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Rupert of Hentzau: From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim

by Anthony Hope · English · Gutenberg #1145 · 471,135 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Rupert of Hentzau: From The Memoirs of Fritz Von Tarlenheim

Author: Anthony Hope


        
Release date: December 1, 1997 [eBook #1145]
                Most recently updated: September 22, 2025

Language: English

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Credits: Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer, and David Widger


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RUPERT OF HENTZAU: FROM THE MEMOIRS OF FRITZ VON TARLENHEIM ***

RUPERT OF HENTZAU

FROM THE MEMOIRS OF FRITZ VON TARLENHEIM

Sequel to The Prisoner of Zenda

By Anthony Hope




CONTENTS

     I.     THE QUEEN’S GOOD-BY
     II.    A STATION WITHOUT A CAB
     III.   AGAIN TO ZENDA
     IV.    AN EDDY ON THE MOAT
     V.     AN AUDIENCE OF THE KING
     VI.    THE TASK OF THE QUEEN’S SERVANTS
     VII.   THE MESSAGE OF SIMON THE HUNTSMAN
     VIII.  THE TEMPER OF BORIS THE HOUND
     IX.    THE KING IN THE HUNTING-LODGE
     X.     THE KING IN STRELSAU
     XI.    WHAT THE CHANCELLOR’S WIFE SAW
     XII.   BEFORE THEM ALL!
     XIII.  A KING UP HIS SLEEVE
     XIV.   THE NEWS COMES TO STRELSAU
     XV.    A PASTIME FOR COLONEL SAPT
     XVI.   A CROWD IN THE KONIGSTRASSE
     XVII.  YOUNG RUPERT AND THE PLAY-ACTOR
     XVIII. THE TRIUMPH OF THE KING
     XIX.   FOR OUR LOVE AND HER HONOR
     XX.    THE DECISION OF HEAVEN
     XXI.   THE COMING OF THE DREAM




CHAPTER I. THE QUEEN’S GOOD-BY

A man who has lived in the world, marking how every act, although
in itself perhaps light and insignificant, may become the source of
consequences that spread far and wide, and flow for years or centuries,
could scarcely feel secure in reckoning that with the death of the
Duke of Strelsau and the restoration of King Rudolf to liberty and his
throne, there would end, for good and all, the troubles born of Black
Michael’s daring conspiracy. The stakes had been high, the struggle
keen; the edge of passion had been sharpened, and the seeds of enmity
sown. Yet Michael, having struck for the crown, had paid for the blow
with his life: should there not then be an end? Michael was dead,
the Princess her cousin’s wife, the story in safe keeping, and Mr.
Rassendyll’s face seen no more in Ruritania. Should there not then be an
end? So said I to my friend the Constable of Zenda, as we talked by the
bedside of Marshal Strakencz. The old man, already nearing the death
that soon after robbed us of his aid and counsel, bowed his head in
assent: in the aged and ailing the love of peace breeds hope of it. But
Colonel Sapt tugged at his gray moustache, and twisted his black cigar
in his mouth, saying, “You’re very sanguine, friend Fritz. But is Rupert
of Hentzau dead? I had not heard it.”

Well said, and like old Sapt! Yet the man is little without the
opportunity, and Rupert by himself could hardly have troubled our
repose. Hampered by his own guilt, he dared not set his foot in the
kingdom from which by rare good luck he had escaped, but wandered to and
fro over Europe, making a living by his wits, and, as some said, adding
to his resources by gallantries for which he did not refuse substantial
recompense. But he kept himself constantly before our eyes, and never
ceased to contrive how he might gain permission to return and enjoy the
estates to which his uncle’s death had entitled him. The chief agent
through whom he had the effrontery to approach the king was his
relative, the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim, a young man of high rank and
great wealth who was devoted to Rupert. The count fulfilled his mission
well: acknowledging Rupert’s heavy offences, he put forward in his
behalf the pleas of youth and of the predominant influence which Duke
Michael had exercised over his adherent, and promised, in words so
significant as to betray Rupert’s own dictation, a future fidelity no
less discreet than hearty. “Give me my price and I’ll hold my tongue,”
 seemed to come in Rupert’s off-hand accents through his cousin’s
deferential lips. As may be supposed, however, the king and those who
advised him in the matter, knowing too well the manner of man the
Count of Hentzau was, were not inclined to give ear to his ambassador’s
prayer. We kept firm hold on Master Rupert’s revenues, and as good watch
as we could on his movements; for we were most firmly determined that
he should never return to Ruritania. Perhaps we might have obtained his
extradition and hanged him on the score of his crimes; but in these days
every rogue who deserves no better than to be strung up to the nearest
tree must have what they call a fair trial; and we feared that, if
Rupert were handed over to our police and arraigned before the courts
at Strelsau, the secret which we guarded so sedulously would become the
gossip of all the city, ay, and of all Europe. So Rupert went unpunished
except by banishment and the impounding of his rents.

Yet Sapt was in the right about him. Helpless as he seemed, he did
not for an instant abandon the contest. He lived in the faith that his
chance would come, and from day to day was ready for its coming. He
schemed against us as we schemed to protect ourselves from him; if
we watched him, he kept his eye on us. His ascendency over
Luzau-Rischenheim grew markedly greater after a visit which his cousin
paid to him in Paris. From this time the young count began to supply
him with resources. Thus armed, he gathered instruments round him and
organized a system of espionage that carried to his ears all our actions
and the whole position of affairs at court. He knew, far more accurately
than anyone else outside the royal circle, the measures taken for the
government of the kingdom and the considerations that dictated the royal
policy. More than this, he possessed himself of every detail concerning
the king’s health, although the utmost reticence was observed on
this subject. Had his discoveries stopped there, they would have been
vexatious and disquieting, but perhaps of little serious harm. They
went further. Set on the track by his acquaintance with what had passed
during Mr. Rassendyll’s tenure of the throne, he penetrated the secret
which had been kept successfully from the king himself. In the knowledge
of it he found the opportunity for which he had waited; in its bold use
he discerned his chance. I cannot say whether he were influenced more
strongly by his desire to reestablish his position in the kingdom or
by the grudge he bore against Mr. Rassendyll. He loved power and money;
dearly he loved revenge also. No doubt both motives worked together, and
he was rejoiced to find that the weapon put into his hand had a double
edge; with one he hoped to cut his own path clear; with the other, to
wound the man he hated through the woman whom that man loved. In fine,
the Count of Hentzau, shrewdly discerning the feeling that existed
between the queen and Rudolf Rassendyll, set his spies to work, and
was rewarded by discovering the object of my yearly meetings with Mr.
Rassendyll. At least he conjectured the nature of my errand; this was
enough for him. Head and hand were soon busy in turning the knowledge to
account; scruples of the heart never stood in Rupert’s way.

The marriage which had set all Ruritania on fire with joy and formed
in the people’s eyes the visible triumph over Black Michael and his
fellow-conspirators was now three years old. For three years the
Princess Flavia had been queen. I am come by now to the age when a man
should look out on life with an eye undimmed by the mists of passion.
My love-making days are over; yet there is nothing for which I am more
thankful to Almighty God than the gift of my wife’s love. In storm it
has been my anchor, and in clear skies my star. But we common folk are
free to follow our hearts; am I an old fool for saying that he is a fool
who follows anything else? Our liberty is not for princes. We need wait
for no future world to balance the luck of men; even here there is an
equipoise. From the highly placed a price is exacted for their state,
their wealth, and their honors, as heavy as these are great; to the
poor, what is to us mean and of no sweetness may appear decked in the
robes of pleasure and delight. Well, if it were not so, who could sleep
at nights? The burden laid on Queen Flavia I knew, and know, so well as
a man can know it. I think it needs a woman to know it fully; for even
now my wife’s eyes fill with tears when we speak of it. Yet she bore it,
and if she failed in anything, I wonder that it was in so little. For
it was not only that she had never loved the king and had loved another
with all her heart. The king’s health, shattered by the horror and
rigors of his imprisonment in the castle of Zenda, soon broke utterly.
He lived, indeed; nay, he shot and hunted, and kept in his hand some
measure, at least, of government. But always from the day of his release
he was a fretful invalid, different utterly from the gay and jovial
prince whom Michael’s villains had caught in the shooting lodge. There
was worse than this. As time went on, the first impulse of gratitude and
admiration that he had felt towards Mr. Rassendyll died away. He came to
brood more and more on what had passed while he was a prisoner; he was
possessed not only by a haunting dread of Rupert of Hentzau, at whose
hands he had suffered so greatly, but also by a morbid, half mad
jealousy of Mr. Rassendyll. Rudolf had played the hero while he lay
helpless. Rudolf’s were the exploits for which his own people cheered
him in his own capital. Rudolf’s were the laurels that crowned his
impatient brow. He had enough nobility to resent his borrowed credit,
without the fortitude to endure it manfully. And the hateful comparison
struck him nearer home. Sapt would tell him bluntly that Rudolf did this
or that, set this precedent or that, laid down this or the other policy,
and that the king could do no better than follow in Rudolf’s steps. Mr.
Rassendyll’s name seldom passed his wife’s lips, but when she spoke of
him it was as one speaks of a great man who is dead, belittling all
the living by the shadow of his name. I do not believe that the king
discerned that truth which his wife spent her days in hiding from him;
yet he was uneasy if Rudolf’s name were mentioned by Sapt or myself, and
from the queen’s mouth he could not bear it. I have seen him fall into
fits of passion on the mere sound of it; for he lost control of himself
on what seemed slight provocation.

Moved by this disquieting jealousy, he sought continually to exact from
the queen proofs of love and care beyond what most husbands can boast
of, or, in my humble judgment, make good their right to, always asking
of her what in his heart he feared was not hers to give. Much she did
in pity and in duty; but in some moments, being but human and herself a
woman of high temper, she failed; then the slight rebuff or involuntary
coldness was magnified by a sick man’s fancy into great offence or
studied insult, and nothing that she could do would atone for it. Thus
they, who had never in truth come together, drifted yet further apart;
he was alone in his sickness and suspicion, she in her sorrows and
her memories. There was no child to bridge the gulf between them, and
although she was his queen and his wife, she grew almost a stranger to
him. So he seemed to will that it should be.

Thus, worse than widowed, she lived for three years; and once only in
each year she sent three words to the man she loved, and received from
him three words in answer. Then her strength failed her. A pitiful scene
had occurred in which the king peevishly upbraided her in regard to some
trivial matter--the occasion escapes my memory--speaking to her before
others words that even alone she could not have listened to with
dignity. I was there, and Sapt; the colonel’s small eyes had gleamed in
anger. “I should like to shut his mouth for him,” I heard him mutter,
for the king’s waywardness had well-nigh worn out even his devotion. The
thing, of which I will say no more, happened a day or two before I
was to set out to meet Mr. Rassendyll. I was to seek him this time at
Wintenberg, for I had been recognized the year before at Dresden;
and Wintenberg, being a smaller place and less in the way of chance
visitors, was deemed safer. I remember well how she was when she called
me into her own room, a few hours after she had left the king. She stood
by the table; the box was on it, and I knew well that the red rose and
the message were within. But there was more to-day. Without preface she
broke into the subject of my errand.

“I must write to him,” she said. “I can’t bear it, I must write. My dear
friend Fritz, you will carry it safely for me, won’t you? And he must
write to me. And you’ll bring that safely, won’t you? Ah, Fritz, I know
I’m wrong, but I’m starved, starved, starved! And it’s for the last
time. For I know now that if I send anything, I must send more. So after
this time I won’t send at all. But I must say good-by to him; I must
have his good-by to carry me through my life. This once, then, Fritz, do
it for me.”

The tears rolled down her cheeks, which to-day were flushed out of their
paleness to a stormy red; her eyes defied me even while they pleaded. I
bent my head and kissed her hand.

“With God’s help I’ll carry it safely and bring his safely, my queen,”
 said I.

“And tell me how he looks. Look at him closely, Fritz. See if he is well
and seems strong. Oh, and make him merry and happy! Bring that smile to
his lips, Fritz, and the merry twinkle to his eyes. When you speak of
me, see if he--if he looks as if he still loved me.” But then she broke
off, crying, “But don’t tell him I said that. He’d be grieved if I
doubted his love. I don’t doubt it; I don’t, indeed; but still tell me
how he looks when you speak of me, won’t you, Fritz? See, here’s the
letter.”

Taking it from her bosom, she kissed it before she gave it to me. Then
she added a thousand cautions, how I was to carry her letter, how I was
to go and how return, and how I was to run no danger, because my wife
Helga loved me as well as she would have loved her husband had Heaven
been kinder. “At least, almost as I should, Fritz,” she said, now
between smiles and tears. She would not believe that any woman could
love as she loved.

I left the queen and went to prepare for my journey. I used to take only
one servant with me, and I had chosen a different man each year. None
of them had known that I met Mr. Rassendyll, but supposed that I was
engaged on the private business which I made my pretext for obtaining
leave of absence from the king. This time I had determined to take with
me a Swiss youth who had entered my service only a few weeks before.
His name was Bauer; he seemed a stolid, somewhat stupid fellow, but as
honest as the day and very obliging.

He had come to me well recommended, and I had not hesitated to engage
him. I chose him for my companion now, chiefly because he was a
foreigner and therefore less likely to gossip with the other servants
when we returned. I do not pretend to much cleverness, but I confess
that it vexes me to remember how that stout, guileless-looking youth
made a fool of me. For Rupert knew that I had met Mr. Rassendyll the
year before at Dresden; Rupert was keeping a watchful eye on all that
passed in Strelsau; Rupert had procured the fellow his fine testimonials
and sent him to me, in the hope that he would chance on something of
advantage to his employer. My resolve to take him to Wintenberg may
have been hoped for, but could scarcely have been counted on; it was the
added luck that waits so often on the plans of a clever schemer.

Going to take leave of the king, I found him huddled over the fire.
The day was not cold, but the damp chill of his dungeon seemed to have
penetrated to the very core of his bones. He was annoyed at my going,
and questioned me peevishly about the business that occasioned my
journey. I parried his curiosity as I best could, but did not succeed
in appeasing his ill-humor. Half ashamed of his recent outburst,
half-anxious to justify it to himself, he cried fretfully:

“Business! Yes, any business is a good enough excuse for leaving me! By
Heaven, I wonder if a king was ever served so badly as I am! Why did you
trouble to get me out of Zenda? Nobody wants me, nobody cares whether I
live or die.”

To reason with such a mood was impossible. I could only assure him that
I would hasten my return by all possible means.

“Yes, pray do,” said he. “I want somebody to look after me. Who knows
what that villain Rupert may attempt against me? And I can’t defend
myself can I? I’m not Rudolf Rassendyll, am I?”

Thus, with a mixture of plaintiveness and malice, he scolded me. At last
I stood silent, waiting till he should be pleased to dismiss me. At any
rate I was thankful that he entertained no suspicion as to my errand.
Had I spoken a word of Mr. Rassendyll he would not have let me go. He
had fallen foul of me before on learning that I was in communication
with Rudolf; so completely had jealousy destroyed gratitude in his
breast. If he had known what I carried, I do not think that he could
have hated his preserver more. Very likely some such feeling was natural
enough; it was none the less painful to perceive.

On leaving the king’s presence, I sought out the Constable of Zenda. He
knew my errand; and, sitting down beside him, I told him of the letter
I carried, and arranged how to apprise him of my fortune surely and
quickly. He was not in a good humor that day: the king had ruffled him
also, and Colonel Sapt had no great reserve of patience.

“If we haven’t cut one another’s throats before then, we shall all be at
Zenda by the time you arrive at Wintenberg,” he said. “The court moves
there to-morrow, and I shall be there as long as the king is.”

He paused, and then added: “Destroy the letter if there’s any danger.”

I nodded my head.

“And destroy yourself with it, if there’s the only way,” he went on with
a surly smile. “Heaven knows why she must send such a silly message at
all; but since she must, she’d better have sent me with it.”

I knew that Sapt was in the way of jeering at all sentiment, and I
took no notice of the terms that he applied to the queen’s farewell. I
contented myself with answering the last part of what he said.

“No, it’s better you should be here,” I urged. “For if I should lose the
letter--though there’s little chance of it--you could prevent it from
coming to the king.”

“I could try,” he grinned. “But on my life, to run the chance for a
letter’s sake! A letter’s a poor thing to risk the peace of a kingdom
for.”

“Unhappily,” said I, “it’s the only thing that a messenger can well
carry.”

“Off with you, then,” grumbled the colonel. “Tell Rassendyll from me
that he did well. But tell him to do something more. Let ‘em say good-by
and have done with it. Good God, is he going to waste all his life
thinking of a woman he never sees?” Sapt’s air was full of indignation.

“What more is he to do?” I asked. “Isn’t his work here done?”

“Ay, it’s done. Perhaps it’s done,” he answered. “At least he has given
us back our good king.”

To lay on the king the full blame for what he was would have been rank
injustice. Sapt was not guilty of it, but his disappointment was bitter
that all our efforts had secured no better ruler for Ruritania. Sapt
could serve, but he liked his master to be a man.

“Ay, I’m afraid the lad’s work here is done,” he said, as I shook him
by the hand. Then a sudden light came in his eyes. “Perhaps not,” he
muttered. “Who knows?”

A man need not, I hope, be deemed uxorious for liking a quiet dinner
alone with his wife before he starts on a long journey. Such, at least,
was my fancy; and I was annoyed to find that Helga’s cousin, Anton von
Strofzin, had invited himself to share our meal and our farewell. He
conversed with his usual airy emptiness on all the topics that were
supplying Strelsau with gossip. There were rumors that the king was
ill; that the queen was angry at being carried off to Zenda; that the
archbishop meant to preach against low dresses; that the chancellor was
to be dismissed; that his daughter was to be married; and so forth.
I heard without listening. But the last bit of his budget caught my
wandering attention.

“They were betting at the club,” said Anton, “that Rupert of Hentzau
would be recalled. Have you heard anything about it, Fritz?”

If I had known anything, it is needless to say that I should not have
confided it to Anton. But the suggested step was so utterly at variance
with the king’s intentions that I made no difficulty about contradicting
the report with an authoritative air. Anton heard me with a judicial
wrinkle on his smooth brow.

“That’s all very well,” said he, “and I dare say you’re bound to say so.
All I know is that Rischenheim dropped a hint to Colonel Markel a day or
two ago.”

“Rischenheim believes what he hopes,” said I.

“And where’s he gone?” cried Anton, exultantly. “Why has he suddenly
left Strelsau? I tell you he’s gone to meet Rupert, and I’ll bet you
what you like he carries some proposal. Ah, you don’t know everything,
Fritz, my boy?”

It was indeed true that I did not know everything. I made haste to admit
as much. “I didn’t even know that the count was gone, much less why he’s
gone,” said I.

“You see?” exclaimed Anton. And he added, patronizingly, “You should
keep your ears open, my boy; then you might be worth what the king pays
you.”

“No less, I trust,” said I, “for he pays me nothing.” Indeed, at this
time I held no office save the honorary position of chamberlain to
Her Majesty. Any advice the king needed from me was asked and given
unofficially.

Anton went off, persuaded that he had scored a point against me. I could
not see where. It was possible that the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim had
gone to meet his cousin, equally possible that no such business claimed
his care. At any rate, the matter was not for me. I had a more pressing
affair in hand. Dismissing the whole thing from my mind, I bade the
butler tell Bauer to go forward with my luggage and to let my carriage
be at the door in good time. Helga had busied herself, since our guest’s
departure, in preparing small comforts for my journey; now she came
to me to say good-by. Although she tried to hide all signs of it, I
detected an uneasiness in her manner. She did not like these errands of
mine, imagining dangers and risks of which I saw no likelihood. I would
not give in to her mood, and, as I kissed her, I bade her expect me back
in a few days’ time. Not even to her did I speak of the new and more
dangerous burden that I carried, although I was aware that she enjoyed a
full measure of the queen’s confidence.

“My love to King Rudolf, the real King Rudolf,” said she. “Though you
carry what will make him think little of my love.”

“I have no desire he should think too much of it, sweet,” said I. She
caught me by the hands, and looked up in my face.

“What a friend you are, aren’t you, Fritz?” said she. “You worship Mr.
Rassendyll. I know you think I should worship him too, if he asked me.
Well, I shouldn’t. I am foolish enough to have my own idol.” All my
modesty did not let me doubt who her idol might be. Suddenly she drew
near to me and whispered in my ear. I think that our own happiness
brought to her a sudden keen sympathy with her mistress.

“Make him send her a loving message, Fritz,” she whispered. “Something
that will comfort her. Her idol can’t be with her as mine is with me.”

“Yes, he’ll send something to comfort her,” I answered. “And God keep
you, my dear.”

For he would surely send an answer to the letter that I carried, and
that answer I was sworn to bring safely to her. So I set out in good
heart, bearing in the pocket of my coat the little box and the queen’s
good-by. And, as Colonel Sapt said to me, both I would destroy, if need
were--ay, and myself with them. A man did not serve Queen Flavia with
divided mind.



CHAPTER II. A STATION WITHOUT A CAB

The arrangements for my meeting with Mr. Rassendyll had been carefully
made by correspondence before he left England. He was to be at the
Golden Lion Hotel at eleven o’clock on the night of the 15th of October.
I reckoned to arrive in the town between eight and nine on the same
evening, to proceed to another hotel, and, on pretence of taking a
stroll, slip out and call on him at the appointed hour. I should then
fulfil my commission, take his answer, and enjoy the rare pleasure of
a long talk with him. Early the next morning he would have left
Wintenberg, and I should be on my way back to Strelsau. I knew that he
would not fail to keep his appointment, and I was perfectly confident of
being able to carry out the programme punctually; I had, however, taken
the precaution of obtaining a week’s leave of absence, in case any
unforeseen accident should delay my return. Conscious of having done
all I could to guard against misunderstanding or mishap, I got into the
train in a tolerably peaceful frame of mind. The box was in my inner
pocket, the letter in a portemonnaie. I could feel them both with my
hand. I was not in uniform, but I took my revolver. Although I had no
reason to anticipate any difficulties, I did not forget that what I
carried must be protected at all hazards and all costs.

The weary night journey wore itself away. Bauer came to me in the
morning, performed his small services, repacked my hand-bag, procured
me some coffee, and left me. It was then about eight o’clock; we had
arrived at a station of some importance and were not to stop again till
mid-day. I saw Bauer enter the second-class compartment in which he
was traveling, and settled down in my own coupe. I think it was at this
moment that the thought of Rischenheim came again into my head, and I
found myself wondering why he clung to the hopeless idea of compassing
Rupert’s return and what business had taken him from Strelsau. But I
made little of the matter, and, drowsy from a broken night’s rest, soon
fell into a doze. I was alone in the carriage and could sleep without
fear or danger. I was awakened by our noontide halt. Here I saw Bauer
again. After taking a basin of soup, I went to the telegraph bureau to
send a message to my wife; the receipt of it would not merely set her
mind at ease, but would also ensure word of my safe progress reaching
the queen. As I entered the bureau I met Bauer coming out of it. He
seemed rather startled at our encounter, but told me readily enough
that he had been telegraphing for rooms at Wintenberg, a very needless
precaution, since there was no danger of the hotel being full. In fact
I was annoyed, as I especially wished to avoid calling attention to my
arrival. However, the mischief was done, and to rebuke my servant might
have aggravated it by setting his wits at work to find out my motive for
secrecy. So I said nothing, but passed by him with a nod. When the whole
circumstances came to light, I had reason to suppose that besides
his message to the inn-keeper, Bauer sent one of a character and to a
quarter unsuspected by me.

We stopped once again before reaching Wintenberg. I put my head out of
the window to look about me, and saw Bauer standing near the luggage
van. He ran to me eagerly, asking whether I required anything. I told
him “nothing”; but instead of going away, he began to talk to me.
Growing weary of him, I returned to my seat and waited impatiently for
the train to go on. There was a further delay of five minutes, and then
we started.

“Thank goodness!” I exclaimed, leaning back comfortably in my seat and
taking a cigar from my case.

But in a moment the cigar rolled unheeded on to the floor, as I sprang
eagerly to my feet and darted to the window. For just as we were
clearing the station, I saw being carried past the carriage, on the
shoulders of a porter, a bag which looked very much like mine. Bauer
had been in charge of my bag, and it had been put in the van under his
directions. It seemed unlikely that it should be taken out now by any
mistake. Yet the bag I saw was very like the bag I owned. But I was not
sure, and could have done nothing had I been sure. We were not to stop
again before Wintenberg, and, with my luggage or without it, I myself
must be in the town that evening.

We arrived punctual to our appointed time. I sat in the carriage a
moment or two, expecting Bauer to open the door and relieve me of my
small baggage. He did not come, so I got out. It seemed that I had few
fellow-passengers, and these were quickly disappearing on foot or in
carriages and carts that waited outside the station. I stood looking for
my servant and my luggage. The evening was mild; I was encumbered with
my hand-bag and a heavy fur coat. There were no signs either of Bauer or
of baggage. I stayed where I was for five or six minutes. The guard of
the train had disappeared, but presently I observed the station-master;
he seemed to be taking a last glance round the premises. Going up to him
I asked whether he had seen my servant; he could give me no news of
him. I had no luggage ticket, for mine had been in Bauer’s hands; but I
prevailed on him to allow me to look at the baggage which had arrived;
my property was not among it. The station-master was inclined, I think,
to be a little skeptical as to the existence both of bag and of
servant. His only suggestion was that the man must have been left behind
accidentally. I pointed out that in this case he would not have had
the bag with him, but that it would have come on in the train. The
station-master admitted the force of my argument; he shrugged his
shoulders and spread his hands out; he was evidently at the end of his
resources.

Now, for the first time and with sudden force, a doubt of Bauer’s
fidelity thrust itself into my mind. I remembered how little I knew of
the fellow and how great my charge was. Three rapid movements of my
hand assured me that letter, box, and revolver were in their respective
places. If Bauer had gone hunting in the bag, he had drawn a blank. The
station-master noticed nothing; he was stating at the dim gas lamp that
hung from the roof. I turned to him.

“Well, tell him when he comes--” I began.

“He won’t come to-night, now,” interrupted the stationmaster, none too
politely. “No other train arrives to-night.”

“Tell him when he does come to follow me at once to the Wintenbergerhof.
I’m going there immediately.” For time was short, and I did not wish to
keep Mr. Rassendyll waiting. Besides, in my new-born nervousness, I was
anxious to accomplish my errand as soon as might be. What had become
of Bauer? The thought returned, and now with it another, that seemed
to connect itself in some subtle way with my present position: why and
whither had the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim set out from Strelsau a day
before I started on my journey to Wintenberg?

“If he comes I’ll tell him,” said the station-master, and as he spoke he
looked round the yard.

There was not a cab to be seen! I knew that the station lay on the
extreme outskirts of the town, for I had passed through Wintenberg on
my wedding journey, nearly three years before. The trouble involved in
walking, and the further waste of time, put the cap on my irritation.

“Why don’t you have enough cabs?” I asked angrily.

“There are plenty generally, sir,” he answered more civilly, with an
apologetic air. “There would be to-night but for an accident.”

Another accident! This expedition of mine seemed doomed to be the sport
of chance.

“Just before your train arrived,” he continued, “a local came in. As
a rule, hardly anybody comes by it, but to-night a number of men--oh,
twenty or five-and-twenty, I should think--got out. I collected their
tickets myself, and they all came from the first station on the line.
Well, that’s not so strange, for there’s a good beer-garden there. But,
curiously enough, every one of them hired a separate cab and drove off,
laughing and shouting to one another as they went. That’s how it happens
that there were only one or two cabs left when your train came in, and
they were snapped up at once.”

Taken alone, this occurrence was nothing; but I asked myself whether the
conspiracy that had robbed me of my servant had deprived me of a vehicle
also.

“What sort of men were they?” I asked.

“All sorts of men, sir,” answered the station-master, “but most of them
were shabby-looking fellows. I wondered where some of them had got the
money for their ride.”

The vague feeling of uneasiness which had already attacked me grew
stronger. Although I fought against it, calling myself an old woman
and a coward, I must confess to an impulse which almost made me beg
the station-master’s company on my walk; but, besides being ashamed
to exhibit a timidity apparently groundless, I was reluctant to draw
attention to myself in any way. I would not for the world have it
supposed that I carried anything of value.

“Well, there’s no help for it,” said I, and, buttoning my heavy coat
about me, I took my hand-bag and stick in one hand, and asked my way
to the hotel. My misfortunes had broken down the station-master’s
indifference, and he directed me in a sympathetic tone.

“Straight along the road, sir,” said he, “between the poplars, for hard
on half a mile; then the houses begin, and your hotel is in the first
square you come to, on the right.”

I thanked him curtly (for I had not quite forgiven him his earlier
incivility), and started on my walk, weighed down by my big coat and
the handbag. When I left the lighted station yard I realized that the
evening had fallen very dark, and the shade of the tall lank trees
intensified the gloom. I could hardly see my way, and went timidly, with
frequent stumbles over the uneven stones of the road. The lamps were
dim, few, and widely separated; so far as company was concerned, I might
have been a thousand miles from an inhabited house. In spite of myself,
the thought of danger persistently assailed my mind. I began to review
every circumstance of my journey, twisting the trivial into some ominous
shape, magnifying the significance of everything which might justly
seem suspicious, studying in the light of my new apprehensions every
expression of Bauer’s face and every word that had fallen from his lips.
I could not persuade myself into security. I carried the queen’s letter,
and--well, I would have given much to have old Sapt or Rudolf Rassendyll
by my side.

Now, when a man suspects danger, let him not spend his time in asking
whether there be really danger or in upbraiding himself for timidity,
but let him face his cowardice, and act as though the danger were real.
If I had followed that rule and kept my eyes about me, scanning the
sides of the road and the ground in front of my feet, instead of losing
myself in a maze of reflection, I might have had time to avoid the trap,
or at least to get my hand to my revolver and make a fight for it; or,
indeed, in the last resort, to destroy what I carried before harm came
to it. But my mind was preoccupied, and the whole thing seemed to happen
in a minute. At the very moment that I had declared to myself the vanity
of my fears and determined to be resolute in banishing them, I heard
voices--a low, strained whispering; I saw two or three figures in the
shadow of the poplars by the wayside. An instant later, a dart was made
at me. While I could fly I would not fight; with a sudden forward plunge
I eluded the men who rushed at me, and started at a run towards the
lights of the town and the shapes of the houses, now distant about a
quarter of a mile. Perhaps I ran twenty yards, perhaps fifty; I do not
know. I heard the steps behind me, quick as my own. Then I fell headlong
on the road--tripped up! I understood. They had stretched a rope across
my path; as I fell a man bounded up from either side, and I found the
rope slack under my body. There I lay on my face; a man knelt on me,
others held either hand; my face was pressed into the mud of the road,
and I was like to have been stifled; my hand-bag had whizzed away from
me. Then a voice said:

“Turn him over.”

I knew the voice; it was a confirmation of the fears which I had lately
been at such pains to banish. It justified the forecast of Anton von
Strofzin, and explained the wager of the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim--for
it was Rischenheim’s voice.

They caught hold of me and began to turn me on my back. Here I saw a
chance, and with a great heave of my body I flung them from me. For a
short instant I was free; my impetuous attack seemed to have startled
the enemy; I gathered myself up on my knees. But my advantage was not to
last long. Another man, whom I had not seen, sprang suddenly on me like
a bullet from a catapult. His fierce onset overthrew me; I was stretched
on the ground again, on my back now, and my throat was clutched
viciously in strong fingers. At the same moment my arms were again
seized and pinned. The face of the man on my chest bent down towards
mine, and through the darkness I discerned the features of Rupert of
Hentzau. He was panting with the sudden exertion and the intense force
with which he held me, but he was smiling also; and when he saw by
my eyes that I knew him, he laughed softly in triumph. Then came
Rischenheim’s voice again.

“Where’s the bag he carried? It may be in the bag.”

“You fool, he’ll have it about him,” said Rupert, scornfully. “Hold him
fast while I search.”

On either side my hands were still pinned fast. Rupert’s left hand did
not leave my throat, but his free right hand began to dart about
me, feeling, probing, and rummaging. I lay quite helpless and in the
bitterness of great consternation. Rupert found my revolver, drew it out
with a gibe, and handed it to Rischenheim, who was now standing beside
him. Then he felt the box, he drew it out, his eyes sparkled. He set
his knee hard on my chest, so that I could scarcely breathe; then he
ventured to loose my throat, and tore the box open eagerly.

“Bring a light here,” he cried. Another ruffian came with a
dark-lantern, whose glow he turned on the box. Rupert opened it, and
when he saw what was inside, he laughed again, and stowed it away in his
pocket.

“Quick, quick!” urged Rischenheim. “We’ve got what we wanted, and
somebody may come at any moment.”

A brief hope comforted me. The loss of the box was a calamity, but I
would pardon fortune if only the letter escaped capture. Rupert might
have suspected that I carried some such token as the box, but he could
not know of the letter. Would he listen to Rischenheim? No. The Count of
Hentzau did things thoroughly.

“We may as well overhaul him a bit more,” said he, and resumed his
search. My hope vanished, for now he was bound to come upon the letter.

Another instant brought him to it. He snatched the pocketbook, and,
motioning impatiently to the man to hold the lantern nearer, he began to
examine the contents. I remember well the look of his face as the fierce
white light threw it up against the darkness in its clear pallor and
high-bred comeliness, with its curling lips and scornful eyes. He had
the letter now, and a gleam of joy danced in his eyes as he tore it
open. A hasty glance showed him what his prize was; then, coolly and
deliberately he settled himself to read, regarding neither Rischenheim’s
nervous hurry nor my desperate, angry glance that glared up at him. He
read leisurely, as though he had been in an armchair in his own house;
the lips smiled and curled as he read the last words that the queen had
written to her lover. He had indeed come on more than he thought.

Rischenheim laid a hand on his shoulder.

“Quick, Rupert, quick,” he urged again, in a voice full of agitation.

“Let me alone, man. I haven’t read anything so amusing for a long
while,” answered Rupert. Then he burst into a laugh, crying, “Look,
look!” and pointing to the foot of the last page of the letter. I was
mad with anger; my fury gave me new strength. In his enjoyment of what
he read Rupert had grown careless; his knee pressed more lightly on me,
and as he showed Rischenheim the passage in the letter that caused him
so much amusement he turned his head away for an instant. My chance
had come. With a sudden movement I displaced him, and with a desperate
wrench I freed my right hand. Darting it out, I snatched at the letter.
Rupert, alarmed for his treasure, sprang back and off me. I also sprang
up on my feet, hurling away the fellow who had gripped my other hand.
For a moment I stood facing Rupert; then I darted on him. He was too
quick for me; he dodged behind the man with the lantern and hurled the
fellow forward against me. The lantern fell on the ground.

“Give me your stick!” I heard Rupert say. “Where is it? That’s right!”

Then came Rischenheim’s voice again, imploring and timid:

“Rupert, you promised not to kill him.”

The only answer was a short, fierce laugh. I hurled away the man who had
been thrust into my arms and sprang forward. I saw Rupert of Hentzau;
his hand was raised above his head and held a stout club. I do not
know what followed; there came--all in a confused blur of instant
sequence--an oath from Rupert, a rush from me, a scuffle, as though some
one sought to hold him back; then he was on me; I felt a great thud on
my forehead, and I felt nothing more. Again I was on my back, with a
terrible pain in my head, and a dull, dreamy consciousness of a knot of
men standing over me, talking eagerly to one another.

I could not hear what they were saying; I had no great desire to hear. I
fancied, somehow, that they were talking about me; they looked at me and
moved their hands towards me now and again. I heard Rupert’s laugh, and
saw his club poised over me; then Rischenheim caught him by the wrist. I
know now that Rischenheim was reminding his cousin that he had promised
not to kill me, that Rupert’s oath did not weigh a straw in the scales,
but that he was held back only by a doubt whether I alive or my dead
body would be more inconvenient to dispose of. Yet then I did not
understand, but lay there listless. And presently the talking forms
seemed to cease their talking; they grew blurred and dim, running into
one another, and all mingling together to form one great shapeless
creature that seemed to murmur and gibber over me, some such monster
as a man sees in his dreams. I hated to see it, and closed my eyes; its
murmurings and gibberings haunted my ears for awhile, making me restless
and unhappy; then they died away. Their going made me happy; I sighed in
contentment; and everything became as though it were not.

Yet I had one more vision, breaking suddenly across my unconsciousness.
A bold, rich voice rang out, “By God, I will!”

“No, no,” cried another. Then, “What’s that?” There was a rush of feet,
the cries of men who met in anger or excitement, the crack of a shot and
of another quickly following, oaths, and scuffling. Then came the sound
of feet flying. I could not make it out; I grew weary with the puzzle of
it. Would they not be quiet? Quiet was what I wanted. At last they grew
quiet; I closed my eyes again. The pain was less now; they were quiet; I
could sleep.

When a man looks back on the past, reviewing in his mind the chances
Fortune has given and the calls she has made, he always torments himself
by thinking that he could have done other and better than in fact he
did. Even now I lie awake at night sometimes, making clever plans by
which I could have thwarted Rupert’s schemes. In these musings I am very
acute; Anton von Strofzin’s idle talk furnishes me with many a clue,
and I draw inferences sure and swift as a detective in the story books.
Bauer is my tool, I am not his. I lay Rischenheim by the heels, send
Rupert howling off with a ball in his arm, and carry my precious burden
in triumph to Mr. Rassendyll. By the time I have played the whole game I
am indeed proud of myself. Yet in truth--in daylight truth--I fear that,
unless Heaven sent me a fresh set of brains, I should be caught in much
the same way again. Though not by that fellow Bauer, I swear! Well,
there it was. They had made a fool of me. I lay on the road with a
bloody head, and Rupert of Hentzau had the queen’s letter.



CHAPTER III. AGAIN TO ZENDA

By Heaven’s care, or--since a man may be over-apt to arrogate to himself
great share of such attention--by good luck, I had not to trust for my
life to the slender thread of an oath sworn by Rupert of Hentzau. The
visions of my dazed brain were transmutations of reality; the scuffle,
the rush, the retreat were not all dream.

There is an honest fellow now living in Wintenberg comfortably and at
his ease by reason that his wagon chanced to come lumbering along with
three or four stout lads in it at the moment when Rupert was meditating
a second and murderous blow. Seeing the group of us, the good carrier
and his lads leapt down and rushed on my assailants. One of the thieves,
they said, was for fighting it out--I could guess who that was--and
called on the rest to stand; but they, more prudent, laid hands on him,
and, in spite of his oaths, hustled him off along the road towards
the station. Open country lay there and the promise of safety. My new
friends set off in pursuit; but a couple of revolver shots, heard by me,
but not understood, awoke their caution. Good Samaritans, but not men
of war, they returned to where I lay senseless on the ground,
congratulating themselves and me that an enemy so well armed should
run and not stand his ground. They forced a drink of rough wine down my
throat, and in a minute or two I opened my eyes. They were for carrying
me to a hospital; I would have none of it. As soon as things grew clear
to me again and I knew where I was, I did nothing but repeat in urgent
tones, “The Golden Lion, The Golden Lion! Twenty crowns to carry me to
the Golden Lion.”

Perceiving that I knew my own business and where I wished to go, one
picked up my hand-bag and the rest hoisted me into their wagon and set
out for the hotel where Rudolf Rassendyll was. The one thought my broken
head held was to get to him as soon as might be and tell him how I had
been fool enough to let myself be robbed of the queen’s letter.

He was there. He stood on the threshold of the inn, waiting for me, as
it seemed, although it was not yet the hour of my appointment. As they
drew me up to the door, I saw his tall, straight figure and his red hair
by the light of the hall lamps. By Heaven, I felt as a lost child must
on sight of his mother! I stretched out my hand to him, over the side of
the wagon, murmuring, “I’ve lost it.”

He started at the words, and sprang forward to me. Then he turned
quickly to the carrier.

“This gentleman is my friend,” he said. “Give him to me. I’ll speak to
you later.” He waited while I was lifted down from the wagon into
the arms that he held ready for me, and himself carried me across the
threshold. I was quite clear in the head by now and understood all that
passed. There were one or two people in the hall, but Mr. Rassendyll
took no heed of them. He bore me quickly upstairs and into his
sitting-room. There he set me down in an arm-chair, and stood opposite
to me. He was smiling, but anxiety was awake in his eyes.

“I’ve lost it,” I said again, looking up at him pitifully enough.

“That’s all right,” said he, nodding. “Will you wait, or can you tell
me?”

“Yes, but give me some brandy,” said I.

Rudolf gave me a little brandy mixed in a great deal of water, and then
I made shift to tell him. Though faint, I was not confused, and I gave
my story in brief, hurried, yet sufficient words. He made no sign till I
mentioned the letter. Then his face changed.

“A letter, too?” he exclaimed, in a strange mixture of increased
apprehension and unlooked-for joy.

“Yes, a letter, too; she wrote a letter, and I carried that as well as
the box. I’ve lost them both, Rudolf. God help me, I’ve lost them both!
Rupert has the letter too!” I think I must have been weak and unmanned
from the blow I had received, for my composure broke down here. Rudolf
stepped up to me and wrung me by the hand. I mastered myself again and
looked in his face as he stood in thought, his hand caressing the strong
curve of his clean-shaven chin. Now that I was with him again it seemed
as though I had never lost him; as though we were still together in
Strelsau or at Tarlenheim, planning how to hoodwink Black Michael,
send Rupert of Hentzau to his own place, and bring the king back to his
throne. For Mr. Rassendyll, as he stood before me now, was changed in
nothing since our last meeting, nor indeed since he reigned in Strelsau,
save that a few flecks of gray spotted his hair.

My battered head ached most consumedly. Mr. Rassendyll rang the bell
twice, and a short, thickset man of middle age appeared; he wore a suit
of tweed, and had the air of smartness and respectability which marks
English servants.

“James,” said Rudolf, “this gentleman has hurt his head. Look after it.”

James went out. In a few minutes he was back, with water, basin, towels,
and bandages. Bending over me, he began to wash and tend my wound very
deftly. Rudolf was walking up and down.

“Done the head, James?” he asked, after a few moments.

“Yes, sir,” answered the servant, gathering together his appliances.

“Telegraph forms, then.”

James went out, and was back with the forms in an instant.

“Be ready when I ring,” said Rudolf. And he added, turning to me, “Any
easier, Fritz?”

“I can listen to you now,” I said.

“I see their game,” said he. “One or other of them, Rupert or this
Rischenheim, will try to get to the king with the letter.”

I sprang to my feet.

“They mustn’t,” I cried, and I reeled back into my chair, with a feeling
as if a red-hot poker were being run through my head.

“Much you can do to stop ‘em, old fellow,” smiled Rudolf, pausing to
press my hand as he went by. “They won’t trust the post, you know. One
will go. Now which?” He stood facing me with a thoughtful frown on his
face.

I did not know, but I thought that Rischenheim would go. It was a great
risk for Rupert to trust himself in the kingdom, and he knew that the
king would not easily be persuaded to receive him, however startling
might be the business he professed as his errand. On the other hand,
nothing was known against Rischenheim, while his rank would secure, and
indeed entitle, him to an early audience. Therefore I concluded that
Rischenheim would go with the letter, or, if Rupert would not let that
out of his possession, with the news of the letter.

“Or a copy,” suggested Rassendyll. “Well, Rischenheim or Rupert will be
on his way by to-morrow morning, or is on his way to-night.”

Again I tried to rise, for I was on fire to prevent the fatal
consequences of my stupidity. Rudolf thrust me back in my chair, saying,
“No, no.” Then he sat down at the table and took up the telegraph forms.

“You and Sapt arranged a cipher, I suppose?” he asked.

“Yes. You write the message, and I’ll put it into the cipher.”

“This is what I’ve written: ‘Document lost. Let nobody see him if
possible. Wire who asks.’ I don’t like to make it plainer: most ciphers
can be read, you know.”

“Not ours,” said I.

“Well, but will that do?” asked Rudolf, with an unconvinced smile.

“Yes, I think he’ll understand it.” And I wrote it again in the cipher;
it was as much as I could do to hold the pen.

The bell was rung again, and James appeared in an instant.

“Send this,” said Rudolf.

“The offices will be shut, sir.”

“James, James!”

“Very good, sir; but it may take an hour to get one open.”

“I’ll give you half an hour. Have you money?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And now,” added Rudolf, turning to me, “you’d better go to bed.”

I do not recollect what I answered, for my faintness came upon me again,
and I remember only that Rudolf himself helped me into his own bed. I
slept, but I do not think he so much as lay down on the sofa; chancing
to awake once or twice, I heard him pacing about. But towards morning
I slept heavily, and I did not know what he was doing then. At eight
o’clock James entered and roused me. He said that a doctor was to be at
the hotel in half an hour, but that Mr. Rassendyll would like to see me
for a few minutes if I felt equal to business. I begged James to summon
his master at once. Whether I were equal or unequal, the business had to
be done.

Rudolf came, calm and serene. Danger and the need for exertion acted on
him like a draught of good wine on a seasoned drinker. He was not only
himself, but more than himself: his excellences enhanced, the indolence
that marred him in quiet hours sloughed off. But to-day there was
something more; I can only describe it as a kind of radiance. I have
seen it on the faces of young sparks when the lady they love comes
through the ball-room door, and I have seen it glow more softly in
a girl’s eyes when some fellow who seemed to me nothing out of the
ordinary asked her for a dance. That strange gleam was on Rudolf’s face
as he stood by my bedside. I dare say it used to be on mine when I went
courting.

“Fritz, old friend,” said he, “there’s an answer from Sapt. I’ll lay the
telegraph offices were stirred in Zenda as well as James stirred them
here in Wintenberg! And what do you think? Rischenheim asked for an
audience before he left Strelsau.”

I raised myself on my elbow in the bed.

“You understand?” he went on. “He left on Monday. To-day’s Wednesday.
The king has granted him an audience at four on Friday. Well, then--”

“They counted on success,” I cried, “and Rischenheim takes the letter!”

“A copy, if I know Rupert of Hentzau. Yes, it was well laid. I like the
men taking all the cabs! How much ahead had they, now.”

I did not know that, though I had no more doubt than he that Rupert’s
hand was in the business.

“Well,” he continued, “I am going to wire to Sapt to put Rischenheim
off for twelve hours if he can; failing that, to get the king away from
Zenda.”

“But Rischenheim must have his audience sooner or later,” I objected.

“Sooner or later--there’s the world’s difference between them!” cried
Rudolf Rassendyll. He sat down on the bed by me, and went on in quick,
decisive words: “You can’t move for a day or two. Send my message to
Sapt. Tell him to keep you informed of what happens. As soon as you can
travel, go to Strelsau, and let Sapt know directly you arrive. We shall
want your help.”

“And what are you going to do?” I cried, staring at him.

He looked at me for a moment, and his face was crossed by conflicting
feelings. I saw resolve there, obstinacy, and the scorn of danger; fun,
too, and merriment; and, lastly, the same radiance I spoke of. He had
been smoking a cigarette; now he threw the end of it into the grate and
rose from the bed where he had been sitting.

“I’m going to Zenda,” said he.

“To Zenda!” I cried, amazed.

“Yes,” said Rudolf. “I’m going again to Zenda, Fritz, old fellow. By
heaven, I knew it would come, and now it has come!”

“But to do what?”

“I shall overtake Rischenheim or be hot on his heels. If he gets there
first, Sapt will keep him waiting till I come; and if I come, he shall
never see the king. Yes, if I come in time--” He broke into a sudden
laugh. “What!” he cried, “have I lost my likeness? Can’t I still play
the king? Yes, if I come in time, Rischenheim shall have his audience
of the king of Zenda, and the king will be very gracious to him, and the
king will take his copy of the letter from him! Oh, Rischenheim shall
have an audience of King Rudolf in the castle of Zenda, never fear!”

He stood, looking to see how I received his plan; but amazed at the
boldness of it, I could only lie back and gasp.

Rudolf’s excitement left him as suddenly as it had come; he was again
the cool, shrewd, nonchalant Englishman, as, lighting another cigarette,
he proceeded:

“You see, there are two of them, Rupert and Rischenheim. Now you can’t
move for a day or two, that’s certain. But there must be two of us there
in Ruritania. Rischenheim is to try first; but if he fails, Rupert will
risk everything and break through to the king’s presence. Give him five
minutes with the king, and the mischief’s done! Very well, then; Sapt
must keep Rupert at bay while I tackle Rischenheim. As soon as you can
move, go to Strelsau, and let Sapt know where you are.”

“But if you’re seen, if you’re found out?”

“Better I than the queen’s letter,” said he. Then he laid his hand on
my arm and said, quite quietly, “If the letter gets to the king, I and I
only can do what must be done.”

I did not know what he meant; perhaps it was that he would carry off the
queen sooner than leave her alone after her letter was known; but there
was another possible meaning that I, a loyal subject, dared not inquire
into. Yet I made no answer, for I was above all and first of all the
queen’s servant. Still I cannot believe that he meant harm to the king.

“Come, Fritz,” he cried, “don’t look so glum. This is not so great an
affair as the other, and we brought that through safe.” I suppose I
still looked doubtful, for he added, with a sort of impatience, “Well,
I’m going, anyhow. Heavens, man, am I to sit here while that letter is
carried to the king?”

I understood his feeling, and knew that he held life a light thing
compared with the recovery of Queen Flavia’s letter. I ceased to urge
him. When I assented to his wishes, every shadow vanished from his
face, and he began to discuss the details of the plan with business-like
brevity.

“I shall leave James with you,” said Rudolf. “He’ll be very useful, and
you can rely on him absolutely. Any message that you dare trust to no
other conveyance, give to him; he’ll carry it. He can shoot, too.” He
rose as he spoke. “I’ll look in before I start,” he added, “and hear
what the doctor says about you.”

I lay there, thinking, as men sick and weary in body will, of the
dangers and the desperate nature of the risk, rather than of the hope
which its boldness would have inspired in a healthy, active brain.
I distrusted the rapid inference that Rudolf had drawn from Sapt’s
telegram, telling myself that it was based on too slender a foundation.
Well, there I was wrong, and I am glad now to pay that tribute to his
discernment. The first steps of Rupert’s scheme were laid as Rudolf had
conjectured: Rischenheim had started, even while I lay there, for Zenda,
carrying on his person a copy of the queen’s farewell letter and armed
for his enterprise by his right of audience with the king. So far we
were right, then; for the rest we were in darkness, not knowing or being
able even to guess where Rupert would choose to await the result of the
first cast, or what precautions he had taken against the failure of his
envoy. But although in total obscurity as to his future plans, I traced
his past actions, and subsequent knowledge has shown that I was right.
Bauer was the tool; a couple of florins apiece had hired the fellows
who, conceiving that they were playing a part in some practical joke,
had taken all the cabs at the station. Rupert had reckoned that I should
linger looking for my servant and luggage, and thus miss my last chance
of a vehicle. If, however, I had obtained one, the attack would still
have been made, although, of course, under much greater difficulties.
Finally--and of this at the time I knew nothing--had I evaded them
and got safe to port with my cargo, the plot would have been changed.
Rupert’s attention would then have been diverted from me to Rudolf;
counting on love overcoming prudence, he reckoned that Mr. Rassendyll
would not at once destroy what the queen sent, and had arranged to track
his steps from Wintenberg till an opportunity offered of robbing him of
his treasure. The scheme, as I know it, was full of audacious cunning,
and required large resources--the former Rupert himself supplied;
for the second he was indebted to his cousin and slave, the Count of
Luzau-Rischenheim.

My meditations were interrupted by the arrival of the doctor. He hummed
and ha’d over me, but to my surprise asked me no questions as to the
cause of my misfortune, and did not, as I had feared, suggest that his
efforts should be seconded by those of the police. On the contrary, he
appeared, from an unobtrusive hint or two, to be anxious that I should
know that his discretion could be trusted.

“You must not think of moving for a couple of days,” he said; “but then,
I think we can get you away without danger and quite quietly.”

I thanked him; he promised to look in again; I murmured something about
his fee.

“Oh, thank you, that is all settled,” he said. “Your friend Herr Schmidt
has seen to it, and, my dear sir, most liberally.”

He was hardly gone when ‘my friend Herr Schmidt’--alias Rudolf
Rassendyll--was back. He laughed a little when I told him how discreet
the doctor had been.

“You see,” he explained, “he thinks you’ve been very indiscreet. I was
obliged, my dear Fritz, to take some liberties with your character.
However, it’s odds against the matter coming to your wife’s ears.”

“But couldn’t we have laid the others by the heels?”

“With the letter on Rupert? My dear fellow, you’re very ill.”

I laughed at myself, and forgave Rudolf his trick, though I think that
he might have made my fictitious inamorata something more than a baker’s
wife. It would have cost no more to make her a countess, and the doctor
would have looked with more respect on me. However, Rudolf had said that
the baker broke my head with his rolling-pin, and thus the story rests
in the doctor’s mind to this day.

“Well, I’m off,” said Rudolf.

“But where?”

“Why, to that same little station where two good friends parted from me
once before. Fritz, where’s Rupert gone?”

“I wish we knew.”

“I lay he won’t be far off.”

“Are you armed?”

“The six-shooter. Well, yes, since you press me, a knife, too; but only
if he uses one. You’ll let Sapt know when you come?”

“Yes; and I come the moment I can stand?”

“As if you need tell me that, old fellow!”

“Where do you go from the station?”

“To Zenda, through the forest,” he answered. “I shall reach the station
about nine to-morrow night, Thursday. Unless Rischenheim has got the
audience sooner than was arranged, I shall be in time.”

“How will you get hold of Sapt?”

“We must leave something to the minute.”

“God bless you, Rudolf.”

“The king sha’n’t have the letter, Fritz.”

There was a moment’s silence as we shook hands. Then that soft yet
bright look came in his eyes again. He looked down at me, and caught me
regarding him with a smile that I know was not unkind.

“I never thought I should see her again,” he said. “I think I shall now,
Fritz. To have a turn with that boy and to see her again--it’s worth
something.”

“How will you see her?”

Rudolf laughed, and I laughed too. He caught my hand again. I think that
he was anxious to infect me with his gayety and confidence. But I could
not answer to the appeal of his eyes. There was a motive in him that
found no place in me--a great longing, the prospect or hope of whose
sudden fulfilment dwarfed danger and banished despair. He saw that I
detected its presence in him and perceived how it filled his mind.

“But the letter comes before all,” said he. “I expected to die without
seeing her; I will die without seeing her, if I must, to save the
letter.”

“I know you will,” said I.

He pressed my hand again. As he turned away, James came with his
noiseless, quick step into the room.

“The carriage is at the door, sir,” said he.

“Look after the count, James,” said Rudolf. “Don’t leave him till he
sends you away.”

“Very well, sir.”

I raised myself in bed.

“Here’s luck,” I cried, catching up the lemonade James had brought me,
and taking a gulp of it.

“Please God,” said Rudolf, with a shrug.

And he was gone to his work and his reward--to save the queen’s letter
and to see the queen’s face. Thus he went a second time to Zenda.



CHAPTER IV. AN EDDY ON THE MOAT

On the evening of Thursday, the sixteenth of October, the Constable of
Zenda was very much out of humor; he has since confessed as much. To
risk the peace of a palace for the sake of a lover’s greeting had never
been wisdom to his mind, and he had been sorely impatient with “that
fool Fritz’s” yearly pilgrimage. The letter of farewell had been an
added folly, pregnant with chances of disaster. Now disaster, or the
danger of it, had come. The curt, mysterious telegram from Wintenberg,
which told him so little, at least told him that. It ordered him--and he
did not know even whose the order was--to delay Rischenheim’s audience,
or, if he could not, to get the king away from Zenda: why he was to act
thus was not disclosed to him. But he knew as well as I that Rischenheim
was completely in Rupert’s hands, and he could not fail to guess that
something had gone wrong at Wintenberg, and that Rischenheim came to
tell the king some news that the king must not hear. His task sounded
simple, but it was not easy; for he did not know where Rischenheim was,
and so could not prevent his coming; besides, the king had been very
pleased to learn of the count’s approaching visit, since he desired to
talk with him on the subject of a certain breed of dogs, which the count
bred with great, his Majesty with only indifferent success; therefore
he had declared that nothing should interfere with his reception of
Rischenheim. In vain Sapt told him that a large boar had been seen in
the forest, and that a fine day’s sport might be expected if he would
hunt next day. “I shouldn’t be back in time to see Rischenheim,” said
the king.

“Your Majesty would be back by nightfall,” suggested Sapt.

“I should be too tired to talk to him, and I’ve a great deal to
discuss.”

“You could sleep at the hunting-lodge, sire, and ride back to receive
the count next morning.”

“I’m anxious to see him as soon as may be.” Then he looked up at Sapt
with a sick man’s quick suspicion. “Why shouldn’t I see him?” he asked.

“It’s a pity to miss the boar, sire,” was all Sapt’s plea. The king made
light of it.

“Curse the boar!” said he. “I want to know how he gets the dogs’ coats
so fine.”

As the king spoke a servant entered, carrying a telegram for Sapt. The
colonel took it and put it in his pocket.

“Read it,” said the king. He had dined and was about to go to bed, it
being nearly ten o’clock.

“It will keep, sire,” answered Sapt, who did not know but that it might
be from Wintenberg.

“Read it,” insisted the king testily. “It may be from Rischenheim.
Perhaps he can get here sooner. I should like to know about those dogs.
Read it, I beg.”

Sapt could do nothing but read it. He had taken to spectacles lately,
and he spent a long while adjusting them and thinking what he should
do if the message were not fit for the king’s ear. “Be quick, man, be
quick!” urged the irritable king.

Sapt had got the envelope open at last, and relief, mingled with
perplexity, showed in his face.

“Your Majesty guessed wonderfully well. Rischenheim can be here at eight
to-morrow morning,” he said, looking up.

“Capital!” cried the king. “He shall breakfast with me at nine, and I’ll
have a ride after the boar when we’ve done our business. Now are you
satisfied?”

“Perfectly, sire,” said Sapt, biting his moustache.

The king rose with a yawn, and bade the colonel good-night. “He must
have some trick I don’t know with those dogs,” he remarked, as he went
out. And “Damn the dogs!” cried Colonel Sapt the moment that the door
was shut behind his Majesty.

But the colonel was not a man to accept defeat easily. The audience that
he had been instructed to postpone was advanced; the king, whom he
had been told to get away from Zenda, would not go till he had seen
Rischenheim. Still there are many ways of preventing a meeting. Some
are by fraud; these it is no injustice to Sapt to say that he had tried;
some are by force, and the colonel was being driven to the conclusion
that one of these must be his resort.

“Though the king,” he mused, with a grin, “will be furious if anything
happens to Rischenheim before he’s told him about the dogs.”

Yet he fell to racking his brains to find a means by which the count
might be rendered incapable of performing the service so desired by the
king and of carrying out his own purpose in seeking an audience. Nothing
save assassination suggested itself to the constable; a quarrel and a
duel offered no security; and Sapt was not Black Michael, and had no
band of ruffians to join him in an apparently unprovoked kidnapping of a
distinguished nobleman.

“I can think of nothing,” muttered Sapt, rising from his chair and
moving across towards the window in search of the fresh air that a man
so often thinks will give him a fresh idea. He was in his own quarters,
that room of the new chateau which opens on to the moat immediately to
the right of the drawbridge as you face the old castle; it was the room
which Duke Michael had occupied, and almost opposite to the spot where
the great pipe had connected the window of the king’s dungeon with the
waters of the moat. The bridge was down now, for peaceful days had come
to Zenda; the pipe was gone, and the dungeon’s window, though still
barred, was uncovered. The night was clear and fine, and the still water
gleamed fitfully as the moon, half-full, escaped from or was hidden by
passing clouds. Sapt stood staring out gloomily, beating his knuckles on
the stone sill. The fresh air was there, but the fresh idea tarried.

Suddenly the constable bent forward, craning his head out and down, far
as he could stretch it, towards the water. What he had seen, or seemed
dimly to see, is a sight common enough on the surface of water--large
circular eddies, widening from a centre; a stone thrown in makes them,
or a fish on the rise. But Sapt had thrown no stone, and the fish in the
moat were few and not rising then. The light was behind Sapt, and threw
his figure into bold relief. The royal apartments looked out the other
way; there were no lights in the windows this side the bridge, although
beyond it the guards’ lodgings and the servants’ offices still showed a
light here and there. Sapt waited till the eddies ceased. Then he heard
the faintest sound, as of a large body let very gently into the water; a
moment later, from the moat right below him, a man’s head emerged.

“Sapt!” said a voice, low but distinct.

The old colonel started, and, resting both hands on the sill, bent
further out, till he seemed in danger of overbalancing.

“Quick--to the ledge on the other side. You know,” said the voice, and
the head turned; with quick, quiet strokes the man crossed the moat till
he was hidden in the triangle of deep shade formed by the meeting of
the drawbridge and the old castle wall. Sapt watched him go, almost
stupefied by the sudden wonder of hearing that voice come to him out of
the stillness of the night. For the king was abed; and who spoke in that
voice save the king and one other?

Then, with a curse at himself for his delay, he turned and walked
quickly across the room. Opening the door, he found himself in the
passage. But here he ran right into the arms of young Bernenstein, the
officer of the guard, who was going his rounds. Sapt knew and trusted
him, for he had been with us all through the siege of Zenda, when
Michael kept the king a prisoner, and he bore marks given him by Rupert
of Hentzau’s ruffians. He now held a commission as lieutenant in the
cuirassiers of the King’s Guard.

He noticed Sapt’s bearing, for he cried out in a low voice, “Anything
wrong, sir?”

“Bernenstein, my boy, the castle’s all right about here. Go round to the
front, and, hang you, stay there,” said Sapt.

The officer stared, as well he might. Sapt caught him by the arm.

“No, stay here. See, stand by the door there that leads to the royal
apartments. Stand there, and let nobody pass. You understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And whatever you hear, don’t look round.”

Bernenstein’s bewilderment grew greater; but Sapt was constable, and on
Sapt’s shoulders lay the responsibility for the safety of Zenda and all
in it.

“Very well, sir,” he said, with a submissive shrug, and he drew his
sword and stood by the door; he could obey, although he could not
understand.

Sapt ran on. Opening the gate that led to the bridge, he sped across.
Then, stepping on one side and turning his face to the wall, he
descended the steps that gave foothold down to the ledge running six or
eight inches above the water. He also was now in the triangle of deep
darkness, yet he knew that a man was there, who stood straight and tall,
rising above his own height. And he felt his hand caught in a sudden
grip. Rudolf Rassendyll was there, in his wet drawers and socks.

“Is it you?” he whispered.

“Yes,” answered Rudolf; “I swam round from the other side and got here.
Then I threw in a bit of mortar, but I wasn’t sure I’d roused you, and
I didn’t dare shout, so I followed it myself. Lay hold of me a minute
while I get on my breeches: I didn’t want to get wet, so I carried my
clothes in a bundle. Hold me tight, it’s slippery.”

“In God’s name what brings you here?” whispered Sapt, catching Rudolf by
the arm as he was directed.

“The queen’s service. When does Rischenheim come?”

“To-morrow at eight.”

“The deuce! That’s earlier than I thought. And the king?”

“Is here and determined to see him. It’s impossible to move him from
it.”

There was a moment’s silence; Rudolf drew his shirt over his head and
tucked it into his trousers. “Give me the jacket and waistcoat,” he
said. “I feel deuced damp underneath, though.”

“You’ll soon get dry,” grinned Sapt. “You’ll be kept moving, you see.”

“I’ve lost my hat.”

“Seems to me you’ve lost your head too.”

“You’ll find me both, eh, Sapt?”

“As good as your own, anyhow,” growled the constable.

“Now the boots, and I’m ready.” Then he asked quickly, “Has the king
seen or heard from Rischenheim?”

“Neither, except through me.”

“Then why is he so set on seeing him?”

“To find out what gives dogs smooth coats.”

“You’re serious? Hang you, I can’t see your face.”

“Absolutely.”

“All’s well, then. Has he got a beard now?”

“Yes.”

“Confound him! Can’t you take me anywhere to talk?”

“What the deuce are you here at all for?”

“To meet Rischenheim.”

“To meet--?”

“Yes. Sapt, he’s got a copy of the queen’s letter.”

Sapt twirled his moustache.

“I’ve always said as much,” he remarked in tones of satisfaction. He
need not have said it; he would have been more than human not to think
it.

“Where can you take me to?” asked Rudolf impatiently.

“Any room with a door and a lock to it,” answered old Sapt. “I command
here, and when I say ‘Stay out’--well, they don’t come in.”

“Not the king?”

“The king is in bed. Come along,” and the constable set his toe on the
lowest step.

“Is there nobody about?” asked Rudolf, catching his arm.

“Bernenstein; but he will keep his back toward us.”

“Your discipline is still good, then, Colonel?”

“Pretty well for these days, your Majesty,” grunted Sapt, as he reached
the level of the bridge.

Having crossed, they entered the chateau. The passage was empty,
save for Bernenstein, whose broad back barred the way from the royal
apartments.

“In here,” whispered Sapt, laying his hand on the door of the room
whence he had come.

“All right,” answered Rudolf. Bernenstein’s hand twitched, but he did
not look round. There was discipline in the castle of Zenda.

But as Sapt was half-way through the door and Rudolf about to follow
him, the other door, that which Bernenstein guarded, was softly yet
swiftly opened. Bernenstein’s sword was in rest in an instant. A
muttered oath from Sapt and Rudolf’s quick snatch at his breath greeted
the interruption. Bernenstein did not look round, but his sword fell to
his side. In the doorway stood Queen Flavia, all in white; and now
her face turned white as her dress. For her eyes had fallen on Rudolf
Rassendyll. For a moment the four stood thus; then Rudolf passed Sapt,
thrust Bernenstein’s brawny shoulders (the young man had not looked
round) out of the way, and, falling on his knee before the queen, seized
her hand and kissed it. Bernenstein could see now without looking round,
and if astonishment could kill, he would have been a dead man that
instant. He fairly reeled and leant against the wall, his mouth hanging
open. For the king was in bed, and had a beard; yet there was the king,
fully dressed and clean shaven, and he was kissing the queen’s hand,
while she gazed down on him in a struggle between amazement, fright, and
joy. A soldier should be prepared for anything, but I cannot be hard on
young Bernenstein’s bewilderment.

Yet there was in truth nothing strange in the queen seeking to see old
Sapt that night, nor in her guessing where he would most probably be
found. For she had asked him three times whether news had come from
Wintenberg and each time he had put her off with excuses. Quick to
forbode evil, and conscious of the pledge to fortune that she had given
in her letter, she had determined to know from him whether there were
really cause for alarm, and had stolen, undetected, from her apartments
to seek him. What filled her at once with unbearable apprehension and
incredulous joy was to find Rudolf present in actual flesh and blood,
no longer in sad longing dreams or visions, and to feel his live lips on
her hand.

Lovers count neither time nor danger; but Sapt counted both, and no
more than a moment had passed before, with eager imperative gestures, he
beckoned them to enter the room. The queen obeyed, and Rudolf followed
her.

“Let nobody in, and don’t say a word to anybody,” whispered Sapt, as
he entered, leaving Bernenstein outside. The young man was half-dazed
still, but he had sense to read the expression in the constable’s eyes
and to learn from it that he must give his life sooner than let the door
be opened. So with drawn sword he stood on guard.

It was eleven o’clock when the queen came, and midnight had struck from
the great clock of the castle before the door opened again and Sapt came
out. His sword was not drawn, but he had his revolver in his hand.
He shut the door silently after him and began at once to talk in low,
earnest, quick tones to Bernenstein. Bernenstein listened intently and
without interrupting. Sapt’s story ran on for eight or nine minutes.
Then he paused, before asking:

“You understand now?”

“Yes, it is wonderful,” said the young man, drawing in his breath.

“Pooh!” said Sapt. “Nothing is wonderful: some things are unusual.”

Bernenstein was not convinced, and shrugged his shoulders in protest.

“Well?” said the constable, with a quick glance at him.

“I would die for the queen, sir,” he answered, clicking his heels
together as though on parade.

“Good,” said Sapt. “Then listen,” and he began again to talk.
Bernenstein nodded from time to time. “You’ll meet him at the gate,”
 said the constable, “and bring him straight here. He’s not to go
anywhere else, you understand me?”

“Perfectly, Colonel,” smiled young Bernenstein.

“The king will be in this room--the king. You know who is the king?”

“Perfectly, Colonel.”

“And when the interview is ended, and we go to breakfast--”

“I know who will be the king then. Yes, Colonel.”

“Good. But we do him no harm unless--”

“It is necessary.”

“Precisely.”

Sapt turned away with a little sigh. Bernenstein was an apt pupil, but
the colonel was exhausted by so much explanation. He knocked softly at
the door of the room. The queen’s voice bade him enter, and he passed
in. Bernenstein was left alone again in the passage, pondering over what
he had heard and rehearsing the part that it now fell to him to play. As
he thought he may well have raised his head proudly. The service seemed
so great and the honor so high, that he almost wished he could die in
the performing of his role. It would be a finer death than his soldier’s
dreams had dared to picture.

At one o’clock Colonel Sapt came out. “Go to bed till six,” said he to
Bernenstein.

“I’m not sleepy.”

“No, but you will be at eight if you don’t sleep now.”

“Is the queen coming out, Colonel?”

“In a minute, Lieutenant.”

“I should like to kiss her hand.”

“Well, if you think it worth waiting a quarter of an hour for!” said
Sapt, with a slight smile.

“You said a minute, sir.”

“So did she,” answered the constable.

Nevertheless it was a quarter of an hour before Rudolf Rassendyll opened
the door and the queen appeared on the threshold. She was very pale,
and she had been crying, but her eyes were happy and her air firm. The
moment he saw her, young Bernenstein fell on his knee and raised her
hand to his lips.

“To the death, madame,” said he, in a trembling voice.

“I knew it, sir,” she answered graciously. Then she looked round on the
three of them. “Gentlemen,” said she, “my servants and dear friends,
with you, and with Fritz who lies wounded in Wintenberg, rest my honor
and my life; for I will not live if the letter reaches the king.”

“The king shall not have it, madame,” said Colonel Sapt. He took
her hand in his and patted it with a clumsy gentleness; smiling, she
extended it again to young Bernenstein, in mark of her favor. They two
then stood at the salute, while Rudolf walked with her to the end of the
passage. There for a moment she and he stood together; the others turned
their eyes away and thus did not see her suddenly stoop and cover his
hand with her kisses. He tried to draw it away, not thinking it fit that
she should kiss his hand, but she seemed as though she could not let
it go. Yet at last, still with her eyes on his, she passed backwards
through the door, and he shut it after her.

“Now to business,” said Colonel Sapt dryly; and Rudolf laughed a little.

Rudolf passed into the room. Sapt went to the king’s apartments, and
asked the physician whether his Majesty were sleeping well. Receiving
reassuring news of the royal slumbers, he proceeded to the quarters
of the king’s body-servant, knocked up the sleepy wretch, and ordered
breakfast for the king and the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim at nine
o’clock precisely, in the morning-room that looked out over the avenue
leading to the entrance to the new chateau. This done, he returned to
the room where Rudolf was, carried a chair into the passage, bade Rudolf
lock the door, sat down, revolver in hand, and himself went to sleep.
Young Bernenstein was in bed just now, taken faint, and the constable
himself was acting as his substitute; that was to be the story, if a
story were needed. Thus the hours from two to six passed that morning in
the castle of Zenda.

At six the constable awoke and knocked at the door; Rudolf Rassendyll
opened it.

“Slept well?” asked Sapt.

“Not a wink,” answered Rudolf cheerfully.

“I thought you had more nerve.”

“It wasn’t want of nerve that kept me awake,” said Mr. Rassendyll.

Sapt, with a pitying shrug, looked round. The curtains of the window
were half-drawn. The table was moved near to the wall, and the arm-chair
by it was well in shadow, being quite close to the curtains.

“There’s plenty of room for you behind,” said Rudolf; “And when
Rischenheim is seated in his chair opposite to mine, you can put your
barrel against his head by just stretching out your hand. And of course
I can do the same.”

“Yes, it looks well enough,” said Sapt, with an approving nod.

“What about the beard?”

“Bernenstein is to tell him you’ve shaved this morning.”

“Will he believe that?”

“Why not? For his own sake he’d better believe everything.”

“And if we have to kill him?”

“We must run for it. The king would be furious.”

“He’s fond of him?”

“You forget. He wants to know about the dogs.”

“True. You’ll be in your place in time?”

“Of course.”

Rudolf Rassendyll took a turn up and down the room. It was easy to see
that the events of the night had disturbed him. Sapt’s thoughts were
running in a different channel.

“When we’ve done with this fellow, we must find Rupert,” said he.

Rudolf started.

“Rupert? Rupert? True; I forgot. Of course we must,” said he confusedly.

Sapt looked scornful; he knew that his companion’s mind had been
occupied with the queen. But his remarks--if he had meditated any--were
interrupted by the clock striking seven.

“He’ll be here in an hour,” said he.

“We’re ready for him,” answered Rudolf Rassendyll. With the thought of
action his eyes grew bright and his brow smooth again. He and old Sapt
looked at one another, and they both smiled.

“Like old times, isn’t it, Sapt?”

“Aye, sire, like the reign of good King Rudolf.”

Thus they made ready for the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim, while my cursed
wound held me a prisoner at Wintenberg. It is still a sorrow to me that
I know what passed that morning only by report, and had not the honor
of bearing a part in it. Still, her Majesty did not forget me, but
remembered that I would have taken my share, had fortune allowed. Indeed
I would most eagerly.



CHAPTER V. AN AUDIENCE OF THE KING

Having come thus far in the story that I set out to tell, I have half a
mind to lay down my pen, and leave untold how from the moment that Mr.
Rassendyll came again to Zenda a fury of chance seemed to catch us all
in a whirlwind, carrying us whither we would not, and ever driving us
onwards to fresh enterprises, breathing into us a recklessness that
stood at no obstacle, and a devotion to the queen and to the man she
loved that swept away all other feeling. The ancients held there to be a
fate which would have its fill, though women wept and men died, and
none could tell whose was the guilt nor who fell innocent. Thus did they
blindly wrong God’s providence. Yet, save that we are taught to believe
that all is ruled, we are as blind as they, and are still left wondering
why all that is true and generous and love’s own fruit must turn so
often to woe and shame, exacting tears and blood. For myself I would
leave the thing untold, lest a word of it should seem to stain her whom
I serve; it is by her own command I write, that all may one day, in
time’s fullness, be truly known, and those condemn who are without sin,
while they pity whose own hearts have fought the equal fight. So much
for her and him; for us less needs be said. It was not ours to weigh her
actions; we served her; him we had served. She was our queen; we bore
Heaven a grudge that he was not our king. The worst of what befell was
not of our own planning, no, nor of our hoping. It came a thunderbolt
from the hand of Rupert, flung carelessly between a curse and a
laugh; its coming entangled us more tightly in the net of circumstances.
Then there arose in us that strange and overpowering desire of which I
must tell later, filling us with a zeal to accomplish our purpose, and
to force Mr. Rassendyll himself into the way we chose. Led by this star,
we pressed on through the darkness, until at length the deeper darkness
fell that stayed our steps. We also stand for judgment, even as she and
he. So I will write; but I will write plainly and briefly, setting down
what I must, and no more, yet seeking to give truly the picture of that
time, and to preserve as long as may be the portrait of the man whose
like I have not known. Yet the fear is always upon me that, failing to
show him as he was, I may fail also in gaining an understanding of how
he wrought on us, one and all, till his cause became in all things
the right, and to seat him where he should be our highest duty and our
nearest wish. For he said little, and that straight to the purpose;
no high-flown words of his live in my memory. And he asked nothing for
himself. Yet his speech and his eyes went straight to men’s hearts and
women’s, so that they held their lives in an eager attendance on his
bidding. Do I rave? Then Sapt was a raver too, for Sapt was foremost in
the business.

At ten minutes to eight o’clock, young Bernenstein, very admirably
and smartly accoutred, took his stand outside the main entrance of
the castle. He wore a confident air that became almost a swagger as he
strolled to and fro past the motionless sentries. He had not long to
wait. On the stroke of eight a gentleman, well-horsed but entirely
unattended, rode up the carriage drive. Bernenstein, crying “Ah, it is
the count!” ran to meet him. Rischenheim dismounted, holding out his
hand to the young officer.

“My dear Bernenstein!” said he, for they were acquainted with one
another.

“You’re punctual, my dear Rischenheim, and it’s lucky, for the king
awaits you most impatiently.”

“I didn’t expect to find him up so soon,” remarked Rischenheim.

“Up! He’s been up these two hours. Indeed we’ve had the devil of a
time of it. Treat him carefully, my dear Count; he’s in one of his
troublesome humors. For example--but I mustn’t keep you waiting. Pray
follow me.”

“No, but pray tell me. Otherwise I might say something unfortunate.”

“Well, he woke at six; and when the barber came to trim his beard there
were--imagine it, Count!--no less than seven gray hairs.” The king fell
into a passion. “Take it off!” he said. “Take it off. I won’t have
a gray beard! Take it off!’ Well what would you? A man is free to be
shaved if he chooses, so much more a king. So it’s taken off.”

“His beard!”

“His beard, my dear Count.” Then, after thanking Heaven it was gone,
and declaring he looked ten years younger, he cried, “The Count
of Luzau-Rischenheim breakfasts with me to-day: what is there for
breakfast?” And he had the chef out of his bed and--“But, by heavens,
I shall get into trouble if I stop here chattering. He’s waiting most
eagerly for you. Come along.” And Bernenstein, passing his arm through
the count’s, walked him rapidly into the castle.

The Count of Luzau-Rischenheim was a young man; he was no more versed
in affairs of this kind than Bernenstein, and it cannot be said that he
showed so much aptitude for them. He was decidedly pale this morning;
his manner was uneasy, and his hands trembled. He did not lack courage,
but that rarer virtue, coolness; and the importance--or perhaps the
shame--of his mission upset the balance of his nerves. Hardly noting
where he went, he allowed Bernenstein to lead him quickly and directly
towards the room where Rudolf Rassendyll was, not doubting that he was
being conducted to the king’s presence.

“Breakfast is ordered for nine,” said Bernenstein, “but he wants to see
you before. He has something important to say; and you perhaps have the
same?”

“I? Oh, no. A small matter; but--er--of a private nature.”

“Quite so, quite so. Oh, I don’t ask any questions, my dear Count.”

“Shall I find the king alone?” asked Rischenheim nervously.

“I don’t think you’ll find anybody with him; no, nobody, I think,”
 answered Bernenstein, with a grave and reassuring air.

They arrived now at the door. Here Bernenstein paused.

“I am ordered to wait outside till his Majesty summons me,” he said in
a low voice, as though he feared that the irritable king would hear him.
“I’ll open the door and announce you. Pray keep him in a good temper,
for all our sakes.” And he flung the door open, saying, “Sire, the Count
of Luzau-Rischenheim has the honor to wait on your Majesty.” With this
he shut the door promptly, and stood against it. Nor did he move, save
once, and then only to take out his revolver and carefully inspect it.

The count advanced, bowing low, and striving to conceal a visible
agitation. He saw the king in his arm-chair; the king wore a suit of
brown tweeds (none the better for being crushed into a bundle the night
before); his face was in deep shadow, but Rischenheim perceived that the
beard was indeed gone. The king held out his hand to Rischenheim, and
motioned him to sit in a chair just opposite to him and within a foot of
the window-curtains.

“I’m delighted to see you, my lord,” said the king.

Rischenheim looked up. Rudolf’s voice had once been so like the king’s
that no man could tell the difference, but in the last year or two the
king’s had grown weaker, and Rischenheim seemed to be struck by the
vigor of the tones in which he was addressed. As he looked up, there was
a slight movement in the curtains by him; it died away when the count
gave no further signs of suspicion, but Rudolf had noticed his surprise:
the voice, when it next spoke, was subdued.

“Most delighted,” pursued Mr. Rassendyll. “For I am pestered beyond
endurance about those dogs. I can’t get the coats right, I’ve tried
everything, but they won’t come as I wish. Now, yours are magnificent.”

“You are very good, sire. But I ventured to ask an audience in order
to--”

“Positively you must tell me about the dogs. And before Sapt comes, for
I want nobody to hear but myself.”

“Your Majesty expects Colonel Sapt?”

“In about twenty minutes,” said the king, with a glance at the clock on
the mantelpiece.

At this Rischenheim became all on fire to get his errand done before
Sapt appeared.

“The coats of your dogs,” pursued the king, “grow so beautifully--”

“A thousand pardons, sire, but--”

“Long and silky, that I despair of--”

“I have a most urgent and important matter,” persisted Rischenheim in
agony.

Rudolf threw himself back in his chair with a peevish air. “Well, if you
must, you must. What is this great affair, Count? Let us have it over,
and then you can tell me about the dogs.”

Rischenheim looked round the room. There was nobody; the curtains were
still; the king’s left hand caressed his beardless chin; the right was
hidden from his visitor by the small table that stood between them.

“Sire, my cousin, the Count of Hentzau, has entrusted me with a
message.”

Rudolf suddenly assumed a stern air.

“I can hold no communication, directly or indirectly, with the Count of
Hentzau,” said he.

“Pardon me, sire, pardon me. A document has come into the count’s hands
which is of vital importance to your Majesty.”

“The Count of Hentzau, my lord, has incurred my heaviest displeasure.”

“Sire, it is in the hopes of atoning for his offences that he has sent
me here to-day. There is a conspiracy against your Majesty’s honor.”

“By whom, my lord?” asked Rudolf, in cold and doubting tones.

“By those who are very near your Majesty’s person and very high in your
Majesty’s love.”

“Name them.”

“Sire, I dare not. You would not believe me. But your Majesty will
believe written evidence.”

“Show it me, and quickly. We may be interrupted.”

“Sire, I have a copy--”

“Oh, a copy, my lord?” sneered Rudolf.

“My cousin has the original, and will forward it at your Majesty’s
command. A copy of a letter of her Majesty’s--”

“Of the queen’s?”

“Yes, sire. It is addressed to--” Rischenheim paused.

“Well, my lord, to whom?”

“To a Mr. Rudolf Rassendyll.”

Now Rudolf played his part well. He did not feign indifference, but
allowed his voice to tremble with emotion as he stretched out his hand
and said in a hoarse whisper, “Give it me, give it me.”

Rischenheim’s eyes sparkled. His shot had told: the king’s attention was
his; the coats of the dogs were forgotten. Plainly he had stirred the
suspicions and jealousy of the king.

“My cousin,” he continued, “conceives it his duty to lay the letter
before your Majesty. He obtained it--”

“A curse on how he got it! Give it me!”

Rischenheim unbuttoned his coat, then his waistcoat. The head of a
revolver showed in a belt round his waist. He undid the flap of a pocket
in the lining of his waistcoat, and he began to draw out a sheet of
paper.

But Rudolf, great as his powers of self-control were, was but human.
When he saw the paper, he leant forward, half rising from his chair. As
a result, his face came beyond the shadow of the curtain, and the full
morning light beat on it. As Rischenheim took the paper out, he
looked up. He saw the face that glared so eagerly at him; his eyes met
Rassendyll’s: a sudden suspicion seized him, for the face, though the
king’s face in every feature, bore a stern resolution and witnessed a
vigor that were not the king’s. In that instant the truth, or a hint of
it, flashed across his mind. He gave a half-articulate cry; in one hand
he crumpled up the paper, the other flew to his revolver. But he was
too late. Rudolf’s left hand encircled his hand and the paper in an iron
grip; Rudolf’s revolver was on his temple; and an arm was stretched out
from behind the curtain, holding another barrel full before his eyes,
while a dry voice said, “You’d best take it quietly.” Then Sapt stepped
out.

Rischenheim had no words to meet the sudden transformation of the
interview. He seemed to be able to do nothing but stare at Rudolf
Rassendyll. Sapt wasted no time. He snatched the count’s revolver and
stowed it in his own pocket.

“Now take the paper,” said he to Rudolf, and his barrel held Rischenheim
motionless while Rudolf wrenched the precious document from his fingers.
“Look if it’s the right one. No, don’t read it through; just look. Is it
right? That’s good. Now put your revolver to his head again. I’m going
to search him. Stand up, sir.”

They compelled the count to stand up, and Sapt subjected him to a search
that made the concealment of another copy, or of any other document,
impossible. Then they let him sit down again. His eyes seemed fascinated
by Rudolf Rassendyll.

“Yet you’ve seen me before, I think,” smiled Rudolf. “I seem to remember
you as a boy in Strelsau when I was there. Now tell us, sir, where
did you leave this cousin of yours?” For the plan was to find out from
Rischenheim where Rupert was, and to set off in pursuit of Rupert as
soon as they had disposed of Rischenheim.

But even as Rudolf spoke there was a violent knock at the door. Rudolf
sprang to open it. Sapt and his revolver kept their places. Bernenstein
was on the threshold, open-mouthed.

“The king’s servant has just gone by. He’s looking for Colonel Sapt.
The King has been walking in the drive, and learnt from a sentry of
Rischenheim’s arrival. I told the man that you had taken the count for a
stroll round the castle, and I did not know where you were. He says that
the king may come himself at any moment.”

Sapt considered for one short instant; then he was back by the
prisoner’s side.

“We must talk again later on,” he said, in low quick tones. “Now you’re
going to breakfast with the king. I shall be there, and Bernenstein.
Remember, not a word of your errand, not a word of this gentleman! At
a word, a sign, a hint, a gesture, a motion, as God lives, I’ll put a
bullet through your head, and a thousand kings sha’n’t stop me. Rudolf,
get behind the curtain. If there’s an alarm you must jump through the
window into the moat and swim for it.”

“All right,” said Rudolf Rassendyll. “I can read my letter there.”

“Burn it, you fool.”

“When I’ve read it I’ll eat it, if you like, but not before.”

Bernenstein looked in again. “Quick, quick! The man will be back,” he
whispered.

“Bernenstein, did you hear what I said to the count?”

“Yes, I heard.”

“Then you know your part. Now, gentlemen, to the king.”

“Well,” said an angry voice outside, “I wondered how long I was to be
kept waiting.”

Rudolf Rassendyll skipped behind the curtain. Sapt’s revolver slipped
into a handy pocket. Rischenheim stood with arms dangling by his side
and his waistcoat half unbuttoned. Young Bernenstein was bowing low on
the threshold, and protesting that the king’s servant had but just gone,
and that they were on the point of waiting on his Majesty. Then the king
walked in, pale and full-bearded.

“Ah, Count,” said he, “I’m glad to see you. If they had told me you
were here, you shouldn’t have waited a minute. You’re very dark in here,
Sapt. Why don’t you draw back the curtains?” and the king moved towards
the curtain behind which Rudolf was.

“Allow me, sire,” cried Sapt, darting past him and laying a hand on the
curtain.

A malicious gleam of pleasure shot into Rischenheim’s eyes. “In truth,
sire,” continued the constable, his hand on the curtain, “we were so
interested in what the count was saying about his dogs--”

“By heaven, I forgot!” cried the king. “Yes, yes, the dogs. Now tell me,
Count--”

“Your pardon, sire,” put in young Bernenstein, “but breakfast waits.”

“Yes, yes. Well, then, we’ll have them together--breakfast and the
dogs. Come along, Count.” The king passed his arm through Rischenheim’s,
adding to Bernenstein, “Lead the way, Lieutenant; and you, Colonel, come
with us.”

They went out. Sapt stopped and locked the door behind him. “Why do you
lock the door, Colonel?” asked the king.

“There are some papers in my drawer there, sire.”

“But why not lock the drawer?

“I have lost the key, sire, like the fool I am,” said the colonel.

The Count of Luzau-Rischenheim did not make a very good breakfast. He
sat opposite to the king. Colonel Sapt placed himself at the back of the
king’s chair, and Rischenheim saw the muzzle of a revolver resting on
the top of the chair just behind his Majesty’s right ear. Bernenstein
stood in soldierly rigidity by the door; Rischenheim looked round at him
once and met a most significant gaze.

“You’re eating nothing,” said the king. “I hope you’re not indisposed?”

“I am a little upset, sire,” stammered Rischenheim, and truly enough.

“Well, tell me about the dogs--while I eat, for I’m hungry.”

Rischenheim began to disclose his secret. His statement was decidedly
wanting in clearness. The king grew impatient.

“I don’t understand,” said he testily, and he pushed his chair back so
quickly that Sapt skipped away, and hid the revolver behind his back.

“Sire--” cried Rischenheim, half rising. A cough from Lieutenant von
Bernenstein interrupted him.

“Tell it me all over again,” said the king. Rischenheim did as he was
bid.

“Ah, I understand a little better now. Do you see, Sapt?” and he turned
his head round towards the constable. Sapt had just time to whisk the
revolver away. The count lent forward towards the king. Lieutenant von
Bernenstein coughed. The count sank back again.

“Perfectly, sire,” said Colonel Sapt. “I understand all the count wishes
to convey to your Majesty.”

“Well, I understand about half,” said the king with a laugh. “But
perhaps that’ll be enough.”

“I think quite enough, sire,” answered Sapt with a smile. The important
matter of the dogs being thus disposed of, the king recollected that the
count had asked for an audience on a matter of business.

“Now, what did you wish to say to me?” he asked, with a weary air. The
dogs had been more interesting.

Rischenheim looked at Sapt. The revolver was in its place; Bernenstein
coughed again. Yet he saw a chance.

“Your pardon, sire,” said he, “but we are not alone.”

The king lifted his eyebrows.

“Is the business so private?” he asked.

“I should prefer to tell it to your Majesty alone,” pleaded the count.

Now Sapt was resolved not to leave Rischenheim alone with the king, for,
although the count, being robbed of his evidence could do little harm
concerning the letter, he would doubtless tell the king that Rudolf
Rassendyll was in the castle. He leant now over the king’s shoulder, and
said with a sneer:

“Messages from Rupert of Hentzau are too exalted matters for my poor
ears, it seems.”

The king flushed red.

“Is that your business, my lord?” he asked Rischenheim sternly.

“Your Majesty does not know what my cousin--”

“It is the old plea?” interrupted the king. “He wants to come back? Is
that all, or is there anything else?”

A moment’s silence followed the king’s words. Sapt looked full at
Rischenheim, and smiled as he slightly raised his right hand and showed
the revolver. Bernenstein coughed twice. Rischenheim sat twisting his
fingers. He understood that, cost what it might, they would not let him
declare his errand to the king or betray Mr. Rassendyll’s presence. He
cleared his throat and opened his mouth as if to speak, but still he
remained silent.

“Well, my lord, is it the old story or something new,” asked the king
impatiently.

Again Rischenheim sat silent.

“Are you dumb, my lord?” cried the king most impatiently.

“It--it is only what you call the old story, sire.”

“Then let me say that you have treated me very badly in obtaining
an audience of me for any such purpose,” said the king. “You knew my
decision, and your cousin knows it.” Thus speaking, the king rose;
Sapt’s revolver slid into his pocket; but Lieutenant von Bernenstein
drew his sword and stood at the salute; he also coughed.

“My dear Rischenheim,” pursued the king more kindly, “I can allow for
your natural affection. But, believe me, in this case it misleads you.
Do me the favor not to open this subject again to me.”

Rischenheim, humiliated and angry, could do nothing but bow in
acknowledgment of the king’s rebuke.

“Colonel Sapt, see that the count is well entertained. My horse should
be at the door by now. Farewell, Count. Bernenstein, give me your arm.”

Bernenstein shot a rapid glance at the constable. Sapt nodded
reassuringly. Bernenstein sheathed his sword and gave his arm to the
king. They passed through the door, and Bernenstein closed it with a
backward push of his hand. But at this moment Rischenheim, goaded to
fury and desperate at the trick played on him--seeing, moreover, that
he had now only one man to deal with--made a sudden rush at the door.
He reached it, and his hand was on the door-knob. But Sapt was upon him,
and Sapt’s revolver was at his ear.

In the passage the king stopped.

“What are they doing in there?” he asked, hearing the noise of the quick
movements.

“I don’t know, sire,” said Bernenstein, and he took a step forward.

“No, stop a minute, Lieutenant; you’re pulling me along!”

“A thousand pardons, sire.”

“I hear nothing more now.” And there was nothing to hear, for the two
now stood dead silent inside the door.

“Nor I, sire. Will your Majesty go on?” And Bernenstein took another
step.

“You’re determined I shall,” said the king with a laugh, and he let the
young officer lead him away.

Inside the room, Rischenheim stood with his back against the door.
He was panting for breath, and his face was flushed and working with
excitement. Opposite to him stood Sapt, revolver in hand.

“Till you get to heaven, my lord,” said the constable, “you’ll never be
nearer to it than you were in that moment. If you had opened the door,
I’d have shot you through the head.”

As he spoke there came a knock at the door.

“Open it,” he said brusquely to Rischenheim. With a muttered curse the
count obeyed him. A servant stood outside with a telegram on a salver.

“Take it,” whispered Sapt, and Rischenheim put out his hand.

“Your pardon, my lord, but this has arrived for you,” said the man
respectfully.

“Take it,” whispered Sapt again.

“Give it me,” muttered Rischenheim confusedly; and he took the envelope.

The servant bowed and shut the door.

“Open it,” commanded Sapt.

“God’s curse on you!” cried Rischenheim in a voice that choked with
passion.

“Eh? Oh, you can have no secrets from so good a friend as I am, my lord.
Be quick and open it.”

The count began to open it.

“If you tear it up, or crumple it, I’ll shoot you,” said Sapt quietly.
“You know you can trust my word. Now read it.”

“By God, I won’t read it.”

“Read it, I tell you, or say your prayers.”

The muzzle was within a foot of his head. He unfolded the telegram. Then
he looked at Sapt. “Read,” said the constable.

“I don’t understand what it means,” grumbled Rischenheim.

“Possibly I may be able to help you.”

“It’s nothing but--”

“Read, my lord, read!”

Then he read, and this was the telegram: “Holf, 19 Konigstrasse.”

“A thousand thanks, my lord. And--the place it’s despatched from?”

“Strelsau.”

“Just turn it so that I can see. Oh, I don’t doubt you, but seeing is
believing. Ah, thanks. It’s as you say. You’re puzzled what it means,
Count?”

“I don’t know at all what it means!”

“How strange! Because I can guess so well.”

“You are very acute, sir.”

“It seems to me a simple thing to guess, my lord.”

“And pray,” said Rischenheim, endeavoring to assume an easy and
sarcastic air, “what does your wisdom tell you that the message means?”

“I think, my lord, that the message is an address.”

“An address! I never thought of that. But I know no Holf.”

“I don’t think it’s Holf’s address.”

“Whose, then?” asked Rischenheim, biting his nail, and looking furtively
at the constable.

“Why,” said Sapt, “the present address of Count Rupert of Hentzau.”

As he spoke, he fixed his eyes on the eyes of Rischenheim. He gave a
short, sharp laugh, then put his revolver in his pocket and bowed to the
count.

“In truth, you are very convenient, my dear Count,” said he.

            *    *    *    *    *



CHAPTER VI. THE TASK OF THE QUEEN’S SERVANTS

THE doctor who attended me at Wintenberg was not only discreet, but also
indulgent; perhaps he had the sense to see that little benefit would
come to a sick man from fretting in helplessness on his back, when he
was on fire to be afoot. I fear he thought the baker’s rolling-pin was
in my mind, but at any rate I extorted a consent from him, and was on
my way home from Wintenberg not much more than twelve hours after Rudolf
Rassendyll left me. Thus I arrived at my own house in Strelsau on the
same Friday morning that witnessed the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim’s
two-fold interview with the king at the Castle of Zenda. The moment I
had arrived, I sent James, whose assistance had been, and continued
to be, in all respects most valuable, to despatch a message to the
constable, acquainting him with my whereabouts, and putting myself
entirely at his disposal. Sapt received this message while a council of
war was being held, and the information it gave aided not a little in
the arrangements that the constable and Rudolf Rassendyll made. What
these were I must now relate, although, I fear, at the risk of some
tediousness.

Yet that council of war in Zenda was held under no common circumstances.
Cowed as Rischenheim appeared, they dared not let him out of their
sight. Rudolf could not leave the room into which Sapt had locked him;
the king’s absence was to be short, and before he came again Rudolf must
be gone, Rischenheim safely disposed of, and measures taken against the
original letter reaching the hands for which the intercepted copy had
been destined. The room was a large one. In the corner farthest from
the door sat Rischenheim, disarmed, dispirited, to all seeming ready to
throw up his dangerous game and acquiesce in any terms presented to him.
Just inside the door, guarding it, if need should be, with their lives,
were the other three, Bernenstein merry and triumphant, Sapt blunt and
cool, Rudolf calm and clear-headed. The queen awaited the result of
their deliberations in her apartments, ready to act as they directed,
but determined to see Rudolf before he left the castle. They conversed
together in low tones. Presently Sapt took paper and wrote. This first
message was to me, and it bade me come to Zenda that afternoon; another
head and another pair of hands were sadly needed. Then followed more
deliberation; Rudolf took up the talking now, for his was the bold plan
on which they consulted. Sapt twirled his moustache, smiling doubtfully.

“Yes, yes,” murmured young Bernenstein, his eyes alight with excitement.

“It’s dangerous, but the best thing,” said Rudolf, carefully sinking
his voice yet lower, lest the prisoner should catch the lightest word
of what he said. “It involves my staying here till the evening. Is that
possible?”

“No; but you can leave here and hide in the forest till I join you,”
 said Sapt.

“Till we join you,” corrected Bernenstein eagerly.

“No,” said the constable, “you must look after our friend here. Come,
Lieutenant, it’s all in the queen’s service.”

“Besides,” added Rudolf with a smile, “neither the colonel nor I would
let you have a chance at Rupert. He’s our game, isn’t he, Sapt?”

The colonel nodded. Rudolf in his turn took paper, and here is the
message that he wrote:

“Holf, 19, Konigstrasse, Strelsau.--All well. He has what I had, but
wishes to see what you have. He and I will be at the hunting-lodge
at ten this evening. Bring it and meet us. The business is
unsuspected.--R.”

Rudolf threw the paper across to Sapt; Bernenstein leant over the
constable’s shoulder and read it eagerly.

“I doubt if it would bring me,” grinned old Sapt, throwing the paper
down.

“It’ll bring Rupert to Hentzau. Why not? He’ll know that the king will
wish to meet him unknown to the queen, and also unknown to you, Sapt,
since you were my friend: what place more likely for the king to choose
than his hunting-lodge, where he is accustomed to go when he wishes to
be alone? The message will bring him, depend on it. Why, man, Rupert
would come even if he suspected; and why should he suspect?”

“They may have a cipher, he and Rischenheim,” objected Sapt.

“No, or Rupert would have sent the address in it,” retorted Rudolf
quickly.

“Then--when he comes?” asked Bernenstein.

“He finds such a king as Rischenheim found, and Sapt, here, at his
elbow.”

“But he’ll know you,” objected Bernenstein.

“Ay, I think he’ll know me,” said Rudolf with a smile. “Meanwhile we
send for Fritz to come here and look after the king.”

“And Rischenheim?”

“That’s your share, Lieutenant. Sapt, is any one at Tarlenheim?”

“No. Count Stanislas has put it at Fritz’s disposal.”

“Good; then Fritz’s two friends, the Count of Luzau-Rischenheim and
Lieutenant von Bernenstein, will ride over there to-day. The constable
of Zenda will give the lieutenant twenty-four hours’ leave of absence,
and the two gentlemen will pass the day and sleep at the chateau. They
will pass the day side by side, Bernenstein, not losing sight of one
another for an instant, and they will pass the night in the same room.
And one of them will not close his eyes nor take his hand off the butt
of his revolver.”

“Very good, sir,” said young Bernenstein.

“If he tries to escape or give any alarm, shoot him through the head,
ride to the frontier, get to safe hiding, and, if you can, let us know.”

“Yes,” said Bernenstein simply. Sapt had chosen well, and the young
officer made nothing of the peril and ruin that her Majesty’s service
might ask of him.

A restless movement and a weary sigh from Rischenheim attracted their
attention. He had strained his ears to listen till his head ached, but
the talkers had been careful, and he had heard nothing that threw light
on their deliberations. He had now given up his vain attempt, and sat in
listless inattention, sunk in an apathy.

“I don’t think he’ll give you much trouble,” whispered Sapt to
Bernenstein, with a jerk of his thumb towards the captive.

“Act as if he were likely to give you much,” urged Rudolf, laying his
hand on the lieutenant’s arm.

“Yes, that’s a wise man’s advice,” nodded the constable approvingly. “We
were well governed, Lieutenant, when this Rudolf was king.”

“Wasn’t I also his loyal subject?” asked young Bernenstein.

“Yes, wounded in my service,” added Rudolf; for he remembered how
the boy--he was little more then--had been fired upon in the park of
Tarlenheim, being taken for Mr. Rassendyll himself.

Thus their plans were laid. If they could defeat Rupert, they would have
Rischenheim at their mercy. If they could keep Rischenheim out of the
way while they used his name in their trick, they had a strong chance of
deluding and killing Rupert. Yes, of killing him; for that and nothing
less was their purpose, as the constable of Zenda himself has told me.

“We would have stood on no ceremony,” he said. “The queen’s honor was at
stake, and the fellow himself an assassin.”

Bernenstein rose and went out. He was gone about half an hour, being
employed in despatching the telegrams to Strelsau. Rudolf and Sapt used
the interval to explain to Rischenheim what they proposed to do with
him. They asked no pledge, and he offered none. He heard what they
said with a dulled uninterested air. When asked if he would go without
resistance, he laughed a bitter laugh. “How can I resist?” he asked. “I
should have a bullet through my head.”

“Why, without doubt,” said Colonel Sapt. “My lord, you are very
sensible.”

“Let me advise you, my lord,” said Rudolf, looking down on him kindly
enough, “if you come safe through this affair, to add honor to your
prudence, and chivalry to your honor. There is still time for you to
become a gentleman.”

He turned away, followed by a glance of anger from the count and a
grating chuckle from old Sapt.

A few moments later Bernenstein returned. His errand was done, and
horses for himself and Rischenheim were at the gate of the castle. After
a few final words and clasp of the hand from Rudolf, the lieutenant
motioned to his prisoner to accompany him, and they two walked out
together, being to all appearance willing companions and in perfect
friendliness with one another. The queen herself watched them go from
the windows of her apartment, and noticed that Bernenstein rode half a
pace behind, and that his free hand rested on the revolver by his side.

It was now well on in the morning, and the risk of Rudolf’s sojourn in
the castle grew greater with every moment. Yet he was resolved to
see the queen before he went. This interview presented no great
difficulties, since her Majesty was in the habit of coming to the
constable’s room to take his advice or to consult with him. The hardest
task was to contrive afterwards a free and unnoticed escape for Mr.
Rassendyll. To meet this necessity, the constable issued orders that
the company of guards which garrisoned the castle should parade at
one o’clock in the park, and that the servants should all, after their
dinner, be granted permission to watch the manoeuvres. By this means he
counted on drawing off any curious eyes and allowing Rudolf to reach the
forest unobserved. They appointed a rendezvous in a handy and sheltered
spot; the one thing which they were compelled to trust to fortune was
Rudolf’s success in evading chance encounters while he waited. Mr.
Rassendyll himself was confident of his ability to conceal his presence,
or, if need were, so to hide his face that no strange tale of the king
being seen wandering, alone and beardless, should reach the ears of the
castle or the town.

While Sapt was making his arrangements, Queen Flavia came to the room
where Rudolf Rassendyll was. It was then nearing twelve, and young
Bernenstein had been gone half an hour. Sapt attended her to the door,
set a sentry at the end of the passage with orders that her Majesty
should on no pretence be disturbed, promised her very audibly to return
as soon as he possibly could, and respectfully closed the door after
she had entered. The constable was well aware of the value in a secret
business of doing openly all that can safely be done with openness.

All of what passed at that interview I do not know, but a part Queen
Flavia herself told to me, or rather to Helga, my wife; for although it
was meant to reach my ear, yet to me, a man, she would not disclose it
directly. First she learnt from Mr. Rassendyll the plans that had been
made, and, although she trembled at the danger that he must run in
meeting Rupert of Hentzau, she had such love of him and such a trust in
his powers that she seemed to doubt little of his success. But she began
to reproach herself for having brought him into this peril by writing
her letter. At this he took from his pocket the copy that Rischenheim
had carried. He had found time to read it, and now before her eyes he
kissed it.

“Had I as many lives as there are words, my queen,” he said softly, “for
each word I would gladly give a life.”

“Ah, Rudolf, but you’ve only one life, and that more mine than yours.
Did you think we should ever meet again?”

“I didn’t know,” said he; and now they were standing opposite one
another.

“But I knew,” she said, her eyes shining brightly; “I knew always that
we should meet once more. Not how, nor where, but just that we should.
So I lived, Rudolf.”

“God bless you!” he said.

“Yes, I lived through it all.”

He pressed her hand, knowing what that phrase meant and must mean for
her.

“Will it last forever?” she asked, suddenly gripping his hand tightly.
But a moment later she went on: “No, no, I mustn’t make you unhappy,
Rudolf. I’m half glad I wrote the letter, and half glad they stole
it. It’s so sweet to have you fighting for me, for me only this time,
Rudolf--not for the king, for me!”

“Sweet indeed, my dearest lady. Don’t be afraid: we shall win.”

“You will win, yes. And then you’ll go?” And, dropping his hand, she
covered her face with hers.

“I mustn’t kiss your face,” said he, “but your hands I may kiss,” and he
kissed her hands as they were pressed against her face.

“You wear my ring,” she murmured through her fingers, “always?”

“Why, yes,” he said, with a little laugh of wonder at her question.

“And there is--no one else?”

“My queen!” said he, laughing again.

“No, I knew really, Rudolf, I knew really,” and now her hands flew out
towards him, imploring his pardon. Then she began to speak quickly:
“Rudolf, last night I had a dream about you, a strange dream. I seemed
to be in Strelsau, and all the people were talking about the king. It
was you they meant; you were the king. At last you were the king, and I
was your queen. But I could see you only very dimly; you were somewhere,
but I could not make out where; just sometimes your face came. Then I
tried to tell you that you were king--yes, and Colonel Sapt and Fritz
tried to tell you; the people, too, called out that you were king. What
did it mean? But your face, when I saw it, was unmoved, and very pale,
and you seemed not to hear what we said, not even what I said. It almost
seemed as if you were dead, and yet king. Ah, you mustn’t die, even to
be king,” and she laid a hand on his shoulder.

“Sweetheart,” said he gently, “in dreams desires and fears blend in
strange visions, so I seemed to you to be both a king and a dead man;
but I’m not a king, and I am a very healthy fellow. Yet a thousand
thanks to my dearest queen for dreaming of me.”

“No, but what could it mean?” she asked again.

“What does it mean when I dream always of you, except that I always love
you?”

“Was it only that?” she said, still unconvinced.

What more passed between them I do not know. I think that the queen told
my wife more, but women will sometimes keep women’s secrets even from
their husbands; though they love us, yet we are always in some sort the
common enemy, against whom they join hands. Well, I would not look too
far into such secrets, for to know must be, I suppose, to blame, and who
is himself so blameless that in such a case he would be free with his
censures?

Yet much cannot have passed, for almost close on their talk about the
dream came Colonel Sapt, saying that the guards were in line, and all
the women streamed out to watch them, while the men followed, lest the
gay uniforms should make them forgotten. Certainly a quiet fell over
the old castle, that only the constable’s curt tones broke, as he bade
Rudolf come by the back way to the stables and mount his horse.

“There’s no time to lose,” said Sapt, and his eye seemed to grudge the
queen even one more word with the man she loved.

But Rudolf was not to be hurried into leaving her in such a fashion. He
clapped the constable on the shoulder, laughing, and bidding him think
of what he would for a moment; then he went again to the queen and would
have knelt before her, but that she would not suffer, and they stood
with hands locked. Then suddenly she drew him to her and kissed his
forehead, saying: “God go with you, Rudolf my knight.”

Thus she turned away, letting him go. He walked towards the door; but a
sound arrested his steps, and he waited in the middle of the room, his
eyes on the door. Old Sapt flew to the threshold, his sword half-way out
of its sheath. There was a step coming down the passage, and the feet
stopped outside the door.

“Is it the king?” whispered Rudolf.

“I don’t know,” said Sapt.

“No, it’s not the king,” came in unhesitating certainty from Queen
Flavia.

They waited: a low knock sounded on the door. Still for a moment they
waited. The knock was repeated urgently.

“We must open,” said Sapt. “Behind the curtain with you, Rudolf.”

The queen sat down, and Sapt piled a heap of papers before her, that it
might seem as though he and she transacted business. But his precautions
were interrupted by a hoarse, eager, low cry from outside, “Quick! in
God’s name, quick!”

They knew the voice for Bernenstein’s. The queen sprang up, Rudolf came
out, Sapt turned the key. The lieutenant entered, hurried, breathless,
pale.

“Well?” asked Sapt.

“He has got away?” cried Rudolf, guessing in a moment the misfortune
that had brought Bernenstein back.

“Yes, he’s got away. Just as we left the town and reached the open road
towards Tarlenheim, he said, ‘Are we going to walk all the way? I was
not loath to go quicker, and we broke into a trot. But I--ah, what a
pestilent fool I am!”

“Never mind that--go on.”

“Why, I was thinking of him and my task, and having a bullet ready for
him, and--”

“Of everything except your horse?” guessed Sapt, with a grim smile.

“Yes; and the horse pecked and stumbled, and I fell forward on his neck.
I put out my arm to recover myself, and--I jerked my revolver on to the
ground.”

“And he saw?”

“He saw, curse him. For a second he waited; then he smiled, and turned,
and dug his spurs in and was off, straight across country towards
Strelsau. Well, I was off my horse in a moment, and I fired three times
after him.”

“You hit?” asked Rudolf.

“I think so. He shifted the reins from one hand to the other and wrung
his arm. I mounted and made after him, but his horse was better than
mine and he gained ground. We began to meet people, too, and I didn’t
dare to fire again. So I left him and rode here to tell you. Never
employ me again, Constable, so long as you live,” and the young man’s
face was twisted with misery and shame, as, forgetting the queen’s
presence, he sank despondently into a chair.

Sapt took no notice of his self-reproaches. But Rudolf went and laid a
hand on his shoulder.

“It was an accident,” he said. “No blame to you.”

The queen rose and walked towards him; Bernenstein sprang to his feet.

“Sir,” said she, “it is not success but effort that should gain thanks,”
 and she held out her hand.

Well, he was young; I do not laugh at the sob that escaped his lips as
he turned his head.

“Let me try something else!” he implored.

“Mr. Rassendyll,” said the queen, “you’ll do my pleasure by employing
this gentleman in my further service. I am already deep in his debt, and
would be deeper.” There was a moment’s silence.

“Well, but what’s to be done?” asked Colonel Sapt. “He’s gone to
Strelsau.”

“He’ll stop Rupert,” mused Mr. Rassendyll. “He may or he mayn’t.”

“It’s odds that he will.”

“We must provide for both.”

Sapt and Rudolf looked at one another.

“You must be here!” asked Rudolf of the constable. “Well, I’ll go to
Strelsau.” His smile broke out. “That is, if Bernenstein’ll lend me a
hat.”

The queen made no sound; but she came and laid her hand on his arm. He
looked at her, smiling still.

“Yes, I’ll go to Strelsau,” said he, “and I’ll find Rupert, ay, and
Rischenheim too, if they’re in the city.”

“Take me with you,” cried Bernenstein eagerly.

Rudolf glanced at Sapt. The constable shook his head. Bernenstein’s face
fell.

“It’s not that, boy,” said old Sapt, half in kindness, half in
impatience. “We want you here. Suppose Rupert comes here with
Rischenheim!”

The idea was new, but the event was by no means unlikely.

“But you’ll be here, Constable,” urged Bernenstein, “and Fritz von
Tarlenheim will arrive in an hour.”

“Ay, young man,” said Sapt, nodding his head; “but when I fight Rupert
of Hentzau, I like to have a man to spare,” and he grinned broadly, being
no whit afraid of what Bernenstein might think of his courage. “Now go
and get him a hat,” he added, and the lieutenant ran off on the errand.

But the queen cried:

“Are you sending Rudolf alone, then--alone against two?”

“Yes, madam, if I may command the campaign,” said Sapt. “I take it he
should be equal to the task.”

He could not know the feelings of the queen’s heart. She dashed her hand
across her eyes, and turned in mute entreaty to Rudolf Rassendyll.

“I must go,” he said softly. “We can’t spare Bernenstein, and I mustn’t
stay here.”

She said no more. Rudolf walked across to Sapt.

“Take me to the stables. Is the horse good? I daren’t take the train.
Ah, here’s the lieutenant and the hat.”

“The horse’ll get you there to-night,” said Sapt. “Come along.
Bernenstein, stay with the queen.”

At the threshold Rudolf paused, and, turning his head, glanced once
at Queen Flavia, who stood still as a statue, watching him go. Then
he followed the constable, who brought him where the horse was. Sapt’s
devices for securing freedom from observation had served well, and
Rudolf mounted unmolested.

“The hat doesn’t fit very well,” said Rudolf.

“Like a crown better, eh?” suggested the colonel.

Rudolf laughed as he asked, “Well, what are my orders?”

“Ride round by the moat to the road at the back; then through the forest
to Hofbau; you know your way after that. You mustn’t reach Strelsau till
it’s dark. Then, if you want a shelter--”

“To Fritz von Tarlenheim’s, yes! From there I shall go straight to the
address.”

“Ay. And--Rudolf!”

“Yes?”

“Make an end of him this time.”

“Please God. But if he goes to the lodge? He will, unless Rischenheim
stops him.”

“I’ll be there in case--but I think Rischenheim will stop him.”

“If he comes here?”

“Young Bernenstein will die before he suffers him to reach the king.”

“Sapt!”

“Ay?”

“Be kind to her.”

“Bless the man, yes!”

“Good-by.”

“And good luck.”

At a swift canter Rudolf darted round the drive that led from the
stables, by the moat, to the old forest road behind; five minutes
brought him within the shelter of the trees, and he rode on confidently,
meeting nobody, save here and there a yokel, who, seeing a man ride hard
with his head averted, took no more notice of him than to wish that he
himself could ride abroad instead of being bound to work. Thus Rudolf
Rassendyll set out again for the walls of Strelsau, through the forest
of Zenda. And ahead of him, with an hour’s start, galloped the Count of
Luzau-Rischenheim, again a man, and a man with resolution, resentment,
and revenge in his heart.

The game was afoot now; who could tell the issue of it?



CHAPTER VII. THE MESSAGE OF SIMON THE HUNTSMAN

I RECEIVED the telegram sent to me by the Constable of Zenda at my own
house in Strelsau about one o’clock. It is needless to say that I
made immediate preparations to obey his summons. My wife indeed
protested--and I must admit with some show of reason--that I was unfit
to endure further fatigues, and that my bed was the only proper place
for me. I could not listen; and James, Mr. Rassendyll’s servant, being
informed of the summons, was at my elbow with a card of the trains from
Strelsau to Zenda, without waiting for any order from me. I had talked
to this man in the course of our journey, and discovered that he had
been in the service of Lord Topham, formerly British Ambassador to the
Court of Ruritania. How far he was acquainted with the secrets of his
present master, I did not know, but his familiarity with the city
and the country made him of great use to me. We discovered, to our
annoyance, that no train left till four o’clock, and then only a slow
one; the result was that we could not arrive at the castle till past
six o’clock. This hour was not absolutely too late, but I was of course
eager to be on the scene of action as early as possible.

“You’d better see if you can get a special, my lord,” James suggested;
“I’ll run on to the station and arrange about it.”

I agreed. Since I was known to be often employed in the king’s service,
I could take a special train without exciting remark. James set out, and
about a quarter of an hour later I got into my carriage to drive to the
station. Just as the horses were about to start, however, the butler
approached me.

“I beg your pardon, my lord,” said he, “but Bauer didn’t return with
your lordship. Is he coming back?”

“No,” said I. “Bauer was grossly impertinent on the journey, and I
dismissed him.”

“Those foreign men are never to be trusted, my lord. And your lordship’s
bag?”

“What, hasn’t it come?” I cried. “I told him to send it.”

“It’s not arrived, my lord.”

“Can the rogue have stolen it?” I exclaimed indignantly.

“If your lordship wishes it, I will mention the matter to the police.”

I appeared to consider this proposal.

“Wait till I come back,” I ended by saying. “The bag may come, and I
have no reason to doubt the fellow’s honesty.”

This, I thought, would be the end of my connection with Master Bauer. He
had served Rupert’s turn, and would now disappear from the scene. Indeed
it may be that Rupert would have liked to dispense with further aid from
him; but he had few whom he could trust, and was compelled to employ
those few more than once. At any rate he had not done with Bauer, and I
very soon received proof of the fact. My house is a couple of miles from
the station, and we have to pass through a considerable part of the old
town, where the streets are narrow and tortuous and progress necessarily
slow. We had just entered the Konigstrasse (and it must be remembered
that I had at that time no reason for attaching any special significance
to this locality), and were waiting impatiently for a heavy dray to
move out of our path, when my coachman, who had overheard the butler’s
conversation with me, leant down from his box with an air of lively
excitement.

“My lord,” he cried, “there’s Bauer--there, passing the butcher’s shop!”

I sprang up in the carriage; the man’s back was towards me, and he was
threading his way through the people with a quick, stealthy tread. I
believe he must have seen me, and was slinking away as fast as he could.
I was not sure of him, but the coachman banished my doubt by saying,
“It’s Bauer--it’s certainly Bauer, my lord.”

I hardly stayed to form a resolution. If I could catch this fellow or
even see where he went, a most important clue as to Rupert’s doings
and whereabouts might be put into my hand. I leapt out of the carriage,
bidding the man wait, and at once started in pursuit of my former
servant. I heard the coachman laugh: he thought, no doubt, that anxiety
for the missing bag inspired such eager haste.

The numbers of the houses in the Konigstrasse begin, as anybody familiar
with Strelsau will remember, at the end adjoining the station. The
street being a long one, intersecting almost the entire length of the
old town, I was, when I set out after Bauer, opposite number 300 or
thereabouts, and distant nearly three-quarters of a mile from that
important number nineteen, towards which Bauer was hurrying like a
rabbit to its burrow. I knew nothing and thought nothing of where he
was going; to me nineteen was no more than eighteen or twenty; my only
desire was to overtake him. I had no clear idea of what I meant to do
when I caught him, but I had some hazy notion of intimidating him into
giving up his secret by the threat of an accusation of theft. In fact,
he had stolen my bag. After him I went; and he knew that I was after
him. I saw him turn his face over his shoulder, and then bustle on
faster. Neither of us, pursued or pursuer, dared quite to run; as it
was, our eager strides and our carelessness of collisions created more
than enough attention. But I had one advantage. Most folk in Strelsau
knew me, and many got out of my way who were by no means inclined to pay
a like civility to Bauer. Thus I began to gain on him, in spite of his
haste; I had started fifty yards behind, but as we neared the end of the
street and saw the station ahead of us, not more than twenty separated
me from him. Then an annoying thing happened. I ran full into a stout
old gentleman; Bauer had run into him before, and he was standing, as
people will, staring in resentful astonishment at his first assailant’s
retreating figure. The second collision immensely increased his
vexation; for me it had yet worse consequences; for when I disentangled
myself, Bauer was gone! There was not a sign of him; I looked up: the
number of the house above me was twenty-three; but the door was shut.
I walked on a few paces, past twenty-two, past twenty-one--and up to
nineteen. Nineteen was an old house, with a dirty, dilapidated front and
an air almost dissipated. It was a shop where provisions of the cheaper
sort were on view in the window, things that one has never eaten but has
heard of people eating. The shop-door stood open, but there was nothing
to connect Bauer with the house. Muttering an oath in my exasperation, I
was about to pass on, when an old woman put her head out of the door and
looked round. I was full in front of her. I am sure that the old woman
started slightly, and I think that I did. For I knew her and she knew
me. She was old Mother Holf, one of whose sons, Johann, had betrayed to
us the secret of the dungeon at Zenda, while the other had died by Mr.
Rassendyll’s hand by the side of the great pipe that masked the king’s
window. Her presence might mean nothing, yet it seemed at once to
connect the house with the secret of the past and the crisis of the
present.

She recovered herself in a moment, and curtseyed to me.

“Ah, Mother Holf,” said I, “how long is it since you set up shop in
Strelsau?”

“About six months, my lord,” she answered, with a composed air and arms
akimbo.

“I have not come across you before,” said I, looking keenly at her.

“Such a poor little shop as mine would not be likely to secure your
lordship’s patronage,” she answered, in a humility that seemed only half
genuine.

I looked up at the windows. They were all closed and had their wooden
lattices shut. The house was devoid of any signs of life.

“You’ve a good house here, mother, though it wants a splash of paint,”
 said I. “Do you live all alone in it with your daughter?” For Max was
dead and Johann abroad, and the old woman had, as far as I knew, no
other children.

“Sometimes; sometimes not,” said she. “I let lodgings to single men when
I can.”

“Full now?”

“Not a soul, worse luck, my lord.” Then I shot an arrow at a venture.

“The man who came in just now, then, was he only a customer?”

“I wish a customer had come in, but there has been nobody,” she replied
in surprised tones.

I looked full in her eyes; she met mine with a blinking
imperturbability. There is no face so inscrutable as a clever old
woman’s when she is on her guard. And her fat body barred the entrance;
I could not so much as see inside, while the window, choked full with
pigs’ trotters and such-like dainties, helped me very little. If the fox
were there, he had got to earth and I could not dig him out.

At this moment I saw James approaching hurriedly. He was looking up
the street, no doubt seeking my carriage and chafing at its delay. An
instant later he saw me.

“My lord,” he said, “your train will be ready in five minutes; if it
doesn’t start then, the line must be closed for another half-hour.”

I perceived a faint smile on the old woman’s face. I was sure then that
I was on the track of Bauer, and probably of more than Bauer. But my
first duty was to obey orders and get to Zenda. Besides, I could not
force my way in, there in open daylight, without a scandal that
would have set all the long ears in Strelsau aprick. I turned away
reluctantly. I did not even know for certain that Bauer was within, and
thus had no information of value to carry with me.

“If your lordship would kindly recommend me--” said the old hag.

“Yes, I’ll recommend you,” said I. “I’ll recommend you to be careful
whom you take for lodgers. There are queer fish about, mother.”

“I take the money beforehand,” she retorted with a grin; and I was as
sure that she was in the plot as of my own existence.

There was nothing to be done; James’s face urged me towards the station.
I turned away. But at this instant a loud, merry laugh sounded from
inside the house. I started, and this time violently. The old woman’s
brow contracted in a frown, and her lips twitched for a moment; then
her face regained its composure; but I knew the laugh, and she must
have guessed that I knew it. Instantly I tried to appear as though I had
noticed nothing. I nodded to her carelessly, and bidding James follow
me, set out for the station. But as we reached the platform, I laid my
hand on his shoulder, saying:

“The Count of Hentzau is in that house, James.”

He looked at me without surprise; he was as hard to stir to wonder as
old Sapt himself.

“Indeed, sir. Shall I stay and watch?”

“No, come with me,” I answered. To tell the truth, I thought that to
leave him alone in Strelsau to watch that house was in all likelihood
to sign his death warrant, and I shrank from imposing the duty on him.
Rudolf might send him if he would; I dared not. So we got into our
train, and I suppose that my coachman, when he had looked long enough
for me, went home. I forgot to ask him afterwards. Very likely he
thought it a fine joke to see his master hunting a truant servant and
a truant bag through the streets in broad daylight. Had he known the
truth, he would have been as interested, though, maybe, less amused.

I arrived at the town of Zenda at half-past three, and was in the castle
before four. I may pass over the most kind and gracious words with which
the queen received me. Every sight of her face and every sound of her
voice bound a man closer to her service, and now she made me feel that
I was a poor fellow to have lost her letter and yet to be alive. But she
would hear nothing of such talk, choosing rather to praise the little I
had done than to blame the great thing in which I had failed. Dismissed
from her presence, I flew open-mouthed to Sapt. I found him in his room
with Bernenstein, and had the satisfaction of learning that my news of
Rupert’s whereabouts was confirmed by his information. I was also made
acquainted with all that had been done, even as I have already related
it, from the first successful trick played on Rischenheim to the moment
of his unfortunate escape. But my face grew long and apprehensive when I
heard that Rudolf Rassendyll had gone alone to Strelsau to put his head
in that lion’s mouth in the Konigstrasse.

“There will be three of them there--Rupert, Rischenheim, and my rascal
Bauer,” said I.

“As to Rupert, we don’t know,” Sapt reminded me. “He’ll be there if
Rischenheim arrives in time to tell him the truth. But we have also to
be ready for him here, and at the hunting lodge. Well, we’re ready for
him wherever he is: Rudolf will be in Strelsau, you and I will ride to
the lodge, and Bernenstein will be here with the queen.”

“Only one here?” I asked.

“Ay, but a good one,” said the constable, clapping Bernenstein on the
shoulder. “We sha’n’t be gone above four hours, and those while the king
is safe in his bed. Bernenstein has only to refuse access to him, and
stand to that with his life till we come back. You’re equal to that, eh,
Lieutenant?”

I am, by nature, a cautious man, and prone to look at the dark side of
every prospect and the risks of every enterprise; but I could not
see what better dispositions were possible against the attack that
threatened us. Yet I was sorely uneasy concerning Mr. Rassendyll.

Now, after all our stir and runnings to and fro, came an hour or two of
peace. We employed the time in having a good meal, and it was past five
when, our repast finished, we sat back in our chairs enjoying cigars.
James had waited on us, quietly usurping the office of the constable’s
own servant, and thus we had been able to talk freely. The man’s calm
confidence in his master and his master’s fortune also went far to
comfort me.

“The king should be back soon,” said Sapt at last, with a glance at his
big, old-fashioned silver watch. “Thank God, he’ll be too tired to sit
up long. We shall be free by nine o’clock, Fritz. I wish young Rupert
would come to the lodge!” And the colonel’s face expressed a lively
pleasure at the idea.

Six o’clock struck, and the king did not appear. A few moments later, a
message came from the queen, requesting our presence on the terrace in
front of the chateau. The place commanded a view of the road by which
the king would ride back, and we found the queen walking restlessly up
and down, considerably disquieted by the lateness of his return. In such
a position as ours, every unusual or unforeseen incident magnifies its
possible meaning, and invests itself with a sinister importance which
would at ordinary times seem absurd. We three shared the queen’s
feelings, and forgetting the many chances of the chase, any one of which
would amply account for the king’s delay, fell to speculating on remote
possibilities of disaster. He might have met Rischenheim--though
they had ridden in opposite directions; Rupert might have intercepted
him--though no means could have brought Rupert to the forest so early.
Our fears defeated common sense, and our conjectures outran possibility.
Sapt was the first to recover from this foolish mood, and he rated us
soundly, not sparing even the queen herself. With a laugh we regained
some of our equanimity, and felt rather ashamed of our weakness.

“Still it’s strange that he doesn’t come,” murmured the queen, shading
her eyes with her hand, and looking along the road to where the dark
masses of the forest trees bounded our view. It was already dusk, but
not so dark but that we could have seen the king’s party as soon as it
came into the open.

If the king’s delay seemed strange at six, it was stranger at seven, and
by eight most strange. We had long since ceased to talk lightly; by now
we had lapsed into silence. Sapt’s scoldings had died away. The queen,
wrapped in her furs (for it was very cold), sat sometimes on a seat, but
oftener paced restlessly to and fro. Evening had fallen. We did not know
what to do, nor even whether we ought to do anything. Sapt would not own
to sharing our worst apprehensions, but his gloomy silence in face of
our surmises witnessed that he was in his heart as disturbed as we were.
For my part I had come to the end of my endurance, and I cried, “For
God’s sake, let’s act! Shall I go and seek him?”

“A needle in a bundle of hay,” said Sapt with a shrug.

But at this instant my ear caught the sound of horses cantering on the
road from the forest; at the same moment Bernenstein cried, “Here they
come!” The queen paused, and we gathered round her. The horse-hoofs came
nearer. Now we made out the figures of three men: they were the king’s
huntsmen, and they rode along merrily, singing a hunting chorus. The
sound of it brought relief to us; so far at least there was no disaster.
But why was not the king with them?

“The king is probably tired, and is following more slowly, madam,”
 suggested Bernenstein.

This explanation seemed very probable, and the lieutenant and I, as
ready to be hopeful on slight grounds as fearful on small provocation,
joyfully accepted it. Sapt, less easily turned to either mood, said,
“Ay, but let us hear,” and raising his voice, called to the huntsmen,
who had now arrived in the avenue. One of them, the king’s chief
huntsman Simon, gorgeous in his uniform of green and gold, came
swaggering along, and bowed low to the queen.

“Well, Simon, where is the king?” she asked, trying to smile.

“The king, madam, has sent a message by me to your majesty.”

“Pray, deliver it to me, Simon.”

“I will, madam. The king has enjoyed fine sport; and, indeed, madam, if
I may say so for myself, a better run.--”

“You may say, friend Simon,” interrupted the constable, tapping him
on the shoulder, “anything you like for yourself, but, as a matter of
etiquette, the king’s message should come first.”

“Oh, ay, Constable,” said Simon. “You’re always so down on a man, aren’t
you? Well, then, madam, the king has enjoyed fine sport. For we started
a boar at eleven, and--”

“Is this the king’s message, Simon?” asked the queen, smiling in genuine
amusement, but impatiently.

“Why, no, madam, not precisely his majesty’s message.”

“Then get to it, man, in Heaven’s name,” growled Sapt testily. For here
were we four (the queen, too, one of us!) on tenterhooks, while the fool
boasted about the sport that he had shown the king. For every boar in
the forest Simon took as much credit as though he, and not Almighty God,
had made the animal. It is the way with such fellows.

Simon became a little confused under the combined influence of his own
seductive memories and Sapt’s brusque exhortations.

“As I was saying, madam,” he resumed, “the boar led us a long way, but
at last the hounds pulled him down, and his majesty himself gave the
coup de grace. Well, then it was very late.”

“It’s no earlier now,” grumbled the constable.

“And the king, although indeed, madam, his majesty was so gracious as
to say that no huntsman whom his majesty had ever had, had given his
majesty--”

“God help us!” groaned the constable.

Simon shot an apprehensive apologetic glance at Colonel Sapt. The
constable was frowning ferociously. In spite of the serious matters in
hand I could not forbear a smile, while young Bernenstein broke into an
audible laugh, which he tried to smother with his hand.

“Yes, the king was very tired, Simon?” said the queen, at once
encouraging him and bringing him back to the point with a woman’s skill.

“Yes, madam, the king was very tired; and as we chanced to kill near the
hunting-lodge--”

I do not know whether Simon noticed any change in the manner of his
audience. But the queen looked up with parted lips, and I believe that
we three all drew a step nearer him. Sapt did not interrupt this time.

“Yes, madam, the king was very tired, and as we chanced to kill near the
hunting-lodge, the king bade us carry our quarry there, and come back
to dress it to-morrow; so we obeyed, and here we are--that is, except
Herbert, my brother, who stayed with the king by his majesty’s orders.
Because, madam, Herbert is a handy fellow, and my good mother taught him
to cook a steak and--”

“Stayed where with the king?” roared Sapt.

“Why, at the hunting-lodge, Constable. The king stays there to-night,
and will ride back tomorrow morning with Herbert. That, madam, is the
king’s message.”

We had come to it at last, and it was something to come to. Simon gazed
from face to face. I saw him, and I understood at once that our feelings
must be speaking too plainly. So I took on myself to dismiss him,
saying:

“Thanks, Simon, thanks: we understand.”

He bowed to the queen; she roused herself, and added her thanks to mine.
Simon withdrew, looking still a little puzzled.

After we were left alone, there was a moment’s silence. Then I said:

“Suppose Rupert--”

The Constable of Zenda broke in with a short laugh.

“On my life,” said he, “how things fall out! We say he will go to the
hunting-lodge, and--he goes!”

“If Rupert goes--if Rischenheim doesn’t stop him!” I urged again.

The queen rose from her seat and stretched out her hands towards us.

“Gentlemen, my letter!” said she.

Sapt wasted no time.

“Bernenstein,” said he, “you stay here as we arranged. Nothing is
altered. Horses for Fritz and myself in five minutes.”

Bernenstein turned and shot like an arrow along the terrace towards the
stables.

“Nothing is altered, madam,” said Sapt, “except that we must be there
before Count Rupert.”

I looked at my watch. It was twenty minutes past nine. Simon’s cursed
chatter had lost a quarter of an hour. I opened my lips to speak. A
glance from Sapt’s eyes told me that he discerned what I was about to
say. I was silent.

“You’ll be in time?” asked the queen, with clasped hands and frightened
eyes.

“Assuredly, madam,” returned Sapt with a bow.

“You won’t let him reach the king?”

“Why, no, madam,” said Sapt with a smile.

“From my heart, gentlemen,” she said in a trembling voice, “from my
heart--”

“Here are the horses,” cried Sapt. He snatched her hand, brushed it
with his grizzly moustache, and--well, I am not sure I heard, and I can
hardly believe what I think I heard. But I will set it down for what it
is worth. I think he said, “Bless your sweet face, we’ll do it.” At any
rate she drew back with a little cry of surprise, and I saw the tears
standing in her eyes. I kissed her hand also; then we mounted, and
we started, and we rode, as if the devil were behind us, for the
hunting-lodge.

But I turned once to watch her standing on the terrace, with young
Bernenstein’s tall figure beside her.

“Can we be in time?” said I. It was what I had meant to say before.

“I think not, but, by God, we’ll try,” said Colonel Sapt. And I knew why
he had not let me speak.

Suddenly there was a sound behind us of a horse at the gallop. Our heads
flew round in the ready apprehension of men on a perilous errand. The
hoofs drew near, for the unknown rode with reckless haste.

“We had best see what it is,” said the constable, pulling up.

A second more, and the horseman was beside us. Sapt swore an oath, half
in amusement, half in vexation.

“Why, is it you, James?” I cried.

“Yes, sir,” answered Rudolf Rassendyll’s servant.

“What the devil do you want?” asked Sapt.

“I came to attend on the Count von Tarlenheim, sir.”

“I did not give you any orders, James.”

“No, sir. But Mr. Rassendyll told me not to leave you, unless you sent
me away. So I made haste to follow you.”

Then Sapt cried: “Deuce take it, what horse is that?”

“The best in the stables, so far as I could see, sir. I was afraid of
not overtaking you.”

Sapt tugged his moustaches, scowled, but finally laughed.

“Much obliged for your compliment,” said he. “The horse is mine.”

“Indeed, sir?” said James with respectful interest.

For a moment we were all silent. Then Sapt laughed again.

“Forward!” said he, and the three of us dashed into the forest.



CHAPTER VIII. THE TEMPER OF BORIS THE HOUND

Looking back now, in the light of the information I have gathered, I am
able to trace very clearly, and almost hour by hour, the events of this
day, and to understand how chance, laying hold of our cunning plan and
mocking our wiliness, twisted and turned our device to a predetermined
but undreamt-of issue, of which we were most guiltless in thought or
intent. Had the king not gone to the hunting-lodge, our design would
have found the fulfilment we looked for; had Rischenheim succeeded in
warning Rupert of Hentzau, we should have stood where we were. Fate
or fortune would have it otherwise. The king, being weary, went to the
lodge, and Rischenheim failed in warning his cousin. It was a narrow
failure, for Rupert, as his laugh told me, was in the house in the
Konigstrasse when I set out from Strelsau, and Rischenheim arrived there
at half past four. He had taken the train at a roadside station, and
thus easily outstripped Mr. Rassendyll, who, not daring to show his
face, was forced to ride all the way and enter the city under cover of
night. But Rischenheim had not dared to send a warning, for he knew
that we were in possession of the address and did not know what steps
we might have taken to intercept messages. Therefore he was obliged to
carry the news himself; when he came his man was gone. Indeed Rupert
must have left the house almost immediately after I was safe away from
the city. He was determined to be in good time for his appointment;
his only enemies were not in Strelsau; there was no warrant on which he
could be apprehended; and, although his connection with Black Michael
was a matter of popular gossip, he felt himself safe from arrest by
virtue of the secret that protected him. Accordingly he walked out
of the house, went to the station, took his ticket to Hofbau, and,
traveling by the four o’clock train, reached his destination about
half-past five. He must have passed the train in which Rischenheim
traveled; the first news the latter had of his departure was from a
porter at the station, who, having recognized the Count of Hentzau,
ventured to congratulate Rischenheim on his cousin’s return. Rischenheim
made no answer, but hurried in great agitation to the house in the
Konigstrasse, where the old woman Holf confirmed the tidings. Then he
passed through a period of great irresolution. Loyalty to Rupert urged
that he should follow him and share the perils into which his cousin was
hastening. But caution whispered that he was not irrevocably committed,
that nothing overt yet connected him with Rupert’s schemes, and that we
who knew the truth should be well content to purchase his silence as to
the trick we had played by granting him immunity. His fears won the day,
and, like the irresolute man he was, he determined to wait in Strelsau
till he heard the issue of the meeting at the lodge. If Rupert were
disposed of there, he had something to offer us in return for peace; if
his cousin escaped, he would be in the Konigstrasse, prepared to second
the further plans of the desperate adventurer. In any event his skin was
safe, and I presume to think that this weighed a little with him; for
excuse he had the wound which Bernenstein had given him, and which
rendered his right arm entirely useless; had he gone then, he would have
been a most inefficient ally.

Of all this we, as we rode through the forest, knew nothing. We might
guess, conjecture, hope, or fear; but our certain knowledge stopped with
Rischenheim’s start for the capital and Rupert’s presence there at three
o’clock. The pair might have met or might have missed. We had to act
as though they had missed and Rupert were gone to meet the king. But we
were late. The consciousness of that pressed upon us, although we evaded
further mention of it; it made us spur and drive our horses as quickly,
ay, and a little more quickly, than safety allowed. Once James’s horse
stumbled in the darkness and its rider was thrown; more than once a low
bough hanging over the path nearly swept me, dead or stunned, from my
seat. Sapt paid no attention to these mishaps or threatened mishaps. He
had taken the lead, and, sitting well down in his saddle, rode ahead,
turning neither to right nor left, never slackening his pace, sparing
neither himself nor his beast. James and I were side by side behind him.
We rode in silence, finding nothing to say to one another. My mind was
full of a picture--the picture of Rupert with his easy smile handing to
the king the queen’s letter. For the hour of the rendezvous was past.
If that image had been translated into reality, what must we do? To kill
Rupert would satisfy revenge, but of what other avail would it be when
the king had read the letter? I am ashamed to say that I found myself
girding at Mr. Rassendyll for happening on a plan which the course
of events had turned into a trap for ourselves and not for Rupert of
Hentzau.

Suddenly Sapt, turning his head for the first time, pointed in front
of him. The lodge was before us; we saw it looming dimly a quarter of
a mile off. Sapt reined in his horse, and we followed his example. All
dismounted, we tied our horses to trees and went forward at a quick,
silent walk. Our idea was that Sapt should enter on pretext of having
been sent by the queen to attend to her husband’s comfort and arrange
for his return without further fatigue next day. If Rupert had come and
gone, the king’s demeanor would probably betray the fact; if he had not
yet come, I and James, patrolling outside, would bar his passage. There
was a third possibility; he might be even now with the king. Our course
in such a case we left unsettled; so far as I had any plan, it was to
kill Rupert and to convince the king that the letter was a forgery--a
desperate hope, so desperate that we turned our eyes away from the
possibility which would make it our only resource.

We were now very near the hunting-lodge, being about forty yards from
the front of it. All at once Sapt threw himself on his stomach on the
ground.

“Give me a match,” he whispered.

James struck a light, and, the night being still, the flame burnt
brightly: it showed us the mark of a horse’s hoof, apparently quite
fresh, and leading away from the lodge. We rose and went on, following
the tracks by the aid of more matches till we reached a tree twenty
yards from the door. Here the hoof marks ceased; but beyond there was
a double track of human feet in the soft black earth; a man had gone
thence to the house and returned from the house thither. On the right of
the tree were more hoof-marks, leading up to it and then ceasing. A man
had ridden up from the right, dismounted, gone on foot to the house,
returned to the tree, remounted, and ridden away along the track by
which we had approached.

“It may be somebody else,” said I; but I do not think that we any of
us doubted in our hearts that the tracks were made by the coming of
Hentzau. Then the king had the letter; the mischief was done. We were
too late.

Yet we did not hesitate. Since disaster had come, it must be faced. Mr.
Rassendyll’s servant and I followed the constable of Zenda up to
the door, or within a few feet of it. Here Sapt, who was in uniform,
loosened his sword in its sheath; James and I looked to our revolvers.
There were no lights visible in the lodge; the door was shut; everything
was still. Sapt knocked softly with his knuckles, but there was no
answer from within. He laid hold of the handle and turned it; the door
opened, and the passage lay dark and apparently empty before us.

“You stay here, as we arranged,” whispered the colonel. “Give me the
matches, and I’ll go in.”

James handed him the box of matches, and he crossed the threshold. For a
yard or two we saw him plainly, then his figure grew dim and indistinct.
I heard nothing except my own hard breathing. But in a moment there was
another sound--a muffled exclamation, and a noise of a man stumbling;
a sword, too, clattered on the stones of the passage. We looked at one
another; the noise did not produce any answering stir in the house; then
came the sharp little explosion of a match struck on its box; next we
heard Sapt raising himself, his scabbard scraping along the stones; his
footsteps came towards us, and in a second he appeared at the door.

“What was it?” I whispered.

“I fell,” said Sapt.

“Over what?”

“Come and see. James, stay here.”

I followed the constable for the distance of eight or ten feet along the
passage.

“Isn’t there a lamp anywhere?” I asked.

“We can see enough with a match,” he answered. “Here, this is what I
fell over.”

Even before the match was struck I saw a dark body lying across the
passage.

“A dead man?” I guessed instantly.

“Why, no,” said Sapt, striking a light: “a dead dog, Fritz.” An
exclamation of wonder escaped me as I fell on my knees. At the same
instant Sapt muttered, “Ay, there’s a lamp,” and, stretching up his hand
to a little oil lamp that stood on a bracket, he lit it, took it down,
and held it over the body. It served to give a fair, though unsteady,
light, and enabled us to see what lay in the passage.

“It’s Boris, the boar-hound,” said I, still in a whisper, although there
was no sign of any listeners.

I knew the dog well; he was the king’s favorite, and always accompanied
him when he went hunting. He was obedient to every word of the king’s,
but of a rather uncertain temper towards the rest of the world. However,
de mortuis nil nisi bonum; there he lay dead in the passage. Sapt put
his hand on the beast’s head. There was a bullet-hole right through his
forehead. I nodded, and in my turn pointed to the dog’s right shoulder,
which was shattered by another ball.

“And see here,” said the constable. “Have a pull at this.”

I looked where his hand now was. In the dog’s mouth was a piece of gray
cloth, and on the piece of gray cloth was a horn coat-button. I took
hold of the cloth and pulled. Boris held on even in death. Sapt drew his
sword, and, inserting the point of it between the dog’s teeth, parted
them enough for me to draw out the piece of cloth.

“You’d better put it in your pocket,” said the constable. “Now come
along;” and, holding the lamp in one hand and his sword (which he did
not resheathe) in the other, he stepped over the body of the boar-hound,
and I followed him.

We were now in front of the door of the room where Rudolf Rassendyll had
supped with us on the day of his first coming to Ruritania, and whence
he had set out to be crowned in Strelsau. On the right of it was the
room where the king slept, and farther along in the same direction the
kitchen and the cellars. The officer or officers in attendance on the
king used to sleep on the other side of the dining-room.

“We must explore, I suppose,” said Sapt. In spite of his outward
calmness, I caught in his voice the ring of excitement rising and
ill-repressed. But at this moment we heard from the passage on our left
(as we faced the door) a low moan, and then a dragging sound, as if a
man were crawling along the floor, painfully trailing his limbs after
him. Sapt held the lamp in that direction, and we saw Herbert the
forester, pale-faced and wide-eyed, raised from the ground on his two
hands, while his legs stretched behind him and his stomach rested on the
flags.

“Who is it?” he said in a faint voice.

“Why, man, you know us,” said the constable, stepping up to him. “What’s
happened here?”

The poor fellow was very faint, and, I think, wandered a little in his
brain.

“I’ve got it, sir,” he murmured; “I’ve got it, fair and straight. No
more hunting for me, sir. I’ve got it here in the stomach. Oh, my God!”
 He let his head fall with a thud on the floor.

I ran and raised him. Kneeling on one knee, I propped his head against
my leg.

“Tell us about it,” commanded Sapt in a curt, crisp voice while I got
the man into the easiest position that I could contrive.

In slow, struggling tones he began his story, repeating here, omitting
there, often confusing the order of his narrative, oftener still
arresting it while he waited for fresh strength. Yet we were not
impatient, but heard without a thought of time. I looked round once at
a sound, and found that James, anxious about us, had stolen along the
passage and joined us. Sapt took no notice of him, nor of anything save
the words that dropped in irregular utterance from the stricken man’s
lips. Here is the story, a strange instance of the turning of a great
event on a small cause.

The king had eaten a little supper, and, having gone to his bedroom,
had stretched himself on the bed and fallen asleep without undressing.
Herbert was clearing the dining-table and performing similar duties,
when suddenly (thus he told it) he found a man standing beside him.
He did not know (he was new to the king’s service) who the unexpected
visitor was, but he was of middle height, dark, handsome, and “looked a
gentleman all over.” He was dressed in a shooting-tunic, and a revolver
was thrust through the belt of it. One hand rested on the belt, while
the other held a small square box.

“Tell the king I am here. He expects me,” said the stranger. Herbert,
alarmed at the suddenness and silence of the stranger’s approach, and
guiltily conscious of having left the door unbolted, drew back. He was
unarmed, but, being a stout fellow, was prepared to defend his master
as best he could. Rupert--beyond doubt it was Rupert--laughed lightly,
saying again, “Man, he expects me. Go and tell him,” and sat himself on
the table, swinging his leg. Herbert, influenced by the visitor’s air of
command, began to retreat towards the bedroom, keeping his face towards
Rupert.

“If the king asks more, tell him I have the packet and the letter,” said
Rupert. The man bowed and passed into the bedroom. The king was asleep;
when roused he seemed to know nothing of letter or packet, and to
expect no visitor. Herbert’s ready fears revived; he whispered that the
stranger carried a revolver. Whatever the king’s faults might be--and
God forbid that I should speak hardly of him whom fate used so
hardly--he was no coward. He sprang from his bed; at the same moment
the great boar-hound uncoiled himself and came from beneath, yawning and
fawning. But in an instant the beast caught the scent of a stranger: his
ears pricked and he gave a low growl, as he looked up in his master’s
face. Then Rupert of Hentzau, weary perhaps of waiting, perhaps only
doubtful whether his message would be properly delivered, appeared in
the doorway.

The king was unarmed, and Herbert in no better plight; their hunting
weapons were in the adjoining room, and Rupert seemed to bar the way.
I have said that the king was no coward, yet I think, that the sight of
Rupert, bringing back the memory of his torments in the dungeon, half
cowed him; for he shrank back crying, “You!” The hound, in subtle
understanding of his master’s movement, growled angrily.

“You expected me, sire?” said Rupert with a bow; but he smiled. I know
that the sight of the king’s alarm pleased him. To inspire terror was
his delight, and it does not come to every man to strike fear into the
heart of a king and an Elphberg. It had come more than once to Rupert of
Hentzau.

“No,” muttered the king. Then, recovering his composure a little, he
said angrily, “How dare you come here?”

“You didn’t expect me?” cried Rupert, and in an instant the thought of a
trap seemed to flash across his alert mind. He drew the revolver halfway
from his belt, probably in a scarcely conscious movement, born of the
desire to assure himself of its presence. With a cry of alarm Herbert
flung himself before the king, who sank back on the bed. Rupert,
puzzled, vexed, yet half-amused (for he smiled still, the man said),
took a step forward, crying out something about Rischenheim--what,
Herbert could not tell us.

“Keep back,” exclaimed the king. “Keep back.”

Rupert paused; then, as though with a sudden thought, he held up the box
that was in his left hand, saying:

‘“Well, look at this sire, and we’ll talk afterwards,” and he stretched
out his hand with the box in it.

Now the king stood on a razor’s edge, for the king whispered to Herbert,
“What is it? Go and take it.”

But Herbert hesitated, fearing to leave the king, whom his body now
protected as though with a shield. Rupert’s impatience overcame him:
if there were a trap, every moment’s delay doubled his danger. With a
scornful laugh he exclaimed, “Catch it, then, if you’re afraid to come
for it,” and he flung the packet to Herbert or the king, or which of
them might chance to catch it.

This insolence had a strange result. In an instant, with a fierce growl
and a mighty bound, Boris was at the stranger’s throat. Rupert had not
seen or had not heeded the dog. A startled oath rang out from him. He
snatched the revolver from his belt and fired at his assailant. This
shot must have broken the beast’s shoulder, but it only half arrested
his spring. His great weight was still hurled on Rupert’s chest, and
bore him back on his knee. The packet that he had flung lay unheeded.
The king, wild with alarm and furious with anger at his favorite’s fate,
jumped up and ran past Rupert into the next room. Herbert followed;
even as they went Rupert flung the wounded, weakened beast from him
and darted to the doorway. He found himself facing Herbert, who held
a boar-spear, and the king, who had a double-barreled hunting-gun.
He raised his left hand, Herbert said--no doubt he still asked a
hearing--but the king leveled his weapon. With a spring Rupert gained
the shelter of the door, the bullet sped by him, and buried itself
in the wall of the room. Then Herbert was at him with the boar-spear.
Explanations must wait now: it was life or death; without hesitation
Rupert fired at Herbert, bringing him to the ground with a mortal wound.
The king’s gun was at his shoulder again.

“You damned fool!” roared Rupert, “if you must have it, take it,” and
gun and revolver rang out at the same moment. But Rupert--never did his
nerve fail him--hit, the king missed; Herbert saw the count stand for
an instant with his smoking barrel in his hand, looking at the king,
who lay on the ground. Then Rupert walked towards the door. I wish I
had seen his face then! Did he frown or smile? Was triumph or chagrin
uppermost? Remorse? Not he!

He reached the door and passed through. That was the last Herbert saw of
him; but the fourth actor in the drama, the wordless player whose part
had been so momentous, took the stage. Limping along, now whining in
sharp agony, now growling in fierce anger, with blood flowing but hair
bristling, the hound Boris dragged himself across the room, through the
door, after Rupert of Hentzau. Herbert listened, raising his head from
the ground. There was a growl, an oath, the sound of the scuffle. Rupert
must have turned in time to receive the dog’s spring. The beast, maimed
and crippled by his shattered shoulder, did not reach his enemy’s face,
but his teeth tore away the bit of cloth that we had found held in the
vise of his jaws. Then came another shot, a laugh, retreating steps,
and a door slammed. With that last sound Herbert woke to the fact of the
count’s escape; with weary efforts he dragged himself into the passage.
The idea that he could go on if he got a drink of brandy turned him in
the direction of the cellar. But his strength failed, and he sank down
where we found him, not knowing whether the king were dead or still
alive, and unable even to make his way back to the room where his master
lay stretched on the ground.

I had listened to the story, bound as though by a spell. Halfway
through, James’s hand had crept to my arm and rested there; when Herbert
finished I heard the little man licking his lips, again and again
slapping his tongue against them. Then I looked at Sapt. He was as pale
as a ghost, and the lines on his face seemed to have grown deeper.
He glanced up, and met my regard. Neither of us spoke; we exchanged
thoughts with our eyes. “This is our work,” we said to one another. “It
was our trap, these are our victims.” I cannot even now think of that
hour, for by our act the king lay dead.

But was he dead? I seized Sapt by the arm. His glance questioned me.

“The king,” I whispered hoarsely.

“Yes, the king,” he returned.

Facing round, we walked to the door of the dining-room. Here I turned
suddenly faint, and clutched at the constable. He held me up, and pushed
the door wide open. The smell of powder was in the room; it seemed as
if the smoke hung about, curling in dim coils round the chandelier which
gave a subdued light. James had the lamp now, and followed us with it.
But the king was not there. A sudden hope filled me. He had not been
killed then! I regained strength, and darted across towards the inside
room. Here too the light was dim, and I turned to beckon for the lamp.
Sapt and James came together, and stood peering over my shoulder in the
doorway.

The king lay prone on the floor, face downwards, near the bed. He had
crawled there, seeking for some place to rest, as we supposed. He did
not move. We watched him for a moment; the silence seemed deeper
than silence could be. At last, moved by a common impulse, we stepped
forward, but timidly, as though we approached the throne of Death
himself. I was the first to kneel by the king and raise his head. Blood
had flowed from his lips, but it had ceased to flow now. He was dead.

I felt Sapt’s hand on my shoulder. Looking up, I saw his other hand
stretched out towards the ground. I turned my eyes where he pointed.
There, in the king’s hand, stained with the king’sblood, was the box
that I had carried to Wintenberg and Rupert of Hentzau had brought to
the lodge that night. It was not rest, but the box that the dying king
had sought in his last moment. I bent, and lifting his hand unclasped
the fingers, still limp and warm.

Sapt bent down with sudden eagerness. “Is it open?” he whispered.

The string was round it; the sealing-wax was unbroken. The secret
had outlived the king, and he had gone to his death unknowing. All
at once--I cannot tell why--I put my hand over my eyes; I found my
eyelashes were wet.

“Is it open?” asked Sapt again, for in the dim light he could not see.

“No,” I answered.

“Thank God!” said he. And, for Sapt’s, the voice was soft.



CHAPTER IX. THE KING IN THE HUNTING LODGE

THE moment with its shock and tumult of feeling brings one judgment,
later reflection another. Among the sins of Rupert of Hentzau I do not
assign the first and greatest place to his killing of the king. It was,
indeed, the act of a reckless man who stood at nothing and held nothing
sacred; but when I consider Herbert’s story, and trace how the deed came
to be done and the impulsion of circumstances that led to it, it seems
to have been in some sort thrust upon him by the same perverse fate that
dogged our steps. He had meant the king no harm--indeed it may be argued
that, from whatever motive, he had sought to serve him--and save under
the sudden stress of self-defense he had done him none. The king’s
unlooked-for ignorance of his errand, Herbert’s honest hasty zeal, the
temper of Boris the hound, had forced on him an act unmeditated and
utterly against his interest. His whole guilt lay in preferring the
king’s death to his own--a crime perhaps in most men, but hardly
deserving a place in Rupert’s catalogue. All this I can admit now, but
on that night, with the dead body lying there before us, with the story
piteously told by Herbert’s faltering voice fresh in our ears, it was
hard to allow any such extenuation. Our hearts cried out for vengeance,
although we ourselves served the king no more. Nay, it may well be that
we hoped to stifle some reproach of our own consciences by a louder
clamor against another’s sin, or longed to offer some belated empty
atonement to our dead master by executing swift justice on the man who
had killed him. I cannot tell fully what the others felt, but in me at
least the dominant impulse was to waste not a moment in proclaiming the
crime and raising the whole country in pursuit of Rupert, so that every
man in Ruritania should quit his work, his pleasure, or his bed, and
make it his concern to take the Count of Hentzau, alive or dead. I
remember that I walked over to where Sapt was sitting, and caught him by
the arm, saying:

“We must raise the alarm. If you’ll go to Zenda, I’ll start for
Strelsau.”

“The alarm?” said he, looking up at me and tugging his moustache.

“Yes: when the news is known, every man in the kingdom will be on the
lookout for him, and he can’t escape.”

“So that he’d be taken?” asked the constable.

“Yes, to a certainty,” I cried, hot in excitement and emotion. Sapt
glanced across at Mr. Rassendyll’s servant. James had, with my help,
raised the king’s body on to the bed, and had aided the wounded
forester to reach a couch. He stood now near the constable, in his
usual unobtrusive readiness. He did not speak, but I saw a look of
understanding in his eyes as he nodded his head to Colonel Sapt. They
were well matched, that pair, hard to move, hard to shake, not to be
turned from the purpose in their minds and the matter that lay to their
hands.

“Yes, he’d probably be taken or killed,” said Sapt.

“Then let’s do it!” I cried.

“With the queen’s letter on him,” said Colonel Sapt.

I had forgotten.

“We have the box, he has the letter still,” said Sapt.

I could have laughed even at that moment. He had left the box (whether
from haste or heedlessness or malice, we could not tell), but the letter
was on him. Taken alive, he would use that powerful weapon to save his
life or satisfy his anger; if it were found on his body, its evidence
would speak loud and clear to all the world. Again he was protected by
his crime: while he had the letter, he must be kept inviolate from all
attack except at our own hands. We desired his death, but we must be
his body-guard and die in his defense rather than let any other but
ourselves come at him. No open means must be used, and no allies sought.
All this rushed to my mind at Sapt’s words, and I saw what the constable
and James had never forgotten. But what to do I could not see. For the
King of Ruritania lay dead.

An hour or more had passed since our discovery, and it was now close on
midnight. Had all gone well we ought by this time to have been far on
our road back to the castle; by this time Rupert must be miles away from
where he had killed the king; already Mr. Rassendyll would be seeking
his enemy in Strelsau.

“But what are we to do about--about that, then?” I asked, pointing with
my finger through the doorway towards the bed.

Sapt gave a last tug at his moustache, then crossed his hands on the
hilt of the sword between his knees, and leant forward in his chair.

“Nothing, he said,” looking at my face. “Until we have the letter,
nothing.”

“But it’s impossible!” I cried.

“Why, no, Fritz,” he answered thoughtfully. “It’s not possible yet; it
may become so. But if we can catch Rupert in the next day, or even in
the next two days, it’s not impossible. Only let me have the letter,
and I’ll account for the concealment. What? Is the fact that crimes are
known never concealed, for fear of putting the criminal on his guard?”

“You’ll be able to make a story, sir,” James put in, with a grave but
reassuring air.

“Yes, James, I shall be able to make a story, or your master will make
one for me. But, by God, story or no story, the letter mustn’t be found.
Let them say we killed him ourselves if they like, but--”

I seized his hand and gripped it.

“You don’t doubt I’m with you?” I asked.

“Not for a moment, Fritz,” he answered.

“Then how can we do it?”

We drew nearer together; Sapt and I sat, while James leant over Sapt’s
chair.

The oil in the lamp was almost exhausted, and the light burnt very dim.
Now and again poor Herbert, for whom our skill could do nothing, gave a
slight moan. I am ashamed to remember how little we thought of him, but
great schemes make the actors in them careless of humanity; the life
of a man goes for nothing against a point in the game. Except for his
groans--and they grew fainter and less frequent--our voices alone broke
the silence of the little lodge.

“The queen must know,” said Sapt. “Let her stay at Zenda and give
out that the king is at the lodge for a day or two longer. Then you,
Fritz--for you must ride to the castle at once--and Bernenstein must get
to Strelsau as quick as you can, and find Rudolf Rassendyll. You three
ought to be able to track young Rupert down and get the letter from him.
If he’s not in the city, you must catch Rischenheim, and force him
to say where he is; we know Rischenheim can be persuaded. If Rupert’s
there, I need give no advice either to you or to Rudolf.”

“And you?”

“James and I stay here. If any one comes whom we can keep out, the king
is ill. If rumors get about, and great folk come, why, they must enter.”

“But the body?”

“This morning, when you’re gone, we shall make a temporary grave. I dare
say two,” and he jerked his thumb towards poor Herbert.

“Or even,” he added, with his grim smile, “three--for our friend Boris,
too, must be out of sight.”

“You’ll bury the king?”

“Not so deep but that we can take him out again, poor fellow. Well,
Fritz, have you a better plan?”

I had no plan, and I was not in love with Sapt’s plan. Yet it offered
us four and twenty hours. For that time, at least, it seemed as if the
secret could be kept. Beyond that we could hardly hope for success;
after that we must produce the king; dead or alive, the king must be
seen. Yet it might be that before the respite ran out Rupert would
be ours. In fine, what else could be chosen? For now a greater peril
threatened than that against which we had at the first sought to guard.
Then the worst we feared was that the letter should come to the king’s
hands. That could never be. But it would be a worse thing if it were
found on Rupert, and all the kingdom, nay, all Europe, know that it
was written in the hand of her who was now, in her own right, Queen of
Ruritania. To save her from that, no chance was too desperate, no scheme
too perilous; yes, if, as Sapt said, we ourselves were held to answer
for the king’s death, still we must go on. I, through whose negligence
the whole train of disaster had been laid, was the last man to hesitate.
In all honesty, I held my life due and forfeit, should it be demanded of
me--my life and, before the world, my honor.

So the plan was made. A grave was to be dug ready for the king; if need
arose, his body should be laid in it, and the place chosen was under the
floor of the wine-cellar. When death came to poor Herbert, he could lie
in the yard behind the house; for Boris they meditated a resting-place
under the tree where our horses were tethered. There was nothing to
keep me, and I rose; but as I rose, I heard the forester’s voice call
plaintively for me. The unlucky fellow knew me well, and now cried to
me to sit by him. I think Sapt wanted me to leave him, but I could not
refuse his last request, even though it consumed some precious minutes.
He was very near his end, and, sitting by him, I did my best to soothe
his passing. His fortitude was good to see, and I believe that we all
at last found new courage for our enterprise from seeing how this humble
man met death. At least even the constable ceased to show impatience,
and let me stay till I could close the sufferer’s eyes.

But thus time went, and it was nearly five in the morning before I bade
them farewell and mounted my horse. They took theirs and led them away
to the stables behind the lodge; I waved my hand and galloped off on my
return to the castle. Day was dawning, and the air was fresh and pure.
The new light brought new hope; fears seemed to vanish before it; my
nerves were strung to effort and to confidence. My horse moved freely
under me and carried me easily along the grassy avenues. It was hard
then to be utterly despondent, hard to doubt skill of brain, strength of
hand, or fortune’s favor.

The castle came in sight, and I hailed it with a glad cry that echoed
among the trees. But a moment later I gave an exclamation of surprise,
and raised myself a little from the saddle while I gazed earnestly at
the summit of the keep. The flag staff was naked; the royal standard
that had flapped in the wind last night was gone. But by immemorial
custom the flag flew on the keep when the king or the queen was at the
castle. It would fly for Rudolf V. no more; but why did it not proclaim
and honor the presence of Queen Flavia? I sat down in my saddle and
spurred my horse to the top of his speed. We had been buffeted by fate
sorely, but now I feared yet another blow.

In a quarter of an hour more I was at the door. A servant ran out, and
I dismounted leisurely and easily. Pulling off my gloves, I dusted my
boots with them, turned to the stableman and bade him look to the horse,
and then said to the footman:

“As soon as the queen is dressed, find out if she can see me. I have a
message from his Majesty.”

The fellow looked a little puzzled, but at this moment Hermann, the
king’s major-domo, came to the door.

“Isn’t the constable with you, my lord?” he asked.

“No, the constable remains at the lodge with the king,” said I
carelessly, though I was very far from careless. “I have a message for
her Majesty, Hermann. Find out from some of the women when she will
receive me.”

“The queen’s not here,” said he. “Indeed we’ve had a lively time, my
lord. At five o’clock she came out, ready dressed, from her room, sent
for Lieutenant von Bernenstein, and announced that she was about to set
out from the castle. As you know, the mail train passes here at six.”
 Hermann took out his watch. “Yes, the queen must just have left the
station.”

“Where for?” I asked, with a shrug for the woman’s whim.

“Why, for Strelsau. She gave no reasons for going, and took with her
only one lady, Lieutenant von Bernenstein being in attendance. It was
a bustle, if you like, with everybody to be roused and got out of bed,
and a carriage to be made ready, and messages to go to the station,
and--”

“She gave no reasons?”

“None, my lord. She left with me a letter to the constable, which she
ordered me to give to his own hands as soon as he arrived at the castle.
She said it contained a message of importance, which the constable was
to convey to the king, and that it must be intrusted to nobody except
Colonel Sapt himself. I wonder, my lord, that you didn’t notice that the
flag was hauled down.”

“Tut, man, I wasn’t staring at the keep. Give me the letter.” For I saw
that the clue to this fresh puzzle must lie under the cover of Sapt’s
letter. That letter I must myself carry to Sapt, and without loss of
time.

“Give you the letter, my lord? But, pardon me, you’re not the
constable.” He laughed a little.

“Why, no,” said I, mustering a smile. “It’s true that I’m not the
constable, but I’m going to the constable. I had the king’s orders to
rejoin him as soon as I had seen the queen, and since her Majesty isn’t
here, I shall return to the lodge directly a fresh horse can be saddled
for me. And the constable’s at the lodge. Come, the letter!”

“I can’t give it you, my lord. Her Majesty’s orders were positive.”

“Nonsense! If she had known I should come and not the constable, she
would have told me to carry it to him.”

“I don’t know about that, my lord: her orders were plain, and she
doesn’t like being disobeyed.”

The stableman had led the horse away, the footman had disappeared,
Hermann and I were alone. “Give me the letter,” I said; and I know that
my self-control failed, and eagerness was plain in my voice. Plain it
was, and Hermann took alarm. He started back, clapping his hand to the
breast of his laced coat. The gesture betrayed where the letter was; I
was past prudence; I sprang on him and wrenched his hand away, catching
him by the throat with my other hand. Diving into his pocket, I got the
letter. Then I suddenly loosed hold of him, for his eyes were starting
out of his head. I took out a couple of gold pieces and gave them to
him.

“It’s urgent, you fool,” said I. “Hold your tongue about it.” And
without waiting to study his amazed red face, I turned and ran towards
the stable. In five minutes I was on a fresh horse, in six I was clear
of the castle, heading back fast as I could go for the hunting-lodge.
Even now Hermann remembers the grip I gave him--though doubtless he has
long spent the pieces of gold.

When I reached the end of this second journey, I came in for the
obsequies of Boris. James was just patting the ground under the tree
with a mattock when I rode up; Sapt was standing by, smoking his pipe.
The boots of both were stained and sticky with mud. I flung myself from
my saddle and blurted out my news. The constable snatched at his letter
with an oath; James leveled the ground with careful accuracy; I do
not remember doing anything except wiping my forehead and feeling very
hungry.

“Good Lord, she’s gone after him!” said Sapt, as he read. Then he handed
me the letter.

I will not set out what the queen wrote. The purport seemed to us, who
did not share her feelings, pathetic indeed and moving, but in the end
(to speak plainly) folly. She had tried to endure her sojourn at Zenda,
she said; but it drove her mad. She could not rest; she did not know how
we fared, nor how those in Strelsau; for hours she had lain awake; then
at last falling asleep, she had dreamt.

“I had had the same dream before. Now it came again. I saw him so plain.
He seemed to me to be king, and to be called king. But he did not answer
nor move. He seemed dead; and I could not rest.” So she wrote, ever
excusing herself, ever repeating how something drew her to Strelsau,
telling her that she must go if she would see “him whom you know,” alive
again. “And I must see him--ah, I must see him! If the king has had the
letter, I am ruined already. If he has not, tell him what you will or
what you can contrive. I must go. It came a second time, and all so
plain. I saw him; I tell you I saw him. Ah, I must see him again. I
swear that I will only see him once. He’s in danger--I know he’s in
danger; or what does the dream mean? Bernenstein will go with me, and I
shall see him. Do, do forgive me: I can’t stay, the dream was so plain.”
 Thus she ended, seeming, poor lady, half frantic with the visions that
her own troubled brain and desolate heart had conjured up to torment
her. I did not know that she had before told Mr. Rassendyll himself of
this strange dream; though I lay small store by such matters, believing
that we ourselves make our dreams, fashioning out of the fears and
hopes of to-day what seems to come by night in the guise of a mysterious
revelation. Yet there are some things that a man cannot understand, and
I do not profess to measure with my mind the ways of God.

However, not why the queen went, but that she had gone, concerned us. We
had returned to the house now, and James, remembering that men must eat
though kings die, was getting us some breakfast. In fact, I had great
need of food, being utterly worn out; and they, after their labors, were
hardly less weary. As we ate, we talked; and it was plain to us that I
also must go to Strelsau. There, in the city, the drama must be played
out. There was Rudolf, there Rischenheim, there in all likelihood Rupert
of Hentzau, there now the queen. And of these Rupert alone, or perhaps
Rischenheim also, knew that the king was dead, and how the issue of last
night had shaped itself under the compelling hand of wayward fortune.
The king lay in peace on his bed, his grave was dug; Sapt and James held
the secret with solemn faith and ready lives. To Strelsau I must go
to tell the queen that she was widowed, and to aim the stroke at young
Rupert’s heart.

At nine in the morning I started from the lodge. I was bound to ride to
Hofbau and there wait for a train which would carry me to the capital.
From Hofbau I could send a message, but the message must announce only
my own coming, not the news I carried. To Sapt, thanks to the cipher, I
could send word at any time, and he bade me ask Mr. Rassendyll whether
he should come to our aid, or stay where he was.

“A day must decide the whole thing,” he said. “We can’t conceal the
king’s death long. For God’s sake, Fritz, make an end of that young
villain, and get the letter.”

So, wasting no time in farewells, I set out. By ten o’clock I was at
Hofbau, for I rode furiously. From there I sent to Bernenstein at the
palace word of my coming. But there I was delayed. There was no train
for an hour.

“I’ll ride,” I cried to myself, only to remember the next moment that,
if I rode, I should come to my journey’s end much later. There was
nothing for it but to wait, and it may be imagined in what mood I
waited. Every minute seemed an hour, and I know not to this day how
the hour wore itself away. I ate, I drank, I smoked, I walked, sat, and
stood. The stationmaster knew me, and thought I had gone mad, till I
told him that I carried most important despatches from the king, and
that the delay imperiled great interests. Then he became sympathetic;
but what could he do? No special train was to be had at a roadside
station: I must wait; and wait, somehow, and without blowing my brains
out, I did.

At last I was in the train; now indeed we moved, and I came nearer.
An hour’s run brought me in sight of the city. Then, to my unutterable
wrath, we were stopped, and waited motionless twenty minutes or half an
hour. At last we started again; had we not, I should have jumped out
and run, for to sit longer would have driven me mad. Now we entered the
station. With a great effort I calmed myself. I lolled back in my seat;
when we stopped I sat there till a porter opened the door. In lazy
leisureliness I bade him get me a cab, and followed him across the
station. He held the door for me, and, giving him his douceur, I set my
foot on the step.

“Tell him to drive to the palace,” said I, “and be quick. I’m late
already, thanks to this cursed train.”

“The old mare’ll soon take you there, sir,” said the driver. I jumped
in. But at this moment I saw a man on the platform beckoning with his
hand and hastening towards me. The cabman also saw him and waited. I
dared not tell him to drive on, for I feared to betray any undue haste,
and it would have looked strange not to spare a moment to my wife’s
cousin, Anton von Strofzin. He came up, holding out his hand delicately
gloved in pearl-gray kid, for young Anton was a leader of the Strelsau
dandies.

“Ah, my dear Fritz!” said he. “I am glad I hold no appointment at court.
How dreadfully active you all are! I thought you were settled at Zenda
for a month?”

“The queen changed her mind suddenly,” said I, smiling. “Ladies do, as
you know well, you who know all about them.”

My compliment, or insinuation, produced a pleased smile and a gallant
twirling of his moustache.

“Well, I thought you’d be here soon,” he said, “but I didn’t know that
the queen had come.”

“You didn’t? Then why did you look for me?”

He opened his eyes a little in languid, elegant surprise. “Oh, I
supposed you’d be on duty, or something, and have to come. Aren’t you in
attendance?”

“On the queen? No, not just now.”

“But on the king?”

“Why, yes,” said I, and I leaned forward. “At least I’m engaged now on
the king’s business.”

“Precisely,” said he. “So I thought you’d come, as soon as I heard that
the king was here.”

It may be that I ought to have preserved my composure. But I am not Sapt
nor Rudolf Rassendyll.

“The king here?” I gasped, clutching him by the arm.

“Of course. You didn’t know? Yes, he’s in town.”

But I heeded him no more. For a moment I could not speak, then I cried
to the cabman:

“To the palace. And drive like the devil!”

We shot away, leaving Anton open-mouthed in wonder. For me, I sank back
on the cushions, fairly aghast. The king lay dead in the hunting-lodge,
but the king was in his capital!

Of course, the truth soon flashed through my mind, but it brought no
comfort. Rudolf Rassendyll was in Strelsau. He had been seen by somebody
and taken for the king. But comfort? What comfort was there, now that
the king was dead and could never come to the rescue of his counterfeit?

In fact, the truth was worse than I conceived. Had I known it all, I
might well have yielded to despair. For not by the chance, uncertain
sight of a passer-by, not by mere rumor which might have been sturdily
denied, not by the evidence of one only or of two, was the king’s
presence in the city known. That day, by the witness of a crowd of
people, by his own claim and his own voice, ay, and by the assent of
the queen herself, Mr. Rassendyll was taken to be the king in Strelsau,
while neither he nor Queen Flavia knew that the king was dead. I must
now relate the strange and perverse succession of events which forced
them to employ a resource so dangerous and face a peril so immense. Yet,
great and perilous as they knew the risk to be even when they dared
it, in the light of what they did not know it was more fearful and more
fatal still.



CHAPTER X. THE KING IN STRELSAU

MR. RASSENDYLL reached Strelsau from Zenda without accident about nine
o’clock in the evening of the same day as that which witnessed the
tragedy of the hunting-lodge. He could have arrived sooner, but prudence
did not allow him to enter the populous suburbs of the town till the
darkness guarded him from notice. The gates of the city were no longer
shut at sunset, as they had used to be in the days when Duke Michael
was governor, and Rudo

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