great,
incentive, splendid, courageous one, the kind which nature calls forth
every score of years to purge her breast of the petty rascals, to the
benefit of mankind in general. Notwithstanding that he was a rascal,
there was an inextinguishable glamour about the man against which the
bolts of truth, history, letters, biographers broke ineffectually. Oh,
but he had shaken up all Europe; he had made precious kings rattle in
their shoes; he had redrawn a hundred maps; and men had laughed as they
died for him. It is something for a rascal to have evolved the Code
Napoleon. What a queer satisfaction it must be, even at this late day,
nearly a hundred years removed, to any Englishman, standing above this
crypt, to recollect that upon English soil the Great Shadow had never
set his iron heel!

Near to Fitzgerald stood an elderly man and a girl. The old fellow was
a fine type of manhood; perhaps in the sixties, white-haired, and the
ruddy enamel on his cheeks spoke eloquently of sea changes and many
angles of the sun. There was a button in the lapel of his coat, and
from this Fitzgerald assumed that he was a naval officer, probably
retired.

The girl rested upon the railing, her hands folded, and dreamily her
gaze wandered from trophy to trophy; from the sarcophagus to the
encircling faces, from one window to another, and again to the porphyry
beneath. And Fitzgerald's gaze wandered, too. For the girl's face was
of that mold which invariably draws first the eye of a man, then his
intellect, then his heart, and sometimes all three at once. The face
was as lovely as a rose of Taormina. Dark brown were her eyes, dark
brown was her hair. She was tall and lithe, too, with the subtle hint
of the woman. There were good taste and sense in her garments. A
bunch of Parma violets was pinned against her breast.

"A well-bred girl," was the grateful spectator's silent comment. "No
new money there. I wish they'd send more of them over here. But it
appears that, with few exceptions, only freaks can afford to travel."

Between Fitzgerald and the girl was a veteran. He had turned eighty if
a day. His face was powder-blown, an empty sleeve, was folded across
his breast, and the medal of the Legion of Honor fell over the Sleeve.
As the girl and her elderly escort, presumably her father, turned about
to leave, she unpinned the flowers and offered them impulsively to the
aged hero.

"Take these, _mon brave_," she said lightly; "you have fought for
France."

The old man was confused and his faded eyes filled. "For me,
mademoiselle?"

"Surely!"

"Thanks, mademoiselle, thanks! I saw _him_ when they brought him back
from St. Helena, and the Old Guard waded out into the Seine. Those
were days. Thanks, mademoiselle; an old soldier salutes you!" And the
time-bent, withered form grew tall.

Fitzgerald cleared his throat, for just then something hard had formed
there. Why, God bless her! She was the kind of girl who became the
mother of soldiers.

With her departure his present interest here began to wane. He
wondered who she might be and what part of his native land she adorned
when not gracing European capitals. Well, this was no time for
mooning. He had arrived from London the day proceeding, and was
leaving for Corfu on the morrow, and perforce he must crowd many things
into this short grace of time. He was only moderately fond of Paris as
a city; the cafes and restaurants and theaters amused him, to be sure;
but he was always hunting for romance here and never finding it. The
Paris of his Dumas and Leloir no longer existed. In one way or
another, the Louvre did not carry him back to the beloved days; he
could not rouse his fancy to such height that he could see D'Artagnan
ruffling it on the staircase, or Porthos sporting a gold baldric, which
was only leather, under his cloak. So then, the tomb of Napoleon and
the articles of clothing and warfare which had belonged to him and the
toys of the poor little king of Rome were far more to him than all the
rest of Paris put together. These things of the first great empire
were tangible, visible, close to the touch of his hand. Therefore,
never he came to Paris that he failed to visit the tomb and the two
museums.

To-day his sight-seeing ended in the hall of Turenne, before the
souvenirs of the Duc de Reichstadt, so-called the king of Rome. Poor,
little lead soldiers, tarnished and broken; what a pathetic history!
Abused, ignored, his childish aspirations trampled on, the name and
glory of his father made sport of; worried as cruel children worry a
puppy; tantalized; hoping against hope that this night or the next his
father would dash in at the head of the Old Guard and take him back to
Paris. A plaything for Metternich! Who can gaze upon these little
toys without a thrill of pity?

"Poor little codger!" Fitzgerald murmured aloud.

"Yes, yes!" agreed a voice in good English, over his shoulder; "who
will ever realize the misery of that boy?"

Fitzgerald at once recognized his justing opponent of the previous
hour. Further, this second appearance refreshed his memory. He knew
now where he had met the man; he even recalled his name.

"Are you not Karl Breitmann?" he asked with directness.

"Yes. And you are--let me think. Yes; I have it. You are the
American correspondent, Fitzgerald."

"And we met in Macedonia during the Greek war."

"Right. And you and I, with a handful of other scribblers, slept that
night under the same tent."

"By George!"

"I did not recall you when we bumped a while ago; but once I had gone
by you, your face became singularly familiar."

"Funny, isn't it?" And Fitzgerald took hold of the extended hand.
"The sight of these toys always gets into my heart."

"Into mine also. Who can say what might have been had they not crushed
out the great spirit lying dormant in his little soul? I saw Bernhardt
and Coquelin recently in _L'Aiglon_. Ah, but they play it! It drove
me here to-day. But this three-cornered hat holds me longest," with a
quick gesture toward the opposite wall. "Can't you see the lean face
under it, the dark eyes, the dark hair falling upon his collar? What
thoughts have run riot under this piece of felt? The brain, the brain!
A lieutenant at this time; a short, wiry, cold-blooded youngster, but
dreaming the greatest dream in the world!"

Fitzgerald smiled. "You are an enthusiast like myself."

"Who wouldn't be who has, visited every battlefield, who has spent days
wandering about Corsica, Elba, St. Helena? But you?"

"My word, I have done the same things."

They exchanged smiles.

"What written tale can compare with this living one?" continued
Breitmann, his eyes brilliant, his voice eager and the tone rich. "Ah!
How many times have I berated the day I was born! To have lived in
that day, to have been a part of that bewildering war panorama; from
Toulon to Waterloo! Pardon; perhaps I bore you?"

"By George, no! I'm as bad, if not worse. I shall never forgive one
of my forebears for serving under Wellington."

"Nor I one of mine for serving under Bluecher!"

They laughed aloud this time. It is always pleasant to meet a person
who waxes enthusiastic over the same things as oneself. And Fitzgerald
was drawn toward this comparative stranger, who was not ashamed to
speak from his heart. They drifted into a long conversation, and
fought a dozen battles, compared this general and that, and built idle
fancies upon what the outcome would have been had Napoleon won at
Waterloo. This might have gone on indefinitely had not the patient
attendant finally dandled his keys and yawned over his watch. It was
four o'clock, and they had been talking for a full hour. They
exchanged cards, and Fitzgerald, with his usual disregard of
convention, invited Breitmann to dine with him that evening at the
Meurice.

He selected a table by the window, dining at seven-thirty. Breitmann
was prompt. In evening clothes there was something distinctive about
the man. Fitzgerald, who was himself a wide traveler and a man of the
world, instantly saw and was agreeably surprised that he had asked a
gentleman to dine. Fitzgerald was no cad; he would have been just as
much interested in Breitmann had he arrived in a cutaway sack. But
chance acquaintances, as a rule, are rudimental experiments.

They sat down. Breitmann was full of surprises; and as the evening
wore on, Fitzgerald remembered having seen Breitmann's name at the foot
of big newspaper stories. The man had traveled everywhere, spoke five
languages, had been a war correspondent, a sailor in the South Seas,
and Heaven knew what else. He had ridden camels and polo ponies in the
Soudan; he had been shot in the Greece-Turkish war, shortly after his
having met Fitzgerald; he had played a part in the recent
Spanish-American, and had fought against the English in the Transvaal.

"And now I am resting," he concluded, turning his chambertin round and
round, giving the effect of a cluster of rubies on the table linen.
"And all my adventures have been as profitable as these," indebted for
the moment to the phantom rubies. "But it's all a great stage, whether
you play behind the wings or before the lights. I am thirty-eight;
into twenty of those years I have crowded a century."

"You don't look it."

"Ah, one does not need to dissipate to live quickly. The life I have
led has kept me in health and vigor. But you? You are not a man who
travels without gaining material."

"I have had a few adventures, something like yours, only not so widely
diversified. I wrote some successful short stories about China once.
I have had some good sport, too, here and there."

"You live well for a newspaper correspondent," suggested Breitmann,
nodding at the bottle of twenty-eight-year-old Burgundy.

"Oh, it's a habit we Americans have," amiably. "We rough it for a few
months on bacon and liver, and then turn our attention to truffles and
old wines and Cabanas at two-francs-fifty. We are collectively, a good
sort of vagabond. I have a little besides my work; not much, but
enough to loaf on when no newspaper or magazine cares to pay my
expenses in Europe. Anyhow, I prefer this work to staying home to be
hampered by intellectual boundaries. My vest will never reach the true
proportions which would make me successful in politics."

"You are luckier than I am," Breitmann replied. He sipped his wine
slowly and with relish. How long was it since he had tasted a good
chambertin?

Perhaps Fitzgerald had noticed it when Breitmann came in. The latter's
velvet collar was worn; there was a suspicious gloss at the elbows; the
cuff buttons were of cheap metal; his fingers were without rings. But
the American readily understood. There are lean years and fat years in
journalism, and he himself had known them. For the present this man
was a little down on his luck; that was all.

A party came in and took the near table. There were four; two elderly
men, an elderly woman, and a girl. Fitzgerald, as he side-glanced, was
afforded a shiver of pleasure. He recognized the girl. It was she who
had given the flowers to the veteran.

"That is a remarkably fine young woman," said Breitmann, echoing
Fitzgerald's thought.

The waiter opened the champagne.

"Yes. I saw her give some violets this afternoon to an old soldier in
the tomb. It was a pretty scene."

"Well," said Breitmann, raising his glass, "a pretty woman and a
bottle!"

It was the first jarring note, and Fitzgerald frowned.

"Pardon me," added Breitmann, observing the impression he had made,
smiling, and when he smiled the student slashes in his cheeks weren't
so noticeable. "What I should have said is, a good woman and a good
bottle. For what greater delight than to sip a rare vintage with a
woman of beauty and intellect opposite? One glass is enough to loose
her laughter, her wit, her charm. Bah! A man who knows how to drink
his wine, a woman who knows when to laugh, a story-teller who stops
when his point is told; these trifles add a little color as we pass.
Will you drink to my success?"

"In what?" with Yankee caution.

"In whatever the future sees fit to place under my hand."

"With pleasure! And by the same token you will wish me the same?"

"Gladly!"

Their glasses touched lightly; and then their glances, drawn by some
occult force, half-circled till they paused on the face of the girl,
who, perhaps compelled by the same invisible power, had leveled her
eyes in their direction. With well-bred calm her interest returned to
her companions, and the incident was, to all outward sign, closed.
Whatever took place behind that beautiful but indifferent mask no one
else ever learned; but simultaneously in the minds of these two
adventurers--and surely, to call a man an adventurer does not
necessarily imply that he is a _chevalier d'industrie_--a thought,
tinged with regret and loneliness, was born; to have and to hold a maid
like that. Love at first sight is the false metal sometimes offered by
poets as gold, in quatrains, distiches, verses, and stanzas, tolerated
because of the license which allows them to give passing interest the
name of love. If these two men thought of love it was only as
bystanders, witnessing the pomp and panoply--favored phrase!--of Venus
and her court from a curbstone, might have thought of it. Doubtless
they had had an affair here and there, over the broad face of the
world, but there had never been any barbs on the arrows, thus easily
plucked out.

"Sometimes, knowing that I shall never be rich, I have desired a
title," remarked Fitzgerald humorously.

"And what would you do with it?" curiously.

"Oh, I'd use it against porters, and waiters, and officials. There's
nothing like it. I have observed a good deal. It has a magic sound,
like Orpheus' lyre; the stiffest back becomes supine at the first
twinkle of it."

"I should like to travel with you, Mr. Fitzgerald," said Breitmann
musingly. "You would be good company. Some day, perhaps, I'll try
your prescription; but I'm only a poor devil of a homeless, landless
baron."

Fitzgerald sat up. "You surprise me."

"Yes. However, neither my father nor my grandfather used it, and as
the pitiful few acres which went with it is a sterile Bavarian
hillside, I have never used it, either. Besides, neither the _Peerage_
nor the _Almanac de Gotha_ make mention of it; but still the patent of
nobility was legal, and I could use it despite the negligence of those
two authorities."

"You could use it in America. There are not many 'Burke's' there."

"It amuses me to think that I should confide this secret to you. The
wine is good, and perhaps--perhaps I was hungry. Accept what I have
told you as a jest."

They both became untalkative as the coffee came. Fitzgerald was musing
over the impulse which had seized him in asking Breitmann to share his
dinner. He was genuinely pleased that he had done so, however; but it
forced itself upon him that sometime or other these impulses would land
him in difficulties. On his part the recipient of this particular
impulse was also meditating; Napoleon had been utterly forgotten,
verbally at least. Well, perhaps they had threshed out that
interesting topic during the afternoon. Finally he laid down the end
of his cigarette.

"I have to thank you very much for a pleasant evening, Mr. Fitzgerald."

"Glad I ran into you. It has done me no end of good. I leave for the
East to-morrow. Is there any possibility of seeing you in the Balkans
this fall?"

"No. I am going to try my luck in America again."

"My club address you will find on my card. You must go? It's only the
shank of the evening."

"I have a little work to do. Some day I hope I may be able to set as
good a dinner before you."

"Better have a cigar."

"No, thank you."

And Fitzgerald liked him none the less for his firmness. So he went as
far as the entrance with him.

"Don't bother about calling a cab," said Breitmann. "It has stopped
raining, and the walk will tone me up. Good night and good luck."

And they parted, neither ever expecting to see the other again, and
equally careless whether they did or not.

Breitmann walked rapidly toward the river, crossed, and at length
entered a gloomy old _pension_ over a restaurant frequented by
bargemen, students, and human driftwood. As he climbed the badly
lighted stairs, a little, gray-haired man, wearing spectacles, passed
him, coming down. A "pardon" was mumbled, and the little man proceeded
into the restaurant, picked a _Figaro_ from the table littered with
newspapers, ensconced himself in a comfortable chair, and ordered
coffee. No one gave him more than a cursory glance. The quarter was
indigent, but ordinarily respectable; and it was only when some noisy
Americans invaded the place that the habitues took any unusual interest
in the coming and going of strangers.

Up under the mansard roof there was neither gas nor electricity.
Breitmann lighted his two candles, divested himself of his collar, tie,
and coat, and flung them on the bed.

"Threadbare, almost! Ah, but I was hungry to-night. Did he know it?
Why the devil should I care? To work! Up to this night I have tried
to live more or less honestly. I have tried to take the good that is
in me and to make the most of it. And," ironically, "this is the
result. I have failed. Now we'll see what I can accomplish in the way
of being a great rascal."

He knelt before a small steamer trunk, battered and plentifully
labeled, and unscrewed the lock. From a cleverly concealed pocket he
brought forth a packet of papers. These he placed on the table and
unfolded with almost reverent care. Sometimes he shrugged, as one does
who is confronted by huge obstacles, sometimes he laughed harshly,
sometimes his jaws hardened and his fingers writhed. When he had
done--and many and many a time he had repeated this performance,
studied the faded ink, the great seal, the watermarks--he hid them away
in the trunk again.

He now approached the open window and leaned out. Glittering Paris,
wonderful city! How the lights from the bridges twinkled on the
wind-wrinkled Seine! Over there lay the third wealth of the world;
luxury, vice, pleasure. Eh, well, he could not fight it, but he could
curse it deeply and violently, which he did.

"Wait, Moloch, wait; you and I are not done with each other yet! Wait!
I shall come back, and when I do, look to yourself! Two million
francs, and every one of them mine!"

He laid his head on his hands. It ached dully. Perhaps it was the
wine.

CHAPTER II

THE BUTTERFLY MAN

The passing and repassing shadows of craft gave a fitful luster to the
river; so crisply white were the spanning highways that the eye grew
quickly dim with looking; the brisk channel breeze which moved with
rough gaiety through the trees in the gardens of the Tuileries, had,
long hours before, blown away the storm. Bright sunshine, expanses of
deep cerulean blue, towering banks of pleasant clouds, these made Paris
happy to-day, in spots.

The great minister gazed across the river, his hands under the tails of
his frock, and the perturbation of his mind expressed by the frequent
flapping of those somber woolen wings. To the little man who watched
him, there was a faint resemblance to a fiddling cricket.

"Sometimes I am minded to trust the whole thing to luck, and bother no
more about him."

"Monsieur, I have obeyed orders for seven years, since we first
recognized the unfortunate affair. Nothing he has done in this period
is missing from my notebook; and up to the present time he has
done--nothing. But just a little more patience. This very moment,
when you are inclined to drop it, may be the one. One way or another,
it is a matter of no real concern to me. There will always be plenty
of work for me to do, in France, or elsewhere. But I am like an old
soldier whose wound, twinging with rheumatism, announces the approach
of damp weather. I have, then, monsieur, a kind of psychological
rheumatism; prescience, bookmen call it. Presently we shall have damp
weather."

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