Читать «Cup of Gold (Золотая чаша)» онлайн - страница 114

"A tale, Sire?"

"Surely. Some story of the colonial wenches; some little interlude in piracy-for I am sure you did not steal only gold." He motioned a servant to keep Henry's glass filled. "I have heard of a certain woman in Panama. Tell us about her."

Henry drained his glass. His face was becoming flushed. "There is a tale about her," he said. "She was pretty, but also she was an heiress. I confess, I favored her. She would inherit silver mines. Her husband offered one hundred thousand pieces of eight for her. He wanted to get his hands on the mines. Here was the question, Sire, and I wonder how many men have been confronted with one like it? Should I get the woman or the hundred thousand?"

The King leaned forward in his chair. "Which did you take? Tell me quickly."

"I remained in Panama for a while," said Henry. "What would Your Majesty have done in my place? I got both. Perhaps I got even more than that. Who knows but my son will inherit the silver mines eventually."

"I would have done that," cried the King. "You are right. I would have done just that. It was clever, sir.

A toast, Captain-to foresight. Your generalship, sir, runs to other matters than warfare, I see. You have never been defeated in battle, they say; but tell me, Captain, were you ever defeated in love? It is a good scene-an unusual scene-when a man admits himself bested in love. The admission is so utterly contrary to every masculine instinct. Another glass, sir, and tell us about your defeat."

"Not by a woman, Sire-But once I was defeated by Death. There are things which so sear the soul that the pain of it follows through life. You asked for the story. Your health, Sire.

"I was born in Wales, among the mountains. My father was a gentleman. One summer, while I was a lad, a little princess of France came to our mountains for the air. She had a small retinue, and being lively and restless and clever, she achieved some freedom. One morning I came upon her where she bathed alone in the river. She was naked and unashamed. In an hour-such is the passionate blood of her race-she was lying in my arms. Sire, in all my wanderings, in the lovely women I have seen and the towns I have taken, there has been no pleasure like the days of that joyous summer. When she could escape, we played together in the hills like little gods. But this was not enough. We wanted to be married. She would give up her rank and we would go to live somewhere in America.

"Then the Autumn came. One day she said, 'They are ready to take me away, but I will not go.' The next day she did not come to me. In the night I went to her window and she threw a little note to me, 'I am imprisoned. They have whipped me.'

"I went home. What else could I do? I could not fight them, the stout soldiers who guarded her. Very late that night there was a pounding on the door and cries, 'Where is a doctor to be had? Quick! The little princess has poisoned herself.' "