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Updated: July 26, 2025
For a moment or two Wetter sat silent, his eyes intently fixed on the Vicomte's face. Then he said in a tone as low as Varvilliers' had been: "I think his Majesty remembers his disabilities too late or has them remembered for him." Vohrenlorf rose to his feet, carried away by anger and excitement. "Sir " he cried loudly. "Vohrenlorf, be quiet. Sit down," said I. "M. Wetter is right." None spoke.
Elsa's lips were parted in a smile that was eager and wondering. Her eyes sparkled; she clasped her hands and nodded to me in a delicious surprised merriment. I caught Varvilliers by the arm and made him sit by me. A cry arose that he should repeat the last story for the King's benefit. He complied at once, and launched on some charming absurdity. Renewed applause greeted the story's point.
I did not find encouragement in the only answer that I could honestly give to my question. Just at this time I received a letter from Varvilliers containing intelligence which was not only interesting in itself, but seemed to possess a peculiar appositeness. He had heard from Coralie Mansoni, and she announced to him her marriage with a prominent operatic impresario.
He leaned across the table and said in a very low voice to Wetter: "Sir, his Majesty is the only gentleman in Forstadt who can not resent an insult." I recollect well little Madame Briande's pale face, as she half rose from her seat with clasped hands. Coralie still smiled. Vohrenlorf was red and fierce, with his hand on the hilt of his sword. Varvilliers was calm, cool, polished in demeanour.
I am not concerned to argue that the world is wrong; and the very best way to advance a paradox is to look as though you were uttering a platitude. In this art the wittiest writer cuts a poor figure beside the laws of society. The end of the week approached. Elsa was to go; Varvilliers was to go. So the arrangement stood; Elsa was to return, about Varvilliers' return nothing had been said.
The letter which lay on the table, addressed to Varvilliers, was fortunately not endowed with speech. It would have jarred our harmony. Later in the day Victoria came to see me. I was sitting in the window, looking down on the river and across to the woods of Waldenweiter. She sat down near me and smiled at me. She sat there and smiled at me.
"Some men are not to be ruled by any means." "You think so?" "Take Wetter now?" "I would give him a week's resistance." "Varvilliers?" "A day." I did not put the third question, but I looked at her with a smile. She saw my meaning, of course, but she did not tell me how long a resistance she would predict for me.
There was a little stir by the door, and a man came through the group that loitered round it, hastily shaking hands here, nodding there, as he steered his course toward Princess Heinrich. I knew that Varvilliers would come to the wedding, but had not been aware that he was already in Forstadt. My companions did not notice him, but I watched his interview with my mother.
Onlookers see most of the game, they say, but here the onlookers were as blind as the players; there was an air of congratulation at Artenberg; the King and his bride were drawing closer together. The blindness was complete; Varvilliers himself shared it. Of his absolute good faith and utter unconsciousness I, who doubt most things, can not doubt.
While I lay ill, Princess Heinrich was the dominant influence in the administration of affairs. When I recovered, I found that Coralie Mansoni was no longer playing in Forstadt, and had left the town some weeks before. I put no questions to my mother. I also found that Varvilliers had resigned his official position in the French service, and remained in Forstadt as a private person.
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