 Part 2, Chapter 3 of the Pride of Yenneco. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recorded by Sylvia M.B. in Washington State. The Pride of Yenneco by Edgerton and Agnes Castle. Part 2, Chapter 3. Captain Basil Yenneco's memoir resumed three months later at Farrandundane. Suffolk. 14th April, 1772. I had thought upon that day when, in my ill temper, I irreparably insulted my wife, that I could never bring myself to face the exposure which I returned to England would necessarily bring about. But when I found the desolation and the haunting memories of Tolendol, like to rob me of all I had left of reason and manliness, when, to my restless spirit, the thought of home, seemed to promise some chance of diversion and relief, I did not hesitate. Without delay, I set to work to put matters at Tolendol upon a sufficiently regular scale. Also, to have realized and transferred to my London bankers a sum of money large enough to meet any reasonable demand. This business accomplished. In less than a month from the date of the ill-fated Rothenburg expedition, I found myself breathing my native air again. Before my departure, I charged Schultz, and I know I can rely upon his faithfulness, to be perpetually on the lookout for any communication from Los Eats, and to be ready to give any one immediate cognizance of my whereabouts. It is a forlorn hope. Although the humour had come upon me to go back to my own land, after the fashion, I fancy the sick man deems he will be better anywhere than where he is. And although I did not hesitate to gratify that humour, I was nevertheless not blind to the peculiar position I must occupy among my people. I had no desire to lay claim to the honours I had so prematurely announced, no desire to present myself under false colours, even were such an imposture likely to succeed. But neither did I see why I should lay bare to the jeers of the fashionable world, to the sneers of dear relatives and friends, or more intolerable still, to their compassion. The whole pitiful plot of that comedy which has turned to such tragedy for me, so when I wrote to my mother to announce my arrival, I adopted a purposely evasive tone. It is deeply unfortunate, I wrote, that you should have broken the bond of secrecy which I enjoined upon you when I informed you of my intended marriage. You know too much of the world, my dear mother, not to understand that when a commoner like myself, however well-born and towered, would contract an alliance with the heiress of a reigning house, it is more than likely that there may be a slip twix the cup and the lip. My cup has been spilt. I come home a broken-hearted man, to find myself, I fear, owing to your breach of confidence, the laughing stock of our society. But the yearning for home is too strong upon me to be resisted. I am returning to England at once. If you would not add yet more to the bitterness of my lot, you will strenuously deny the report, you indiscreetly spread, and warn curiosity-mongers from daring to probe a wound which I could not bear even your hand to touch. These words, by which I intended to spare myself at least the humiliation of personal explanation, have produced an unexpected effect. My poor mother performed her task so well that I find myself quite as much the hero of the hour over here as if I had brought back my exalted bride. The mystery in which I am shrouded, the obvious melancholy of my demeanor, the very indifference with which I receive all notice, added of course to my wealth, and possibly to the belief that I am still a prize in the matrimonial market. My extraordinary luck at cards, when I can be induced to play, my carelessness to loss or gain, all this has placed me upon a pinnacle, which is as gratifying to my mother as, or so I hear, for I have declined all reconciliation with the renegade. It is galling to my brother and his family. But the best yet, so far as I am concerned, is that no one has dared to put to me an indiscreet question, and that even my mother, although her wistful eyes implore my confidence, respects my silence. Now having tried in vain to find a solace in the pleasures of the town, I have betaken myself to that part of the island, which is the cradle of our race, to try whether a taste of good old English sport may not revive some interest in my life. Often in the last month at Toledal, when the whole land was locked in ice and the gray sky looked down piteously upon the white earth, day by day, with never a change and scarcely a shadow, I thought of the green winters of my youth in the old country, of rousing gallops with the west wind in my face, across wide fields all verdant still and homely, of honest English faces, English voices, the tongue of the hounds, the blast of the cracked horn, with almost a passion of desire. It seemed to me that if I could be back in the midst of it all again, I might feel as the boy Basil had felt and be rid or it but for the space of a good cross-country run of that present, Basil Yenneco, whose brain was so weary of working upon the same useless round, whose heart was so sore within him. So soon, therefore, as the weather broke, for the winter has been hard even in this milder climate, I accepted my mother's offer of her dower house, set up a goodly stable of hunters and established myself at the manner of fairing Dundane. I have actually derived some satisfaction from a couple of days' sport, to which a sight of my Lord brother's discomforture, each time I cut him deliberately in the face of the whole field, has added perhaps a grain. April 29th, I am this day like the man in the Gospel, who having driven out the devil from his heart and swept and garnished it, finds himself presently possessed of seven devils worse than the first, the daemon of wrath I had exercised, I believe long ago, the fiend of unrest and longing I had thought these days to have led to. In spite of her too obdurate resentment, I had no feeling for my wife, wherever she might be, but tenderness. Now, oh, utterly, utterly, do I most hate thee or lovely? I know not by my soul, yet this at least I do know. Mine thou art, and mine thou shalt remain, though we never meet again on earth. Mine as I am thine, though the true good race of Yenickel wither and die on my barren stock. But even what serves it to rant in this fashion to myself when I have not even the satisfaction of hearing a contradiction, not even an excuse to shake my fury. Small satisfaction likewise has that pulling, mincing messenger to carry back to you, my wife, poor old man. I am feigned to laugh even in my anger when I recall his panic-stricken countenance of an hour ago. The hounds were to meet at ten this morning at Sir Percy Spalding's, not three miles from here, and so I was taking the day easy I had but just finished breakfast, and was standing on the steps of the porch, quaffing a draft of ale as I awaited my horse sniffing the while, the moist southern wind, and my thoughts for once were pleasantly occupied. For once the nine canker was at rest within me. Presently my attention was awakened by the rumbling sound of wheels, and looking towards the avenue yet so sparsely believed as to afford a clear view down at the whole length. I saw coming along at its slow pace a heavy vehicle, which in time disclosed itself as a shabby, hired traveling chase drawn by an ancient horse, and driven by that drunken scoundrel Bateman from Yarmouth, once a familiar figure to my childish eyes. My heart leaped. I expected no one. My mother was at Cheltenham for the waters. No one save indeed her whom I ever unconsciously await. It was perhaps the unreasonable disappointment that fell upon me when, gazing eagerly for a glimpse of the occupant, as the carriage lumbered through the inner gate, I saw that it contained but the single figure of an old man, huddled, despite the spring warmth of the day, in furs to the very chin that turned me into so bitter and black a temper. Even as the chase drove up before the steps and as I stood staring down at it motionless, although within me there was turmoil enough, the fellows came round with my horses. Best, the Irish mare, took umbrage at the little grotesque figure that with an alertness one would scarcely have given it credit for, skipped from the chase, looking more like one of those images I have seen on socks and clocks, than anything human. How she plunged and how the fool that held her stared, and how I cursed him for not minding his business, was a vast relief to my feelings, and how the old gentleman regarded us as newly come among the savages, and how he finally advanced upon me, mincing, I laugh again to think back upon it, but I had no mind to laugh to then. It was plain, before he opened his mouth to speak, that my visitor hailed from foreign parts, and at closer acquaintance, the reason why, even from a distance, he had appeared to me as something less than human, became evident, his countenance was shriveled and seared by recent smallpox, scarred in a manner perfectly fantastic to behold. That curse of my life, that persistent hope I believe I could get along well enough, but, tis, the hope that kills me, began to stir within me. Have I the honor of speaking to Captain Basel and Duginical? Said the puppet in French, and before the question was well out of his mouth I had capped it with another, breathless. Come you not from Rothenburg? He bowed and scraped. Each saw he had his answer. I was all civility now, heaven help me, ain't cordial enough to make up for a more discourteous reception. I ordered my horses back to the stables, dismissed the chase in spite of the newcomer's protestations, and led him within the house, calling for refreshments for him, all the while a thousand questions to which I yet dreaded the answers, burning on my tongue. I had installed him in the deepest armchair in the apartment I habitually used. I had kindled a fire with my own hands, for he was shivering in his furs, whether from fear, embarrassment, or cold. I know not. Maybe all three together. I had placed a glass of wine at his elbow, which he sipped nervously when I pressed him, and then when I knew that I should hear what had brought him, from very cowardliness I was mute. It seemed to me as if my courtesies embarrassed him, and that this augured ill. Although I reasoned with myself, if she should send me a messenger at all, I ought to anticipate good tidings. I am fortunate, sir, began the old man in quavering tones, to find you at home. Sir, I have come a long way to seek you. I went first to your castle at Tolendall, where steward, the countryman of my own, to whose politeness I am much indebted, gave me very careful instructions as to the road to your English domicile. A most worthy and amenable person. I should not so soon have had the advantage of making your acquaintance, had it not been for the help he gave me. I have come by Yarmouth, sir. The wind was all in our favor. I am informed we had a good passage. Here he shivered, and yet a greener shade underspread the scars upon his brow. But I am not accustomed to the sea, and I have been ill, sir, lately. Very ill. He coughed awkwardly, reached out his trembling hand for the wine, but put down the glass again untasted. Surely I am right in believing, said I, that you come from some one very dear to me, from one from whom I am parted by a series of unfortunate misunderstandings. I felt my lips go cold as I spoke, and I know that I panted. If you have a letter, said I, give it to me. I reached out my hand and saw, with a strange sort of self-pity, that it shook no less than had the old man's withered claw. Or if you have a message, cried I, breaking out a last speak, for God's sake, he drew back from my impetuosity. There was fear of me in his eye at the same time I thought with a chill about my heart. Compassion. My good sir, he said, between ums and aas, which well I drove me distracted. I believe I may say, in fact, I will venture to assert that I have come from the young lady I ever had to speak of. I have been made aware of the unfortunate circumstances. The young lady. Here he hitched himself up in his chair and began to fumble in the skirts of his floating coat. Between his furs and his feebleness, this was a sufficiently lengthy operation to give time for my hopes to kindle stronger again and my small stock of patience to fail. Your doubt was prepared to hear, he went on at length, that the young lady, being now fully alive to the consequence of her ill-considered conduct, a girlish freaks or a child, I may say, believes that she will be meeting your wishes, nay, your expressed desire, by joining with you in an application to his holiness for the immediate annulment of so regular a marriage. What! cried I with a roar, leaping from my chair, so occupied had I been in watching the movements of his hands as he fingered a great pocketbook, expecting him every instant to produce a letter from her to me, that I have scarce heeded the drift of his babble to the last words struck upon my ear. Annul our marriage, I thundered, and my desire, in the devil's name, who are you, and whence come you, for could not be my wife who has sent you with such a message to me. The little man had jumped, too, at my violence, like a grasshopper, but my question evidently touched his pride in a sensitive quarter and browsed him to a sense of offense in which he forgot his tremors. Truly, sir, truly you remind me, he said tardily, if you will have but a little patience. I was in the very act of seeking my credentials when you so impetuously interrupted me, as he spoke with a skip in a bow, which recalled I know not what big memory of a bygone merry hour. He drew forth a folded sheet, and unfolding it presented it to me. I knew the handwriting too well to doubt its authenticity. How often had I conned and kissed the few poor lines she had ever written to me, I, although they had been penned in her assumed character. To Monsieur de Yenico, I empower Monsieur de Shrekendorf to act for me in the affair, Monsieur de Yenico, what's of, and I agree beforehand to all his arrangements, thereto the signature. Not a word more, not a word of regret, even of anger, the same impeccable unbending resentment. I stood staring at the lines, reading them and rereading them, and each letter seemed to print itself like fire upon my soul. I heard, as in a dream, my visitor pour forth further explanations, still in that tone of injury my roughness had evoked. I am myself Sir a friend. Yes, I may say a friend, an old friend of the young lady. Her parents have always reposed confidence in me. I, Sir, am Monsieur de Shrekendorf, the very fact I should think of my being in possession of this letter of this document. Here there was a great rattling of stiff parchment. We'll assure you I should hope of my identity. Nevertheless, if you wish further proof, I have a letter to our ambassador in London, and I am willing to accompany you to his house or meet you there at your convenience. Indeed, it would perhaps be more proper and correct in every way that the whole matter should be settled and the documents duly attested at the residence of the accredited representative of Lusatia. I will not disguise to you that his serene harness, the Duke himself takes, takes an interest in the lady and is desirous of having this business, which so nearly affects the welfare and credit of a well-known member of his court, settled in the promptest and most efficacious manner. They sigh, descapade, you must admit yourself. And all the while my heart was crying out within me in an agony. Oh, autoly, how could you, how could you? Was the memory of those days nothing to you? Is the knowledge of my love and sorrow nothing to you? Are you a woman, and have you no forgiveness? Taking perhaps my silence for acquiescence, for this messenger of my wife, albeit entrusted with so delicate a mission, was no true diplomatist. Monsieur de Schreckendorf here spread out with an agreeable flourish and amazing-looking Latin document with rubrics ready filled up. It seemed, but for certain spaces left blank, for the names, I suppose, of the appealing parties. I have been led to understand, pursued he then in tones of greatly increased confidence, that you entirely concur in the lady's desire for the annulment of this contestable union, the actual legality of which indeed is too doubtful to be worth discussing. From the religious point of view, however, one of chief importance to my young friend, I think I may call her so, the matter is otherwise serious, for there was no doubt a sacrament administered by a priest duly ordained, but unfortunately through old age and natural infirmity wanting in due prudence and further misled as to the identity of one of the contracting persons. A sacrament, sir, there undoubtedly was, but I am glad to inform you that special leading divines have been already approached upon the subject, and they give good hope, sir, good hope that a properly drawn-up petition, supported by the signatures of the two persons concerned, will meet at Rome with most favorable consideration. The ecclesiastical part of the difficulty once settled, the legal one goes of itself. I was gradually becoming attentive to the run of his glib speech. I hardly know how I contained myself so far, but I kept a rigid silence for yet another minute or two gave him all my ear. Such being the case, he continued, I need hardly trouble you to disturb yourself by journeying all the way to London. We need proceed no further than Yarmouth, indeed, and there in the presence of two competent witnesses, I would suggest a priest of our religion and some neighbouring gentlemen of substance. All you will have to do is just sign this document. I repeat, I understand that you are naturally anxious, likewise to be delivered from a marriage in which you have considered yourself aggrieved, and not unnaturally. Here the little monster threw a sly look at me and added, you were made a victim of a little deception, eh? And in the course of a few months, Rome is always slow, you know, you will both be as free as air with no more loss to either of you than the loss of a little inexperience. As free as air, utterly as free as air, then it was that the violence of my wrath overflowed. That moment is a blank to my memory. I only know that I heard the sound of my own voice ringing with shattering violence in the room, and I came to myself again to find that, with a strength my fury alone could have lent. I was shredding the tough parchment between my fingers so that the ground was strewn with its rags. What most restored me to something like composure was the abject terror of the unlucky messenger who huddled away from me in a corner of the room, was peeping round a chair at me much as you might see a monkey caught in mischief. His teeth were chattering. Good anger was wasted on so miserable an object, and indeed the feelings that swayed me had had roots in ground such as he could never try to pawn. Come out, Monsieur de Shrekendorf. I said with a calmness which surprised myself, but there are times when a man's courage rises with the very magnitude of a calamity. You have nothing to fear from me. You will want an answer to carry back to her that sent you. Take her to this. I stooped as I spoke and gathered together the shreds of the document, folded them in a great sheet of paper and tied it with ribbon into a neat parcel. Not a word. I went on. I will hear no more. When you have rested and partaken of refreshment, one of my carriages will be at your disposal for whatever point you may desire to reach today. Stay. You will want some evidence to show that you have fulfilled your embassy. Sitting down to my writing table, I hastily addressed the packet to Madame Basel du Gynical, adding thereafter her distinctive title as maid of honor. This done I sealed it with my great seal, Monsieur de Shrekendorf meanwhile uttering uncouth little groans. Here, sir, said I, holding out the packet with its bold inscription. They will no longer as evident deny the existence at the court of Lusatia of the person I have here addressed. Here, sir, take this to my wife and tell her that her husband has more respect than she has for the holy sacrament he received with her. Here, sir, at every here, sir, I advanced a step upon him holding out the bundle and at every step I took he retreated till impatiently I flung it on the table nearest him and making him a low ironical bow of farewell turned to leave him. I paused a moment on the threshold of the room, however, and had the satisfaction of seeing him after throwing his hands heavenwards as if in despairing protest, bringing them down again on the packet and proceed to stuff it into the recesses of his coat. I turned once more to go, went to my surprise he called after me in tones unexpectedly stern and loud. Young man, young man, this is a grave mistake, have a care. I shrugged my shoulders and slammed the door upon his warning cry. Nor though he subsequently sent twice by my servants, first to demand then to supplicate a further interview, would I consent to parlay with him again. I passed a couple of restless hours until length from an upper window I saw him depart from my house, in far greater state and comfort than he had come. Now, as I write, I know that he is being whirled along the Yarmouth Road at the best pace of my fine horses, speeding back to Los Eats to take my wife, my eloquent answer. End of Part 2, Chapter 3. Part 2, Chapter 4 of the Pride of Yenekal. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recorded by Sylvia M.B. in Washington State. The Pride of Yenekal by Edgerton and Agnes Castle. Part 2, Chapter 4. Narrative of an episode at White's Club in which Captain Yenekal was concerned, set forth from contemporary accounts. The tenth hour of an October night had rung out over a fog swathed London. Yet, despite the time of fear, unfashionable for town life, despite the unpropitious weather, the long-card room at White's was rapidly filling. The tables, each lit by its own set of candles, shown dimly like a little green archipelago in a sea of mist, groups were gathering round sundry of these boards. The dice had begun to rattle, voices to ring out. The nightly scene was being repeated, wherein all were actors down to the waiters who had their private bets and lost and won with their patrons. Somewhat apart in this occlusion of a window recess, causally ensconced, so as to profit of the warmth of the great yellow fire, sat three gentlemen. A fourth chair remained vacant at their table, and from the impatient glances which two of the party now and again turned upon the different doors, it was evident that the arrival of its expected occupant was overdue. The third gentleman who bore the stamp of a distinctly foreign race, although his hair, which he bore but slightly powdered, was of a fair hue, and his face rather sanguine than dark, seemed to endure the delay with complete indifference. His attention was wholly given to the shuffling of a pack of cards, which he manipulated with extreme dexterity, while he listened to his companion's remarks with impassive countenance. He was a handsome man, despite a bulk of frame and feature which almost amounted to coarseness, hardly yet in the prime of life, with full blue eyes and full red lips, which took, when he spoke or smiled a curious curve, bearing the canine in almost sinister fashion. The Chevalier de Ville Rouge, introduced at whites by the Prussian ambassador, as a distinguished officer of the great Frederick, visiting England for his pleasure, had shown himself so daring a player as to be welcomed among the most noted gamblers. He had lost and won large sums with great breeding, and had, in his six-week stay, contrived to improve an imperfect knowledge of an alien tongue in such fashion as to make intercourse with his English companions quite sufficiently easy. The youngest of the trio at the table in the corner, this foggy night, was naturally the one to display his feelings most openly. A clean-faced, square-built English lad, fresh it would seem from the playing fields of school, yet master of his title and fortune, and cornet in the lifeguards. Sir John Bedos was already a familiar figure in the club, as indeed his finances could bear doleful testimony. The green cuffguards adjusted over his delicate ruffles, the tablets and pencil ready at his elbow. It was clear he was itching to put another slice of his patrimony to the hazard. His opposite neighbor, Bo Kerou, as he dearly loved to hear himself dubbed, was a man of another kidney. In fifteen years of nights, systematically turned in to days, had left their stamp upon features once noted for their beauty. Though ready now with a sneer or a jest for his companion's youthful eagerness, his eyes wandering restlessly from the clock to the doors, betrayed an almost equal anxiety to begin the business of the evening. Devil take Yenakul, cried the Baronet at last, striking the table so that the dice leaped in their box. Upon my soul, it's too bad. He gave me an appointment here at ten tonight. And at once now but six minutes to eleven. Bet he comes before the clock strikes. Imposed Mr. Kerou. Ten guineas? Done with you, dick, said Sir John promptly. The bet was registered. A five minutes passed in watching the timepiece of the mantle shelf. All the young Baronet's eagerness being now against the event he had been burning to hasten. The strokes rang out. With a smile he held out his broad palm into which Kerou duly dropped ten pieces. Tis the first bit of luck the fellow has brought me yet. God, I believe my luck has turned. Why the devil don't he come? But I may ease him of a little of that superfluous wealth of his. I swear he gets more swollen day by day while we grow lean. Hey Kerou, like the kind in the Bible. Damn him. The water goes to the river as the French say in spite of all our dams. Sniggered Kerou. But as for me, I am content that you should go on playing with Yenneco so that I may back him. My purse has not been in such good condition for many a long day. Poor devil. How monstrous unfortunate his amours must still be. I only wish with a conscience wriggle. He could give me the recipe. Yet you have lost on him now. Retort to beddows. Tapping his breast pocket. And if you back him tonight you lose on him again. I warn you I am in the vein. I tell you but there is the quarter. Rock him. I believe he is going to rat after all. Bet you he don't come till half past. Kerou. Fifty. Done. Said Kerou. Quietly. Noting down the entry. He is erratic. I grant you. Hee hee. Did you note me Chevalier? But he has a taste for the table. Though I believe he'd as soon lose as win were it only for the sake of change. Tis about all he cares for the delus dog. I bet you there is not a man in the room has heard him laugh. You won't find any fool to take up that bet Kerou. I whole I'd willingly accommodate myself a little of his melancholy at that price. Better look up a princess for yourself then Jack. Said Kerou. Perhaps the Chevalier can give you an introduction to some other fascinating German Highness. Won't it do over here? Asked Petos with a grin. Do you think I'd have a chance with Augusta? Twenty past. Let him keep away till the half hour now. Zounds would be a mean trick if he failed me on my lucky night. Though I don't want him for ten minutes yet. He has fairly cleared me out. The team will have to go next if I don't get back some of my IOUs. Why it would be a very good thing for the Jack if he played the false. I say so. Though I should lose most damnably by it. Thy team will go. Thy coaches will go. Thy carts thy rooms. Thy talk. Thy cat. Why man thou must lose. Tis as plain as the nose on Lady Maria's face. And he must win. Poor wretch. And I too since I back him. Ask the Chevalier if it is not a text of truth all over the world. Lucky at carts unlucky in love. Never look so sulky boy. Tis providential compensation. You surprise me, gentlemen. Said the Chevalier with a strong guttural accent lifting as he spoke his heavy lids for the first time. I was not aware the Captain Yenickle was so afflicted in his affections. You surprise me, Chevalier. Returned to Karoo Gailey. I deemed you and he such friends. Why, I want a hundred from my Lord Oleswater, but yes, there even by waging him that you would be the only man in the room to whom Yenickle would speak more than ten words within the hour. The counting was not difficult. He said sixty-four to you and five to Jack. Mr. Yenickle has certainly shown me both kindness and sympathy. Said the Chevalier who now had folded his strong white hands over the pack of cards and set the very embodiment of repose. Doubtless are having both served in the same part of the world. The wonder different standards has someone drawn us together. But he has not made me his confidant. And so you don't know the tale of Yenickle and the Princess. Just a dashed fine tale. Keru you are a witt or think you are. It comes too much the same thing. Tune up man. Give your version for turning to the Chevalier again. There are now as many versions current as days in the month. It is twenty-five minutes past. You had better get your I owe you ready, yet. Said Keru then turning to the forner. Would you really care to hear the true story of our friends discomforture? I am about the only man in town that knows the true one. But all that's old scandal now. Town talk of last year a stale as Lady Villiers nine virgin daughters. There are a dozen new ones since. Would you not rather hear the last of Israel Highness of Duke of C and Lady W? That is choice if you like. And as fresh as Rosalinda's last admirer. Hey John. I am not fond. Said the Chevalier Drally of hearing those discussed who being high-born have the right to claim respect and homage. But I confess to some interest in my friend Mr. Yannicole. Begad then responded Mr. Keru flicking a grain of snuff from the ruffles of his pouting bosom. I cannot promise to spare your scruples concerning scandal in high quarters. For the hero one of the romance is and would appear one of your own German royalties. But since you wish the story you shall have it. There is then a certain Carolina Sophia etc. etc. Daughter of some Duke of Alsatia Swabia Dalmatia No Stay Lusatia wherever that may be. Aye, that's the name one of your 200 odd principalities. You know all about it. I don't. And Yannicole who as you are aware was in the Imperial Service met this wondrously beautiful princess at some court function somewhere. They danced they conversed. She was fair. He was fond. Fill it in for yourself. He thought himself a tremendous cock of the walk to be brief. He aspired to act King cofetua and the beggar maid turned the other way with the exception that he is as richest creases. He made so sure of the ladies favor that he wrote over to his mother to announce the marriage as a settled thing. A royal alliance with the prospect of speedily mounting to the throne on the strength of his wife's pretensions. It is a drole story, then sounds you can conceive the flutter in the Dove coat over him. My Lady Enneco his mother was blown out with pride swimming in the higher regions and a perfect balloon. Dad she would no longer bow to anyone less than a tube. She ran hither and thither tackling the news like the hen that has laid an egg. She sent I was told the best authority to the Lord Chamberlain to know what precedence the young couple would be given at the next birthday. She called at the College of arms to inquire about the fact marshalling of the coat of Lusatia with the at of Enneco and whether the result in monstrosity would comport a royal crown. Faith that's a good one said Sir John with a gaff I had not heard that Carew fact fact I assure you smiled the wit very drole repeated Mr. Deville Rouge with impassive muscles when continued Carew lo and behold what a falling off was there as young what a come down Humpty Dumpty was nothing to it poor Lady Enneco's egg Oh well we all know pride must have a fall your fair compatriot sir had but amused herself with the fine Englishman for which I would be loath to blame her she gave him it is said indeed every pledge of her affection but when he began to pray to rings and marriage lines and pressed her to become Mrs. Enneco she found him a little too presumptuous at least I take it so and being it would seem of a Mary turn of mind devised a little joke to play upon him pretending to yield at last to his urgency she gave her consent to a secret marriage and in the dark chapel palmed off her chamber made upon him haha so the poor devil carrying off his bride by night and highly thinking himself a very fine fellow indeed never discovered till he had brought her home they had given his hand a name to a squinting sausage nosed keratin made daughter of the court confectioner called in baptism by the princess's names like half the girls in town the story goes that the princess with all the court were waiting at his house to see the happy pair arrive and I have had secret but absolutely incontestable information that the princess laughed till she had to be bled Mr. de Villereau smiled at last in evident appreciation of the humor of the situation it is on my honor a most comic story he said but how come you so well acquainted with the matter surely my poor friend Yenneco has ill-chosen his confident devil a word have I heard from Yenneco said Kiru faith he has ever been the same cheerful conversational fellow you want of and it would take a bold man to question him but truth you know will out truth will out in time I said the chivalier and was shaken with silent merriment half past eleven were on the baronette suddenly stretching out a great paw and snapping his fingers under the bow's face zowns cried the witt turning to look at the clock with some discomposure no jack no there is still a fraction of a minute the half hour has not struck and by heaven here's our man had you not better sup with rosalinda tonight sir john in the act of looking round pettishly he had not yet reached the enviable state of mind in which a gambler declares that the greatest delight after winning is that of losing found his attention unexpectedly arrested by the countenance of the chivalier de Ville Rouge which presented at that moment such an extraordinary appearance for the young man forgot his irritation and remained gazing at it in open mouth astonishment the features usually remarkable for their set rather heavy composure were perturbed to the verge of distortion the whole face was stained with angry purple the veins of the forehead swollen like a whip cord sir john bettow's wits were none of the sharpest but it was clear even to him that the emotion thus expressed was one of furious disappointment but while he cuddled his brains for an explanation of this sudden humor in a man who was neither winner nor loser by Bacillianico's appearance the face of the chivalier resumed its wanted indifferent expression and dullness of hue with rapidity that all together confounded the observer by this time the tall figure of the newcomer had wended its way down the room and was close upon them all turned to greet him and poor sir John found his feelings once more subjected to a shock the acquaintances of Bacillianico who were accustomed to find his brow charged with gloom to see his cheek wear the pallor of one who sleeps little and thinks much but in his demeanor tonight was more than the usual somberness on his countenance other than natural pallor and he stood for a moment responding absently to the chivalier's hearty greeting and carous bantering salutation of all hail it became further apparent that his dress was disordered that his ruffles were torn and blood stained that his brocade jacket was jaggedly rent upon the left side and also ominously stained here and there God zoops man exclaimed Keru his bleared gray eyes lighting at the prospect of a new whole sale scandal for his little retail shop what has happened the wounded how ah best not inquire perhaps bedos lad see you he has got reasons for his delay who knows but that you may have a chance tonight after all a deadly dig well aimed under the fifth rib a true Benedict's pinking or shall we say nicole these wounds from horned beasts are reputed ill to heal ah sad dog sad dog I will warrant thou hast had the balance nevertheless to that credit now do I remember a little lady was casting very curious looks at you at all max last night basil had flung himself into the chair that had so long awaited him and seemed to lend but a half apprehending ear to the prattler on his left who as he lent towards him was hardly able to restrain his eager hand from fingering the hurt so unmistakably evidenced on the right the chivalier as unsuccessfully pressed him with earnest queries manifesting it would seem a genuine anxiety great God my friend what has happened the stentorian tones of Sir John Betos who saw an opportunity of retrieving his fortunes here broke in hastily upon Keru's flow of words bet you double or quits it was not Lady Sue and aroused Mr. Yannacles attention I should be loath to spoil sport he said but I advise no one to bet on my boom fortune this scratch for it is nothing more Mr. Keru and I would show it to you with pleasure and reward for your flattering interest but the surgeon has just bound it up very neatly and it would be a pity to disturb his handiwork he's but the sixth of a series of attempts on my life and made within the last six weeks by persons unknown for purposes likewise unknown day shit Yannacle you might have let me into the bet said the baronate socally while Keru sniffing a choicertid bit of gossip then he had expected wriggled with pleasure and the chevalier expressed unbound amazement that such a state of things could exist above all in England it is even so resumed basal turning to the last speaker as if glad to give vent to some of his pent up irritation I confess that when I returned to my native land I did expect to find at least a quiet life why in my house at Tolendall were those who surrounded me were half savages ruled by the master to walk the roads without his bodyguard there was never so much as a stone thrown after me but here in old England my life I believe would not be worth backing for a week he looked around with a smile in which melancholy and disdain were blended now damn me cried Sir John struck in his easy good nature into sudden warmth and sympathy nay now damn me Yenico I will take any man a hundred guineys that you are alive this day month done said the chevalier with such energy that all three turned around to look at him with surprise perceiving which he went on laughing to conceal an evident embarrassment you're betting habits here are infectious but while I will not withdraw I'm prepared to be glad to lose rather than gain for once he fixed Basel across the table with his brooding eye as he spoke and bowed to him then returned to the bernet no Sir Betos I am not going to recede from a wager this as a wager worth recording was forthwith entered into the club book Basel looked on half an amusement half in bitterness Tis likely after all he said addressing Sir John but you may win and that the chevalier may be afforded the pleasure of losing for I seem to bear a charm to life perhaps he added with a sigh because I care so little for it though to be sure there is something galling to a man in being shot at from behind a hedge and set on in the dark not knowing where the murderer may be lying in wait for him at what street corner at what turn of the road at what hey where if I have not kept my appointment over punctually tonight it is because a rogue has had me by the park gateway in Piccadilly there is more here than mere accidental villainy the next will be that I shall see murder in my own servant's eyes or who knows find it lying at the bottom of my cup PAH I'm as bold as most men I would welcome death more readily than most but by heaven it is unfair treatment and I have had more than my share of it why in a co said Kiru you never spoke a word of this before if fellow has no right to keep such doings dark tell us the details I tell us all about it said Sir John with round eyes ready to start from their orbits true said basal you have now an interest Jack in knowing what sorts of odds are against you well you shall learn all you wish but let us to supper gentlemen meanwhile that we may lose no further time and start better fortified upon the evening's business if bet us is still anxious for his revenge end of part two chapter four part two chapter five of the pride of Yenneco this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox dot or recorded by Sylvia and B in Washington state the pride of Yenneco by Edgerton and Agnes Castle part two chapter five narrative of an episode at it was over a dish of deviled kidneys and a couple of bottles of burgundy that pressed by the eager curiosity of his English friends no less than by the interest Monsieur de Ville Rouge continued to profess his concerns with all two tonic earnestness Basil Yenneco began to narrate his misadventures in the same tone of ironical resentment with which he had already alluded to them it began at Farringdon Dane he said on the little property in Suffolk which my mother has placed at my disposal towards some six weeks gone walking through wood at sundown I was shot at from behind a tree the charge passed within an inch of my face to embed itself in a sapling behind me I was according to my want an evil habit deeply absorbed in thought and was alone consequently although I searched the cops from end to end I could find no trace of my well-wisher that was number one I gave very little heat to the occurrence at first believing it to be some poacher's trick or maybe the unwitting act of what you call in your country Chevalier Sunday sportsman whom is took my brown beaver for the hide of a nobler quarry but the next attempt gave me more serious food for reflection this time I was shot at while sitting reading in my study at night when all the household had retired it was close weather and I had drawn the curtains and opened the windows the bullet again whizzed by my ear and this time shattered the lamp beside me no doubt the total darkness which ensued saved me from a second and better aim you are a fortunate young man gravely do you think so Chevalier answered Yennechal with a smile which all the bitterness of his thoughts could not altogether rob of sweetness I do not think anyone need envy my fate well gentlemen you can conceive the uproar which ensued upon the event I have just described the best efforts of myself my servants and my dogs failed however to track the fugitive although the marks of what seemed a very neat pair of shoes were imprinted on my mother's most choice flower beds after this adventure of goodwill in the country once I was shot at crossing a Ford in full daylight and my poor nag was struck this time I did catch a glimpse of the scoundrel but he was mounted to and poor best though she did her utmost fell dead after the first 20 strides in pursuit thereupon my mother grew so morbidly nervous and the mystery resisting all our attempts at elucidation I gave way to her entreaties and return to London where she deemed I would find myself in greater safety and has your friend followed you up here exclaimed Sir John for getting his supper in his interest by George this is a good story I was stopped on the road by a high woman answered Mr. Enneco quietly nothing unusual in that he will say but there was something a little out of the common nevertheless in the fact that he fired his pistol at me without the formality of bidding me stand and deliver which formality I believe is according to the etiquette of the road I am glad to tell you that I think we left our mark on the gentlemen this time for as he rode away he bent over a saddle we thought like one who will not ride very far but faith the brood is not extirpated and the worthy folk who display such an interest in me find hot lead so unsuccessful have now taken to cold steel Sir John Betos damned his immortal soul with great fervor praise sir remarked Mr. Karoo with an insinuating smile may not the identity of the murderer be of easier solution than you deem are there no errors to your money I might pretend to misunderstand you may so flushing although your meaning is plain permit me to say however that I failed to find a point to the jest it was hardly likely you would find humor in a point so inconveniently aimed against your shelf answered Karoo eerily but is a rarity yet ago to find a man ready to take up the cudges for his heirs and successors nevertheless I crave your pardon more so because I am feigned to know what fell you tonight tonight was an ill night to choose for looking reflectively round upon the fog which hung ever closer even in the warm and well-lit room it was the very night for their purpose my dear Chevalier returned the young man with artificial gaiety faith it was like to have succeeded with them and I make sure mine enemy whoever he may be is pluming himself even now upon the world well rid of my cumbersome existence I was on foot too and what with the darkness and emptiness of the streets I was I may say delivered into their hands but my pretty fellows in Moravia would have done it such a job for me were I in the way to require it as cleanly and with as little ado as you pick your first pheasant in October Jack and yet it may be that I am providentially preserved preserved for a better fit here he tossed off his glass as if to a silent toast but why on foot my dear Yenakal on foot fi fi and this weather could you expect said Karoo with the shiver of horror if you were not so fond of interruption Mr. Karoo said the Chevalier with a senator's smile perhaps we might sooner get to the end of Mr. Yenakal's story we're all eagerness to hear about this last miraculous preservation I hardly know myself how I come to be alive I could get no sedan my dear Karoo and that was just the rub what with Lady Bedford's card party in the fog there was not one to be had within a mile and I had given my stable in a holiday I sent my servant upon the quest for a chair but got tired of waiting friend and neighbor here so it was that I set forth as I said on foot and alone the mist was none so thick but that I could find my way and I was pursuing it at a round pace when opposite Devonshire house some fellow bearing a link crossed from over the road came straight upon me without a word raised his torch and peered intently into my face I halted but before I could demand a meaning of his insolence down when his firebrand fizzing into the mud out came his sword and I was struck with such that in the very attempt to recover my balance I fell backwards all my length upon the pavement skewered like a chicken and carrying the skewer with me some gentlemen happened to reach the spot at that moment there was a cry for the watch but the rogue had made good use of his heels on the fog and was out of sight and hearing in a moment Verdant villain cried Mr. Devil Rouge whose brow had grown ever blacker during this account say my Amy Bill friend did you not get even a lunch at him lunchman I could not even draw his sword was as sharp as a razor a fine sword I have had it brought to my chambers had gone clean through innumerable folds of cloak and cape back in front only to graze my ribs after all it was bent double by the fall and it took the strength of the watchman and two gentlemen to draw it out again by George they thought I was spitted beyond hope a fowl of fair all together murmured Kiru absently but the sorry jest was lost in the strident tones of the anxiously plied basal as to the surgeon's opinion of the wound and expressed himself relieved beyond measure by the reply at this juncture Sir John Betos who had drunk enough to inflame his gambler's ardor to boister his pitch began to climb her for his promised revenge and the whole party once more adjourned to the card room in his heart basal Yenneco would have been genuinely glad to be unsuccessful at the hazard that night partly from a good nature dislike to be the cause of the foolish young man's complete feeling of superstition but the luck ran as persistently in his favor as ever Karoo with John tablets began loudly to back the winter challenging all his acquaintance to wager against him but although the high play and Sir John's increasing excitement and restlessness as well as the extraordinary good fortune which cleaved to Yenneco soon attracted a circle of watchers men were cherry of courting what seemed certain loss and Karoo found his easing gains not likely further who with his cheek resting upon his hand had seemed plunged in deep reflection ever since they had left the supper room rose and with an hour of geniality which sat awkwardly enough upon him cried out to the surprise of all for he had not been want to back any player in the club and there is really no one to side with my good friend Bedos tonight why then Mr. Karoo I will be the man thunder weather Bedos clapping him on the shoulder I believe the luck will turn yet so brave Mr. Karoo something substantial to encourage our friend Yinako looked down at the pile of vouchers which led his elbow it amounted already to a terrible sum then he looked across at the boy's face drawn almost haggard in spite of its youth and chubbiness and sighed impatiently he could not advise the fool to go home to bed yet for himself he was heartily sick of these winnings the dice were thrown again Sir John's hand trembling again vouchers were added to the heap Mr. Deville Rouge threw a dark glance at the winner as he stepped up to Karoo to settle his own debt you should not have backed me said Sir John ruefully lifting his eyes from the contemplation of the paper that meant for him another step towards ruin the Tevils in it I will play no more tonight nay then cried the Chevalier by her leave I will take your place I for warn him no such believer and the continuance of Mr. Yinako's good luck there was something harsh almost in the tone of the last words and Basel turned in surprise towards the speaker the Chevalier he said is very ready to risk his gold against me tonight Tis so Sir return the Chevalier with such singular arrogance that the watchers looked at each other significantly and Karoo whispered to a young man behind his chair Faith our foreign friend is a bad loser after all Basel had flushed but he made no reply and contented himself with raising his eyebrows somewhat contemptuously while he languidly pushed his own dice box across the table toward his new opponent come said the Chevalier seizing it and shaking it fiercely I will not mince the stake a hundred guineas on the main he threw and the result of all his rattling being after all the lowest cast of the evening it was an ill suppressed titter on the table Basel made no attempt to hide his smile as he lazily turned over his dice and through just one hire the Germans face had grown suffused with dark angry in his temples began to swell double or quits he cried huskily he through and lost double to stake through and lost again there was something about the scene that aroused the audience to more potent interest than the ordinary nightly repeated spectacle of loss and gain the extraordinary passion displayed by the foreigner not only in his inflamed countenance but in the very motion of his hands in the rigid tension of his whole body in one who had been known hither to his courteous and composed to formality it is to be hoped someone has a Lancet said Garoo for I believe the gentlemen will have an apoplexy unless a little blood be let soon I fear me answered his companion that there will be more blood blood than you think for did you mark that look at the same instant the Chevalier flung down his box with such violence that the dice rebounding flew about the room engaged across had to give event at last to long pent up fury by heaven Mr. Yenoko he cried or not that I have been told how well you have qualified for this success I should think there was more in such marvelous throwing of dice than met the eye but your love affairs I hear and I should have born it in mind have been so disastrous so more than usually disastrous hear his voice broke into a sort of snarl as to afford sufficient explanation for any cold silence then Yenoko rose white as death if you know so much about me sir he said in tones that for all the anger that vibrated in them fell harmoniously upon the ear after the Chevalier savage outburst you should know too that there is a subject upon which I never allow anyone to touch your first insinuation I pass over with the contempt it deserves but as regard your observation on what you are pleased to call my love affairs I can only consider it as an intentional insult and this is my answer the German in his turn had sprung to his feet but basal Yenoko lent across the table and before he could guard himself struck him lightly but deliberately across the mouth end of part two chapter five part three chapter one of the pride of Yenoko this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recorded by Sylvia M.B. in Washington State The Pride of Yenoko by Anderton in Agnes Castle part three chapter one memoir of Captain Basel Yenoko resumed in the spring of the year 1773 in my castle of Tolendall March 1773 it is the will of one whose wishes are law to me that I should proceed with these pages begun under such stress of mental trouble until I bring the tangled story of Basel Yenoko's marriage to its singular settlement without as I now write all over the land the ice-bound Brooks are melting and our fields and roads are deep in impassable mud the whole air is full of the breath of spring as grateful to the nostrils as it is stirring to the blood of man to the sap of trees but it is ill getting about for all that the spring time is so sweet as sweet and as capricious as a woman wood and thus there is time for this occupation of scribe yet it is a curious task for one bread so vastly different a trade neither God knows do I find time heavy on my hands just now nevertheless I must even in this preface as I have begun it and say that I am feigned to do as I am bidden the last line I traced upon these sheets I am filled with a good deal of wonder at and no little admiration of myself when I view what a goodly mass I have already blackened was penned at one of the darkest moments of that dark year Monsieur de Shrekendorf little messenger of such ill omen had but just departed and in the month that followed his visit the courage had failed me to resume my melancholy record though truly I had things to relate that a man might consider like to form a more than usually thrilling chapter of autobiography towards the beginning of September I still a dweller upon my mother's little property most peaceful haunt it would seem in the heart of our peaceful land began to find myself the object of a series of murderous attacks these so repeated and inveterate that it was evident that they were dictated by the most deliberate purpose and the more alarming perhaps that I could give then no guess from what quarter they proceeded suspicion fell on a poaching gang on a dishonest room on a discharged bailiff at length seen my mother like to fall ill of the anxiety I consented to return to London although the country life as the wholesome excitement of sport had afforded me relief from my restlessness which existence in the town was far from providing no sooner however was I fully installed in my London chambers then the persecution began afresh I had fallen into an idle habit of going night after night to whites there to bet and gamble with my modest acquaintances it was not that the dice had any special attraction for me but that my nights were so long on my way thither one mid-october foggy evening my life was once and this time with a deliberation and ferocity which might well have proved successful at last as it was however I again providentially escaped and was able to proceed to the club where I had an appointment with a poor youth our Norfolk neighbor Sir John Betos who had already lost a great deal of money to me that would not be content until he had lost a great deal more I had the most insupportable good luck I little knew that I should find awaiting me there the greatest danger I had yet to run that the head which had directed all these blows in the dark was to gear let's say preparing to attack me in the open and push its malice to a certain climax a foreign gentlemen one chivalier Doville Rouge as I knew him then had seduously thought first my acquaintance and there upon my company for some weeks past and though I had not found him very entertaining I was not in the mood to be entertained by anyone I had no reason to deny him either the one or the other but this night began to strike me as unwarrantable he sat a round of hazard with me for the soul and determined purpose as I even then saw of grossly insulting me as a reply struck him across the face for however transparent was the trap laid for me the provocation before witnesses was of a kind I could not pass over and for heaven I believe I was in my heart glad of the diversion the meeting was fixed for the next morning neither of us would consent to delay and indeed once he had given a loose rain to his fury is more that of a wild beast thirsting for blood than of a being endowed with reason both Sir John Betos and Mr. Carew who had formed our party indignant at the coarseness of the foreigner's behavior volunteered on the spot to be my seconds and Carew who has a subtle knowledge of the etiquette of honor arranged the details of our meeting it was to take place in Chelsea Gardens half an hour after sunrise the weapons chosen by Mr. Deville Rouge were swords for although the quarrel had been of his own seeking my blow had given him the right of choice it was two o'clock before I found myself again alone in my rooms that night my friends having conducted me home and seeming somewhat loath to retire I was longing for a couple of hours solitude before the dawn of the day which might be my last I felt that my career had reached its turning point that this was an event otherwise serious than any of the quarrels in which I had been hither to embroiled and that the conduct of affairs was not in my hands Karoo was anxious about me he had never yet seen a duelist of my kidney I believe and my very quietness puzzled him make that nutcracker attendant of yours prepare you a hot drink man cried he as at last with honest beddose he withdrew and get to bed nothing will steady your hand like a spell of sleep but there was no sleep for me besides that pain of the slight wound which I had received in the night's GUET that bends was there was an excitement in my brain partially due to the fever incident on the hurt which would not permit the thought of rest I had but little business to transact in view of the present uncertainty of my life I had recently drawn up a will in which after certain fitting legacies I left my great fortune to my wife now I merely gathered together the whole of this accumulated narrative of mine into a weighty packet and after addressing it deposited it in the honest hands with the strict injunction in the event of my demise to deliver it personally to utterly no farewell message would be so eloquent as these pages in which I had laid bare the innermost thoughts of my soul since I first knew her she should receive no other message from me I next tore up poor beddow's litter of I OU's and making a parcel of the fragments directed it to him Yannos received my instructions with his usual taciturn docility yet if anything could have roused me from the curious state of apathy in which I found myself it would have been the sight of the dumb concern on the faithful fellow's countenance having thus put all my worldly affairs in order I sacked me down in my armchair awaiting the dawn and viewed the past as one who has done with life I had a strong presentiment upon me that I should not survive the meeting at times the vision of my wife's sleeping at that very moment as I had so often watched her sleep lightly and easily as a child little watching little caring perhaps if she had wanted of her husband's solemn vigil would rise up before me they vividness so cruel as well night aroused me but the new calmness of my soul defied these assaults an unknown philosophy had succeeded to the violence of my emotions when my seconds called for me in the first grayness of the morning they found me ready for them they themselves were shivering from the rock cold with arms thrust to the elbows into the depths of their muffs Karoo all yellow and shriveled an old man of a sudden in beddose blue and purple the sleep still in his swollen eyes hardly able to keep his teeth from chattering a very schoolboy they could scarce conceal their amazement at my placidity it was not indeed that I found myself bodily fit for the contest for the whole of my left side was stiff and I could hardly move that arm without pain yet placid I was I scarcely know now why thus we set forth in sir beddose coach Yanos on the box and a civil shy young man on the back seat beside beddose this was the latter informed me the best surgeon he had been able to secure at such short notice the fog disappeared and when the mists evaporated it promised to be a fine bright frosty morning now it may be after all that I was a little light-headed with the heat of the wound in my blood for I have no very clear recollections of that morning it remains in my mind rather as a bright colored fantasy then a series of events I have actually lived through I remember as a man may remember a scene in a play a garden running down to the river side of my bulky antagonist as he conferred excitedly with two outlandish looking men his seconds these had fierce mustaches and reminded me vaguely of the cravat captains I had known in the empire then the scene shifts we stand to facing each other I am glad of the chill of the air with nothing between it and my fevered breast but the thinness of my shirt but my opponent stamps like a menacing bull as a furious at the benumbing blasts now I am fighting fighting never in battle or in single combat have I had need to fight before this is no courteous duel between gentlemen no honorable meeting but the struggle of a man with his murderer physically at a disadvantage from my heart I am more over conscious that against this brute fury all my skill at arms is of no avail and my strength is rapidly failing then as he drives me by the sheer weight of his mass I see his face thrust forward into mine distorted with such a frenzy that I wonder in a sort of uninformed way why this man should thus thirst to kill me the next moment with an extraordinary sense of universal failure and disorganization which is yet not pain I realize that I am hit badly hit upon that instant I find my brain cleared to a lucidity I have never felt before I see my opponent sword flash ruby red with my own blood in the sun rays I see him smile a smile of glorious triumph which cuts a deep dimple beside his lip I hear him pant at me the strange words ha orderly and then I am again seared rent once more and then to the sound of a howl of many voices my world falls into chaos and exists no more it is sometimes but a short an easy way up to the gates of death but a long and a weary journey back to life it was a long and weary journey to me I was like a man who travels in the dead of night over rough ways and now and again slumbers easily with troubled dreams and now looks out upon a glimmer of light in some house or village and now on nothing but the pitchy darkness and yet he is always traveling on and on till he is wary with badness and fatigue and then as the dawn breaks upon the wanderer as he sees a strange land around him so the dawn of what seemed a new existence began to break for me and I looked with eyes so tired and drowsy as scarce to care to notice but in yet a little while I warmed and quickened to the sun of returning health I began to be something more than a mere tortured mass of humanity each breath was no longer misery to draw the mind was able to reassert authority over the flesh the dark watchful figure that seemed to have been sitting at the foot of my bed for centuries my next thought was amaze that I should be in a strange room it had a very teasing tapestry its figures had word me long before I could notice them in a little while I began to understand that I was not in my own chambers and to feel such irritation at the liberty which had been taken with me that I should have demanded instant explanation had my strength been equal to the task but I come of too vigorous stock the blood and the fools of my day poisoned it with endless potations and disiluteness for me when once on the broad high road to recovery to continue my traveling simile to dally over the ground moreover I was too well nursed Yannos it seems after first couple of visits in each of which I was wisely bled of the diminished store before his eyes and never a chance of hanging the murderer it had ended in the old soldier taking the lawn to his own hands dismissing the man of medicine and treating me after his own lights he had had a fairly good apprenticeship having attended my uncle through all his campaigns as far as I am concerned I am convinced that in this as well as in another matter which I am about to relate he saved my life the other matter and my ire the true explanation of which however I did not receive until I was strong enough to entertain visitors Yannos would give me little or no satisfaction I thought in myself it would be more wholesome for your honor than your other house was the utmost I could extract indeed he strenuously discouraged all conversation but the day when this stern guardian first consented to admit Keru and Bedos to my presence and that was not until I had been curious about was made clear to me Keru indeed had the virtue of being an excellent gossip I had at one time deemed it his only quality but I learned better then both the gentleman each in his own fashion displayed a certain emotion at seeing me again in which the pleasure at the fact of my being still in the land of the living and likely to remain so was qualified by the painful impression produced by my altered silence with something like tears in his eyes Keru the Rue was very deliberate in his choice of a chair took snuff with a vast deal of elegant gesture and fired off with it might be in excess of merriment such jocularities as he had gathered ready against the occasion both of them seemed to deem it incumbent upon them to avoid any reference to the dual I however very promptly brought up the subject now for God's sake I said nurse take your pap go to sleep ask no questions learn at last a little about himself in the first place where am I in the second what has become of the red devil who brought me to this past in the first place Yanako said Keru you are at the house of Lady Betos mother to our friend here a very pleasing little residence situate on Richmond Hill secondly that red devil as you call him that most damnable villain or a naive deserve stringing up as high as Hammond but of that anon there is a good deal to tell you if you think you can bear the excitement well he pursued upon my somewhat pettish aseration I myself think a little pleasant conversation will do you more good than harm to begin with your doubtless not aware that you are a dead man how cried I a little startled for my nerve was yet interposed Sir John don't you make those jokes gruesome my column it makes me creep no basal lad thou art alive and will live to set that Chevalier whoever he may be swinging for it and here in his eager partisanship he broke into a volley of execrations which would have run my poor great uncle's performance is pretty close why said I am patiently to his enigma to me still why I am here why am I dead why the Chevalier I think you have all sworn to drive me mad among you I was so evidently exasperated that bettos, all of a tremble besought Keru to explain the situation he'll do himself a mischief he cried pathetically do you tell him Keru you know what a fool I am Keru was nothing loath to set about what was indeed the chief pleasure of his life the retailing of scandal and it seems that the Yenakodule first said he settling himself to his task with gusto why the Chevalier should hang who he really is where he comes from why he hates you with such deadly hatred Yenakodule are all mysteries which I confess myself unable to fathom doubtless you can furnish us with the clue by and by as he spoke his pale eye kindled with a most devouring curiosity he proceeded glibly but why the Chevalier should hang is another matter cut soaks I'd run him down myself but for his impudence in getting gentlemen like myself to come and see foul play why Yenakodule don't you know that after charging you like a bull and running you once through the body this count will scab you again as you were sinking down him I'd have run him through their interposed surgeon excitedly I had drawn for it had I not dick and I'd have run him through but that surgeon called out that you were dead and dashed me between the turn I got and the way those queer seconds of his hustled him away I lost the chance and the three of them ran they ran like rats to the river I'd have left my mark in them even then as Jack told you said Karu no sooner had they heard you were dead my friend than they ran for it and it is quite true that I restrained Jack here from sticking them in the back as they skedaddled a pretty affair of honour indeed I lay back on my pillows a while musing I had had time to reflect on many things these days and God knows there were enigmas enough in my life to give me food for reflection what I had just heard caused me no surprise that I had previously reached after a moment Karu cleared his throat edged his chair for a foot nearer and queried confidentially did it never strike you that the Chevalier must have been part and parcel if not the moving spirit of those attacks upon your life which you told us of that night at the club you did not appear to have a notion of it then but there was not a man of us there who did not see but the quarrel was deliberately got up and do you mind said Karu and Yenako knows best himself if in his gay youth in foreign parts he has not given good cause for this mortal enmity though to be sure the mystery thickens when remember how friendly you were with each other Yenako is such a close dog he keeps such a dash tight counsel I smiled Yenako would keep his counsel still I meant these good fellows should expound my riddles for me not I theirs but since I am dead said I begin the gentleman did not leave his address said Sir John with a grin and he furtively squeezed my hand to express his secret sense of the little transaction of the IOUs we made some clamour at the embassy I promise you into post Karu we were anxious to pay him all his do you may be sure but devil a bit of satisfaction could we get save indeed that the ambassador took to his bed with a fit of gout and you being a member to bury you was the best thing your friends could do for you till you were able to take fit measures to protect yourself and indeed it was that queer old tartar of yours yannos or whatever you call him who loudly insisted upon your demise when we found the first alarm was unfounded and that you still breathe Gad I believe you have the faith he besought us with such urgency that with seeing you lying there and knowing what we knew of the foul play that had been practiced upon you we were ready enough to fall in with his desires Sir John bethaught him of his mother's house at richman and offered to accompany you there or rather your body you were a little less just then next the surgeon and so he won the day and miles the surgeon gave in but indeed he told me apart to his waist of time disputing for anyhow you could not see the noon but here you are at my lady bed house at richman alive and like to live though you have seized to exist for most men there was a charming really a most touching but nobody knows anything positive the secret is still kept Janos I believe has contrived to us watch the anxiety of your relatives here the speaker took so copious a pinch to refresh himself after his long speech that he set me off sneezing or upon my special Cerberus promptly made his parents and bundled the visitors the memory of Mr. De Ville Rouge's cry as he dealt me what he believed my death stroke a cry in which it would be hard to say whether savage triumph or sheer vindictiveness most predominant had come back on me as soon as I could think at all with most revealing force his arrival in England had coincided with the beginning of the persecution the look on his face as I had last seen it the smile and that dimple had haunted me during long hours of delirium just maddening grotesque and horrible likeness to the face of her I had so loved coupling these things in later sanity of mind with the other evidence I could not doubt but that here had been some relative of Otterly who had interest to put an end to her husband's existence had not her pockmarked mercury at the close of our interview uttered words of earnest warning I, I minded them now the matter will not end here have a care young man as I thought of all this as the whole meaning of what had seemed so mysterious now lay clear before me I would be seized with a sort of deadly anguish compared to which all my previous sufferings whether of body or mind had been but trivial could she could Otterly have known of this work could she have inspired it the sweat that would break out upon me at such a thought was more than all my fever had rung from my body and my faithful leech would wonder to find me faint and reeking and would puzzle his poor brains down the cause and decocked me new teas of dreadful compounds Fred refuges which he vowed had never failed but then at other times the vision of my wife would rise before me and shame me I would see again her noble brow her clear eye her arched an innocent lip and in my weakness and the passion of my longing I would turn and weep upon my pillow to think that having to my sorrow lost her I should come now to lose even my faith in her mad love now there must be as Yanos would have it something remarkably tough in the breed of Yenakal for me to recover from such wounds both bodily and mental recover I did however in spite of all odds and a resolve I made with returning strength did a good deal to ease my mind tossed between such torturing fluctuations this resolve was no less than to leave the country some fine morning in secret so soon as I could undertake the journey of being able to persevere in it to speed to Buddhism and discover myself the real attitude of Othole towards me I was determined that according as I found her either what my heart would still deem her or yet so base a thing as the fiend whispered that I would try to win her back or I could die in the attempt or thrust her from my life forever thus when I heard that my enemy in the world believed me dead when I realized that she too must probably share in the delusion not only would it materially facilitate my re-entering the duchy but it would afford me an excellent opportunity of judging her real feelings I had no doubt but that if I set to work in a proper manner and duly preserved my incognito I should be able now that all pretext for quarantine had disappeared to secure an interview without too much difficulty so all my desires hastening towards that goal I set myself to become a whole man again with so much energy that even Iganos was surprised at the rapidity of my progress End of Part 3 Chapter 1 Part 3 Chapter 2 of the Pride of Yenneco This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recorded by Sylvia M.B. in Washington State The Pride of Yenneco by Edgerton and Agnes Castle Part 3 Chapter 2 It was towards the middle of December that we started upon the journey a little sooner indeed than my surgeon and mentor approved of but his power over me dwindled as my own strength returned Being chiefly anxious to preserve my incognito I hesitated some time before permitting Yenneos to accompany me His personal appearance unfortunately being of a kind unlikely to be forgotten when once seen But besides the fact that I could not find it in me to inflict such pain upon that excellent fellow there was an undoubted advantage to myself in the presence of one upon whose fidelity and courage I could so absolutely reckon in an expedition likely to prove of extreme difficulty and perhaps of peril Moreover the man would have followed me in spite of me I insisted, however, upon his shaving off his great pandor mustaches a process which though it altered did not improve his appearance His aspect indeed being now so fantastically ugliest drive me despite my preoccupation into inextinguishable paroxysms of laughter every time I unexpectedly got a glimpse of his visage until habit wore away the impression As to myself my long illness had as I thought sufficiently changed me Besides the news of my resurrection was too recently and too vaguely rumored in London to have reached or to be likely to reach the continent for many a long day Under the humble style therefore of a Munich gentleman Theodor Desperger with his attendant now dubbed Johann a character which my Austrian German fitly enabled me to sustain I set sail from London to Hamburg and after a favourable sea passage which did much to invigorate me we landed in the free city and proceeded towards Buddhism by easy stages for despite the order of my impatience I felt the importance of husband in my newly acquired strength from that chosen upon our first venture one much farther away from the palace The little town presented now a very different aspect indeed it's gay and cheery bustle and the crisp frosty weather which greeted us there might have raised inspiring thoughts but it was with a heart very full of anxiety with a determination rather to face ill fortune bravely than the hope of good that I passed the night I got but little sleep for having reached my goal I scarcely began nor in the morning had I arrived at any definite conclusion the risk of presenting myself in person at the palace after my former fashion was too great to be entertained for a moment I had therefore to content myself with dispatching Ianos to make cautious inquiries as to one far-line pollen and her relatives not forgetting a bulky gentleman he knew of recently returned from England I myself in my plainest suit and with my cloak as a muffler partly concealed my face set forth upon my side to gather what crumbs of information I might at the very outset I had a most singular meeting traversing the little town in the brisk morning air under a dome of palest blue I naturally directed my steps toward the castle seated on its terrace and towering above the citizens brown rules I had taken a somewhat circuitous route to avoid passing in front of the main guard and found myself one side of which was bound by the castle garden walls and the other that upon which I walked by a row of private houses seemingly of some importance now as I walked engaged in gazing upwards at the long row of escutcheoned windows which I could just see above the wall and foolishly wondering through which of them my cruel little wife might be want to look forth into the outer world for myself and to apologize something in the dark figure struck me with poignant reminiscence the next instant as she would have passed me I caught her by the shoulder Anna I cried wildly God be thanked Anna for upon this very first morning of my quest heaven had brought me face to face with no less a person than Ottley's old nurse the recognition on her side certainly countenance that she had turned upon me became convulsed by the most extraordinary emotion she gave a stifled cry then she clapped her hands together pressed them clasped against her cheek and stared at me with piercing intensity crying again and again God in heaven you God in heaven you the black eyes were as hard as they were and as we stood thus the space of a few seconds my mind misgave me as to whether I had not already jeopardized all my prospects by this impulsive disclosure it was evident that the woman had heard the story of my death which in this hostile place was my chief security but that I was cast and the chance of information was too precious not to be seized even at greater risks I laid hold and the bear thought that I was once more so near the beloved of my heart brought in my weakness the heat of tears to my eyes where is she where is my wife what does she and I must see her my life is in danger in this place they have tried to kill me because I love her but I had rather risked death again a thousand times and give her up take me to her Anna the woman had never seized regarding me with the same enigmatic earnestness all at once her eyes lightened she looked at me with the same earnestness of some animal conscious of danger then wrenched her hands out of mine follow me sir she said in a whisper so urgent in its apprehension as to strike a colder chill into my veins than the wildest scream could have done without another glance at me she started off in front and as I hastily followed almost mechanically flinging whoever they were she had always I had thought hated me or into the arms of my wife she turned away from the palace down a by street and then took another turn which brought us into a poor alley where the houses became almost cottages and where the gutters ran among the cobbles with liquid filth my wild hope gave place to sinister foreboding and as I plotted carefully after her unwavering figure I loosened and settled the folds of my cloak around my left arm so that at a pinch I might doff it and use it for defense suddenly my guide halted for a second looked at me over her shoulder and disappeared down some steps into the open door of a mean little shop I entered after her at once disappointed in all my expectations and reassured by the humble vulgarity of the place below gloomy and evil smelly narrow room I saw her imperiously motion an ugly sallow young woman out of her presence and still in silence I watched her wondering as she made fast the doors and bent her dark face to listen if all were still then she produced from a counter paper ink and pen and spreading them out turned to me with a single word right so small that if I write to your mistress you will convey the letter alas I have written before and should not even receive my writing oh can you not get me speech of her I conjure you by the love you bear her let me see her but for a few minutes the woman fixed me for a second with a startled wondering eye opened her mouth as if to speak but immediately clapped her hand to it as if to restrain the words and paper and cried once more right and so I seemed ever destined to communicate with my wife from strange places and by strange messengers with a trembling hand and a brain in a world I wrote I hardly know what a wild passionate reproachful appeal setting forth incoherent words all I had done and suffered all my desire all my faithful love when I looked up at length I found the black trust my life and its hopes to this woman and for a moment I hesitated but at the same instant there was some noise without and snatching the letter unfinished from before me she thrusted into her bosom folded her cloak across it and stooping close to me demanded in her breathless undertone where to you live mechanically I told her adding ask for Monsieur drew me hastily out by the back along a close flagged passage leaving an irate customer hammering and clamoring for admittance we proceeded to a small yard into another alley and here she halted a second still detaining me by my cloak go home she said then keep close there's danger danger you will hear she suddenly caught my hand kissed it and was gone I stood a while bewildered astonished staring hardly able to grasp the meaning of what had passed for this last scene in the drama of my life had been acted hurriedly and was full of mysterious significance then unobtrusively I sought the shelter of my own inn resolving to obey to the letter the injunctions laid upon me but fate had wielded otherwise determined not to interfere with the course of fortune by any least in docility I retired texting a slight in disposition to rouse no undue suspicion by an air of mystery gave orders for my dinner to be served there a stout red-cheeked winch with rough bare arms had just grinning clattered the first greasy dish before me when I heard Janos's foot upon the stairs I had learnt to know the sound of his step pretty well in my as if its owner hesitated to enter filled me with such a furious impatience that I got up and flung it open to rest his news from him not even when he had held up my poor great uncle in his arms to let him draw his last breath on earth had I seen the fellow wear accountants of such discomposure in heaven's name Janos cried I and the sturdy house-wunch turned and stared at the servitor snapping at her with such sourness and so forgetful of the decorum he usually displayed in my presence that it was clear he was mightily moved she fled as if some savage old watchdog had nipped at her heel and we were alone I had returned from my own exploration full of hope and at the same time of wonder so that I was at once ill and well-prepared for any tidings however extraordinary let us go home honored sir he stammered again and again surveying me with a compassion and an anxiety he had not vouchsafed upon me at the worst of my illness I had to drag the words from him piecemeal as the torturer forces out the unwilling confession yes he had news bad news this was no place for me it was not wholesome for us here let us return to Tollendall or Vienna or even England I believe I fell upon him at last and shook him what had he heard what had he heard of her I vowed he was driving me mad vowed that if he did not instantly tell me all I would throw caution to the wind and go to the palace and demand my wife in person were at of the Duke himself this thread extorted at length terrible thing that even the rough old soldier feared to utter the lady he stammered the lady Ken no longer be spoken of as your honor's wife she is married married I cried what do you mean you scoundrel no longer my wife married you are raving this is stark lunacy he shook his grey head under the shower of my fury married does your honor forget that they think here that they have at last succeeded in killing you I looked at him aghast unwilling to admit the awful illumination that flashed upon my mind he believing me still incredulous proceeded married she is fraulein pollen the lady in waiting fraulein pollen as your honor bade me call her and as it seems she called herself until and then with a significant emphasis until six weeks ago and who is the man said I the words sounded in my ears as as someone else had spoken them but I believe composure Janos seemed to take more confidence and continued in easier tones while I held myself still to listen it is the court physician one privy counselor Lothner I was shown his house a big one in the schlosskraben number ten opposite the palace walls I yes they were married six weeks ago and the Duke was present at the marriage and the princess too they say it was made up to let us hence you are well quit of it all this is a bad place yet I stood without moving chasm after chasm horror after horror seemed to be opening before my mind chasm so black that I scarce ventured to look into their depths horror so unspeakable that I could put no word shape to them after Othely's messenger had failed to induce me with such rancorous hate and had called Othely into my dying ears had returned to claim his pride and they had wedded in their blood guilt well might the nurse cry and repeat the cry of God in heaven God in heaven what new ambush would they now can try your honor said Janos and he put his hand respectfully upon my sleeve the greatest fool in Christendom the fool of the play that is tricked and mocked and beaten from one act to another tricked into marrying a serving maid instead of a princess tricked into loving her when he should have repudiated her with scorn abandoned by her when he could no longer live without her mocked when he sought his wife driven away by lackeys stabbed by a murdering hound a scoking he laughed at the fool but we shall see Janos we shall see he laughs best who laughs last they say ten schloss graben did you say I caught my cloak I think the faithful fellow actually laid hands upon me to arrest me but I broke from him as if his clasp had been straw I'll drive my sword I remember saying into the first coin what way I took yet going as straight as a die to my goal I had no other thought but how clean I would run my blade through the clumsy lumbering brute who deemed he had so well widowed my wife I had that strength of ten men in me End of part three chapter two