"Yes," said Daphne gravely, "the Baron. You heard what the Court Godmother said about seeing him as soon as he returns? We have forbidden him to speak – but it's quite possible that she will get the truth out of him – and that might be rather disagreeable for you, mightn't it?"
"Very," agreed the trembling Mrs. Stimpson. "She'd have no mercy on me – on any of us!"
"I'm afraid not," said Daphne, "and she might not listen even to me. So – don't you think it would be wiser to change your mind about staying and go back to Gablehurst before she does see him?"
"Much," said Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson in a half-choked voice – "much! if – if it can be arranged."
"I think it can. The journey to Clairdelune and back won't tire the storks – they will be quite able to take you over to England as soon as you are ready to start."
"We'll go and get ready at once," said Mrs. Stimpson, "so as not to keep the car waiting."
"You have plenty of time. It can't be here for some hours yet."
"Oh, I hope the Baron will make haste – and – and if your Majesty could only prevent him from seeing the Court Godmother till after we are gone!"
"She will probably be asleep," said Daphne, "but in any case he shall have instructions to take you home the very moment he arrives at the Palace. I think," she added, "that is all we had to say to one another."
"Except," said Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson, "that your Majesty really must allow me to express my deep sense of the very handsome – "
"No, please!" said Daphne, turning away, for she felt that she had had as much of Mrs. Stimpson as she could stand just then.
That good lady, having partially recovered her equanimity, retreated to her husband and family.
"I've been talking it over with her Majesty, Sidney," she announced, "and she has quite brought me to see that, under the circumstances, we shall really be more comfortable in dear old England. So she has kindly arranged for us to be taken home in the car directly it gets back from Clairdelune."
"Glad to hear it, my love," said the ex-Monarch. "Personally, I much prefer 'Inglegarth' to this sort of thing."
"But I say," Clarence put in, glancing down at his fantastic attire, "I don't quite see myself going back to Gablehurst in this get up. Wish I knew what had become of the kit we came in!"
It was now the hour when the Court was accustomed to go up and change their costumes before dinner, and Daphne felt a difficulty as to the proper course to pursue with the Wibberley-Stimpsons. Could she without indelicacy invite them to sit as guests at what had lately been their own table? And yet it seemed hardly human to leave them out. She decided that the former course was on the whole less open to objection.
"I hope," she said to Mrs. Stimpson, with a touch of shyness, "that you will all give me the pleasure of dining with us this evening? You see, you must have something to eat before such a long journey."
"Your Majesty is most kind," said Mrs. Stimpson in a great flurry, "but, if you will excuse us from accepting what – no one knows better than I – is really a command, I – I really don't think we should have time to sit through a long dinner. We – we might miss the car – and besides, there's the question of dressing. If we could have a few sandwiches and a little wine in one of the vestibules while we are waiting for the car, that will be all we shall require!"
"You shall do exactly as you please about it," replied Daphne. She was greatly relieved, as one reason for her hesitation in asking them had been the dread that Mr. Stimpson might think himself called upon to make an after-dinner speech.
Her ladies-in-waiting were already in her Tiring-Chamber, highly delighted by the prospect of arraying a Queen whom, even when she had been nominally one of themselves, they had always not merely admired but adored.
It had suddenly occurred to Daphne that the Stimpson family might find themselves on their return to Gablehurst in certain difficulties against which she felt bound to do what she could to protect them.
She thought over the best means of doing this, which took so much time to carry out that the business of arraying her for her first banquet as a Royal Hostess had to be got through more hurriedly than her ladies of the Bedchamber thought at all decorous.
But she knew that Mirliflor would be well content with her, however she looked – and as a matter of fact he not only was, but had every reason to be so.
The Wibberley-Stimpsons had already ascertained that the clothes they had worn on their arrival in Märchenland had been carefully laid up in one of the Royal wardrobes, from which they were brought at their earnest request. They put them on in frantic haste, and, in deadly fear of being surprised by the Royal Household, they stole down the great Staircase to an antechamber by the Entrance Hall. There they found a table set with every description of tempting food, to which all did justice but Mrs. Stimpson, the state of whose nerves had entirely taken away her appetite. She was continually starting up and saying, "Listen! I'm sure I hear these storks!"
"You'd better eat something, Mater," Clarence said. "It's the last dinner we shall ever have in Märchenland."
"I can't," she replied, "I don't know how any of you can… There go the silver trumpets! She's going into the Banqueting Hall now. On Prince Mirliflor's arm, most likely! How she can have the heart when she must know we are still here!"
"She did ask us to dinner, my love," Mr. Stimpson mildly reminded her.
"She had the execrable taste to do that, Sidney," replied his wife, "and I think the manner in which I declined must have been a lesson to her… Dear me, is that car never coming?"
She said that many times during the evening, as they sat on in the ebony and ivory chamber, while the strains of music reached them faintly from the distant Ballroom.
Clarence thought gloomily of the dance on the night of the Coronation, and how his mother had forbidden him to choose Daphne as his partner. Perhaps, if he had insisted on having his own way – if he had not limited himself to a merely morganatic alliance, she might have – but it was too late to grouse about that now! He endeavoured to cheer himself by the thought that he would very soon be in a civilised land of cigarettes.
It was getting late, and the music had now ceased, from which they gathered that the Queen and Court had already retired. "She might have had the common civility to say good-bye to us!" complained Mrs. Stimpson, "but of course she is too grand now to condescend so far! Not that I have any desire to see her again. On the contrary!"
The doors of the Vestibule were thrown open here and one of the ushers announced: "Her Majesty the Queen and His Royal Highness Prince Mirliflor."
"Coming here to triumph over us!" was Mrs. Stimpson's comment as she rose.
"We came to wish you a pleasant journey to Gablehurst," explained Daphne, as she entered, followed by Mirliflor. "I hope you won't have to wait for the car much longer, but I've told the attendants in the Hall to let you know the minute it is here."
She was looking radiantly lovely and girlish – and queenly as well, in spite of the fact that she was still uncrowned. But if she had had the right to wear her crown, she was incapable of doing so just then.
Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson made a curtsey that might have been lower if she had had any practice – but all the curtseying previously had been done to herself. "We thank your Majesty," she said. "I too hope there will be no more of this delay. I am getting worn out with all this waiting. Oh, while I think of it," she went on (the desire to be offensive overcoming any fear of the consequences), "of course we are not in a position now to give really valuable wedding presents – and I'm afraid mine must be a very humble offering, particularly as it needs repairing. However, such as it is, perhaps your Majesty will honour me by accepting it with our congratulations and very best wishes?" And she offered the jewel which she had formerly acquired from Daphne. Daphne's eyebrows contracted for an instant, but the next moment she laughed.
"I really couldn't, Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson!" she said. "You see, you have already given it to Clarence, and I mustn't deprive him of it."
"Won't you accept it from me, then?" he said awkwardly. "I – I shan't have any use for it now."
She shook her head. "You will please me so much better by keeping it," she said gently – "in memory of Märchenland."
It was true that it had once belonged to her father – the father she had never known – but then it had also belonged to Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson, and Daphne was conscious now of an invincible unwillingness to accept any gift from that lady.
"I – I'd do anything to please you," said Clarence, taking the pendant from his mother and slipping it into the pocket of his dinner-jacket.
Ruby, in the white silk frock she had last worn at "Inglegarth," was clinging to Daphne. "I don't want to go back!" she wailed, "I want to stay here with you. Won't you send for me some day? Say you will; do say you will!"
Daphne stooped to caress and comfort her, and also to hide her own emotion. "I wish I could, darling," she said tenderly, "but I'm afraid, I'm afraid I mustn't make any promises that I'm not sure of being able to keep."
"Then say you will —perhaps!" entreated Ruby, but her mother promptly interposed.
"Ruby, my dear," she said, "you're forgetting how far her Majesty is now our superior. A Palace is no longer a fit place for any of us to visit, and I consider it best we should remain in future strictly in our respective spheres."
"Then I will go to mine at once," said Daphne, smiling. "Good-bye, Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson. Good-bye, Edna." She held out her hand to both of them, but they curtsied formally without offering to take it. "Good-bye, dearest little Ruby – I hope your next governess will love you nearly as much as I do – she can't quite! Good-bye, Mr. Stimpson – I think you will be rather glad to be back in the City again, won't you?"
"I shall, indeed, your Majesty," he said. "To tell you the honest truth, I don't think I was ever cut out for a monarch."
It was Clarence's turn next, and when he saw her offering him her hand with the old frank friendliness, he had a renewed sense of his own unworthiness.
"No," he said in a low voice, "you can't want to shake hands with – with such a hopeless rotter as I've been!"
"I shouldn't," she replied, "if I weren't sure that you could be something very much better if you chose. And I know you will choose."
"I will," he said, "I swear I will – if I ever get the chance!"
"Your chance will come. Quite soon, perhaps. And when it does, remember that I believe in you – and, good-bye, Clarence."
"Good-bye – Daphne," he said brokenly. As he took her hand he thought with a keen pang that he had never held it before, and never would again. And the time had been – or so at least he imagined – when he might have made that hand his own for ever!
"Good night, Mirliflor," said Daphne, as he held aside the hangings for her. "We shall meet to-morrow."
She passed into the great Hall with a dignity the more charming for being so natural and unconscious – and that was the last Clarence was ever destined to see of her.
He turned to Mirliflor, whose eyes still betrayed the pride he felt in his beloved. "I don't mind telling you, old chap – er – Prince Mirliflor, that I took to you from the start, and – as I can't be the lucky man myself, I'm jolly glad it's to be you!"
"Thank you," said Mirliflor, who was less given to florid phrases than the average Fairy Prince. "So am I."
"I dare say," Clarence went on, as he realised the contrast between his own clothes and the magnificent costume that the old Fairy had provided for her royal godson, "I dare say you're thinking we're not looking very smart?"
Mirliflor was honestly able to disclaim having any impressions on the subject.
"Well, these togs must seem a bit rummy to you– but I can assure you that, for informal occasions like the present, they're quite the right thing in England." (He had a momentary impulse to except his father's white tie, but, after all, why should he say anything about that when Mirliflor knew no better? So he decided to pass it), "Worn by the very best Society."
Mirliflor politely accepted this information, and then made his farewells. Edna's good wishes were couched in a spirit of frigid magnanimity. She had too much self-respect to let him perceive that she resented his fickleness.
They were now alone in the antechamber. From time to time Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson would rise impatiently and peer out into the vast hall, now only lit by one or two flickering cressets, to see if the stork-car had arrived – but the attendants in waiting always assured her that it had not, and, after some fussing and fretting, she lay down on a divan and fell into an uneasy slumber.
Her husband was snoring placidly; Ruby had cried herself to sleep long before; Edna had brought down her lecture-notes, and was conscientiously employing the time in polishing up her knowledge of English Literature.
Her notes on Nietzsche's philosophy had been torn out after the rupture with the Count. Somehow the Nietzschean theories did not seem to work quite well when carried into practice. But, after deciphering a very few Literature notes, Edna found herself too drowsy to continue.
Clarence remained awake longest. He had wandered restlessly out into the hall just to look at the great Staircase half lost in the gloom. Daphne had ascended it a little while since. To-morrow she would come down, fresh and radiant, to meet Mirliflor. Before long they would be married and crowned, and live happy ever after in the good old Märchenland way. Well, he wouldn't have to look on and see them doing it, which was some consolation. He went back to the antechamber and regarded the sleeping forms of his family with disillusioned eyes. "We look like Royalties – I don't think!" he said to himself. "No wonder they've booted us out. Why, a bally rabbit-warren would!"
But this depressing reflection soon ceased to trouble him, unless it still continued to shadow his dreams.
CHAPTER XXII
SQUARING ACCOUNTS
Almost simultaneously Mr. Wibberley-Stimpson and his son and daughters opened their eyes, then rubbed them, and sat up and looked about them with a bewilderment that gradually gave way to intense relief. For, although the light had faded, their surroundings were reassuringly familiar. They were in their own drawing-room at "Inglegarth." It occurred at once to most of them that they had never actually left it – an impression that was pleasantly confirmed by Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson's first remark as she awoke later.
"Why, hasn't the dinner-gong gone yet?" she inquired crossly. "Cook gets more and more unpunctual!"
"I don't think it can be eight o'clock yet, my dear," said her husband, "it's quite light still."
"Nonsense, Sidney, it must be long past dinner-time! I've been so lost in my own thoughts that somehow I – "
"Now, Mother, you know you've been asleep and only just woke up!" said Edna, from one of the chintz couches.
"Have I? Perhaps I did drop off just for a few seconds. In fact I must have done – for I begin to recollect having quite a curious dream. I dreamed that you and I, Sidney, were King and Queen of some absurd fairy Kingdom or other, and that – well, it was not at all a pleasant dream."
"It's a most singular coincidence, Selina," he said, "but I've been dreaming much the same sort of thing myself!"
The others looked at one another, but none of them ventured to express just yet what was in all their minds.
"Have you?" said his wife languidly. "I suppose it was telepathy or something of that kind. Ring for Mitchell, Clarence – I hope dinner has not been allowed to get cold. And – and Miss Heritage seems to have left the drawing-room. Run up, Ruby, and tell her to come down."
"I don't believe she's upstairs at all, mummy," said Ruby. "No, of course she can't be. We left her in the Palace – don't you remember? She's Queen now, you know?"
"Queen! Miss Heritage! Why, you don't mean to tell me you've been dreaming that too?"
"So have I, as far as that goes, mater," said Clarence. "If it was a dream, and not – not – "
"How could it be anything else? Besides, here we all are, exactly as we were!"
"We've got our cloaks and things on, though," said Ruby. "I know how it was! We've been brought here in the stork-car while we were fast asleep. We sat up ever so long waiting for it."
"It can't be! I won't believe anything so absurd. Draw the curtains, somebody, and pull up the blinds… It's odd, but it certainly looks more like early morning than any other time. Clarence, go out and strike the gong. Perhaps the maids haven't finished dressing yet."
Clarence went out accordingly. The gong bellowed and boomed from the hall, but there was no sound of stirring above. "I say," he reported, "I've just looked into the dining-room, and all the chairs are upside down on the table. That looks rather as if we'd been away for a bit – what?"
"Clarence! You're not beginning to think that – that all that about our having been a Royal Family may be true?"
"Well, Mater," he said, "if we haven't been in Märchenland, where have we been? Oh yes, we've been Royalties right enough – and a pretty rotten job we made of it!"
At this time there was a deprecatory knock at the drawing-room door. "Mitchell!" cried her mistress, "don't you know better than to – ?" However, it was not Mitchell that entered – but a person unknown – a respectable-looking elderly female, who seemed to have made a hasty toilette.
"Askin' your pardons," she said, "but if you were wishing to see the family, they're away just now."
"We are the family," replied Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson. "We have been – er – abroad, but have returned. And we should be glad of breakfast at once."
"I can git you a cup of tea as soon as the kittle's on the boil," she said, "but I'm only put in as caretaker like, and I've nothink in the 'ouse except bread and butter. The shops'll be opening now, so if you don't object to waiting a little, I could go out and get you a naddick and eggs and such like."
"Yes, buck up, old lady!" said Clarence, "and I say, see if you can get a Daily Mail or a paper of some sort."
"What are you so anxious to see the paper for?" inquired Edna after the caretaker had departed.
"Only wanted to know what month we're in," he said. "It would have looked so silly to ask her what day it is. We must have been – over there – a good long time."
"At least a year!" said Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson, no longer able to sustain the dream theory. "More. When we left it was quite early Spring – and now all the trees are out! Sidney, what will your firm say to your having been away so long without letting them know where you were?"
"I can't say, my love. I'm afraid they might make it a ground for a dissolution of partnership – unless I can give them a satisfactory explanation of my absence."
"The difficulty will be to find one!" said his wife. "As for you, Clarence, they will be too glad to see you back again at the Insurance Office to ask any questions."
"I dare say they would, Mater, only – it didn't seem worth mentioning before – but, as a matter of fact, I – er – resigned the day we left."
"Then it seems," said Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson bitterly, "we have been sent back here to find ourselves in comparative poverty! I hope and trust" – she felt furtively in her bead handbag before continuing more cheerfully – "that we shall be able to struggle through somehow."
She knew now that they would not be without resources. She could feel them through the handkerchief in which they had been wrapped – two pieces which she had had the presence of mind to pick up from the Halma board as she passed through Edna's and Ruby's chamber the evening before. One was carved from a ruby, the other from a diamond, and each of them was worth a small fortune. Her one regret now was that she had not pocketed several more while she was about it. But, although she would have been perfectly within her rights in doing so – for were they not her own property? – she had thought at the time that it would be risky to take any number that could be noticed. There was always the chance that Miss Heritage might count them!
However, she said nothing about this to her family just then; it would be a pleasant surprise for them later on.
"But," she continued, "I do think it might have occurred to Miss Heritage – I can't and won't call her by any other name – that, as she was known to be in my employment when we left 'Inglegarth,' our returning without her may expose us to very unpleasant remarks. People may think I've discharged her – left her stranded in foreign parts – or I don't know what!"
"That is what she calculated on, no doubt!" said Edna.
"Oh, stop it, Edna!" said her brother, "you ought to know her better than that!"
"Oh, of course she's an angel – in your estimation! But she could have saved mother from being misunderstood if she'd wanted to – and since she hasn't – well, I'll leave you to draw the obvious inference!"
Ruby, who had been roving about the room during this conversation, now broke in:
"Mummy," she cried, "there's a letter here for you, and it looks like darling Queen Daphne's writing!" And she brought it to her mother. It was enclosed in a folded square of parchment – envelopes, like other modern conveniences, being unknown in Märchenland – and fastened with the royal signet, which Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson broke with a melancholy reminiscence of the satisfaction it had given her to use the seal herself.
"Dear Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson," she read aloud – "As I am about to be married here very shortly, my return with you to England will naturally be impossible. It is a great grief to me to have to part from my dear little pupil Ruby, to whom I have become so deeply and sincerely attached. Will you please tell her from me that I shall never forget her, and miss her very much indeed. – Believe me, very truly yours,
Daphne Heritage."
"Well," commented Mrs. Stimpson, while poor Ruby's tears began to flow afresh, "that is certainly a letter which I could show to anybody. Though I notice she doesn't say anything about being grieved to part with anyone but Ruby. A deliberate slight to the rest of us! And then the meanness of turning us out without the slightest return for all we've done for her! It does show such petty ingratitude!"
"Easy on, Mater!" said Clarence. "She don't seem to have let us go away quite empty-handed after all. I mean to say there's a box or something over there that I fancy I've seen before in the Palace."
He went up to examine it as he spoke. It was an oblong case, rather deeper and squarer than a backgammon box, covered with faded orange velvet and fitted with clasps and corners of finely wrought silver set with precious stones.
Inside were the emerald and opal "halma" board and ruby and diamond pieces, and with them a slip of parchment with Daphne's handwriting. "I thought perhaps," she had written, "you might care to have this. Princess Rapunzelhauser tells me she is afraid two of the men are missing, but I hope she is mistaken and they are really all there. – D."
"I shall never play with them!" declared Ruby breaking down once more. "I – I couldn't bear to, without Her!"
"Of course you will never play with them, my dear," said her mother, "they are far too valuable for that."
A very inadequate impression of Mrs. Wibberley-Stimpson's strength of character must have been given if anyone expects that this gift would cause her the slightest degree of shame or contrition; on the contrary, it only served to justify her in her own eyes – not that she needed any justification – for having appropriated those two pieces. She had merely anticipated – and nothing would be easier than to put them back in the box without being observed.
