Chapter 20: A Local Storm

I knocked very gently at Thusis’s door and she opened it, signed for me to enter, then closed it cautiously.

“Do you know,” said I, “that it is after midnight?”

“I know it is. But as long as others don’t know you are here, what does it matter, Michael?”

“Of course,” I muttered, “you and I know there’s no cause for scandal.”

Her delightful laughter welled up from the whitest throat I have ever seen, but she instantly suppressed it.

“We’re very indiscreet,” she said mockingly; “we’ve exchanged hearts and we’re here in my bedroom at midnight. Can you imagine what that queen downstairs would say?”

“Had you meant to kidnap her, also?” I inquired.

“No,” she said scornfully. “The Allies can take care of the Hohenzollern litter after they take the sty.”

“Berlin,” I nodded.

“Berlin. Hercules had no such task in his Augean stable. It was Hercules, wasn’t it, Michael? I always get him and his labors mixed up with Theseus. But the Prince of Argolis used address, not bull force ... His mother’s name was Æthra ... My mother’s name was Æthra, too.”

“That is Greek.”

“Very. And the name of the ancient pal—I mean the name of our old house on the island of Naxos was Thalassa!—You remember the Ten Thousand?”

“Yes. Your house overlooked the sea?”

“The Ægean! You enter from the landward lawn, advance toward the portico—and suddenly, through the marble corridor, a sheet of azure! Thalassa!”

I said slowly: “Little white goddess of Naxos with hair like the sun and eyes of Ægean blue, why have you sent for me to come to your chamber at midnight?”

Thusis looked at me and her happy smile faded.

“To ask one question,” she said very gravely, “and to answer one—if you ask it.”

“Ask yours, first.”

“What did that dreadful Princess say to you and to Mr. Smith after I left the room?”

I told her what had passed.

“What!” she cried fiercely, clenching her hands. “Tino had the impudence to offer her Naxos as a bribe!”

“The Duchy of Naxos,” I repeated.

I have never seen an angrier or more excited girl. She sprang to her feet and began to pace the bedroom, her hands doubled in fury, her face tense and white.

“Naxos!” she kept repeating in a voice strangled by emotion. “That treacherous Tino offers Naxos to a miserable, fat Russian Princess! Oh! Was ever such an insult offered to any girl! Naxos! My Naxos! Could the civilized world believe it! Can the outrage on Belgium equal such an infamy! Even with the spectacle of martyred France, of Roumania in Teuton chains, of Russia floundering in blood—could the world believe its senses if Naxos is betrayed!”

Her emotion was tragic, yet it seemed to me that the lovely Thusis took Naxos a trifle too seriously. Because I was not at all certain that this same civilized and horrified world was unanimously aware of the existence of Naxos. But I didn’t say this to Thusis.

As she paced the room she wrung her hands once or twice naïvely deploring the avalanche.

“Because,” she said, halting in front of me, “Smith or no Smith, I should certainly attempt to seize this treacherous, beastly Constantine, and smuggle him over the frontier. The traitor! The double traitor! For Naxos is not his! No! It is a Venetian Duchy. What if Turkey did steal it! What if Greece stole it in turn? It is Venetian. It is Italian. It is my home and I love it! It is my birthplace and I worship it! It is my native land and I adore it!”

“The King of Italy,” I reminded her, “does not seem to desire that Naxos be included in his domain.”

“But I do!” she said passionately. “I am a Venetian of Naxos. Have I not the right to decide where my island belongs? For six hundred years my family has owed allegiance to Venice—and naturally, therefore, to Italy. Have I not every right to raise the banner of revolt in Naxos and defy this ruffianly ex-king who comes sneaking stealthily into Switzerland to plot for his own restoration?—who comes here secretly to offer Naxos to a vulgar Russian as a bribe for financial aid?—offers to sell my home for a few millions cash and buy cannon and men and send them into Greece to fight for him and his rotten throne?”

“Thusis——”

“No!” she said violently, “there is no argument possible. And God never sent His avalanche to ruin my hopes and destroy all chance of freedom for Naxos! It was the bestial Gott of the boche who loosed the snow up yonder—the filthy fetish of the hun who did that!” She flung out her white arms and looked upward. And “oh!” she cried, “for one hour of the old Greek gods to call on! Oh for the thunderbolts of Zeus!—the spear of Athene!—the tender grace and mercy of Aphrodite, and her swift and flaming vengeance when her temples were profaned!—when her children were betrayed and disinherited!—Naxos—my Naxos——”

All Greek now, pagan, beautiful, the girl’s whole body was quivering with rage and grief. And I knew enough to hold my tongue.

While the fierce storm swept her, bending her like a sapling with gusts of passion, I stood silent, awaiting the rain of tears to end it.

None came to break the tension, though the gray eyes harbored lightning and her brow remained dark.

“As Naxos falls, so falls the world,” she said. “The eyes of civilization are on her; the fateful writing runs like fire across God’s heaven! Let the world heed what passes! The doom of Naxos is the doom of freedom and of man!”

I, personally, had scarcely looked at it in that light. It did not strike me that the hub of civilization rested on Naxos. Nor do I believe the world was under that impression. But I was not going to say so to this excited young Naxosienne—or Naxosoise—or Naxosette, —whichever may be the respectful and properly descriptive nomenclature.

And so, standing near the window, I watched the tempest wax, wane, and gradually pass, leaving her at last silent, seated on her couch, with one arm across her knee and her head bent like the “Resting Hermes.”

When I walked over and stood looking down at her she reached out and, without looking, took my hand.

“It is your turn now, Michael; and I already know what question you mean to ask.”

“Shall I ask it, Thusis?” After a silence her hand closed convulsively in mine.

“I do love you ... I am not—free—to marry you.”

“Could you tell me why?”

She slowly shook her head: “You will learn why, some day.”