The Sea Peoples(80)
Hildred felt an impatience at the dull sparkle of the moonlight on the water; it brought him no such sensations of exquisite pleasure as when the sunshine played over the polished steel of a corselet on Hawberk’s knee. He watched the bats darting and turning above the water plants in the fountain basin, but their rapid, jerky flight set his nerves on edge, and he turned away to walk aimlessly amid the park’s trees. The artillery stables were dark, but in the cavalry barracks the officers’ windows were brilliantly lighted, and the sallyport was constantly filled with troopers in drab fatigue uniforms, carrying straw and harness and baskets filled with tin dishes.
Twice the mounted sentry at the gates was changed while he wandered up and down the asphalt walk. He pulled a watch on a chain out of a waistcoat pocket—something John had read of in the Regency-era books that were so popular in the Protectorate, especially among gentlewomen—and looked at the dial. It was nearly the midnight hour he’d arranged with his cousin Louis. The lights in the barracks went out one by one, the barred gate was closed, and every minute or two an officer passed in through the side wicket, leaving a rattle of accouterments and a jingle of spurs on the night air. The square had become very silent.
The last homeless loiterer had been driven away by the gray-coated park policeman’s kick and prod with his nightstick, the streetcar tracks along Wooster Street were deserted, and the only sound which broke the stillness was the stamping of the sentry’s horse and the ring of his sabre against the saddle pommel. In the barracks, the officers’ quarters were still lighted, and military servants passed and repassed before the bay windows. It wasn’t altogether different from the castle garrisons of men-at-arms John was used to.
Twelve o’clock sounded, the altogether familiar sound of a church’s bells.
St. Francis Xavier Cathedral, Hildred thought. The new one.
At the last stroke of the sad-toned bell a figure passed through the wicket beside the portcullis that closed off the interior courtyard of the cavalry barracks, returned the salute of the sentry, and crossed the street into the square and walked towards the Benedick apartment house with the brisk stride of a man who was used to facing disagreeable work.
“Louis,” Hildred called.
The man pivoted on his spurred heels and came straight towards his cousin.
“Is that you, Hildred?”
“Yes. You are on time.”
Hildred took his offered hand, and they strolled towards the Lethal Chamber.
“It’s late, but perhaps that’s as well—I couldn’t sleep, and at least now I’m not tempted by too many toasts to Constance and her charms, I can’t have a sore head tomorrow! By God, Hildred, I keep thinking how lucky I am! And Captain’s bars already, you’ll note—”
Hildred has a will like iron, John thought. He’s not trying to tear Louis’ throat out with his teeth and he wants to, God how he wants to!
At last they stood under the elms on the Fourth Street corner of the square opposite the Lethal Chamber.
“But I’m babbling,” Louis said with a laugh. “What is it that you wanted to speak with me about, old chap? Unless you knew I’d need fresh air and a fresh face.”
Hildred motioned him to a seat on a bench under the electric light, and sat down beside him.
And he hates that look . . . the one that’s looking for signs of madness. Because he is mad, and down deep he knows it and fears it . . . as he fears and loves the Yellow King. I never really understood how true it is that evil is its own self-inflicted punishment before!
“Well, old chap,” he inquired, “what can I do for you?”
Hildred drew from his pocket the manuscript and notes of the Imperial Dynasty of America. The Boisean looked at it with a swirl of contradictory feelings; bitter betrayal seemed to be the strongest of them, oddly enough.
Hildred looked him in the eye and said:
“I will tell you. On your word as a soldier, promise me to read this manuscript from beginning to end, without asking me a question. Promise me to read these notes in the same way, and promise me to listen to what I have to tell later.”
“I promise, if you wish it,” he said pleasantly. “Give me the paper, Hildred.”
He began to read, raising his eyebrows with a puzzled, whimsical air.
Uh-oh. This Hildred hates being patronized. Nobody enjoys it—
A young, artistically inclined Prince with an aversion to boring busywork and speeches in a dynasty of serious warriors and grimly energetic rulers got enough of that. Though his father had sympathized enough to tip him a wink when he ducked out to work on a song instead of giving a speech at the opening of a bridge now and then.
—but most of us don’t shake with a need to kill when we get it, even when it’s doubly irritating because it’s hidden.
As Louis read he frowned, eyebrows contracted, and his lips seemed to form the word what rubbish! Then he started and blinked as he came to his own name in the closely written pages, and when he came to Hildred’s he lowered the paper, and looked sharply at him for a moment. When he came to the end and read the signature of Mr. Wilde, he folded the paper carefully and returned it to his cousin.
Hildred handed him the notes, and he settled back, pushing his fatigue cap up to his forehead. A flash of memory in Hildred’s mind recalled the same gesture with a schoolboy’s hat as he walked whistling with a satchel of books over his shoulder on a sunlit day long ago. It was a disturbing element of common humanity in a mind that seemed to be sinking into a sea of chaotic hatred, and then it was gone.