# Terence O'Rourke/Part 1/Chapter 5

CHAPTER V
HE ENGAGES BOTH HIS WORD AND SWORD
"Our destination, monsieur," the girl indicated briefly, with a dainty little nod of her head.
Half stupefied, the Irishman managed to get himself—somehow—out of the vehicle. Wholly fascinated, he made haste to turn and assist the woman to alight; for a moment her gloved hand rested in his broad palm—her hand, warm, soft, fragile …! But, almost immediately, it was gone; O'Rourke found himself bowing reverently, and, he felt, idiotically, over space. He recovered himself, and followed the girl, his eyes aglow with a new, clear light.
Their fiacre had halted before a certain impressive mansion on a broad boulevard—a hôtel familiar to the Irishman in a way, and yet nameless to him. Rather than mansion, the building might be termed a palace, so huge, so impressive it bulked in the night. Seemingly a fête of some sort was in progress within; the windows shone with soft radiance, faint strains of music filtered through the open entrance, at either side of which stood stolid servants in gorgeous livery after the English fashion.
From the doors, down the steps to the curb, ran a carpet under an awning. The girl tripped nonchalantly up the steps, as one knowing well the place, and gave a whispered word or two coldly to a footman who bowed with a respect which struck the Irishman as exaggerated.
They passed through an elaborate vestibule banked with ​plants, its atmosphere heady with the fragrance of flowers, and so into a great hallway where other servants relieved the newcomers of their wraps.
Before them a doorway arched, giving upon a ballroom, whence a flood of sound leaped out to greet them: laughter of women and the heavier voices of men; scraping of fiddles and of feet in time to the music; the swish of skirts, the blare of a French horn.
Mademoiselle had accepted the arm of the Irishman; they moved toward the ballroom, but before entering she turned toward him, speaking confidentially, yet with an assumption of lightness.
"You are to converse with me, monsieur, lightly, if you please, as though we were lifelong friends. I shall chatter—oh, positively!—and you must answer me in kind. It—it is essential, monsieur."
He bowed, attempting an easy smile, which failed utterly; for a regally attired personage at the doorway demanded the honor of announcing the late guests. And O'Rourke had not the least clew to his mademoiselle's identity! He colored, stammered, hating the servant rabidly for what he considered his cold, suspicious eye.
Yet he need not have shown confusion, had he but guessed. He managed to mouthe his name—"Colonel O'Rourke"—and the servant turned to the ballroom, raising a stentorian voice:
"Madame la Princess de Grandlieu! Monsieur—"
His own name followed, but was lost to O'Rourke in the thunder of his companion's title. And the châteaux of romance which he had been busy erecting en Espagne fell, crashing about his astounded ears.
A princess! And, if that did not place "mademoiselle" ​far beyond his reach—he, a mere Irish adventurer!—she was also "madame"—married!
"Monsieur!" the voice of the woman came to his ears through the daze of his reverie; and it was a-thrill with dismay. "Monsieur, for the love of Heaven do not look so wrathful! You—why, you are ruining our play; you must, must pay attention to me—"
With an effort he contrived to gain some control of his emotions; he schooled himself to bend an attentive ear towards the woman, and to smile lightly the while they chatted of inconsequential matters, slowly threading a way down the length of the salon, through a whirling maze of dancing couples: all of which floated vaguely before O'Rourke's eyes, a blur of women's gleaming, rounded shoulders, of coruscant jewels and fugitive flashes of color, all spotted with the severe black-and-white costumes of men. They ran the gantlet of a thousand pairs of curious eyes, whose searching and impertinent scrutiny O'Rourke keenly felt, and as keenly longed to return.
They were making, he found, for the far end of the room—towards a wall of glass through which peeped green, growing plants. And there, in the conservatory, the princess presently left the adventurer.
"You will await me here," she instructed him, "that I may know where to find you when the time comes. In ten minutes, then, Colonel O'Rourke!"
She smiled graciously. He was gripping himself strongly, in order that he might answer her with some semblance of coherency; and he blushed in his embarrassment, finding himself slow to recover—very boyish looking, young and handsome.
Madame la Princesse turned away, smiling inscrutably, ​and left him. He strolled about for a few moments, then seated himself upon a bench in full view of the room he had just quitted. For ten long minutes he waited, as tranquilly as he might; which is as much as to say that he was restless to the extreme and vibrant with curiosity.
For fifteen minutes or so longer he wriggled on the seat qf uncertainty, wondering if he was being played with,—made a fool of. A thought struck him like a shot: was she detaining him while sending for the police?
The essential idiocy of that conjecture became evident within a few minutes. The princess was but proving her inborn, feminine method of measuring time; she returned at last—flushed and breathless, more bewitching than he had imagined her, who had not ere this seen her in a good light
"Come, Colonel O'Rourke, if you please."
He was instantly at her side, offering his arm. She seemed to hesitate the merest fraction of a second, then lightly placed her fingers upon his sleeve, where they rested, flower-like. The man gazed upon them with all his soul in his eyes. His hand trembled to seize them—oh, already he was far gone! But the manner of Madame la Princesse kept him within bounds; its temperature was perceptibly lower than formerly.
For her part, she was choosing to ignore what he could not conceal—the devotion which her personality had so suddenly inspired in the breast of the young Irishman.
They re-entered the ballroom; now it was half deserted, and a facile way lay open to them on the floor that had been so crowded.
By an almost imperceptible pressure upon his arm the princess guided him across the room, and into a salon that was quite deserted.
​"It is late," she said, half in explanation, half to keep the man's mind on matters other than herself; "in a quarter of an hour the fête will be a thing of the past, monsieur."
"And the guests all departed on their various ways," he said—merely to make talk.
She favored him with a sidelong glance. "Not all," she returned, with a meaning which he failed to grasp, and stopped before a closed door, of which she handed him the key. He opened in silence, and they passed into a large room and gloomy, furnished rather elaborately as a library and study, its walls lined with shelves of books.
In the center of the room stood a great desk of mahogany, upon which rested a drop-light with a green shade that flooded the desk itself with yellow radiance, leaving the rest of the apartment in shadow.
The princess marched with determination to the farther side of the desk and there seated herself.
"The door, monsieur," she said imperiously: "you will lock it."
Wondering, he did her bidding; then stood with his back to it, instinctively in the pose of an orderly awaiting the command of a superior officer—shoulders back, head up, eyes level, feet together, hands at sides.
She noted the attitude, and relented a trifle from her frigid mood. "That Colonel O'Rourke is a soldier is self-evident," she said. "Be seated, monsieur,"—motioning to a chair on the opposite side of the desk.
Again he obeyed in silence; for, in truth, he feared to trust his tongue.
The woman lowered her lashes, drawing off her gloves slowly, as though lost in deepest meditation. As a matter of fact she was planning her campaign for the subjugating of ​this adventurer; at present, he was impossible—too earnest, too willing to serve, too fervent for comfort.
For a time she did not speak, and the room was very quiet. If she watched him, O'Rourke was unable to make certain of it; for the upper half of her face was in deep shadow. Only her arms, bared, showed very white and rounded; O'Rourke might not keep his gaze from them.
But she found a way to bring him to his senses. Suddenly she leaned forward, and turned the shade of the lamp so that its glare fell full upon the Irishman's face; her gaze then became direct; and, resting her elbows upon the table, lacing her fingers and cradling her chin upon the backs of her hands, the girl boldly challenged him.
"Colonel O'Rourke," she said deliberately—at once to the point; "you are to consider that this is a matter of business, purely."
He flushed, drew himself bolt upright.
"Pardon!" he murmured stiffly.
"Granted, monsieur," she replied briskly. "And now, before we implicate ourselves, let us become acquainted. You, I already know, I believe."
"Yes, madame?"
"There was a man of whom I have heard, of the name of O'Rourke, who served as a colonel in the Foreign Legion in the Soudan, for a number of years."
"The same, madame," he said—not-without a touch of pride in his tones.
"He received the decoration of the Legion of Honor, I believe? For gallantry?"
"They called it such, madame."
He turned aside the lapel of his coal; she nodded, her eyes ​brightening as she glimpsed the scrap of ribbon and the pendent silver star.
"I begin to think that chance has been very kind to me, Colonel O'Rourke," she said, less coolly.
"Possibly, madame."
"You have seen other service) monsieur?"
"Yes—"
"For 'Cuba Libre,' I believe?"
"But the list is a long one," he expostulated laughingly.
"For so young a man—so gallant a soldier!"
"Oh, madame!" he deprecated.
"You are," she changed the subject, "pledged to no cause, monsieur?"
"To yours alone, madame."
She thanked him with a glance. He was amply rewarded. After an instant of hesitation, she proceeded bluntly:
"You, I presume, know who I am?"
"Madame la Princesse—" he began.
"I do not mean that," she interrupted; "but before my marriage—?"
"No—" he dubitated.
This seemed to gratify her.
"That is good, then—you do not know me, really," she concluded. "You do not even know where you are?"
"No more than in Paris," he laughed.
"Oh, that is good, indeed! Then I may talk freely—although I must ask that you consider every word confidential. I rely upon your honor—"
"Believe me, ye may."
"Then—to business."
Heretofore she had been studying his features intently; what character she had read therein must have been reassur​ing to the girl, for at once she discarded the constraint which she had imposed upon their conversation, and plunged in medias res.
"Colonel O'Rourke," she began slowly, as if choosing each phrase with care, "I have a brother—a very young man: younger even than I. His wealth is great, and he is—very regrettably weak, easily influenced by others, wild, wilful, impatient of restraint, dissipated. His associates are not such as one might wish. But let that pass. You comprehend?"
"Perfectly, madame."
"Some time ago—recently, in fact—he conceived a hare-brained scheme, a mad adventure—I cannot tell you how insane! I believe it fraught with the gravest danger to him, monsieur. I have sought to dissuade him, to no effect. At the same time I discovered by accident that it would further the interests of—certain of his companions to have him out of the way—dead, in fact. I questioned my brother closely; he admitted, in the end, that it was proposed to him—this scheme—by those same persons. I made inquiries, secretly, and satisfied myself that not one of my brother's so-called friends was anything more or less than a parasite. For years they have been bleeding him systematically, for their own pockets. And now, not content with what they have stolen from him, they want his fortune in toto. In short, he consorts with sycophants of the most servile, treacherous type."
She paused, drawing her long white gloves thoughtfully through her hands, eying O'Rourke abstractedly beneath her level brows; the Irishman's gaze assured her of his sympathy.
"Proceed, madame," he said gently.
"To-night, monsieur—this morning, rather—" she ​smiled—"my brother gives this rout to cover a conference with the instigators of the scheme. It—it must certainly be of an unlawful nature, monsieur, else they would not meet so secretly, with such caution. Even now certain of the guests are assembled in another room of this, my brother's house, conspiring with him. To-morrow, possibly—in a few days at the latest—my brother will start upon this—this expedition, let us call it. For my part I cannot believe that he will return alive. I fear for him—fear greatly. But I have obtained his consent to something for which I have fought ever since I found that he would not give up his project; he has agreed to take with him one man, whom I am to select, to give him high place in his councils, and—what is more important—to keep his identity as my agent a secret from the other parties interested.
"I had but twelve hours to find the man I needed. He must be a soldier, courageous, loyal, capable of leading men. I knew no such man. I consulted with the one being in the world whom I can trust—a family friend of long standing, one Monsieur Chambret. I—I—monsieur, I cannot trust my husband; he is allied with these false friends of my brother!"
O'Rourke started, afire with generous indignation; she cautioned him to silence with a gesture.
"One moment. I am not through, if you please … Monsieur Chambret was equally at a loss for a suitable man. He did what he could. This evening he came to me, offering a last hope, saying that he knew of a place where men of spirit who were not overly prosperous might be expected to congregate. I was to take my carriage, and wait at a certain spot in the Champs Élysées. He was to bring or send the man, should he find him. If the gentleman came alone he ​would make himself known to me by the password—which you know.
"So—apparently Monsieur Chambret failed in his mission. The rest you know. You came—and now that I know you, Colonel O'Rourke, I thank—"
"Madame!" cried the Irishman arising.
She, too, stood up; her glance met his, and seemed deeply to penetrate his mind. As if satisfied, impulsively she flung out a hand towards him. O'Rourke clasped it in both his own. He felt himself unable to speak; for the moment mere words were valueless.
But beneath his glance the woman colored; her regard of him did not waver; the earnestness of her purpose blinded her to the danger of encouraging that grand amoreux, Terence O'Rourke. Her eyes shone softly and it may have been that her breathing was a trifle hurried.
"Monsieur," she cried, "I—I love my brother. I would save him from—from himself. Will you, then, enter my service—go with him and guard him, stand at his side and by his back, shielding him against assassination or—or worse? Will you, can you bring yourself to do this thing for me, whom you do not know, and for my brother, whom you will dislike?"
"For ye, madame!" he declared. "To the ends of the earth, if need be!"
He felt the pressure of her fingers on his own, significant of her gratitude. O'Rourke bent over the little hand, raising it to his lips. …
There was a knock on the door. The woman released her hand, swiftly, with an air of alarm.
"Quick!" she cried. "The key, monsieur! This will be Monsieur Chambret!"