The Great Court Scandal
by William Le Queux · English · Gutenberg #41005 · 430,500 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: The Great Court Scandal
Author: William Le Queux
Illustrator: C. Dudley Tennant
Release date: October 9, 2012 [eBook #41005]
Most recently updated: October 23, 2024
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/41005
Credits: Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREAT COURT SCANDAL ***
The Great Court Scandal, by Willian Le Queux.
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THE GREAT COURT SCANDAL, BY WILLIAN LE QUEUX.
PREFACE.
WILLIAM LE QUEUX.
William Le Queux, one of the most popular of present-day authors, was
born in London on July 2, 1864. He has followed many callings in his
time. After studying art in Paris, he made a tour on foot through
France and Germany. Then he drifted into journalism, attaching himself
to the Paris "Morning News." Later, he crossed to London, where he
joined the staff of the "Globe" in the Gallery of the House of Commons.
This was in 1888, and he continued to report Parliament till 1891, when
he was appointed a sub-editor on the "Globe." Along with his work as a
journalist he developed his faculty for fiction, and in 1893 resigned
his position on the press to take up novel-writing as a business. His
first book was "Guilty Bonds" published in 1890. Since that date he has
issued an average of three novels a year. One of Mr. Le Queux's
recreations is revolver practice, and that may account for the free use
of the "shooting iron" which distinguishes some of his romances.
PROLOGUE.
"The Ladybird will refuse to have anything to do with the affair, my
dear fellow. It touches a woman's honour, and I know her too well."
"Bah! We'll compel her to help us. She must."
"She wouldn't risk it," declared Harry Kinder, shaking his head.
"Risk it! Well, we'll have to risk something! We're in a nice hole
just now! Our traps at the Grand, with a bill of two thousand seven
hundred francs to pay, and `the Ladybird' coolly sends us from London a
postal order for twenty-seven shillings and sixpence--all she has!"
"She might have kept it and bought a new sunshade or a box of chocolates
with it."
"The little fool! Fancy sending twenty-seven bob to three men stranded
in Paris! I can't see why old Roddy thinks so much of her," remarked
Guy Bourne to his companion.
"Because she's his daughter, and because after all you must admit that
she's jolly clever with her fingers."
"Of course we know that. She's the smartest woman in London. But what
makes you think that when the suggestion is made to her she will
refuse?"
"Well, just this. She's uncommonly good-looking, dresses with exquisite
taste, and when occasion demands can assume the manner of a high-born
lady, which is, of course, just what we want; but of late I've noticed a
very great change in her. She used to act heedless of risk, and
entirely without pity or compunction. Nowadays, however, she seems
becoming chicken-hearted."
"Perhaps she's in love," remarked the other with a sarcastic grin.
"That's just it. I honestly think that she really is in love," said the
short, hard-faced, clean-shaven man of fifty, whose fair, rather scanty
hair, reddish face, tightly-cut trousers, and check-tweed suit gave him
a distinctly horsey appearance, as he seated himself upon the edge of
the table in the shabby sitting-room _au troisieme_ above the noisy Rue
Lafayette, in Paris.
"`The Ladybird' in love! Whatever next!" ejaculated Guy Bourne, a man
some ten years his junior, and extremely well, even rather foppishly,
dressed. His features were handsome, his hair dark, and outwardly he
had all the appearance of a well-set-up Englishman. His gold
sleeve-links bore a crest and cipher in blue enamel, and his dark
moustache was carefully trained, for he was essentially a man of taste
and refinement. "Well," he added, "I've got my own opinion, old chap,
and you're quite welcome to yours. `The Ladybird' may be in love, as
you suspect, but she'll have to help us in this. It's a big thing, I
know; but look what it means to us! If she's in love, who's the jay?"
he asked, lighting a cigarette carelessly.
"Ah! now you ask me a question."
"Well," declared Bourne rather anxiously, "whoever he may be, the
acquaintanceship must be broken off--and that very quickly, too. For us
the very worst catastrophe would be for our little `Ladybird' to fall in
love. She might, in one of her moments of sentimentality, be
indiscreet, as all women are apt to be; and if so--well, it would be all
up with us. You quite recognise the danger?"
"I do, most certainly," the other replied, with a serious look, as he
glanced around the poorly-furnished room, with its painted wood floor in
lieu of carpet. "As soon as we're back we must keep our eyes upon her,
and ascertain the identity of this secret lover."
"But she's never shown any spark of affection before," Bourne said,
although he knew that the secret lover was actually himself. "We must
ask Roddy all about it. Being her father, he may know something."
"I only wish we were back in London again, sonny," declared Kinder.
"Paris has never been safe for us since that wretched affair in the
Boulevard Magenta. Why Roddy brought us over I can't think."
"He had his eye on something big that unfortunately hasn't come off.
Therefore we're now landed at the Grand with a big hotel bill and no
money to pay it with. The Johnnie in the bureau presented it to me this
morning, and asked for payment. I bluffed him that I was going down to
the bank and would settle it this evening."
"With twenty-seven and sixpence!" remarked the clean-shaven man with
sarcasm.
"Yes," responded his companion grimly. "I only wish we could get our
traps away. I've got all my new rig-out in my trunk, and can't afford
to lose it."
"We must get back to London somehow," Harry said decisively. "Every
moment we remain here increases our peril. They have our photographs at
the Prefecture, remember, and here the police are pretty quick at making
an arrest. We're wanted, even now, for the Boulevard Magenta affair. A
pity the Doctor hit the poor old chap so hard, wasn't it?"
"A thousand pities. But the Doctor was always erratic--always in fear
of too much noise being made. He knocked the old fellow down when there
was really no necessity: a towel twisted around his mouth would have
been quite as effectual, and the affair would not have assumed so ugly a
phase as it afterwards did. No; you're quite right, Harry, old chap;
Paris is no place for us nowadays."
"Ah!" Kinder sighed regretfully. "And yet we've had jolly good times
here, haven't we? And we've brought off some big things once or twice,
until Latour and his cadaverous crowd became jealous of us, and gave us
away that morning at the St. Lazare station, just when Roddy was working
the confidence of those two American women. By Jove! we all had a
narrow escape, and had to fly."
"I remember. Two agents pounced upon me, but I managed to give them the
slip and get away that night to Amiens. A good job for us," the younger
man added, "that Latour won't have a chance to betray his friends for
another fifteen years."
"What! has he been lagged?" asked the horsey man as he bit the end off a
cigar.
"Yes, for a nasty affair down at Marseilles. He was opening a banker's
safe--that was his speciality, you know--and he blundered."
"Then I'm not sorry for him," Kinder declared, crossing the room and
looking out of the window into the busy thoroughfare below.
It was noon, on a bright May day, and the traffic over the granite setts
in the Rue Lafayette was deafening, the huge steam trams snorting and
clanging as they ascended the hill to the Gare du Nord.
Guy Bourne was endeavouring to solve a very serious financial
difficulty. The three shabbily-furnished rooms in which they were was a
small apartment which Roddy Redmayne, alias "The Mute," alias Ward,
alias Scott-Martin, and alias a dozen other names beside, had taken for
a month, and were, truth to tell, the temporary headquarters of "The
Mute's" clever and daring gang of international thieves, who moved from
city to city plying their profession.
They had been unlucky--as they were sometimes. Harry Kinder had
succeeded in getting some jewellery two days before, only to discover to
his chagrin that the diamonds were paste. He had seen them in a bad
light, otherwise, expert that he was, he would never have touched them.
He always left pearls religiously alone. There were far too many
imitations, he declared. For three weeks the men had done themselves
well in Paris, and spent a considerable amount in ingratiating
themselves with certain English and American visitors who were there for
the season. Kinder and Bourne worked the big hotels--the Grand, the
Continental, and the Chatham, generally frequenting the American bar at
the latter place each afternoon about four o'clock, on the keen lookout
for English pigeons to pluck. This season, however, ill-luck seemed to
constantly follow them, with the result that they had spent their money
all to no purpose, and now found themselves with a large hotel bill, and
without the wherewithal to discharge it.
Guy Bourne's life had been a veritable romance. The son of a wealthy
country squire, he had been at Eton and at Balliol, and his father had
intended him to enter the Church, for he had an uncle a bishop, and was
sure of a decent preferment. A clerical career had, however, no
attractions for Guy, who loved all kinds of sport, especially racing, a
pastime which eventually proved his downfall. Like many other young
men, he became mixed up with a very undesirable set--that unscrupulous
company that frequents racecourses--and finding his father's door shut
to him, gradually sank lower until he became the friend of Kinder and
one of the associates and accomplices of the notorious Roddy Redmayne--
known as "The Mute"--a king among Continental thieves.
Like the elder man who stood beside him, he was an audacious,
quick-witted, and ingenious thief, very merry and easy-going. He was a
man who lived an adventurous life, and generally lived well, too;
unscrupulous about annexing other people's property, and therefore
retaining nowadays few of the traits of the gentleman. At first he had
not been altogether bad; at heart he hated and despised himself; yet he
was a fatalist, and had long ago declared that the life of a thief was
his destiny, and that it was no use kicking against the pricks.
An excellent linguist, a well-set-up figure, a handsome countenance, his
hair slightly turning grey, he was always witty, debonair and
cosmopolitan, and a great favourite with women. They voted him a
charming fellow, never for one moment suspecting that his polished
exterior and gentlemanly bearing concealed the fact that he had designs
upon their jewellery.
His companion, Harry Kinder, was a man of entirely different stamp;
rather coarse, muscular, well versed in all the trickery and subterfuge
of the international criminal; a clever pickpocket, and perhaps one of
the most ingenious sharpers in all Europe. He had followed the
profession ever since a lad; had seen the interior of a dozen different
prisons in as many countries; and invariably showed fight if detected.
Indeed, Harry Kinder was a "tough customer," as many agents of police
had discovered to their cost.
"Then you really don't think `the Ladybird' will have anything to do
with the affair?" Guy remarked at last, standing beside him and gazing
aimlessly out of the window.
"I fear she won't. If you can persuade her, then it'll all be plain
sailing. They'll help us, and the risk won't be very much. Yet after
all it's a dirty trick to play, isn't it?"
His companion shrugged his shoulders, saying, "Roddy sees no harm in it,
and we must live the same as other people. We simply give our services
for a stated sum."
"Well," declared Kinder, "I've never drawn back from any open and
straightforward bit of business where it was our wits against another's,
or where the victim is a fool or inexperienced; but I tell you that I
draw a line at entrapping an innocent woman, and especially an English
lady."
"What!" cried Bourne. "You've become conscientious all at once! Do you
intend to back out of it altogether?"
"I've not yet decided what I shall do. The only thing is that I shall
not persuade `the Ladybird' either way. I shall leave her entirely in
Roddy's hands."
"Then you'd better tell Roddy plainly when he comes back. Perhaps
you're in love, just as you say `the Ladybird' is!"
"Love! Why, my dear Guy--love at my age! I was only in love once--when
I was seventeen. She sat in a kind of fowl-pen and sold stamps in a
grocer's shop at Hackney. Since then I can safely say that I've never
made a fool of myself over a woman. They are charming all, from
seventeen to seventy, but there is not one I've singled out as better
than the rest."
"Ah, Harry!" declared Guy with a smile, "you're a queer fellow. You are
essentially a lady's man, and yet you never fall in love. We all
thought once that you were fond of `the Ladybird.'"
"`The Ladybird!'" laughed the elder man. "Well, what next? No. `The
Ladybird' has got a lover in secret somewhere, depend upon it. Perhaps
it is yourself. We shall get at the truth when we return to town."
"When? Do you contemplate leaving your things at the Grand, my dear
fellow? We can't. We must get money from somewhere--money, and to-day.
Why not try some of the omnibuses, or the crowd at one of the railway
stations? We might work together this afternoon and try our luck," Guy
suggested.
"Better the Cafe Americain, or Maxim's to-night," declared Kinder, who
knew his Paris well. "There's more money there, and we're bound to pick
up a jay or two."
At that moment the sharp click of a key in the lock of the outer door
caused them to pause, and a moment later they were joined by an elderly,
grey-haired, gentlemanly-looking man in travelling-ulster and grey felt
hat, who carried a small brown kit-bag which, by its hotel labels,
showed sign of long travel.
"Hulloa, Roddy!" Kinder cried excitedly in his Cockney dialect. "Luck,
I see! What have you got?"
"Don't know yet," was the newcomer's reply, his intonation also that of
a born Londoner. "I got it from a young woman who arrived by the
_rapide_ at the Gare de l'Est." And throwing off his travelling get-up
he placed the kit-bag upon the table. Then touching a spring in the
lock he lifted it again, and there remained upon the table a lady's
dressing-bag with a black waterproof cover.
"Looks like something good," declared Guy, watching eagerly.
The innocent-looking kit-bag was one of those specially constructed for
the use of thieves. The bottom was hinged, with double flaps opening
inward. The interior contained sharp iron grips, so that the bag, when
placed upon any object smaller than it, would cover it entirely, the
flaps forming the bottom opening inward, while the grips, descending,
held the bag or other object tight. So the kit-bag, when removed, would
also remove the object concealed within it.
Roddy, a grey-faced, cool, crafty old fellow of sixty, bore such a
serious expression that one might readily have taken him for a
dissenting minister or a respectable surgeon. He carefully took off the
outer cover of the crocodile-skin dressing-case, examined its gilt lock,
and then, taking from his pocket a piece of steel about six inches long,
with a pointed end, almost a miniature of a burglar's jemmy, he quickly
prised it open.
The trio eagerly looked within, and saw that it was an elegantly-fitted
bag, with gold-topped bottles, and below some miscellaneous articles and
letters lay a small, cheap leather bag.
In a moment the wily old thief had it open, and next instant there was
displayed a magnificent bodice ornament in diamonds, a pair of exquisite
pearl earrings, several fine bracelets, a long rope of splendid pearls,
a fine ruby brooch, and a quantity of other ornaments.
"Excellent!" exclaimed Guy. "We're on our feet once more! Well done,
Roddy, old man! We were just thinking that we'd have to pick the
pockets of some poor wretches if things didn't change, and I never like
doing that."
"No," remarked the leader of the gang, critically examining one after
another of the articles he had stolen. "I wonder to whom these belong?"
he added. "They're uncommonly good stuff, at any rate. Ascertain what
those letters say."
Guy took up the letters and glanced at the superscriptions upon the
envelopes.
"By Heaven!" he gasped next instant, and crushing the letters in his
hand stood staring at the open bag. "What infernal irony of Fate is
this? What curse is there upon us now? Look! They are hers--hers!
And we have taken them!"
The three men exchanged glances, but no word was uttered.
The startling truth held Guy Bourne speechless, staggered, stupefied.
CHAPTER ONE.
CONCERNS A COURT INTRIGUE.
The bright moon shed a white light over the great, silent courtyards of
the Imperial palace at Vienna.
A bugle had just sounded, the guards had changed with a sudden clang of
arms that rang out in the clear night, followed by the sound of men
marching back to the guardhouse. A sharp word of command, a second
bugle note, and then all was quiet again, save for the slow, measured
tread of the sentries at each angle of the ponderous palace.
From without all looked grim and gloomy, in keeping with that strange
fate that follows the hapless Hapsbourgs; yet beyond those black walls,
in the farther wing of the Imperial palace were life and gaiety and
music; indeed there was presented perhaps the most magnificent scene in
all Europe.
The first Court ball of the season was at its height, and the aged
Emperor Francis-Joseph was himself present--a striking figure in his
uniform and orders.
Filled with the most brilliant patrician crowd in all the world--the
women in tiaras and blazing with jewels, and the men in Court dress or
in gorgeous uniforms--the huge ballroom, with its enormous crystal
electroliers and its gold--and--white Renaissance decorations, had never
been the scene of a more dazzling display. Archdukes and archduchesses,
princes and princesses, nobles and diplomatists, ministers of the empire
and high functionaries of State danced or gossiped, intrigued or talked
scandal; or those whose first ball it was worried themselves over points
of etiquette that are always so puzzling to one not born in the Court
atmosphere.
The music, the scent of the flowers, the glare and glitter, the beauty
of the high-born women, the easy swagger of the bestarred and beribboned
men, combined to produce a scene almost fairy-like.
Laughter rang from pretty lips, and men bent to whisper into the ears of
their partners as they waltzed over the perfect floor, after having paid
homage to their Emperor--that lonely, broken man whose good wife, alas!
had fallen beneath the assassin's knife.
A sovereign's heart may be broken, but he must nevertheless keep up a
brave show before his subjects.
So he stood at the end of the room with the Imperial circle about him,
smiling upon them and receiving their homage, although he longed to be
back in his own quiet room at the farther end of the palace, where their
laughter and the strains of music could not reach his ears.
One pale, sweet-faced woman in that gay, irresponsible crowd glanced at
him and read his heart.
Her fair beauty was extremely striking, and her neat-waisted figure
perfect. Indeed, she had long ago been acknowledged to be the most
lovely figure at the Austrian Court--the most brilliant Court of
Europe--a countenance which even her wide circle of enemies could not
criticise without showing their ill nature; a perfect countenance,
which, though it bore the hallmark of her imperial birth as an
Archduchess, yet was sweet, dimpled, and innocent as a child's.
The Princess Claire--Cecille-Marie-Alexandrine was twenty-four. Born
and bred at that Court, she had three years before been married to the
Crown Prince of a German house, the royal house of Marburg, and had left
it for the Court at Treysa, over which her husband would, by reason of
his father's great age, very soon be sovereign.
At that moment she was back in Vienna on a brief visit to her father,
the Archduke Charles, and had taken a turn around the room with a smart,
well-set-up man in cavalry uniform--her cousin Prince George of Anhalt.
She was dressed in ivory white, wearing in her fair hair a wonderful
tiara; while in the edge of her low-cut bodice there showed the crosses
and ribbons of the Orders of St. Elizabeth and Teresa--decorations
bestowed only upon Imperial princesses.
Many eyes were turned upon her, and many of the friends of her girlhood
days she saluted with that charming frankness of manner which was so
characteristic of her open nature. Suddenly, while walking around the
room, a clean-shaven, dark-haired, quick-eyed man of thirty in Court
dress bowed low before her, and in an instant, recognising him, she left
her cousin's side, and crossing spoke to him.
"I must see your Imperial Highness before she leaves Vienna," he
whispered quickly to her in English, after she had greeted him in German
and inquired after his wife. "I have something private and important to
tell you."
The Crown Princess looked at him quickly, and recognised that the man
was in earnest. Her curiosity became aroused; but she could ask no
questions, for a hundred eyes were now upon her.
"Make an appointment--quickly, your Highness. I am here expressly to
see you," he said, noticing that Prince George was approaching to carry
her off to the upper end of the room, where the members of the Imperial
family were assembled.
"Very well. In the Stadtpark, against the Caroline Bridge, at eight
to-morrow night. It will be dark then."
"Be careful that you are not followed," he whispered; and then he bowed
deeply as she left him.
When her cousin came up he said,--
"You are very foolish, Claire! You know how greatly such a breach of
etiquette annoys the Emperor. Why do you speak with such people?"
"Because I like to," she answered defiantly. "If I have the misfortune
to be born an Imperial Archduchess and am now Crown Princess, it need
surely not preclude me from speaking to people who are my friends?"
"Oh, he is a friend, is he? Who is the fellow?" inquired the Prince,
raising his eyebrows.
"Steinbach. He is in our Ministry of Foreign Affairs."
"You really possess some queer friends, Claire," the young man said,
smiling. "They will suspect you of being a Socialist if you go on in
this way. You always shock them each time you come back to Vienna
because of your extraordinary unconventionality."
"Do I?" she laughed. "Well, I'm sure I don't care. When I lived here
before I married they were for ever being scandalised by my conduct in
speaking to people. But why shouldn't I? I learn so much them. We are
all too narrow-minded; we very little of the world beyond the palace
walls."
"I heard yesterday that you'd been seen walking in the Kamthnerstrasse
with two women who were not of the nobility. You really oughtn't to do
that. It isn't fair to us, you know," he said, twisting his moustache.
"We all know how wilful you are, and how you love to scandalise us; but
you should draw the line at displaying such socialistic tendencies
openly and publicly."
"My dear old George," she laughed, turning her bright eyes to him,
"you're only my cousin and not my husband. I shall do exactly what I
like. If it amuses and interests me to see the life of the people, I
shall do so; therefore it's no use talking. I have had lots of lectures
from the Emperor long ago, and also from my stiff old father-in-law the
King. But when they lecture me I only do it all the more," she
declared, with a mischievous laugh upon her sweet face. "So they've
given me up."
"You're incorrigible, Claire--absolutely incorrigible," her cousin
declared as he swung along at her side. "I only _do_ hope that your
unconventionality will not be taken advantage of by your jealous
enemies. Remember, you are the prettiest woman at our Court as well as
at your own. Before long, too, you will be a reigning queen; therefore
reflect well whether this disregard of the first rule of Court
etiquette, which forbids a member of the Imperial family to converse
with a commoner, is wise. For my own part, I don't think it is."
"Oh, don't lecture me any more for goodness' sake," exclaimed the Crown
Princess with a little musical laugh. "Have this waltz with me."
And next moment the handsome pair were on their way down the great room
with all eyes turned upon them.
When, ten minutes later, they returned to join the Imperial circle about
the Emperor, the latter motioned his niece towards him.
"Come to me when this is ended," he said in a serious voice. "I wish to
talk to you. You will find me in the white room at two o'clock."
The Crown Princess bowed, and returned to the side of her father, the
Archduke Charles, a tall, thin, grey-haired man in a brilliant uniform
glittering with orders.
She knew that his Majesty's quick eye had detected that she had spoken
with the commoner Steinbach, and anticipated that she was to receive
another lecture. Why, she wondered, was Steinbach there? Truth to
tell, Court life bored her. She was tired to death of all that intrigue
and struggle for place, power, and precedence, and of that unhealthy
atmosphere of recklessness wherein she had been born and bred. She
longed for the free open life in the country around Wartenstein, the
great old castle in the Tyrol that was her home, where she could tramp
for miles in the mountains and be friendly with the honest country folk.
After her marriage--a marriage of convenience to unite two royal
houses--she had found that she had exchanged one stiff and brilliant
Court for another, more dull, more stiff, and where the etiquette was
even more rigid.
Those three years of married life had wrought a very great change in
her.
She had left Vienna a bright, athletic girl, fond of all sports, a great
walker, a splendid horsewoman, sweet, natural, and quite unaffected; yet
now, after those three years of a Court, smaller yet far more severe
than that of Austria, she had become rebellious, with one desire--to
forsake it all and live the private life of an ordinary citizen.
Her own world, the little patrician but narrow world behind the throne,
whispered and shrugged its shoulders. It was believed that her marriage
was an unhappy one, but so clever was she that she never betrayed her
bitterness of heart. Like all her Imperial family, she was a born
diplomatist, and to those who sought to read her secret her face was
always sphinx-like. Her own Court saw her as a merry, laughter-loving
woman, witty, clever, a splendid dancer, and with a polished and
charming manner that had already endeared her to the people over whom
she was very shortly to reign. But at Court her enemies looked upon her
with distrust. She exhibited no sign of displeasure on any occasion,
however provoking. She was equally pleasant with enemies as with
friends. For that reason they suspected her.
Her charming ingenuousness and her entire disregard of the traditional
distinction between the Imperial house and the people had aroused the
anger of her husband's father, the aged King, a sovereign of the old
school, who declared that she was fast breaking up all the traditions of
the royal house, and that her actions were a direct incentive to
Socialism and Anarchism within the kingdom.
But she only laughed. She had trained herself to laugh gleefully even
when her young heart was filled with blackest sorrow; even though her
husband neglected and despised her; even though she was estranged for
ever from her own home and her own beloved family circle at the great
mountain stronghold.
Next to the Emperor Francis-Joseph, her father, the Archduke Charles,
was the greatest and wealthiest man in Austria. He had a Court of his
own with all its appendages and functionaries, a great palace in the
Parkring in Vienna, another in Buda-Pesth, the magnificent castle of
Wartenstein, near Innsbruck, besides four other castles in various parts
of Austria, and a beautiful villa at Tivoli, near Rome. From her birth
the Princess Claire had always breathed the vitiated air of the courts
of Europe; and yet ever since a girl, walking with her English governess
at Wartenstein, she had longed and dreamed of freedom. Her marriage,
however, was arranged for her, and she awakened from the glamour of it
all to find herself the wife of a peevish prince who had not finished
the sowing of his wild oats, and who, moreover, seemed to have no place
for her in his heart.
Too late she realised the tragedy of it all. When alone she would sit
for hours in tears. Yet to no living soul, not even to her father or to
the dark-haired, middle-aged Countess de Trauttenberg, her
lady-in-waiting and confidante, did she utter one single syllable. She
kept her secret.
The world envied her her marvellous beauty, her exquisite figure, her
wealth, her position, her grace and ineffable charm. Yet what would it
have said had it known the ugly truth? Surely it would have pitied her;
for even an Imperial archduchess, forbidden to speak with the common
world, has a human heart, and is entitled to human sympathy.
The Crown Prince was not present. He was, alas I seldom with the
Princess. As she stood there in the Imperial circle with folded hands,
laughing merrily and chatting vivaciously with the small crowd of
Imperial Highnesses, no one would have guessed that she was a woman
whose young heart was already broken.
Ah yes! she made a brave show to conceal her bitterness and sorrow from
the world, because she knew it was her duty to do so--her duty to her
princely family and to the kingdom over which she was soon to be queen.
The Emperor at last made his exit through the great white-and-gold
doors, the Imperial chamberlains bowing low as he passed out. Then at
two o'clock the Crown Princess managed to slip away from the Imperial
circle, and with her rich train sweeping behind her, made her way
rapidly through the long, tortuous corridors to his Majesty's private
workroom, known as the White Chamber, on the other side of the great
palace.
She tapped upon the door with her fan, and obtained entrance at once,
finding the Emperor alone, standing near the great wood fire, for it was
a chilly evening, close to his big, littered writing-table. His heavy
expression told her that he was both thoughtful and displeased. The
chamber, in contrast to the luxury of the splendid palace, was plainly
furnished, essentially the workroom of the ruler of a great empire--the
room in which he gave audiences and transacted the affairs of the
Austria-Hungarian nation.
"Claire," he said, in a low, hard voice, "be seated; I wish to speak to
you."
"Ah, I know," exclaimed the brilliant woman, whose magnificent diamonds
glittered beneath the electric light, "I know! I admit, sire, that I
committed an unpardonable breach of etiquette in speaking with
Steinbach. You are going to reprove me--I know you are," she pouted.
"But do forgive me. I did not reflect. It was an indiscretion."
"You never reflect, Claire; you are too irresponsible," the Emperor said
in a tone of distinct displeasure. "But it is not that. I have called
you here to learn why the Crown Prince is not in Vienna with you."
He fixed his grey, deep-sunken eyes upon hers, and awaited her answer.
"Well--" she faltered. "There are some Court dinners, and--and I
believe he has some military engagements--anniversaries or something."
The Emperor smiled dubiously.
"You are shielding him, Claire," he said slowly; "I see you are. I know
that Ferdinand is estranged from you. Of late I have learnt things
concerning you--more than you imagine. You are unloved by your husband,
and unhappy, and yet you are bearing your burden in silence, though you
are a young and beautiful woman. Now, Claire," he said in a changed
voice, placing his hand tenderly upon his niece's shoulder, "tell me the
truth. I wish to hear the truth from your own lips. Do you know what
they say of you? They say," he added, lowering his voice--"they say
that you have a lover!"
"A lover!" she gasped hoarsely, starting from her chair, her beautiful
face as white as the dress she wore; "a lover! Who--who told you so?"
CHAPTER TWO.
HER IMPERIAL HIGHNESS.
Whatever passed between the Emperor and his niece, whether she confessed
the truth or defied him, one fact was plain--she had been moved to
bitter tears.
When, half an hour later, she went back through those long corridors,
her rich train sweeping over the red carpets, her white-gloved hands
were clenched, her teeth set hard, her eyes red, her countenance
changed. Her face was changed; it was that of a woman heart-broken and
desperate.
She did not return to the ballroom, but descended to the courtyard,
where one of the Imperial servants called her carriage, and she returned
alone to her father's splendid palace in the Parkring.
Ascending straight to her room, she dismissed the Countess de
Trauttenberg, her lady-in-waiting, and Henriette, her French maid; and
then locking the door, she tore off her tiara and her jewels and sank
upon her knees upon the old carved prie-dieu before the ivory crucifix
placed opposite her bed.
Her hands were clasped, her fair head bent, her sweet lips moved in
fervent prayer, her eyes the while streaming with tears. Plunged in
grief and unhappiness, she besought the Almighty to aid and counsel her
in the difficult situation in which she now found herself.
"Help me, my Father!" she sobbed aloud. "Have mercy upon me--mercy upon
a humble woman who craves Thy protection and direction." And her
clasped hands trembled in the fervency of her appeal.
Those who had seen her an hour ago, the gay, laughing figure, blazing
with jewels, the centre of the most brilliant Court of Europe, would
have been astounded to see her at that moment prostrated before her
Maker. In Austria, as in Germany, she was believed to be a rather giddy
woman, perhaps by reason of her uncommon beauty, and perhaps because of
her easy-going light-heartedness and disregard for all Court etiquette.
Yet the truth was that the strong religious principles instilled into
her by her mother, the deceased Archduchess Charles, had always
remained, and that no day passed without one hour set apart for her
devotions, in secret even from the Countess, from Henriette, and from
the Crown Prince, her husband.
She was a Catholic, of course, like all her Imperial house, but upon one
point she disagreed--that of confession.
Her husband, though he professed Catholicism, at heart scoffed at
religion; and more than once when he had found her in the private chapel
of the palace at Treysa had jeered at her. But she bore it all in
patience. She was his wife, and she had a duty to perform towards his
nation--to become its queen.
For nearly an hour she remained upon her knees before the crucifix, with
the tiny oil-light flickering in its cup of crimson glass, kneeling in
mute appeal, strong in her faith, yet humble as the humblest commoner in
the land.
"My God!" she cried aloud at last. "Hear me! Answer my prayer! Give
me strength and courage, and direct my footsteps in the right path. I
am a weak woman, after all; a humble sinner who has repented. Help me,
O God! I place all my trust in Thee! Amen."
And, crossing herself, she rose slowly with a deep-drawn breath that
sounded weirdly through the fine room, and walking unsteadily towards
the big cheval glass, gazed at her own reflection.
She saw how pale and haggard was her face, and looked at her trembling
hands.
The ribbons and stars at the edge of her bodice caught her eye, and with
a sudden movement she tore them off and cast them heedlessly upon the
table as though the sight of them annoyed her. They had been conferred
upon her on her marriage. She sighed as she looked back at them.
Ah, the hollow mockery of it all!
She glanced out of the window, and saw in the bright moonlight the
sentry pacing up and down before the palace. Across the wide boulevard
were the dark trees of the park. It recalled to her the appointment she
had made there for the next evening.
"I wonder why Steinbach has followed me here?" she exclaimed to herself.
"How did he obtain entrance to the Court ball? Probably he has some
friend here. But surely his mission is urgent, or he would never have
run this risk. I was, however, foolish to speak to him before them
all--very foolish. Yet," she added slowly to herself, "I wonder what he
has to tell me? I wonder--" And, without concluding her sentence, she
stood gazing out upon the dark park, deep in thought, her mind full of
grave apprehensions of the future.
She was a Hapsbourg--and evil fate follows a Hapsbourg always. She had
prayed to God; for God alone could save her.
She, the most brilliant and the most envied woman in the Empire, was
perhaps the most heart-broken, the most unhappy. Casting herself into
an armchair before the log fire, she covered her drawn, white face with
her hands and sobbed bitterly, until at last she sat immovable, staring
straight into the embers watching the spark die out, until she fell
asleep where she sat.
Next day her sweet, fresh face bore no traces of her desperation of the
night. She was as gay and merry as ever, and only Henriette noticed in
her eyes a slight redness, but discreetly said nothing.
The Countess, a rather pleasant-faced but stiff-mannered person, brought
her her engagement-book, from which it appeared that she was due at a
review by the Emperor at eleven o'clock; therefore, accompanied by her
lady-in-waiting, she drove there, and was everywhere admired by the
great crowds assembled. The Austrian people called her "our Claire,"
and the warm-hearted Viennese cheered when they recognised that she was
back again among them.
It was a brilliant scene in the bright spring sunlight, for many of the
Imperial Court were present, and the troops made a brave show as they
marched past his Majesty and the assembled members of the Imperial
house.
Then she had a luncheon engagement with the Archduchess Gisela, the wife
of Prince Leopold of Bavaria, afterwards drove in the Ringstrasse and
the Prater, dined early at her father's palace, after giving Henriette
leave of absence for the evening, and also allowing the Countess de
Trauttenberg her freedom, saying that she intended to remain at home.
Then, shortly before eight o'clock, she ascended to her room, exchanged
her turquoise-blue dinner-gown for a plain, stiff, tailor-made dress,
put on a hat with a lace veil that concealed her features, and managed
to slip across the courtyard of the domestic offices and out of the
palace unseen.
The night was cloudy and dark, with threatening rain, as she crossed the
broad Parkring, entering the park near the Kursalon, and traversing the
deserted walks towards the River Wien. The chill wind whistled in the
budding trees above, sweeping up the dust in her path, and the
statuesque guard whom she passed in the shadow glanced inquisitively at
her, of course not recognising her.
There was no one in the Stadtpark at that hour, and all was silent,
gloomy, and dismal, well in keeping with her own sad thoughts. Behind
her, the street lamps of the Parkring showed in a long, straight line,
and before her were the lights on the Caroline Bridge, the spot
appointed for the meeting.
Her heart beat quickly. It was always difficult for her to escape
without the knowledge of De Trauttenberg or Henriette. The former was,
as a good lady-in-waiting should be, ever at her side, made her
engagements for her, and saw that she kept them. That night, however,
the Countess desired to visit her sister who was in Vienna with her
husband, therefore it had happened opportunely; and, freed of Henriette,
she had now little to fear.
The dress she wore was one she used when in the country. She had thrown
a short cape of Henriette's about her shoulders, and was thus
sufficiently disguised to avoid recognition by people in the streets.
As she came around a sudden bend in the pathway to the foot of the
bridge the dark figure of a man in a black overcoat emerged from the
shadow, and was next instant at her side, holding his hat in his hand
and bowing before her.
"I began to fear that your Imperial Highness would not come," he said
breathlessly in German. "Or that you had been prevented."
"Is it so very late, then?" she inquired in her sweet, musical voice, as
the man walked slowly at her side. "I had difficulty in getting away in
secret."
"No one has followed you, Princess?" he said, glancing anxiously behind
him. "Are you quite sure?"
"No one. I was very careful. But why have you asked me to come here?
Why were you at the ball last night? How did you manage to get a card?"
"I came expressly to see you, Princess," answered the young man in a
deep earnest voice. "It was difficult to get a command to the ball, but
I managed it, as I could approach you by no other way. At your
Highness's own Court you, as Crown Princess, are unapproachable for a
commoner like myself, and I feared to write to you, as De Trauttenberg
often attends to your correspondence."
"But you are my friend, Steinbach," she said. "I am always to be seen
by my friends."
"At your own risk, your Highness," he said quickly. "I know quite well
that last night when you stopped and spoke to me it was a great breach
of etiquette. Only it was imperative that I should see you to-night.
To you, Princess, I owe everything. I do not forget your great kindness
to me; how that I was a poor clerk out of work, with my dear wife ill
and starving, and how, by your letter of recommendation, I was appointed
in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, first as French translator, and now
as a secretary. Were it not for you, Princess, I and my family would
have starved. You saved me from ruin, and I hope you are confident that
in me, poor and humble though I am, you at least have a friend."
"I am sure of that, Steinbach," was her Highness's kindly reply. "We
need not cross the bridge," she said. "It is quiet along here, by the
river. We shall meet no one."
For a few moments a silence fell between them, and the Princess began to
wonder why he had asked her there to meet him.
At last, when they were in a dark and narrower pathway, he turned
suddenly to her and said,--
"Princess, I--I hardly know how to speak, for I fear that you may take
what I have to say in a wrong sense. I mean," he faltered, "I mean that
I fear you may think it impertinent of me to speak to you, considering
the great difference in our stations."
"Why?" she asked calmly, turning to him with some surprise. "Have you
not just told me that you are my friend?"
She noticed at that moment that he still held his hat in his hand, and
motioned to him to reassume it.
"Yes. I am your Highness's friend," he declared quickly. "If I were
not, I would not dare to approach you, or to warn you of what at this
moment is in progress."
"What is in progress?" she exclaimed in surprise. "Tell me."
She realised that this man had something serious to say, or surely he
would never have followed her to Vienna, and obtained entrance to the
Imperial Court by subterfuge.
"Your Highness is in peril," he declared in a low voice, halting and
standing before her. "You have enemies, fierce, bitter enemies, on
every side; enemies who are doing their utmost to estrange you from your
husband; relentless enemies who are conspiring might and main against
you and the little Princess Ignatia. They--"
"Against my child?" cried the Princess, amazed. "Do you really mean
that there is actually a conspiracy against me?"
"Alas! that is so, Highness," said the man, seriously and distinctly.
"By mere chance I have learnt of it, and being unable to approach you at
your own Court, I am here to give you timely warning of what is
intended." She was silent, gazing straight into her companion's face,
which was, however, hardly distinguishable in the darkness. She could
scarcely believe the truth of what this commoner told her. Could this
man, whom she had benefited by her all-powerful influence, have any
ulterior motive in lying to her?
"And what is intended?" she inquired in a strange, hard voice, still
half dubious and half convinced.
"There is a plot, a dastardly, widespread conspiracy to cause your
Highness's downfall and part you from the Crown Prince before he comes
to the throne," was his answer.
"But why? For what motive?" she inquired, starting at the amazing
revelation.
"Cannot your Highness discern that your jealous enemies are in fear of
you?" he said. "They know that one day ere long our invalid King must
die, and your husband will then ascend the throne. You will be Queen,
and they feel convinced that the day of your accession will be their
last day at Court--frankly, that having seen through their shams and
intrigues, you will dismiss them all and change the entire entourage."
"Ah! I see," replied the Crown Princess Claire in a hoarse, bitter
voice. "They fear me because they have realised their own shortcomings.
So they are conspiring against me to part me from my husband, and drive
me from Court! Yes," she sighed heavily, "I know that I have enemies on
every side. I am a Hapsbourg, and that in itself is sufficient to
prejudice them against me. I have never been a favourite with their
Majesties the King and Queen because of my Liberal tendencies. They
look upon me as a Socialist; indeed, almost as a revolutionist. Their
sycophants would be glad enough to see me banished from Court. And yet
the Court bow to me with all that hateful obsequiousness."
"Your Highness is, unfortunately, quite right," declared the man
Steinbach. "The Crown Prince is being enticed farther and farther from
you, as part of the ingenious plot now afoot. The first I knew of it
was by accident six months ago, when some letters from abroad fell into
my hands at the Ministry. The conspiracy is one that permeates the
whole Court. The daily talk of your enemies is the anticipation of your
downfall."
"My downfall! But how is that to be accomplished?" she demanded, her
fine eyes flashing with indignation. "I surely have nothing to fear--
have I? I beg of you to be quite candid with me, Steinbach. In this
affair your information may be of greatest service, and I am deeply
indebted to you. It staggers me. What have I done that these people
should seek my ruin?" she cried in blank dismay.
"Will your Highness pardon me if I tell the truth?" asked the man at her
side, speaking very seriously. "You have been too free, too frank, and
too open-minded. Every well-meant action of yours is turned to account
by those who seek to do you evil. Those whom you believe to be your
friends are your worst antagonists. I have longed to approach you and
tell you this for months, but I always feared. How could I reach you?
They are aware that the secret correspondence passed through my hands,
and therefore they suspect me of an intention of betraying them."
"Then you are here at imminent risk to yourself, Steinbach," she
remarked very slowly, looking again straight into his dark face.
"I am here as your Highness's friend," replied the young man simply.
"It is surely worth the risk to save my gracious benefactress from
falling victim to their foul, dastardly conspiracy?"
"And who, pray, are my worst antagonists?" she asked hoarsely.
He gave her rapidly half a dozen names of Court officials and persons in
the immediate entourage of their Majesties.
"And," he added, "do not trust the Countess de Trauttenberg. She is
playing you false. She acts as spy upon you and notes your every
action."
"The Countess--their spy!" she gasped, utterly taken aback, for if there
was one person at Court in whom she had the utmost confidence it was the
woman who had been in her personal service ever since her marriage.
"I have documentary proof of it," the man said quietly. "I would beg of
your Highness to make no sign whatever that the existence of the plot is
known to you, but at the same time exercise the greatest caution, both
for your own sake and that of the little Princess."
"Surely they do not mean to kill me, Steinbach?" she exclaimed in alarm.
"No--worse. They intend to banish your Highness from Court in disgrace,
as a woman unworthy to reign over us as Queen. They fear you because
you have discovered their own intrigues, corruptions, and scandals, and
they intend that, at all costs, you shall never ascend the throne."
"But my husband! He should surely know this!"
"Princess," exclaimed the clean-shaven young man, speaking very slowly
and seriously, "I regret that it is I who am compelled to reveal this to
you, but the Crown Prince already believes ill of you. He suspects; and
therefore whatever lies they, now invent concerning you he accepts as
truth. Princess," he added in a low, hard voice, "you are in deadly
peril. There, the truth is out, for I cannot keep it from you longer.
I am poor, unknown, without influence. All I can do is to give you this
warning in secret, because I hope that I may call myself your friend."
The unhappy daughter of the Imperial house was silent. The revelation
was startling and amazing. She had never realised that a plot was afoot
against her in her husband's kingdom. Words entirely failed her. She
and her little daughter Ignatia were marked down as victims. She now
for the first time realised her peril, yet she was powerless to stem the
tide of misfortune that, sooner or later, must overwhelm her and crush
her. She stood there a defenceless woman.
CHAPTER THREE.
THE REVELATIONS OF A COMMONER.
Princess and commoner walked in silence, side by side. The rough night
wind blew the dust in their faces, but they bent to it heedlessly, both
too full of their own thoughts for words; the man half confused in the
presence of the brilliant woman who ere long would be his sovereign; the
woman stupefied at the dastardly intrigue that had not only estranged
her husband from her, but had for its object the expulsion from the
kingdom of herself and her child.
Open-hearted as she was, liberal-minded, pleasant, easy-going, and a
delightful companion, she had never sufficiently realised that at that
stiff, narrow-minded Court there were men and women who hated her. All
of us are so very loth to believe that we have enemies, and more
especially those who believe in the honesty and integrity of mankind.
She reflected upon her interview with the Emperor. She remembered his
Majesty's hard words. Had those conspiring against her obtained his
ear?
Even De Trauttenberg, the tall, patient, middle-aged woman in whom she
had reposed such confidence, was their spy! Steinbach's story staggered
belief. And yet--and yet was not the Emperor's anger plain proof that
he knew something--that a foul plot was really in progress?
Along those dark winding paths they strolled slowly, meeting no one, for
the place was utterly deserted. It was an exciting escapade, and
dangerous withal.
The man at last broke the silence, saying,--
"I need not impress upon your Imperial Highness the necessity for
discretion in this matter. To betray your knowledge of the affair would
be to betray me."
"Trust me," was her answer. "I know how to keep a secret, and I am not
likely to forget this important service you have rendered me."
"My only regret is that I was unable to approach you months ago, when I
first made the discovery. Your Highness would have then been able to
avoid the pitfalls constantly set for you," the man said meaningly.
The Princess Claire bit her lip. She knew to what he referred. She had
been foolish, ah yes; very foolish. And he dare not be more explicit.
"Yes," she sighed. "I know--I know to what you refer. But surely we
need not discuss it. Even though I am Crown Princess, I am a woman,
after all."
"I beg your Highness's pardon," he exclaimed quickly, fearing that she
was annoyed.
"There is nothing to pardon," was her reply. "You are my friend, and
speak to me in my own interests. For that I thank you. Only--only--"
she added, "all that you've just told me is such a startling revelation.
My eyes are opened now. I see the dastardly ingenuity of it all. I
know why my husband--"
But she checked herself instantly. No. However ill-treated she had
been she would preserve her secret. She would not complain to a
commoner at risk of her domestic infelicity going forth to her people.
It was true that within a year of marriage he had thrown her down in her
room and kicked her in one of his paroxysms of temper. He had struck
her blows innumerable; but she had borne all in patience, and De
Trauttenberg had discovered dark marks upon her white shoulders which
she had attributed to a fall upon the ice. She saw now the reason of
his estrangement; how his sycophants had poisoned his mind against her
because they feared her.
"Steinbach," she said at last, "tell me the truth. What do the people
think of me? You are a commoner and live among them. I, imprisoned at
Court, unfortunately, know nothing. The opinions of the people never
reach us."
"The people, your Highness, love you. They call you `their Claire.'
You surely know how, when you drive out, they raise their hats and shout
in acclamation."
"Yes," she said in a low, mechanical voice, "but is it real enthusiasm?
Would they really love me if I were Queen?"
"Your Highness is at this moment the most popular woman in the whole
kingdom of Marburg. If it were known that this plot was in progress
there would in all probability be a revolution. Stuhlmann and his
friends are hated everywhere, and their overthrow would cause universal
satisfaction."
"And the people do not really think ill of me?"
"Think ill of you, Princess?" he echoed. "Why, they literally worship
you and the little Princess Ignatia."
She was silent again, walking very slowly, and reflecting deeply. It
was so seldom she had opportunity of speaking with one of the people
unless he were a deputy or a diplomatist, who then put on all his Court
manners, was unnatural, and feared to speak. From the man beside her,
however, she saw she might learn the truth of a matter which was ever
uppermost in her mind. And yet she hesitated to approach what was,
after all, a very delicate subject.
Suddenly, with her mind made up, she halted, and turning to him, said,--
"Steinbach, I want you to answer me truthfully. Do not evade the
question for fear of annoying me. Speak openly, as the friend you are
to me. I wish to know one thing," and she lowered her voice until it
almost faltered. "Have you heard a--well, a scandal concerning myself?"
He made no answer.
She repeated her question; her veiled face turned to his.
"Your Highness only a few moments ago expressed a desire not to discuss
the matter," he replied in a low, distinct voice.
"But I want to know," she urged. "I must know. Tell me the truth. If
you are my friend you will at least be frank with me when I command."
"If you command, Princess, then I must obey, even with reluctance," was
his response. "Yes. I have heard some gossip. It is spoken openly in
Court by the _dames du palais_, and is now being whispered among the
people."
She held her breath. Fortunately, it was dark, for she knew that her
countenance had gone crimson.
"Well?" she asked. "And what do they say of me?"
"They, unfortunately, couple your Highness's name with that of Count
Leitolf, the chief of the private cabinet of his Majesty," was his low
answer.
"Yes," she said in a toneless voice. "And what more?"
"They say that Major Scheel, attache at the Embassy in Paris, recognised
you driving with the Count in the Avenue de l'Opera, when you were
supposed to be at Aix-les-Bains with the little Princess Ignatia."
"Yes. Go on."
"They say, too, that he follows you everywhere--and that your maid
Henriette helps you to leave the palace in secret to meet him."
She heard his words, and her white lips trembled.
"They also declare," he went on in a low voice, "that your love of the
country is only because you are able to meet him without any one
knowing, that your journey here to Vienna is on account of him--that he
has followed you here."
She nodded, without uttering a word.
"The Count has, no doubt, followed your Highness, indiscreetly if I may
say so, for I recognised him last night dining alone at Breying's."
"He did not see you?" she exclaimed anxiously.
"No. I took good care not to be seen. I had no desire that my journey
here should be known, or I should be suspected. I return to-night at
midnight."
"And to be frank, Steinbach, you believe that all this has reached my
husband's ears?" she whispered in a hard, strained voice.
"All that is detrimental to your Highness reaches the Crown Prince," was
his reply to the breathless woman, "and certainly not without
embellishments. That is why I implore of you to be circumspect--why I
am here to tell you of the plot to disgrace you in the people's eyes."
"But the people themselves are now speaking of--of the Count?" she said
in a low, uncertain voice, quite changed from her previous musical tones
when first they met.
"A scandal--and especially a Court one--very soon spreads among the
people. The royal servants gossip outside the palace, and moreover your
Highness's many enemies are only too delighted to assist in spreading
such reports. It gives motive for the Crown Prince's estrangement."
Her head was bent, her hands were trembling. The iron had entered her
soul.
The people--the people whom she so dearly loved, and who had waved their
hands and shouted those glad welcomes to her as she drove out--were now
whispering of Leitolf.
She bit her lip, and her countenance went pale as death as the truth
arose before her in all its hideous ghastliness.
Even the man at her side, the humble man who had stood by her as her
friend, knew that Leitolf was there--in Vienna--to be near her. Even
Steinbach could have no further respect for her as a woman--only respect
because she was one day to be his sovereign.
Her hands were clenched; she held her breath, and shivered as the chill
wind cut through her. She longed to be back in her father's palace; to
be alone in her room to think.
"And nothing more?" she asked in that same blank voice which now caused
her companion to wonder.
"Only that they say evil of you that is not worth repeating," was his
brief answer.
She sighed again, and then when she had sufficiently recovered from the
effect of his words, she whispered in a low voice,--
"I--I can only thank you, Steinbach, for giving me this warning.
Forgive me if--if I am somewhat upset by it--but I am a woman--and
perhaps it is only natural. Trust me to say nothing. Leave Vienna
to-night and return home. If you ever wish to communicate with me write
guardedly, making an appointment, and address your letter to Madame
Emond at the Poste Restante in Brussels. You will recollect the name?"
"Most certainly I shall, your Highness. I can only ask pardon for
speaking so openly. But it was at your request."
"Do not let us mention it further," she urged, her white lips again
compressed. "Leave me now. It is best that I should walk down yonder
to the Parkring alone."
He halted, and bowing low, his hat in his hand, said,--
"I would ask your Imperial Highness to still consider me your humble
servant to command in any way whatsoever, and to believe that I am ever
ready to serve you and to repay the great debt of gratitude I owe to
you."
And, bending, he took her gloved hand and raised it to his lips in
obeisance to the princess who was to be his queen.
"Adieu, Steinbach," she said in a broken voice. "And for the service
you have rendered me to-night I can only return you the thanks of an
unhappy woman."
Then she turned from him quickly, and hurried down the path to the park
entrance, where shone a single gas lamp, leaving him standing alone,
bowing in silence.
He watched her graceful figure out of sight, then sighed, and turned
away in the opposite direction.
A few seconds later the tall, dark figure of a man emerged noiselessly
from the deep shadow of the tree where, unobserved, he had crept up and
stood concealed. The stranger glanced quickly up and down at the two
receding figures, and then at a leisurely pace strode in the direction
the Princess had taken.
When at last she had turned and was out of sight he halted, took a
cigarette from a silver case, lit it after some difficulty in the
tearing wind, and muttered some words which, though inaudible, were
sufficiently triumphant in tone to show that he was well pleased at his
ingenious piece of espionage.
CHAPTER FOUR.
HIS MAJESTY CUPID.
As the twilight fell on the following afternoon a fiacre drew up before
the Hotel Imperial, one of the best and most select hotels in the
Kartner Ring, in Vienna, and from it descended a lady attired in the
deep mourning of a widow.
Of the gold-laced concierge she inquired for Count Carl Leitolf, and was
at once shown into the lift and conducted to a private sitting-room on
the second floor, where a young, fair-moustached, good-looking man, with
well-cut, regular features and dark brown eyes, rose quickly as the door
opened and the waiter announced her.
The moment the door had closed and they were alone he took his visitor's
hand and raised it reverently to his lips, bowing low, with the
exquisite grace of the born courtier.
In an instant she drew it from him and threw back her veil, revealing
her pale, beautiful face--the face of her Imperial Highness the Crown
Princess Claire.
"Highness!" the man exclaimed, glancing anxiously at the door to
reassure himself that it was closed, "I had your note this morning,
but--but are you not running too great a risk by coming here? I could
not reply, fearing that my letter might fall into other hands; otherwise
I would on no account have allowed you to come. You may have been
followed. There are, as you know, spies everywhere."
"I have come, Carl, because I wish to speak to you," she said, looking
unflinchingly into his handsome face. "I wish to know by what right you
have followed me here--to Vienna?"
He drew back in surprise, for her attitude was entirely unexpected.
"I came here upon my own private affairs," he answered.
"That is not the truth," she declared in quick resentment. "You are
here because you believed that you might meet me at the reception after
the State dinner to-night. You applied for a card for it in order that
you could see me--and this, after what passed between us the other day!
Do you consider that you are treating me fairly? Cannot you see that
your constant attentions are compromising me and causing people to
talk?"
"And what, pray, does your Imperial Highness care for this idle Court
gossip?" asked the well-dressed, athletic-looking man, at the same time
placing a chair for her and bowing her to it. "There has been enough of
it already, and you have always expressed the utmost disregard of
anything that might be said, or any stories that might be invented."
"I know," she answered. "But this injudicious action of yours in
following me here is utter madness. It places me in peril. You are
known in Vienna, remember."
"Then if that is your view, your Highness, I can only apologise," he
said most humbly. "I will admit that I came here in order to be able to
get a few minutes' conversation with you to-night. At our Court at home
you know how very difficult it is for me to speak with you, for the
sharp eye of the Trauttenberg is ever upon you."
The Princess's arched brows contracted slightly. She recollected what
Steinbach had revealed to her regarding her lady-in-waiting.
"And it is surely best that you should have difficulty in approaching
me," she said. "I have not forgotten your foolish journey to Paris,
where I had gone incognito to see my old nurse, and how you compelled me
to go out and see the sights in your company. We were recognised. Do
you know that?" she exclaimed in a hard voice. "A man who knew us both
sent word to Court that we were in Paris together."
"Recognised!" he gasped, the colour fading instantly from his face.
"Who saw us?"
"Of his identity I'm not aware," she answered, for she was a clever
diplomatist, and could keep a secret well. She did not reveal Scheel's
name. "I only know that our meeting in Paris is no secret. They
suspect me, and I have you to thank for whatever scandal may now be
invented concerning us."
The lithe, clean-limbed man was silent, his head bent before her. What
could he reply? He knew, alas! too well, that in following her from
Germany to Paris he had acted very injudiciously. She was believed to
be taking the baths at Aix, but a sudden caprice had seized her to run
up to Paris and see her old French nurse, to whom she was much attached.
He had learnt her intention in confidence, and had met her in Paris and
shown her the city. It had been an indiscretion, he admitted.
Yet the recollection of those few delightful days of freedom remained
like a pleasant dream. He recollected her childish delight of it all.
It was out of the season, and they believed that they could go hither
and thither, like the crowds of tourists do, without fear of
recognition. Yet Fate, it seemed, had been against them, and their
secret meeting was actually known!
"Cannot you see the foolishness of it all?" she asked in a low, serious
voice. "Cannot you see, Carl, that your presence here lends colour to
their suspicions? I have enemies--fierce, bitter enemies--as you must
know too well, and yet you imperil me like this!" she cried
reproachfully.
"I can make no defence, Princess," he said lamely. "I can only regret
deeply having caused you any annoyance."
"Annoyance!" she echoed in anger. "Your injudicious actions have placed
me in the greatest peril. The people have coupled our names, and you
are known to have followed me on here."
Her companion was silent, his eyes downcast, as though not daring to
meet her reproachful gaze.
"I have been foolish--very foolish, I know," she cried. "In the old
days, when we knew each other at Wartenstein, a boy-and-girl affection
sprang up between us; and then, when you left the University, they sent
you as attache to the Embassy in London, and we gradually forgot each
other. You grew tired of diplomacy, and returned to find me the wife of
the Crown Prince; and in a thoughtless moment I promised, at your
request, to recommend you to a post in the private cabinet of the King.
Since that day I have always regretted. I ought never to have allowed
you to return. I am as much to blame as you are, for it was an entirely
false step. Yet how was I to know?"
"True, my Princess!" said the man in a low, choking voice. "How were
you to know that I still loved you in silence, that I was aware of the
secret of your domestic unhappiness, that I--"
"Enough!" she cried, drawing herself up. "The word love surely need not
be spoken between us. I know it all, alas! Yet I beg of you to
remember that I am the wife of another, and a woman of honour."
"Ah yes," he exclaimed, his trembling hand resting on the back of the
chair upon which she sat. "Honour--yes. I love you, Claire--you surely
know that well. But we do not speak of it; it is a subject not to be
discussed by us. Day after day, unable to speak to you, I watch you in
silence. I know your bitterness in that gilded prison they call the
Court, and long always to help you and rescue you from that--that man to
whom you are, alas! wedded. It is all so horrible, so loathsome, that I
recoil when I see him smiling upon you while at heart he hates you. For
weeks, since last we spoke together, how I have lived I scarcely know--
utter despair, insane hopes alternately possess me--but at last the day
came, and I followed you here to speak with you, my Princess."
She remained silent, somewhat embarrassed, as he took her gloved hand
and again kissed it.
She was nervous, but next instant determined.
"Alas! I have not failed to notice your strong affection for me, Carl,"
she said with a heavy sigh, her beautiful face slightly flushed. "You
must therefore control this passion that seems to have been rekindled
within your heart. For my sake go, and forget me," she implored.
"Resign your appointment, and re-enter the diplomatic service of the
Emperor. I will speak to Lindenau, who will give you an appointment,
say, in Rome or Paris. But you must not remain at Treysa. I--I will
not allow it."
"But, Princess," he cried in dismay, "I cannot go and leave you there
alone among your enemies. You--"
"You must; for, unintentionally, because you have my interests at heart,
you are my worst enemy. You are indiscreet, just as every man is who
loves a woman truly."
"Then you really believe I love you still, Claire," he cried, bending
towards her. "You remember those delightfully happy days at Wartenstein
long ago, when--"
She held up her hand to stop the flow of his words.
He looked at her. For an instant her glance wavered and shrank.
She was his idol, the beautiful idol with eyes like heaven.
Yes, she was very beautiful--beautiful with all the beauty of woman now,
not with the beauty of the girl.
And she, with her sad gaze fixed upon him, remembered all the past--the
great old castle in the far-off Tyrol, her laughter at his awkwardness;
their chats in English when both were learning that language; the
quarrel over the lilac blossom. At Arcachon--the shore and the pine
forest; the boyish kiss stolen under the mistletoe; the declaration of
their young love on that lonely mountain-side with the world lying at
their feet; the long, sweet, silent kisses exchanged on their homeward
walk; the roses she had given him as farewell pledge when he had left
for London.
All had gone--gone for ever.
Nevertheless, though everything was past, she could not resist an
impulse to recall it--oh, very briefly--in a few feeling words, as one
may recall some sweet and rapturous dream.
"We were very foolish," she said.
He was silent. His heart was too full for words. He knew that a woman
who can look back on the past--on rapture, delight, the first thrilling
kiss, the first fervent vow--and say, "We were very foolish," is a woman
changed beyond recall.
In other days, had he heard such sacrilegious words a cry of horror
would have sprung from his lips. But now, though he shuddered with
anguish, he simply said,--
"I shall always remember it, Princess;" adding, with a glance at her,
"and you."
Her wonderful eyes shrank once more and her lips quivered, as though for
one second touched again by the light wing of love--as if, indeed, she
felt she had done something unworthy of her, something which might bring
her regret hereafter.
In the midst of his confusion, the man remained victorious. She would
never be his, and yet she would be his for ever. No matter how she
might strive, she would never entirely forget.
She sighed, and rising, walked unsteadily to the window, where, below,
the street lamps were just being lit. Daylight had faded, and in the
room it was almost dark.
"To-night, Carl, we meet for the last time," she said with an effort, in
a hard, strained voice. "Both for you and for me it is best that we
should part and forget. I did wrong to recommend you to the post at
Court, and I ought to have foreseen the grave peril of the situation.
Fortunately, I have realised it in time, even though our enemies already
believe ill and invent lies concerning us. You must not return to
Court. Remember, I forbid you. To-night, at the State dinner, I will
speak to Lindenau and ask him to send you as attache to Rome or to
Petersburg. It is the wisest course."
"Then your Highness really intends to banish me?" he said hoarsely, in a
low, broken voice of reproach.
"Yes," she faltered. "I--I must--Carl--to--to save myself."
"But you are cruel--very cruel--Princess," he cried, his voice trembling
with emotion.
"You must realise my peril," she said seriously. "Your presence at
Court increases my danger hourly, because"--and she hesitated--"because,
Carl, I confess to you that I do not forget--I never shall forget," she
added as the tears sprang to her blue eyes. "Therefore, go! Let me
bear my own burden as best I can alone, and let me remember you as what
you have always been--chivalrous to an unhappy woman; a man of honour."
Slowly she moved across the room towards the door, but he arrested her
progress, and took her small hand quickly in his grasp.
For some moments, in the falling gloom, he looked into her sweet,
tearful face without speaking; then crushing down the lump that arose in
his throat, he raised to his hot, passionate lips the hand of the woman
he loved, and, imprinting upon it a tender, lingering kiss, murmured,--
"Adieu, Claire--my Princess--my first, my only love!" She drew her hand
away as his passionate words fell upon her ear, sighed heavily, and in
silence opened the door and passed out from his presence.
And thus were two brave hearts torn asunder.
CHAPTER FIVE.
SOME SUSPICIONS.
State dinners, those long, tedious affairs at which the conversation is
always stilted and the bearing of everybody is stiff and unnatural,
always bored the Crown Princess Claire to death.
Whenever she could she escaped them; but as a Crown Princess she was
compelled by Court etiquette to undergo ordeals which, to a woman not
educated as an Imperial Archduchess, would have been impossible. She
had trained herself to sit for hours smiling and good-humoured, although
at heart she hated all that glittering formality and rich display.
There were times when at her own Court at Treysa, at the military
anniversary dinners that were so often held, she had been compelled to
sit at table with her husband and the guests for four and five hours on
end, without showing any sign of fatigue beyond taking her
smelling-salts from the hand of her lady-in-waiting. Yet she never
complained, though the eating, and more especially the drinking,
disgusted her. It was a duty--one of the many wearisome, soul-killing
duties which devolve upon a Crown Princess--of which the world at large
is in utter ignorance. Therefore she accepted it in silence, yet bored
always by meeting and speaking with the same circle of people day after
day--a small circle which was ever intriguing, ever consumed by its own
jealousies, ever striving for the favour of the aged king; the
narrow-minded little world within the Palace who treated those outside
as though of different flesh and blood to themselves.
Whether at a marriage, at a funeral, at the opera, at a review, or at a
charity _fete_--everywhere where her Court duties called her--she met
the same people, she heard the same interminable chatter and the same
shameful scandals, until, unhappy in her own domestic life, she had
grown to loathe it all, and to long for that liberty of which she had
dreamed when a girl at her father's castle at Wartenstein, or at the
great old Residenz-Schloss, or palace, at Pressburg.
Yet what liberty could she, heiress to a throne, obtain; what, indeed,
within her husband's Court, a circle who dined at five o'clock and were
iron-bound by etiquette?
The State dinner at the Imperial palace that night differed but little
from any other State dinner--long, dull, and extremely uninteresting.
Given in honour of a Swedish Prince who was at the moment the guest of
the Emperor, there were present the usual circle of Imperial Archdukes
and Archduchesses, who after dinner were joined in the great reception
room by the Ministers of State, the British, French, and Italian
Ambassadors, the Swedish Minister and the whole staff of the Swedish
Embassy in the Schwindgasse. Every one was in uniform and wore his
orders, the Emperor himself standing at the end of the room, chatting
with his young guest in French.
The Crown Princess Claire, a striking figure in turquoise chiffon, was
standing near, discussing Leoncavallo's new opera with her cousin, the
Princess Marie of Bourbon, who had arrived only a few days before from
Madrid. Suddenly her eye caught the figure she had all the evening been
in Search of.
Count de Lindenau, Privy Councillor, Chamberlain, Minister of the
Imperial Household, and Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Austrian
Empire--a short, rather stout, bald-headed man, with heavy white
moustache, with the crimson ribbon of the Order of Saint Stephen of
Hungary across his shirt-front and the Grand Cross in brilliants upon
his coat--stopped to bow low before the Crown Princess, who in an
instant seized the opportunity to leave her cousin and speak with him.
"It is really quite a long time since we met, Count," she exclaimed
pleasantly. "I met the Countess at Cannes in January, and was delighted
to see her so much better. Is she quite well again?"
"I thank your Imperial Highness," responded the Minister. "The Countess
has completely recovered. At present she is at Como. And you? Here
for a long stay in Vienna, I hope. We always regret that you have left
us, you know," he added, smiling, for she had, ever since a girl, been
friendly with him, and had often visited his wife at their castle at
Mauthhausen.
"No; I regret that I must return to Treysa in a few days," she said as
she moved along and he strolled at her side down the great gilded room
where the little groups were standing gossiping. Then, when his
Excellency had asked after the health of the Crown Prince and of the
little Princess Ignatia, she drew him aside to a spot where they could
not be overheard, and halting, said in a lower tone,--
"I have wished to meet you, Count, because I want you to do me a
favour."
"Your Imperial Highness knows quite well that if I can serve you in any
way I am always only too delighted." And he bowed.
More than once she had asked favour of Lindenau, the stern Foreign
Minister and favourite of the Emperor, and he had always acted as she
wished. She had known him ever since her birth. He had, indeed, been
present at her baptism.
"Well, it is this," she said. "I want to give my recommendation to you
on behalf of Count Leitolf, who is at present chief of the King's
private cabinet at Treysa, and who is strongly desirous of returning to
the Austrian diplomatic service, and is anxious for a post abroad."
Mention of Leitolf's name caused the wily old Minister to glance at her
quickly. The rumour had reached his ears, and in an instant he
recognised the situation--the Crown Princess wished to rid herself of
him. But the old fellow was diplomatic, and said, as though compelled
to recall the name,--
"Leitolf? Let me see. That is Count Carl, whom I sent to London a few
years ago? He resigned his post to take service under your
father-in-law the King. Ah yes, I quite recollect. And he now wishes
to be appointed abroad again, eh? And you wish to recommend him?"
"Exactly, Count," she answered. "I think that Leitolf is tired of our
Court; he finds it too dull. He would prefer Rome, he tells me."
"Your Imperial Highness is well aware that any recommendation of yours
always has the most earnest attention," said the Minister, with a polite
bow. His quick grey eyes were watching the beautiful woman sharply. He
wondered what had occurred between her and Count Carl.
"Then you will send him to Rome?" she asked, unable to conceal her
eagerness.
"If he will present himself at the Ministry, he will be at once
appointed to the Embassy to the Quirinal," responded his Excellency
quietly.
"But he will not present himself, I am afraid."
"Oh, why not?" inquired the great Austrian diplomatist, regarding her in
surprise.
"Because--" and she hesitated, as a slight flush crossed her
features--"because he is rather ashamed to ask for a second appointment,
having resigned from London."
The old Minister smiled dubiously.
"Ah!" he exclaimed confidentially, "I quite understand. Your Imperial
Highness wishes to get rid of him from your Court, eh?"
The Princess started, twisting her diamond bracelet nervously round her
wrist.
"Why do you think that, Count?" she asked quickly, surprised that he
should have thus divined her motive.
"Well, your Imperial Highness is rather unduly interested in the man--if
you will permit me to say so," was his answer. "Besides, if I may speak
frankly, as I know I may, I have regarded his presence in your Court as
distinctly dangerous--for you. There are, you know, evil tongues ever
ready to invent scandal, even against a Crown Princess."
"I know," she said, in a low, changed voice. "But let us walk;
otherwise they will all wonder why I am talking with you so long," and
the two moved slowly along side by side. "I know," she went on--"I know
that I have enemies; and, to confess the truth, I wish, in order to show
them that they lie, to send him from me."
"Then he shall go. To-morrow I will send him orders to rejoin the
service, and to proceed to Rome immediately. And," he added in a kindly
voice, "I can only congratulate your Imperial Highness upon your
forethought. Leitolf is entirely without discretion. Only this evening
I was actually told that he had followed you to Vienna, and--"
But he stopped abruptly, without concluding his sentence. "And what
else?" she asked, turning pale. Even the Minister knew; therefore
Leitolf had evidently allowed himself to be seen.
"Shall I tell you, Princess?"
"Certainly; you need not keep anything from me."
"I was also told that he is staying at the Hotel Imperial, and that you
had called upon him this afternoon." She started, and looked him
straight in the face.
"Who told you that?" she demanded.
"I learned it from the report of the secret agents of the Ministry."
"Then I am spied upon here!" she exclaimed, pale with anger. "Even in
my own home watch is kept upon me."
"Not upon your Imperial Highness," was the great Minister's calm reply,
"but upon the man we have recently been discussing. It was, I venture
to think, rather indiscreet of you to go to the hotel; although, of
course, the knowledge of your visit is confidential, and goes no further
than myself. It is a secret of the Ministry."
"Indiscreet!" she echoed with a sigh. "In this polluted atmosphere, to
breathe freely is to be indiscreet. Because I am an Archduchess I am
fettered as a prisoner, and watched like a criminal under surveillance.
My enemies, jealous of my position and power, have invented scandalous
stories that have aroused suspicion, and for that reason you all believe
ill of me."
"Pardon me, Princess," said the crafty old man, bowing, "I, for one, do
not. Your anxiety to rid yourself of the fellow is proof to me that the
scandal is a pure invention, and I am only too pleased to render you
this service. Your real enemies are those around your husband, who have
hinted and lied regarding you in order to estrange you from Court."
"Then you are really my friend, Count?" she asked anxiously. "You do
not believe what they say regarding me?"
"I do not, Princess," he replied frankly; "and I trust you will still
regard me, as I hope I have ever been, your Imperial Highness's friend.
I know full well how Leitolf craved your favour for recommendation to
your King; and you, with a woman's blindness to the grave eventualities
of the future, secured him the appointment. Of late you have, I
suppose, realised the fatal mistake?"
"Yes," she said in a low voice; "I have now foreseen my own peril. I
have been very foolish; but I have halted, and Leitolf must go."
"Very wise--very wise indeed! Your Imperial Highness cannot afford to
run any further risk. In a few months, or a couple of years at most,
the poor King's disease must prove fatal, and you will find yourself
Queen of a brilliant kingdom. Once Queen, your position will be
assured, and you will make short work of all those who have conspired to
secure your downfall. You will, perhaps, require assistance. If so,
rely upon me to render you in secret whatever help lies in my power.
With you, a Hapsbourg, as Queen, the influence of Austria must be
paramount, remember. Therefore I beg of your Imperial Highness to
exercise the greatest discretion not to imperil yourself. The Crown
Prince must be allowed no loophole through which he can openly quarrel
with you. Remain patient and forbearing until you are Queen."
They were in a corner of the great hall, standing behind one of the high
marble columns and unobserved.
"I am always patient, Count," was her rather sad response, her chest
heaving beneath her chiffon. "As you well know, my marriage has not
been a happy one; but I strive to do my duty to both the Court and the
people. I make no denial to you. You doubtless know the truth--that
when a girl I loved Count Leitolf, and that it was an act prompted by
foolish sentimentalism to have connived at his appointment at my
husband's own Court. Betrayed, perhaps, by my own actions, my enemies
have seized upon my embarrassing situation to lie about me. Ah," she
added bitterly, "how little they know of my own dire unhappiness!"
"No, no," urged the Minister, seemingly full of sympathy for her,
knowing the truth as he did. "Bear up; put a brave countenance always
towards the world. When Leitolf has gone your Imperial Highness will
have less embarrassment, and people cannot then place any
misconstructions upon your actions. You will not have the foolish young
man following you wherever you go, as he now does. At noon to-morrow I
will sign the decree for his immediate appointment to Rome, and he will
receive but little leave of absence, I can assure you. He will be as
much a prisoner in the Palazzo Chigi as is his Holiness in the Vatican,"
he added.
"Thank you," she answered simply, glancing gratefully into his grey,
deeply-lined face; and as he bowed to her she left him and swept up the
room to where the Emperor was engaged in conversation with Lord
Powerstock, the British Ambassador.
The old Minister's face had changed the instant he left her. The mask
of the courtier had fallen from the wily old countenance, and glancing
after her, he muttered some words that were inaudible.
If she had but seen the evil smile that played about the old
diplomatist's lips, she would have detected that his intention was to
play her false, and she might then have saved herself.
But, alas! in her ignorance she went on light-heartedly, her long train
sweeping behind her, believing in De Lindenau's well-feigned sympathy,
and congratulating herself that the all-powerful personage behind the
Emperor was still her friend.
The Minister saw that she was satisfied; then turning on his heel, he
gave vent to a short, hard laugh of triumph.
CHAPTER SIX.
THE HOUSE OF HER ENEMIES.
Two days later the Crown Princess Claire returned to Marburg.
In the twilight the express from Vienna came to a standstill in the big,
echoing station at Treysa, the bright and wealthy capital, and
descending from her private saloon, she walked over the red carpet laid
for her, bowing pleasantly to the line of bareheaded officials waiting
to receive her; then, mounting into her open landau, she drove up the
fine, tree-lined Klosterstrasse to the royal palace.
De Trauttenberg was with her--the woman whom she now knew to be a spy.
Around her, on every side, the crowd at her side shouted a glad welcome
to "their Claire," as they called her, and just before the royal
carriage could move off, two or three of the less timorous ones managed
to seize her hand and kiss it, though the police unceremoniously pushed
them away.
She smiled upon the enthusiastic crowd; but, alas! she was heavy of
heart. How little, she thought, did those people who welcomed her dream
of her unhappiness! She loved the people, and, looking upon them,
sighed to think that she was not free like them.
Behind her clattered the hoofs of her cavalry escort, and beside the
carriage were two agents of police on bicycles. Wherever she moved in
her husband's kingdom she was always under escort, because of anarchist
threats and socialistic rumours.
Marburg was one of the most beautiful and wealthiest of the kingdoms and
duchies comprised in the German Empire. The fine capital of Treysa was
one of the show cities of Germany, always bright, gay, and brilliant,
with splendid streets, wide, tree-lined promenades, a great opera house,
numerous theatres, gay restaurants, and an ever-increasing commerce.
Frequented much by English and Americans, there were fine hotels,
delightful public gardens, and pleasant suburbs. In no other part of
the Empire were the nobility so wealthy or so exclusive, and certainly
no Court in Europe was so difficult of access as that of Marburg.
The kingdom, which possessed an area of nearly seven thousand square
miles and a population of over fifteen millions, was rich in
manufactures and in minerals, besides being a smiling country in a high
state of cultivation, with beautiful mountainous and wooded districts,
where in the valleys were situated many delightful summer resorts.
Through its length and breadth, and far beyond the frontiers, the name
of the Crown Princess Claire was synonymous of all that was good and
affable, generous to the poor, and ever interested in the welfare of the
people.
The big electric globes were already shining white in the streets as she
drove back to the beautiful royal palace that was, alas! to her a
prison. Her few days of liberty in Vienna were over, and when
presently, after traversing many great thoroughfares full of life and
movement, the carriage swung out into a broader tree-lined avenue, at
the end of which were the great gates of the royal gardens, her brave
heart fell within her.
Beyond was the house of her enemies, the house in which she was
compelled to live friendless, yet surrounded by those who were daily
whispering of her overthrow.
The great gates swung open to allow the cavalcade to pass, then closed
again with a clang that, reaching her ear, caused her to shudder.
The Countess noticed it, and asked whether she felt cold. To this she
gave a negative reply, and still remained silent, until the carriage,
passing up through the beautiful park, at last drew up before the
magnificent palace.
Descending, she allowed the gorgeously-dressed man in the royal livery
to take her cloak from her shoulders; and then, without a word, hastened
along the great marble hall, up the grand staircase and along corridor
after corridor--those richly-carpeted corridors of her prison that she
knew so well--to her own splendid suite of apartments.
The servants she met at every turn bowed to her, until she opened the
door of a large, airy, well-furnished room, where a middle-aged woman,
in cap and apron, sat reading by a shaded lamp.
In an instant, on recognising the newcomer, she sprang to her feet. But
at the same moment the Princess rushed to the dainty little cot in the
corner and sank down beside the sleeping curly-haired child--her child--
the little Princess Ignatia.
So passionately did she kiss the sweet chubby little face of the
sleeping child that she awoke, and recognising who it was, put out her
little hands around her mother's neck.
"Ah, my little pet!" cried the Princess. "And how are you? It seems so
long, so very long, since we parted." And her voice trembled, for tears
stood in her eyes. The child was all she had in the world to love and
cherish. She was her first thought always. The glare and glitter of
the brilliant Court were all hateful to her, and she spent all the time
she dared in the nursery with little Ignatia.
The English nurse, Allen, standing at her side, said, with that
formality which was bound to be observed within those walls,--
"The Princess is in most excellent health, your Imperial Highness. I
have carried out your Highness's instructions, and taken her each day
for a walk in the park."
"That's right, Allen," responded the mother, also in English. "Where is
the Crown Prince?"
"I have not seen him, your Highness, since you left. He has not been in
to see Ignatia."
Claire sighed within herself, but made no outward sign. "Ah, I expect
he has been away--to Berlin, perhaps. Is there any function to-night,
have you heard?"
"A State ball, your Highness. At least they said so in the servants'
hall."
The Princess glanced at the little silver timepiece, for she feared that
her presence was imperative, even though she detested all such
functions, where she knew she would meet that brilliant crowd of men and
women, all of them her sworn enemies. What Steinbach had told her in
confidence had lifted the scales from her eyes. There was a wide and
cleverly-contrived conspiracy against her.
She took her fair-haired child in her arms, while Allen, with deft
fingers, took off her hat and veil. Her maids were awaiting her in her
own room, but she preferred to see Ignatia before it was too late to
disturb the little one's sleep. With the pretty, blue-eyed little thing
clinging around her neck, she paced the room with it, speaking, in
German, as every fond mother will speak to the one she adores.
Though born to the purple, an Imperial Princess, Claire was very human
after all. She regretted always that she was not as other women were,
allowed to be her own mistress, and to see and to tend to her child's
wants instead of being compelled so often to leave her in the hands of
others, who, though excellent servants, were never as a mother.
She sent Allen upon a message to the other end of the palace in order to
be alone with the child, and when the door closed she kissed its soft
little face fondly again and again, and then burst into tears. Those
Court sycophants were conspiring, to drive her away--perhaps even to
part her from the only one for whom she entertained a spark of
affection. Many of her enemies were women. Could any of them really
know all that was meant by a mother's heart?
Prince Ferdinand-Leopold-Joseph-Marie, her husband, seldom, if ever, saw
the child. For weeks he never mentioned its existence, and when he did
it was generally with an oath, in regret that it was not a son and an
heir to the throne.
In his paroxysms of anger he had cursed her and his little daughter, and
declared openly that he hated the sight of them both. But she was ever
patient. Seldom she responded to his taunts or his sarcasm, or resented
his brutal treatment. She was philosophic enough to know that she had a
heavy burden to bear, and for the sake of her position as future Queen
of Marburg she must bear it bravely.
Allen was absent fully a quarter of an hour, during which time she spoke
continually to little Ignatia, pacing up and down the room with her.
The child, seeing her mother's tears, stared at her with her big,
wide-open eyes.
"Why does mother cry?" she asked in her childish voice, stroking her
cheek.
"Because mother is not happy, darling," was the Princess's sad answer.
"But," she added, brightening up, "you are happy, aren't you? Allen has
bought you such a beautiful doll, she tells me."
"Yes, mother," the child answered. "And to-morrow, Allen promises, if I
am very good, that we will go to buy a perambulator for my dolly to ride
in. Won't that be nice?"
"Oh, it will! But you must be very, very good--and never cry, like
mother, will you?"
"No," answered the little one. "I'll never cry, like mother does."
And the unhappy woman, hearing the child's lisping words, swallowed the
great lump that arose in her throat. It was surely pathetic, that
admission of a heart-broken mother to her child. It showed that even
though an Imperial Princess, she was still a womanly woman, just as any
good woman of the people.
A few moments later Allen returned with the reply to the message she had
sent to the aged King.
"His Majesty says that, though regretting your Imperial Highness is
tired after her journey, yet your presence with the Crown Prince at the
ball is imperative." Claire sighed with a heavy heart, saying,--
"Very well, Allen. Then we will put Ignatia to bed, for I must go at
once and dress," and she passed her hand across her hot, wearied brow.
Again and again she kissed the child, and then, having put her back into
her cot, over which was the royal crown of Marburg in gold, she bade the
infant Princess goodnight, and went along to eat a hasty dinner--for she
was hungry after her eighteen-hour journey--and afterwards to put
herself in the charge of her quick-handed maids, to prepare her for the
brilliant function of that evening.
Two hours later, when she swept into the magnificent Throne Room, a
brilliant, beautiful figure in her Court gown of cream, and wearing her
wonderful tiara, her face was as stern and haughty as any of those
members of the royal family present. With her long train rustling
behind her, and with her orders and ribbons giving the necessary touch
of colour to her bodice, she took up her position beside her husband, a
fair-headed, round-faced, slight-moustached man, in a dark-blue uniform,
and wearing a number of orders. His face was flat and expressionless.
Though they had not met for a week, no word of greeting escaped him.
They stood side by side, as though they were strangers. He eyed her
quickly, and his countenance turned slightly pale, as though displeased
at her presence.
Yet the whole assembly, even though hating her, could not but admire her
neat waist, her splendid figure, and matchless beauty. In the whole of
the Courts of Europe there was no prettier woman than the Crown Princess
Claire; her figure was perfect, and her gait always free--the gait of a
princess. Even when dressed in her maid's dresses, as she had done on
occasion, her walk betrayed her. Imperial blood can seldom be
disguised.
The hundred women, those German princesses, duchesses, countesses,
baronesses, to each of whom attached their own particular scandal--the
brilliant little world that circled around the throne--looked at her
standing there with her husband, her hands clasped before her, and
envied her looks, figure, position--everything. She was a marked woman.
The proud, haughty expression upon her face as she regarded the assembly
was only assumed. It was the mask she was compelled to wear at Court at
the old King's command. Her nature was the reverse of haughty, yet the
artificiality of palace life made it necessary for the Crown Princess to
be as unapproachable as the Queen herself.
The guests were filing before the white-haired King, the hide-bound old
martyr to etiquette, when the Crown Prince spoke to his wife in an
undertone, saying roughly, with bitter sarcasm,--
"So you are back? Couldn't stay away from us longer, I suppose?"
"I remained in Vienna as long as I said I should," was the sweet-faced
woman's calm reply.
"A pity you didn't stay there altogether," he muttered. "You are
neither use nor ornament here."
"You have told me that several times before. Much as I regret it,
Ferdinand, my place is here."
"Yes, at my side--to annoy me," he said, frowning.
"I regret to cause you any annoyance," she answered. "It is not
intentional, I assure you."
A foul oath escaped him, and he turned from her to speak with Count
Graesal, grand-marechal of the Court. Her face, however, betrayed
nothing of his insult. At Court her countenance was always sphinx-like.
Only in her private life, in that gorgeous suite of apartments on the
opposite side of the palace, did she give way to her own bitter
unhappiness and blank despair.
CHAPTER SEVEN.
A SHAMEFUL TRUTH.
When at last the brilliant company moved on into the great ballroom she
had an opportunity of walking among those men and women who, though they
bent before her, cringing and servile, were, she knew, eagerly seeking
her ruin. The Ministers, Stuhlmann, Hoepfner, and Meyer, all three
creatures of the King, bowed low to her, but she knew they were her
worst enemies. The Countess Hupertz, a stout, fair-haired,
masculine-looking woman, also bent before her and smiled--yet this woman
had invented the foulest lies concerning her, and spread them
everywhere. In all that brilliant assembly she had scarcely one single
person whom she could term a friend. And for a very simple reason.
Friendliness with the Crown Princess meant disfavour with the King, and
none of those place-seekers and sycophants could afford to risk that.
Yet, knowing that they were like a pack of hungry wolves about her,
seeking to tear her reputation to shreds and cast her out of the
kingdom, she walked among them, speaking with them, and smiling as
though she were perfectly happy.
Presently, when the splendid orchestra struck up and dancing commenced,
she came across Hinckeldeym, the wily old President of the Council of
Ministers, who, on many occasions, had showed that, unlike the others,
he regarded her as an ill-used wife. A short, rather podgy, dark-haired
man, in Court dress, he bowed, welcomed her back to Treysa, and inquired
after her family in Vienna.
Then, as she strolled with him to the farther end of the room, lazily
fanning herself with her great ostrich-feather fan, she said in a low
voice,--
"Hinckeldeym, as you know, I have few friends here. I wonder whether
you are one?"
The flabby-faced old Minister pursed his lips, and glanced at her
quickly, for he was a wily man. Then, after a moment's pause, he
said,--
"I think that ever since your Imperial Highness came here as Crown
Princess I have been your partisan. Indeed, I thought I had the honour
of reckoning myself among your Highness's friends."
"Yes, yes," she exclaimed quickly. "But I have so many enemies here,"
and she glanced quickly around, "that it is really difficult for me to
distinguish my friends."
"Enemies!" echoed the tactful Minister in surprise. "What causes your
Highness to suspect such a thing?"
"I do not suspect--I know," was her firm answer as she stood aside with
him. "I have learnt what these people are doing. Why? Tell me,
Hinckeldeym--why is this struggling crowd plotting against me?"
He looked at her for a moment in silence. He was surprised that she
knew the truth.
"Because, your Imperial Highness--because they fear you. They know too
well what will probably occur when you are Queen."
"Yes," she said in a hard, determined voice. "When I am Queen I will
sweep clear this Augean stable. There will be a change, depend upon it.
This Court shall be an upright and honourable one, and not, as it now
is, a replica of that of King Charles the Second of England. They hate
me, Hinckeldeym--they hate me because I am a Hapsbourg; because I try
and live uprightly and love my child, and when I am Queen I will show
them that even a Court may be conducted with gaiety coupled with
decorum."
The Minister--who, though unknown to her, was, perhaps, her worst enemy,
mainly through fear of the future--listened to all she said in discreet
silence. It was a pity, he thought, that the conspiracy had been
betrayed to her, for although posing as her friend he would have been
the first to exult over her downfall. It would place him in a position
of safety.
He noted her threat. It only confirmed what the Court had anticipated--
namely, that upon the death of the infirm old monarch, all would be
changed, and that brilliant aristocratic circle would be sent forth into
obscurity--and by an Austrian Archduchess, too!
The Princess Claire unfortunately believed the crafty Hinckeldeym to be
her friend, therefore she told him all that she had learnt; of course,
not betraying the informer.
"From to-day," she went on in a hard voice, "my attitude is changed. I
will defend myself. Against those who have lied about me, and invented
their vile scandals, I will stand as an enemy, and a bitter one.
Hitherto I have been complacent and patient, suffering in silence, as so
many defenceless women suffer. But for the sake of this kingdom, over
which I shall one day be Queen, I will stand firm; and you, Hinckeldeym,
must remain my friend."
"Your Imperial Highness has but to command me," replied the false old
courtier, bowing low with the lie ever ready upon his lips. "I hope to
continue as your friend."
"From the day I first set foot in Treysa, these people have libelled me
and plotted my ruin," she went on. "I know it all. I can give the
names of each of my enemies, and I am kept informed of all the
scandalous tales whispered into my husband's ears. Depend upon it that
those liars and scandalmongers will in due time reap their reward."
"I know very little of it," the Minister declared in a low voice, so
that he could not be overheard. "Perhaps, however, your Highness has
been indiscreet--has, I mean, allowed these people some loophole through
which to cast their shafts?"
"They speak of Leitolf," she said quite frankly. "And they libel me, I
know."
"I hear to-day that Leitolf is recalled to Vienna, and is being sent as
attache to Rome," he remarked. "Perhaps it is as well in the present
circumstances."
She looked him straight in the face as the amazing truth suddenly dawned
upon her.
"Then you, too, Hinckeldeym, believe that what is said about us is
true!" she exclaimed hoarsely, suspecting, for the first time, that the
man with the heavy, flabby face might play her false.
And she had confessed to him, of all men, her intention of changing the
whole Court entourage the instant her husband ascended the throne! She
saw how terribly injudicious she had been.
But the cringing courtier exhibited his white palms, and with that
clever exhibition of sympathy which had hitherto misled her, said,--
"Surely your Imperial Highness knows me sufficiently well to be aware
that in addition to being a faithful servant to his Majesty the King, I
am also a strong and staunch friend of yours. There may be a plot," he
said; "a vile, dastardly plot to cast you out from Marburg. Yet if you
are only firm and judicious, you must vanquish them, for they are all
cowards--all of them." She believed him, little dreaming that the words
she had spoken that night had sealed her fate. Heinrich Hinckeldeym was
a far-seeing man, the friend of anybody who had future power in his
hands--a man who was utterly unscrupulous, and who would betray his
closest friend when necessity demanded. And yet, with his courtly
manner, his fat yet serious face, his clever speech, and his marvellous
tact, he had deceived more than one of the most eminent diplomatists in
Europe, including even Bismarck himself.
He looked at her with his bright, ferret-like eyes, debating within
himself when the end of her should be. He and his friends had already
decided that the blow was soon to be struck, for every day's delay
increased their peril. The old King's malady might terminate fatally at
any moment, and once Queen, then to remove her would be impossible.
She had revealed to him openly her intention, therefore he was
determined to use in secret her own words as a weapon against her, for
he was utterly unscrupulous.
The intrigues of Court had a hundred different undercurrents, but it was
part of his policy to keep well versed in them all. His finger was ever
upon the pulse of that circle about the throne, while he was also one of
the few men in Marburg who had the ear of the aristocratic old monarch
with whom etiquette was as a religion.
"Your Imperial Highness is quite right in contemplating the Crown
Prince's accession to the throne," he said ingeniously, in order to
further humour her. "The doctors see the King daily, and the
confidential reports made to us Ministers are the reverse of reassuring.
In a few months at most the end must come--suddenly in all probability.
Therefore the Crown Prince should prepare himself for the
responsibilities of the throne, when your Highness will be able to repay
your enemies for all their ill-nature."
"I shall know the way, never fear," she answered in a low, firm voice.
"To-day their power is paramount, but to-morrow mine shall be. I shall
then live only for my husband and my child. At present I am living for
a third reason--to vindicate myself."
"Then your Imperial Highness contemplates changing everything?" he asked
simply, but with the ingenuity of a great diplomatist. Every word of
her reply he determined to use in order to secure her overthrow.
"I shall change all Ministers of State, Chamberlains, every one, from
the Chancellor of the Orders down to the Grand Master of the Ceremonies.
They shall all go, and first of all the _dames du palais_--those women
who have so cleverly plotted against me, but of whose conspiracy I am
now quite well aware." And she mentioned one or two names--names that
had been revealed to her by the obscure functionary Steinbach.
The Minister saw that the situation was a grave, even desperate one. He
was uncertain how much she knew concerning the plot, and was therefore
undecided as to what line he should adopt. In order to speak in private
they left the room, pacing the long, green-carpeted corridor that,
enclosed in glass, ran the whole length of that wing of the palace. He
tried by artful means to obtain from her further details, but she
refused to satisfy him. She knew the truth, and that, she declared, was
all sufficient.
Old Hinckeldeym was a power in Marburg. For eighteen years he had been
the confidant of the King, and now fearing his favour on the wane, had
wheedled himself into the good graces of the Crown Prince, who had given
him to understand, by broad hints, that he would be only too pleased to
rid himself of the Crown Princess. Therefore, if he could effect this,
his future was assured. And what greater weapon could he have against
her than her own declaration of her intention to sweep clear the Court
of its present entourage?
He had assuredly played his cards wonderfully well. He was a past
master in deception and double-dealing. The Princess, believing that he
was at least her friend, had spoken frankly to him, never for one moment
expecting a foul betrayal.
Yet, if the truth were told, it was that fat-faced, black-eyed man who
had first started the wicked calumny which had coupled her name with
Leitolf; he who had dropped scandalous hints to the Crown Prince of his
beautiful wife's _penchant_ for the good-looking _chef du cabinet_; he
who had secretly stirred up the hostility against the daughter of the
Austrian Archduke, and whose fertile brain had invented lies which were
so ingeniously concocted that they possessed every semblance of truth.
A woman of Imperial birth may be a diplomatist, versed in all the
intricacies of Court etiquette and Court usages, but she can never be at
the same time a woman of the world. Her education is not that of
ordinary beings; therefore, as in the case of the Princess Claire,
though shrewd and tactful, she was no match for the crafty old Minister
who for eighteen years had directed the destiny of that most important
kingdom of the German Empire.
The yellow-haired Countess Hupertz, one of Hinckeldeym's puppets,
watched the Princess and Minister walking in the corridor, and smiled
grimly. While the orchestra played those dreamy waltzes, the tragedy of
a throne was being enacted, and a woman--a sweet, good, lovable woman,
upright and honest--was being condemned to her fate by those fierce,
relentless enemies by which she was, alas! surrounded.
As she moved, her splendid diamonds flashed and glittered with a
thousand fires, for no woman in all the Court could compare with her,
either for beauty or for figure. And yet her husband, his mind poisoned
by those place-hunters--a man whose birth was but as a mushroom as
compared with that of Claire, who possessed an ancestry dating back a
thousand years--blindly believed that which they told him to be the
truth.
De Trauttenberg, in fear lest she might lose her own position, was in
Hinckeldeym's pay, and what she revealed was always exaggerated--most of
it, indeed, absolutely false.
The Court of Marburg had condemned the Crown Princess Claire, and from
their judgment there was no appeal. She was alone, defenceless--doomed
as the victim of the jealousies and fears of others.
Returning to the ballroom, she left the Minister's side; and, by reason
of etiquette, returned to join that man in the dark-blue uniform who
cursed her--the man who was her husband, and who ere long was to reign
as sovereign.
Stories of his actions, many of them the reverse of creditable, had
reached her ears, but she never gave credence to any of them. When
people discussed him she refused to listen. He was her husband, the
father of her little Ignatia, therefore she would hear nothing to his
discredit.
Yes. Her disposition was quiet and sweet, and she was always loyal to
him. He, however, entirely misjudged her.
An hour later, when she had gone to her room, her husband burst in
angrily and ordered the two maids out, telling them that they would not
be wanted further that night. Then, when the door was closed, he strode
up to where she sat before the great mirror, lit by its waxen candles,
for Henriette had been arranging her hair for the night.
"Well, woman!" he cried, standing before her, his brows knit, his eyes
full of fire, "and what is your excuse to me this time?"
"Excuse?" she echoed, looking at him in surprise and very calmly. "For
what, Ferdinand?"
"For your escapade in Vienna!" he said between his teeth. "The instant
you had left, Leitolf received a telegram calling him to Wiesbaden, but
instead of going there he followed you."
"Not with my knowledge, I assure you," she said quickly. "Why do you
think so ill of me--why do you always suspect me?" she asked in a low,
trembling voice of reproach.
"Why do I suspect you? You ask me that, woman, when you wrote to the
man at his hotel, made an appointment, and actually visited him there?
One of our agents watched you. Do you deny it?"
"No," she answered boldly. "I do not deny going to the Count's hotel.
I had a reason for doing so."
He laughed in her face.
"Of course you had--you, who pretend to be such a good and faithful
wife, and such a model mother," he sneered. "I suppose you would not
have returned to Treysa so soon had he not have come back."
"You insult me!" she cried, rising from her chair, her Imperial blood
asserting itself.
"Ah!" he laughed, taunting her. "You don't like to hear the truth, do
you? It seems that the scandal concerning you has been discovered in
Vienna, for De Lindenau has ordered the fellow to return to the
diplomatic service, and is sending him away to Rome."
She was silent. She saw how every word and every action of hers was
being misconstrued.
"Speak, woman!" he cried, advancing towards her. "Confess to me that
you love the fellow."
"Why, Ferdinand, do you wish me to say what is untrue?" she asked in a
low voice, quite calm again, notwithstanding his threatening attitude.
"Ah, you deny it! You lie to me, even when I know the truth--when all
the Court discuss your affection for the fellow whom you yourself
introduced among us. You have been with him in Paris. Deny that!"
"I deny nothing that is true," she answered. "I only deny your right to
charge me with what is false."
"Oh yes," he cried. "You and your brat are a pretty pair. You believe
we are all blind; but, on the contrary, everything is known. Confess!"
he muttered between his teeth. "Confess that you love that man."
She was silent, standing before him, her beautiful eyes fixed upon the
carpet.
He repeated his question in a harder tone than before, but still she
uttered no word. She was determined not to repeat the denial she had
already given, and she recognised that he had some ulterior motive in
wringing from her a confession which was untrue.
"You refuse to speak!" he cried in a quick paroxysm of anger. "Then
take that!" and he struck her with his fist a heavy blow full in the
face, with such force, indeed, that she reeled, and fell backwards upon
the floor.
"Another time perhaps you'll speak when I order you to," he said through
his set teeth, as with his foot he kicked her savagely twice, the dull
blows sounding through the big, gilt-ceilinged room.
Then with a hard laugh of scorn upon his evil lips the brute that was a
Crown Prince, and heir to a European throne, turned and left with an
oath upon his lips, as he slammed the door after him.
In the big, gorgeous room, where the silence was broken by the low
ticking of the ormolu clock, poor, unhappy Claire lay there where she
had fallen, motionless as one dead. Her beautiful face was white as
death, yet horribly disfigured by the cowardly blow, while from the
corner of her mouth there slowly trickled a thin red stream.
CHAPTER EIGHT.
IS MAINLY ABOUT THE COUNT.
Next morning, when she saw her reflection in the mirror, she sighed
heavily, and hot tears sprang to her eyes.
Her beautiful countenance, bruised and swollen, was an ugly sight; her
mouth was cut, and one of her even, pretty teeth had been broken by the
cowardly blow.
Henriette, the faithful Frenchwoman, had crept back to her mistress's
room an hour after the Crown Prince had gone, in order to see if her
Highness wanted anything, when to her horror she discovered her lying
insensible where she had been struck down.
The woman was discreet. She had often overheard the Prince's torrents
of angry abuse, and in an instant grasped the situation. Instead of
alarming the other servants, she quickly applied restoratives, bathed
her mistress's face tenderly in eau de Cologne, washing away the blood
from the mouth, and after half an hour succeeded in getting her
comfortably to bed.
She said nothing to any one, but locked the door and spent the remainder
of the night upon the sofa near her Princess.
While Claire was seated in her wrap, taking her chocolate at eight
o'clock next morning, the Countess de Trauttenberg, her husband's spy,
who probably knew all that had transpired, entered with the
engagement-book.
She saw what a terrible sight the unhappy woman presented, yet affected
not to notice it.
"Well, Trauttenberg?" asked the Princess in a soft, weary voice, hardly
looking up at her, "what are our engagements to-day?"
The lady-in-waiting consulted the book, which upon its cover bore the
royal crown above the cipher "C," and replied,--
"At eleven, the unveiling of the monument to Schilling the sculptor in
the Albert-Platz; at one, luncheon with the Princess Alexandrine, to
meet the Duchess of Brunswick-Lunebourg; at four, the drive; and
to-night, `Faust,' at the Opera."
Her Highness sighed. The people, the enthusiastic crowd who applauded
her, little knew how wearying was that round of daily duties, how
soul-killing to a woman with a broken heart. She was "their Claire,"
the woman who was to be their Queen, and they believed her to be happy!
"Cancel all my engagements," she said. "I shall not go out to-day.
Tell the Court newsman that I am indisposed--a bad cold--anything."
"As your Imperial Highness commands," responded De Trauttenberg, bowing,
and yet showing no sign that she observed the disfiguration of her poor
face.
The woman's cold formality irritated her.
"You see the reason?" she asked meaningly, looking into her face.
"I note that your Imperial Highness has--has met with a slight
accident," she said. "I trust it is not painful."
That reply aroused the fire of the Hapsbourg blood within her veins.
The woman was her bitter enemy. She had lied about her, and had
poisoned her husband's mind against her. And yet she was helpless. To
dismiss her from her duties would only be a confirmation of what the
woman had, no doubt, alleged.
It was upon the tip of her tongue to charge her openly as an enemy and a
liar. It was that woman, no doubt, who had spied upon her when she had
called upon Count Leitolf, and who on her return to Treysa had gone
straight to the Crown Prince with a story that was full of vile and
scandalous inventions.
"Oh, dear, no," she said, managing to control her anger by dint of great
effort. "It is not at all painful, I assure you. Perhaps,
Trauttenberg, you had better go at once and tell the newsman, so that my
absence at the Schilling unveiling will be accounted for."
Thus dismissed, the woman, with her false smiles and pretended sympathy,
went forth, and the journals through Germany that day reported, with
regret, that the Crown Princess Claire of Marburg was confined to her
room, having caught a severe chill on her journey from Vienna, and that
she would probably remain indisposed for a week.
When her maids had dressed her she passed on into her gorgeous little
blue-and-gold boudoir, her own sanctum, for in it were all the little
nick-nacks, odds and ends which on her marriage she had brought from her
own home at Wartenstein. Every object reminded her of those happy days
of her youth, before she was called upon to assume the shams of royal
place and power; before she entered that palace that was to her but a
gilded prison.
The long windows of the room looked out upon the beautiful gardens and
the great lake, with its playing fountains beyond, while the spring
sunlight streaming in gave it an air of cheerfulness even though she was
so despondent and heavy of heart. The apartment was gorgeously
furnished, as indeed was the whole of the great palace. Upon the backs
of the chairs, embroidered in gold upon the damask, was the royal crown
and cipher, while the rich carpet was of pale pastel blue. For a long
time she stood at the window, looking out across the park.
She saw her husband in his cavalry uniform riding out with an escort
clattering behind him, and watched him sadly until he was out of sight.
Then she turned and glanced around the cosy room which everywhere bore
traces of her artistic taste and refinement. Upon the side-tables were
many photographs, signed portraits of her friends, reigning sovereigns,
and royal princes; upon the little centre-table a great old porcelain
bowl of fresh tea-roses from the royal hot-houses. Her little buhl
escritoire was littered with her private correspondence--most of it
being in connection with charities in various parts of the kingdom in
which she was interested, or was patroness.
Of money, or of the value of it, she knew scarcely anything. She was
very wealthy, of course, for her family were one of the richest in
Europe, while the royal house of Marburg was noted for its great wealth;
yet she had never in her life held in her possession more than a few
hundred marks at a time. Her bills all went to the official of the
household whose duty it was to examine and pay them, and to charities
she sent drafts through that same gold-spectacled official.
She often wondered what it was like to be poor, to work for a daily wage
like the people she saw in the street and in the theatres. They seemed
bright, contented, happy, and at least they had their freedom, and loved
and married whom they chose.
Only the previous night, when she had entered her carriage at the
station, a working-man had held his little child up to her for her to
pat its head. She had done so, and then sighed to compare the
difference between the royal father and that proud father of the people.
Little Ignatia, sweet and fresh, in her white frock and pale pink sash,
was presently brought in by Allen to salute her mother, and the latter
snatched up the child gladly in her arms and smothered its chubby face
with fond kisses.
But the child noticed the disfigured countenance, and drew herself back
to look at it.
"Mother is hurt," she said in English, in her childish speech. "Poor
mother!"
"Yes, I fell down, darling," she answered. "Wasn't that very
unfortunate? Are you sorry?"
"Very sorry poor mother is hurt," answered the child. "And, why!--one
of poor mother's tooths have gone." The Princess saw that Allen was
looking at her very hard, therefore she turned to her and explained,--
"It is nothing--nothing; a slight accident. I struck myself."
But the child stroked its mother's face tenderly with the soft, chubby
little hand, saying,--
"Poor mother must be more careful another time or I shall scold her.
And Allen will scold her too."
"Mother will promise to be more careful," she assured the little one,
smiling. And then, seating herself, listened for half an hour to the
child's amusing prattle, and her joyous anticipation of the purchase of
a perambulator for her dolly.
With tender hands the Crown Princess retied the broad pink ribbon of the
sash, and presently produced some chocolates from the silver bon-bon box
which she kept there on purpose for her little one.
And Allen, the rather plain-faced Englishwoman, who was the best of
nurses, stood by in silence, wondering how such an accident could have
happened to her Imperial mistress, but, of course, unable to put any
question to her.
"You may take Ignatia to buy the perambulator, Allen," said she at last
in English. "Get a good one; the best you can. And after luncheon let
me see it. I shall not go out to-day, so you can bring the Princess
back to me at two o'clock."
"Very well, your Highness."
And both she and the child withdrew, the latter receiving the maternal
kiss and caramels in each hand.
Again alone, Claire sat for a long time in deep thought. The
recollection of those cruel, bitter accusations which her husband had
uttered was still uppermost in her mind. What her humble friend
Steinbach had told her was, alas! only too true. At Court it was said
that she loved Leitolf, and the Crown Prince believed the scandalous
libel.
"Ah, if Ferdinand only knew!" she murmured to herself. "If he could
only read my heart! Then he would know the truth. Perhaps, instead of
hating me as he does, he would be as forbearing as I try to be. He
might even try to love me. Yet, alas!" she added bitterly, "such a
thing cannot be. The Court of Marburg have decided that, in the
interests of their own future, I must be ruined and disgraced. It is
destiny, I suppose," she sighed; "my destiny!"
Then she was silent, staring straight before her at Bronzino's beautiful
portrait of the Duchess Eleanor on the wall opposite. The sound of a
bugle reached her, followed by the roll of the drums as the palace guard
was changed. The love of truth, the conscientiousness which formed so
distinct a feature in Claire's character, and mingled with its
picturesque delicacy a certain firmness and dignity, she maintained
consistently always.
The Trauttenberg returned, but she dismissed her for the day, and when
she had left the boudoir the solitary woman murmured bitterly aloud,--
"A day's leave will perhaps allow you to plot and conspire further
against the woman to whom you owe everything, and upon whose charity
your family exist. Go and report to my husband my appearance this
morning, and laugh with your friends at my unhappiness!" She rose and
paced the room, her white hands clasped before her in desperation.
"Carl! Carl!" she cried in a hoarse, low voice. "I have only your
indiscretion to thank for all this! And yet have I not been quite as
indiscreet? Why, therefore, should I blame you? No," she said in a
whisper, after a pause, "it is more my own fault than yours. I was
blind, and you loved me. I foolishly permitted you to come here,
because your presence recalled all the happiness of the past--of those
sweet, idyllic days at Wartenstein, when we--when we loved each other,
and our love was but a day-dream never to be realised. I wonder whether
you still recollect those days, as I remember them--those long rambles
over the mountains alone by the by-paths that I knew from my childhood
days, and how we used to stand together hand in hand and watch the
sinking sun flashing upon the windows of the castle far away. Nine
years have gone since those days of our boy-and-girl love--nine long,
dark years that have, I verily believe, transformed my very soul. One
by one have all my ideals been broken and swept away, and now I can only
sit and weep over the dead ashes of the past. The past--ah! what that
means to me--life and love and freedom. And the future?" she sighed.
"Alas! only black despair, ignominy, and shame." Again she halted at
the window, and hot tears coursed down her pale cheeks. Those words,
uttered almost without consciousness on her own part, contained the
revelation of a life of love, and disclosed the secret burden of a heart
bursting with its own unuttered grief. She was repulsed, she was
forsaken, she was outraged where she had bestowed her young heart with
all its hopes and wishes. She was entangled inextricably in a web of
horrors which she could not even comprehend, yet the result seemed
inevitable.
"These people condemn me! They utter their foul calumnies, and cast me
from them unjustly," she cried, pushing her wealth of fair hair from her
brow in her desperation. "Is there no justice for me? Can a woman not
retain within her heart the fond remembrance of the holy passion of her
youth--the only time she has loved--without it being condemned as a sin?
without--"
The words died on her dry lips, for at that moment there was a tap at
the door, and she gave permission to enter.
One of the royal servants in gorgeous livery bowed and advanced,
presenting to her a small packet upon a silver salver, saying,--
"The person who brought this desired that it should be given into your
Imperial Highness's hands at once."
She took the packet, and the man withdrew.
A single glance was sufficient to show her that the gummed address label
had been penned by Count Carl Leitolf's own hand. Her heart beat
quickly as she cut the string and opened the packet, to find within a
book--a dull, uninteresting, philosophical treatise in German. There
was no note or writing of any kind.
She ran through the leaves quickly, and then stood wondering. Why had
he sent her that? The book was one that she certainly could never read
to understand. Published some fifteen years before, it bore signs of
not being new. She was much puzzled.
That Leitolf had a motive in sending it to her she had no doubt. But
what could it denote? Again and again she searched in it to find some
words or letters underlined--some communication meant for her eye alone.
Presently, utterly at a loss to understand, she took up the brown-paper
wrapping, and looked again at the address. Yes, she was not mistaken.
It was from Carl.
For a few moments she held the paper in her hand, when suddenly she
detected that the gummed address label had only been stuck on lightly by
being wetted around the edge, and a thought occurred to her to take it
off and keep it, together with the book.
Taking up the large ivory paper-knife, she quickly slipped it beneath
the label and removed it, when to her astonished eyes there were
presented some written words penned across the centre, where the gum had
apparently been previously removed.
The words, for her eye alone, were in Carl's handwriting, lightly
written, so that they should not show through the label.
The message--the last message from the man who loved her so fondly, and
whose heart bled for her in her gilded unhappiness--read:--
"Adieu, my Princess. I leave at noon to-day, because you have willed it
so. I have heard of what occurred last night. It is common knowledge
in the palace. Be brave, dear heart. May God now be your comforter.
Recollect, though we shall never again meet, that I shall think ever and
eternally of you, my Princess, the sweet-faced woman who was once my
own, but who is now, alas! lost to me for ever. Adieu, adieu. I kiss
your hand, dear heart, adieu!"
It was his last message. His gentle yet manly resignation, the deep
pathos of his farewell, told her how full of agony was his own heart.
How bitter for her, too, that parting, for now she would stand alone and
unprotected, without a soul in whom to confide, or of whom to seek
advice.
As she reread those faintly-traced words slowly and aloud the light died
from her face.
"I kiss your hand, dear heart, adieu!" she murmured, and then, her heart
overburdened by grief, she burst into a flood of emotion.
CHAPTER NINE.
THE THREE STRANGERS.
By noon all Treysa knew, through the papers, of the indisposition of the
Crown Princess; and during the afternoon many smart carriages called at
the gates of the royal palace to inquire after her Imperial Highness's
health.
The pompous, scarlet-liveried porters told every one that the Princess
had, unfortunately, caught a severe chill on her journey from Vienna,
and her medical advisers, although they did not consider it serious,
thought, as a precaution, it was best that for a few days she should
remain confined to her room.
Meanwhile the Princess, in her silent, stunning, overwhelming sorrow,
was wondering how she might call Steinbach. She was unapproachable to
any but the Court set, therefore to call a commoner would be an
unheard-of breach of etiquette. And yet she desired to see him and
obtain his advice. In all that gay, scheming circle about her he was
the only person whom she could trust. He was devoted to her service
because of the little charitable actions she had rendered him. She knew
that he would if necessary lay down his very life in order to serve her,
for he was one of the very few who did not misjudge her.
The long day dragged by. She wrote many letters--mostly to her family
and friends in Vienna. Then taking a sheet of the royal notepaper from
the rack, she again settled herself, after pacing the boudoir in thought
for some time, and penned a long letter, which when finished she reread
and carefully corrected, afterwards addressing it in German to "His
Imperial Majesty the Emperor, Vienna," and sealing it with her own
private seal.
"He misjudges me," she said to herself very gravely; "therefore it is
only right that I should defend myself."
Then she rang, and in answer to her summons one of the royal footmen
appeared.
"I want a special messenger to carry a letter for me to Vienna. Go at
once to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and ask the Under-Secretary,
Fischer, whether Steinbach may be placed at my service," she commanded.
"Yes, your Imperial Highness," answered the clean-shaven, grave-faced
man, who bowed and then withdrew.
Allen soon afterwards brought in little Ignatia to show the doll's
perambulator, with which the child was delighted, wheeling it up and
down the boudoir. With the little one her mother played for upwards of
an hour. The bright little chatterbox caused her to forget the tragedy
of her own young life, and Allen's kindly English ways were to her so
much more sympathetic than the stiff formalities of her treacherous
lady-in-waiting.
The little one in her pretty speeches told her mother of her adventures
in the toy-shops of Treysa, where she was, of course, recognised, and
where the shopkeepers often presented her little Royal Highness with
dolls and games. In the capital the tiny Ignatia was a very important
and popular personage everywhere; certainly more popular with the people
than the parrot-faced, hard-hearted old King himself.
Presently, while the Crown Princess was carrying her little one
pick-a-pack up and down the room, the child crowing with delight at its
mother's romping and caresses, there came a loud summons at the door,
the rap that announced a visitor, and the same grave-faced manservant
opened the long white doors, saying,--
"Your Imperial Highness. Will it please you to receive Herr Steinbach
of the Department of Foreign Affairs?"
"Bring Herr Steinbach here," she commanded, and then, kissing the child
quickly, dismissed both her and her nurse.
A few moments later the clean-shaven, dark-haired man in sombre black
was ushered in, and bending, kissed the Crown Princess's hand with
reverent formality.
As soon as they were alone she turned to him, and, taking up the letter,
said,--
"I wish you, Steinbach, to travel to Vienna by the express to-night,
obtain audience of the Emperor, and hand this to him. Into no other
hand must you deliver it, remember. In order to obtain your audience
you may say that I have sent you; otherwise you will probably be
refused. If there is a reply, you will bring it; if not--well, it does
not matter."
The quick-eyed man, bowing again, took the letter, glanced at the
superscription, and placing it in the inner pocket of his coat, said,--
"I will carry out your Imperial Highness's directions."
The Princess crossed to the door and opened it in order to satisfy
herself that there were no eavesdroppers outside. Then returning to
where the man stood, she said in a low voice,--
"I see that you are puzzled by the injury to my face when the papers are
saying I have a chill. I met with a slight accident last night." Then
in the next breath she asked, "What is the latest phase of this
conspiracy against me, Steinbach? Tell me. You need conceal nothing
for fear of hurting my feelings."
The man hesitated a moment; then he replied,--
"Well, your Imperial Highness, a great deal of chatter has been
circulated regarding Count Leitolf. They now say that, having grown
tired of him, you have contrived to have him transferred to Rome."
"Well?"
"They also say that you visited Leitolf while you were in Vienna. And I
regret," he added, "that your enemies are now spreading evil reports of
you among the people. Certain journalists are being bribed to print
articles which contain hints against your Highness's honour."
"This is outrageous!" she cried. "Having ruined me in the eyes of my
husband and the King, they now seek to turn the people against me! It
is infamous!"
"Exactly. That really seems their intention. They know that your
Highness is the most popular person in the whole Kingdom, and they
intend that your popularity shall wane."
"And I am helpless, Steinbach, utterly helpless," she cried in
desperation. "I have no friend except yourself."
The man sighed, for he was full of sympathy for the beautiful but
unjustly-treated woman, whose brave heart he knew was broken. He was
aware of the love-story of long ago between the Count and herself, but
he knew her too well to believe any of those scandalous tales concerning
her. He knew well how, from the very first days of her married life,
she had been compelled to endure sneers, insult, and libellous report.
The King and Queen themselves had been so harsh and unbending that she
had always held aloof from them. Her every action, either in private or
in public, they criticised adversely. She even wore her tiaras, her
jewels, and her decorations in a manner with which they found fault; and
whatever dress she assumed at the various functions, the sharp-tongued
old Queen, merely in order to annoy her, would declare that she looked
absolutely hideous. And all this to a bride of twenty-one, and one of
the most beautiful girls in Europe!
All, from the King himself down to the veriest palace lackey, had
apparently united to crush her, to break her spirit, and drive her to
despair.
"I hope, as I declared when we last met, Princess, that I shall ever
remain your friend," said the humble employe of the Foreign Ministry.
"I only wish that I could serve you to some good purpose--I mean, to do
something that might increase your happiness. Forgive me, your
Highness, for saying so."
"The only way to give me happiness, Steinbach, is to give me freedom,"
she said sadly, as though speaking to herself. "Freedom--ah, how I long
for it! How I long to escape from this accursed palace, and live as the
people live! I tell you," she added in a low, half-whisper, her pale,
disfigured face assuming a deadly earnest look--"I tell you that
sometimes I feel--well, I feel that I can't endure it much longer, and
that I'm slowly being driven insane."
He started at her words, and looked her straight in the face. Should he
tell her the truth of an amazing discovery he had made only on the
previous day; or was it really kinder to her to hold his tongue?
His very heart bled for her. To her influence he owed all--everything.
No; he could not tell her of that new and dastardly plot against her--at
least not yet. Surely it was not yet matured! When he returned from
Vienna would be quite time enough to warn her against her increased
peril. Now that Leitolf had left her, life might perhaps be a trifle
more happy; therefore why should he, of all men, arouse her suspicions
and cause her increased anxiety?
Steinbach was a cautious man; his chief fault perhaps was his
over-cautiousness. In this affair he might well have spoken frankly;
yet his desire always was to avoid hurting the feelings of the woman
with whom he so deeply sympathised--the Imperial Princess, to whom he
acted as humble, devoted, and secret friend.
"You must not allow such fears to take possession of you," he urged.
"Do not heed what is said regarding you. Remember only that your own
conscience is clear, even though your life is, alas, a martyrdom! Let
them see that you are heedless and defiant, and ere long they will grow
tired of their efforts, and you will assume a power at Court far greater
than hitherto."
"Ah no--never!" she sighed. "They are all against me--all. If they do
not crush me by force, they will do so by subterfuge," declared the
unhappy woman. "But," she added quickly with an effort, "do not let us
speak of it further. I can only thank you for telling me the truth. Go
to-night to Vienna, and if there is a reply, bring it to me immediately.
And stay--what can I do to give you recompense? You have no
decoration! I will write at once a recommendation for you for the cross
of St. Michael, and whenever you wear it you will, I hope, remember the
grateful woman who conferred it upon you."
"I thank your Highness most truly," he said. "I have coveted the high
honour for many years, and I can in turn only reassure you that any
mission you may entrust to me will always be carried out in secret and
faithfully."
"Then adieu, Steinbach," she said, dismissing him. "_Bon voyage_, and a
quick return from Vienna--my own dear Vienna, where once I was so very
happy."
The man in black bent low and again kissed the back of the soft white
hand, then, backing out of the door, bowed again and withdrew.
When Henriette came that evening to change her dress the woman said in
French,--
"I ask your Imperial Highness's pardon, but the Prince, who returned
half an hour ago, commanded me to say that he would dine with you this
evening, and that there would be three men guests."
"Guests!" she cried. "But the Prince must be mad! How can I receive
guests in this state, Henriette?"
"I explained that your Imperial Highness was not in a fit state to dine
in public," said the maid quietly; "but the Prince replied that he
commanded it."
What fresh insult had her husband in store for her? Did he wish to
exhibit her poor bruised face publicly before her friends? It was
monstrous!
Yet he had commanded; therefore she allowed Henriette to brush her fair
hair and dress her in a black net dinner-gown, one that she often wore
when dining in the privacy of her own apartments. Henriette cleverly
contrived, by the aid of powder and a few touches of make-up, to half
conceal her mistress's disfiguration; therefore at eight o'clock the
Princess Claire entered the fine white-and-gold reception-room, lit by
its hundreds of small electric lamps, and there found her husband in
uniform, speaking earnestly with three elderly and rather
distinguished-looking men in plain evening dress.
Turning, he smiled at her as though nothing had occurred between them,
and then introduced his friends by name; but of their names she took no
notice. They were strangers, and to her quite uninteresting.
Yet she bowed, smiled, and put on that air of graciousness that, on
account of her Court training, she could now assume at will.
The men were from somewhere in North Germany, she detected by their
speech, and at the dinner-table the conversation was mostly upon the
advance of science; therefore she concluded, from their spectacled
appearance and the technical terms they used, that they were scientists
from Berlin to whom her husband wished to be kind, and had invited them
quite without formality.
Their conversation did not interest her in the least; therefore she
remained almost silent throughout the meal, except now and then to
address a remark to one or other of her guests. She noticed that once
or twice they exchanged strange glances. What could it mean?
At last she rose, and after they had bowed her out they reseated
themselves, and all four began conversing in a lower tone in English,
lest any servant should enter unexpectedly.
Then ten minutes later, at a signal from the Prince, they rose and
passed into the _fumoir_, a pretty room panelled with cedar-wood, and
with great palms and plashing fountains, where coffee was served and
cigars were lit.
There the conversation in an undertone in English was again resumed, the
Prince being apparently very interested in something which his guests
were explaining. Though the door was closed and they believed
themselves in perfect privacy, there was a listener standing in the
adjoining room, where the cedar panelling only acted as a partition.
It was the Princess Claire. Her curiosity had been aroused as to who
the strangers really were.
She could hear them speaking in English at first with difficulty, but
presently her husband spoke. The words he uttered were clear. In an
instant they revealed to her an awful, unexpected truth.
She held her breath, her left hand upon her bare chest above her
corsage, her mouth open, her white face drawn and haggard.
Scarce believing her own ears, she again listened. Could it really be
true?
Her husband again spoke. Ah yes! of the words he uttered there could be
not the slightest doubt. She was doomed.
With uneven steps she staggered from her hiding-place along the corridor
to her own room, and on opening the door she fell forward senseless upon
the carpet.
CHAPTER TEN.
THE PERIL OF THE PRINCESS.
That night, six hours later, when the great palace was silent save for
the tramping of the sentries, the Princess sat in the big chair at her
window, looking out upon the park, white beneath the bright moonbeams.
The room was in darkness, save for the tiny silver lamp burning before
the picture of the Madonna. The Trauttenberg had found her lying
insensible, and with Henriette's aid had restored her to consciousness
and put her to bed. Then the Countess had gone along to the Crown
Prince and told him that his wife had been seized with a fainting fit,
and was indisposed.
And the three guests, when he told them, exchanged significant glances,
and were silent.
In the darkness, with the moonlight falling across the room, the
Princess, in her white silk dressing-gown, sat staring straight before
her out upon the fairy-like scene presented below. No word escaped her
pale lips, yet she shuddered, and drew her laces about her as though she
were chilled.
She was recalling those hard words of her husband's which she had
overheard--the words that revealed to her the ghastly truth. If ever
she had suffered during her married life, she suffered at that moment.
It was cruel, unjust, dastardly. Was there no love or justice for her?
The truth was a ghastly one. Those three strangers whom her husband had
introduced to her table as guests were doctors, two from Berlin and the
third from Cologne--specialists in mental disease. They had come there
for the purpose of adding their testimony and certificates to that of
Veltman, the crafty, thin-nosed Court physician, to declare that she was
insane!
What fees were promised those men, or how that plot had been matured,
she could only imagine. Yet the grim fact remained that her enemies,
with the old King and her husband at their head, intended to confine her
in an asylum.
She had heard her husband himself suggest that on the morrow they should
meet Veltman, a white-bearded, bald-headed old charlatan whom she
detested, and add their testimony to his that she was not responsible
for her actions. Could anything be more cold-blooded, more absolutely
outrageous? Those words of her husband showed her plainly that in his
heart there now remained not one single spark either of affection or of
sentiment. He was anxious, at all hazards and at whatever cost, by fair
means or foul, to rid himself of her.
Her enemies were now playing their trump card. They had no doubt bribed
those three men to certify what was a direct untruth. A royal sovereign
can, alas I command the services of any one; for everybody, more or
less, likes to render to royalty a service in the hope of decoration or
of substantial reward. Most men are at heart place-seekers. Men who
are most honest and upright in their daily lives will not hesitate to
perjure themselves, or "stretch a point" as they would doubtless put it,
where royalty is concerned.
Gazing out into the brilliant moonlight mirrored upon the smooth surface
of the lake, she calmly reviewed the situation.
She was in grave peril--so grave, indeed, that she was now utterly
bewildered as to what her next step should be. Once certified as a
lunatic and shut up in an asylum somewhere away in the heart of the
country, all hope of the future would be cut off. She would be entirely
at the mercy of those who so persistently and unscrupulously sought her
end. Having failed in their other plot against, her, they intended to
consign her to a living tomb.
Yet by good fortune had her curiosity been aroused, and she had
overheard sufficient to reveal to her the truth. Her face was now hard,
her teeth firmly set. Whatever affection she had borne her husband was
crushed within her now that she realised how ingeniously he was
conspiring against her, and to what length he was actually prepared to
go in order to rid himself of her.
She thought of Ignatia, poor, innocent little Ignatia, the child whom
its father had cursed from the very hour of its birth, the royal
Princess who one day might be crowned a reigning sovereign. What would
become of her? Would her own Imperial family stand by and see their
daughter incarcerated in a madhouse when she was as sane as they
themselves--more sane, perhaps?
She sat bewildered.
With the Emperor against her, however, she had but little to hope for in
that quarter. His Majesty actually believed the scandal that had been
circulated concerning Leitolf, and had himself declared to her face that
she must be mad.
Was it possible that those hot words of the Emperor's had been seized
upon by her husband to obtain a declaration that she was really insane?
Insane? She laughed bitterly to herself at such a thought.
"Ah!" she sighed sadly, speaking hoarsely to herself. "What I have
suffered and endured here in this awful place are surely sufficient to
send any woman mad. Yet God has been very good to me, and has allowed
me still to preserve all my faculties intact. Why don't they have some
assassin to kill me?" she added desperately. "It would surely be more
humane than what they now intend."
Steinbach, her faithful but secret friend, was on his way to Vienna.
She wondered whether, after reading the letter, the Emperor would relent
towards her? Surely the whole world could not unite as her enemy.
There must be human pity and sympathy in the hearts of some, as there
was in the heart of the humble Steinbach.
Not one of the thirty millions over whom she would shortly rule was so
unhappy as she that night. Beyond the park shone the myriad lights of
the splendid capital, and she wondered whether any one living away there
so very far from the world ever guessed how lonely and wretched was her
life amid all that gorgeous pomp and regal splendour.
Those three grave, spectacled men who had dined at her table and talked
their scientific jargon intended to denounce her. They had been quick
to recognise that a future king is a friend not to be despised, while
the bankers' drafts that certain persons had promised them in exchange
for their signatures as experts would no doubt be very acceptable.
Calmly she reviewed the situation, and saw that, so clearly had her
enemies estranged her from every one, she was without one single friend.
For her child's sake it was imperative for her to save herself. And she
could only save herself by flight. But whither? The only course open
to her was to leave secretly, taking little Ignatia with her, return to
her father, and lay before him the dastardly plot now in progress.
Each hour she remained at the palace increased her peril. Once
pronounced insane by those three specialists there would be no hope for
her. Her enemies would take good care that she was consigned to an
asylum, and that her actions were misconstrued into those of a person
insane.
Her heart beat quickly as she thought out the best means of secret
escape.
To leave that night was quite impossible. Allen was sleeping with
Ignatia; and besides, the guards at the palace gate, on seeing her make
her exit at that hour, would chatter among themselves, in addition to
which there were no express trains to Vienna in the night. The best
train was at seven o'clock in the evening, for upon it was a _wagon-lit_
and dining-car that went through to the Austrian capital, _via_ Eger.
About six o'clock in the evening would be the best time to secure the
child, for Allen and Henriette would then both be at dinner, and little
Ignatia would be in charge of the under-nurse, whom she could easily
send away upon some pretext. Besides, at that hour she could secure
some of Henriette's clothes, and with her veil down might pass the
sentries, who would probably take her for the French maid herself.
She calculated that her absence would not be noted by her servants till
nearly eight; for there was a Court ball on the morrow, and on nights of
the balls she always dressed later.
And so, determined to leave the great palace which to her was a prison,
she carefully thought over all the details of her flight. On the morrow
she would send to the royal treasurer for a sum of money, ostensibly to
make a donation to one of her charities.
Presently rising, she closed the shutters, and switching on the electric
light, opened the safe in the wall where her jewels were kept--mostly
royal heirlooms that were worth nearly a million sterling.
Case after case she drew out and opened. Her two magnificent tiaras,
her emerald and diamond necklet, the great emerald pendant, once the
property of Catherine di Medici, six wonderful collars of perfect pearls
and some other miscellaneous jewels, all of them magnificent, she
replaced in the safe, as they were heirlooms of the Kingdom. Those
royal tiaras as Crown Princess she placed in their cases and put them
away with a sigh, for she knew she was renouncing her crown for ever.
Her own jewels, quite equal in magnificence, she took from their cases
and placed together upon the bed. There was her magnificent long rope
of pearls, that when worn twice twisted around her neck hung to below
the knees, and was declared to be one of the finest in the world; her
two diamond collars, her wonderful diamond bodice ornaments, her many
pairs of earrings, antique brooches, and other jewels--she took them all
from their cases until they lay together, a brilliant, scintillating
heap, the magnificent gems flashing with a thousand fires.
At last she drew forth a leather case about six inches square, and
opening it, gazed upon it in hesitancy. Within was a large true-lover's
knot in splendid diamonds, and attached to it was the black ribbon and
the jewelled cross--her decoration as Dame de la Croix Etoilee of
Austria, the order bestowed upon the Imperial Archduchesses.
She looked at it wistfully. Sight of it brought to her mind the fact
that in renouncing her position she must also renounce that mark of her
Imperial birth. Yet she was determined, and with trembling fingers
detached the ribbon and cross from the diamond ornament, threw the
latter on to the heap upon the bed, and replaced the former with the
jewels she intended to leave behind.
The beautiful cross had been bestowed upon her by her uncle the Emperor
upon her marriage, and would now be sent back to him.
She took two large silk handkerchiefs from a drawer, and made two
bundles of the precious gems. Then she hid them away until the morrow,
and reclosing the safe, locked it; and taking the key off the bunch,
placed it in the drawer of her little escritoire.
Thus she had taken the first step towards her emancipation.
Her eye caught the Madonna, with its silver lamp, and she halted before
it, her head bowed, her lips moving in silent prayer as she sought help,
protection, and guidance in the act of renunciation she was about to
commit.
Then, after ten minutes or so, she again moved slowly across the room,
opening the great inlaid wardrobe where hung a few of her many dresses.
She looked upon them in silence. All must be left behind, she decided.
She could only take what she could carry in her hand. She would leave
her personal belongings to be divided up by that crowd of human wolves
who hungered to destroy her. The Trauttenberg might have them as her
perquisites--in payment for her treachery.
By that hour to-morrow she would have left Treysa for ever. She would
begin a new life--a life of simplicity and of freedom, with her darling
child.
Presently she slept again, but it was a restless, fevered sleep.
Constantly she wondered whether it would be possible for her to pass
those palace guards with little Ignatia. If they recognised the child
they might stop her, for only Allen herself was permitted to take her
outside the palace.
Yet she must risk it; her only means of escape was that upon which she
had decided.
Next day passed very slowly. The hours dragged by as she tried to
occupy herself in her boudoir, first with playing with the child, and
afterwards attending to her correspondence. She wrote no letter of
farewell, as she deemed it wiser to take her leave without a word. Yet
even in those last hours of her dignity as Crown Princess her thoughts
were with the many charitable institutions of which she was patroness,
and of how best she could benefit them by writing orders to the royal
treasurer to give them handsome donations in her name.
She saw nothing of her husband. For aught she knew, those three
grave-faced doctors might have already consulted with Veltman; they
might have already declared her insane.
The afternoon passed, and alone she took her tea in English fashion,
little Ignatia being brought to her for half an hour, as was the rule
when she was without visitors. She had already been to Henriette's room
in secret, and had secured a black-stuff dress and packet, a long black
travelling-coat and a felt canotte, all of which she had taken to her
own room and hidden in her wardrobe.
When Allen took the child's hand in order to lead her out, her mother
glanced anxiously at the clock, and saw that it was half-past five.
"You can leave Ignatia here while you go to dinner," she said in
English; "she will be company for me. Tell the servants that I am not
to be disturbed, even by the Countess de Trauttenberg."
"Very well, your Highness," was the Englishwoman's answer, as bowing she
left the room.
For another quarter of an hour she laughed and played with the child,
then said,--
"Come, darling, let us go along to my room." And taking her tiny hand,
led her gently along the corridor to her own chamber. Once within she
locked the door, and quickly throwing off her own things, assumed those
of the maid which she took from the wardrobe. Then upon Ignatia she put
a cheap dark coat of grey material and a dark-blue woollen cap which at
once concealed the child's golden curls. This concluded, she assumed a
thick black lace veil, which well concealed her features, and around her
throat she twisted a silken scarf. The collar of her coat, turned up,
hid the colour of her hair, and her appearance was in a few moments well
transformed. Indeed, she presented the exact prototype of her maid
Henriette.
The jewels were in a cheap leather hand-bag, also the maid's property.
This she placed in her dressing-bag, and with it in her hand she took up
little Ignatia, saying,--
"Hush, darling! don't speak a word. You'll promise mother, won't you?"
The child, surprised at all this preparation, gave her promise, but
still remained inquisitive.
Then the Crown Princess Claire gave a final glance around the room, the
scene of so much of her bitter domestic unhappiness. Sighing heavily,
she crossed herself before the Madonna, uttered a few low words in
prayer, and unlocking the door stole out into the long, empty corridor.
Those were exciting moments--the most exciting in all her life.
With her heart beating quickly she sped onward to the head of the great
marble gilt staircase. Along one of the side corridors a royal valet
was approaching, and the man nodded to her familiarly, believing her to
be Henriette.
At the head of the staircase she looked down, but saw nobody. It was
the hour when all the servants were at their evening meal. Therefore,
descending quickly, she passed through the great winter garden, a
beautiful place where, among the palms and flowers, were cunningly
placed tiny electric lamps. Across a large courtyard she went--as it
was a short cut from that wing of the palace in which her apartments
were situated--and at last she reached the main entrance, where stood
the head concierge in his cocked hat and scarlet livery, and where idled
an agent of police in plain clothes, reading the evening paper.
At her approach they both glanced at her.
She held her breath. What if they stopped her on account of the child?
But summoning all her courage she went forward, compelled to pass them
quite closely.
Then as she advanced she nodded familiarly to the gold-laced janitor,
who to her relief wished her good-evening, and she passed out into the
park.
She had successfully passed through one peril, but there was yet a
second--those carefully-guarded gilded gates which gave entrance to the
royal demesne. Day and night they were watched by palace servants and
the agents of police entrusted with his Majesty's personal safety.
She sped on down the broad gravelled drive, scarce daring to breathe,
and on arrival at the gatehouse passed in it, compelled to make her exit
through the small iron turnstile where sat two men, the faithful
white-bearded old gatekeeper, who had been fifty years in the royal
service, and a dark-faced brigadier of police. Recognition would mean
her incarceration in an asylum as insane.
Both men looked up as she entered. It was the supreme moment of her
peril. She saw that the detective was puzzled by her veil. But she
boldly passed by them, saying in French, in a voice in imitation of
Henriette's,--
"_Bon soir, messieurs_!"
The old gatekeeper, in his low, gruff German, wished her good-night
unsuspiciously, drew the lever which released the turnstile, and next
moment the Crown Princess Claire stepped out into the world beyond--a
free woman.
CHAPTER ELEVEN.
DOOM OR DESTINY.
With quickened footsteps she clasped the child to her, and hurrying on
in the falling gloom, skirted the long, high walls of the royal park,
where at equal distances stood the sentries.
More than one, believing her to be Mademoiselle, saluted her.
She was free, it is true; but she had yet to face many perils, the
greatest of them all being that of recognition by the police at the
station, or by any of the people, to whom her countenance was so well
known.
Presently she gained the broad Klosterstrasse, where the big electric
lamps were already shining; and finding a fiacre at the stand, entered
it and drove to a small outfitter's shop, where she purchased two
travelling-rugs and a shawl for little Ignatia. Thence she went to a
pastrycook's and bought some cakes, and then drove up the wide
Wolbeckerstrasse to the central railway station.
The streets were alive with life, for most of the shops were closed, the
main thoroughfares were illuminated, and all Treysa was out at the cafes
or restaurants, or promenading the streets, for the day was a national
festival. The national colours were displayed everywhere, and the band
of the 116th Regiment was playing a selection from "La Boheme" as she
crossed the great Domplatz.
Hers was indeed a strange position.
Unknown and unrecognised, she drove in the open cab, with the tiny,
wondering Princess at her side, through the great crowds of
holiday-makers--those people who had they known of her unhappiness would
in all probability have risen in a body and revolted.
She remembered that she had been "their Claire," yet after that night
she would be theirs no longer. It was a sad and silent leave-taking.
She had renounced her crown and imperial privileges for ever.
Many men and women stared at her as she passed under the bright electric
street lamps, and once or twice she half feared that they might have
penetrated her disguise. Yet no cheer was raised; none rushed forward
to kiss her hand.
She gave the cabman orders to drive up and down several of the principal
thoroughfares, for there was still plenty of time for the train; and,
reluctant to take leave of the people of Treysa whom she loved so well,
and who were her only friends, she gazed upon them from behind her veil
and sighed.
At the busy, echoing station she arrived ten minutes before the express
was due, and took her tickets; but when she went to the _wagon-lit_
office, the official, not recognising her, sharply replied that the
places had all been taken by an American tourist party. Therefore she
was compelled to enter an ordinary first-class compartment. The train
was crowded, and all the corner seats were taken. Fearing to call a
porter to her assistance lest she should be recognised--when the royal
saloon would at once be attached to the train for her--she was compelled
to elbow her way through the crowd and take an uncomfortable seat in the
centre of a compartment, where all through the night she tried to sleep,
but in vain.
Little Ignatia soon closed her eyes and was asleep, but Claire, full of
regrets at being compelled to renounce husband, crown, everything, as
she had done, and in wonder of what the future had in store for her, sat
silent, nursing her child through the long night hours. Her
fellow-travellers, two fat Germans of Jewish cast, and three women,
slept heavily, the men snoring.
The grey dawn showed at last over the low green hills. Had her absence
been discovered? Most certainly it had, but they had now passed the
confines of the kingdom, and she was certain that the people at the
palace would not telegraph news of her disappearance for fear of
creating undue scandal.
At last she had frustrated their dastardly plot to incarcerate her in an
asylum. She sat there, a figure of sweet loveliness combined with
exceeding delicacy and even fragility--one of the most refined elegance
and the most exquisite modesty.
At a small wayside station where they stopped about seven o'clock she
bought a glass of coffee, and then they continued until the Austrian
frontier at Voitersreuth was reached; and at Eger, a few miles farther
on, she was compelled to descend and change carriages, for only the
_wagon-lit_ went through to the capital.
It was then eleven o'clock in the morning, and feeling hungry, she took
little Ignatia into the buffet and had some luncheon, the child
delighted at the novel experience of travelling.
"We are going to see grandfather," her mother told her. "You went to
see him when you were such a wee, wee thing, so you don't remember him."
"No," declared the child with wide-open, wondering eyes; "I don't
remember. Will Allen be there?"
"No, darling, I don't think so," was the evasive reply to a question
which struck deep into the heart of the woman fleeing from her
persecutors.
While Ignatia had her milk, her mother ate her cutlet at the long table
among the other hasty travellers, gobbling up their meal and shouting
orders to waiters with their mouths full.
Hitherto, when she passed there in the royal saloon, the railway
officials had come forward, cap in hand, to salute her as an Imperial
Archduchess of Austria; but now, unknown and unrecognised, she passed as
an ordinary traveller. Presently, when the Vienna express drew up to
the platform, she fortunately found an empty first-class compartment,
and continued her journey alone, taking off her hat and settling herself
for the remaining nine hours between there and the capital. Little
Ignatia was still very sleepy, therefore she made a cushion for her with
her cape and laid her full length, while she herself sat in a corner
watching the picturesque landscape, and thinking--thinking deeply over
all the grim tragedy of the past.
After travelling for three hours, the train stopped at a small station
called Protovin, the junction of the line from Prague, whence a train
had arrived in connection with the express. Here there seemed quite a
number of people waiting upon the platform.
She was looking out carelessly upon them when from among the crowd a
man's eyes met hers. He stared open-mouthed, turned pale, and next
instant was at the door. She drew back, but, alas! it was too late.
She was without hat or veil, and he had recognised her.
She gave vent to a low cry, half of surprise, half of despair.
Next second the door opened, and the man stood before her, hat in hand.
"Princess!" he gasped in a low, excited voice. "What does this mean?
You--alone--going to Vienna?"
"Carl!" she cried, "why are _you_ here? Where have you come from?"
"I have been to my estate up at Rakonitz, before going to Rome," was his
answer. "Is it Destiny that again brings us together like this?"
And entering the carriage, he bent and kissed her hand.
Was it Destiny, or was it Doom?
"You with Ignatia, and no lady-in-waiting? What does this mean?" he
inquired, utterly puzzled.
The porter behind him placed his bag in the carriage, while he, in his
travelling-ulster and cap, begged permission to remain there.
What could she say? She was very lonely, and she wanted to tell him
what had occurred since her return to Treysa and of the crisis of it
all. So she nodded in the affirmative.
Then he gave the porter his tip, and the man departed. Presently,
before the train moved off, the sleeping child opened her eyes, shyly at
first, in the presence of a stranger; but a moment later, recognising
him, she got up, and rushing gladly towards him, cried in her pretty,
childish way,--
"Leitolf! Good Leitolf to come with us! We are so very tired!"
"Are you, little Highness?" exclaimed the man laughing, and taking her
upon his knee. "But you will soon be at your destination."
"Yes," she pouted, "but I would not mind if mother did not cry so much."
The Princess pressed her lips together. She was a little annoyed that
her child should reveal the secret of her grief. If she did so to
Leitolf she might do so to others.
After a little while, however, the motion of the train lulled the child
off to sleep again, and the man laid her down as before. Then, turning
to the sorrowing woman at his side, he asked,--
"You had my message--I mean you found it?"
She nodded, but made no reply. She recollected each of those
finely-penned words, and knew that they came from the heart of as honest
and upright a man as there was in the whole empire.
"And now tell me, Princess, the reason of this second journey to
Vienna?" he asked, looking at her with his calm, serious face.
For a moment she held her breath. There were tears welling in her eyes,
and she feared lest he might detect them--feared that she might break
down in explaining to him the bitter truth.
"I have left Treysa for ever," she said simply.
He started from his seat and stared at her.
"Left Treysa!" he gasped. "Left the Court--left your husband! Is this
really true?"
"It is the truth, Carl," was her answer in a low, tremulous tone. "I
could bear it no longer."
He was silent. He recognised the extreme gravity of the step she had
taken. He recognised, too, that, more serious than all, her
unscrupulous enemies who had conspired to drive her from Court had now
triumphed.
His brows were knit as he realised all that she was suffering--this
pure, beautiful woman, whom he had once loved so fondly, and whose
champion he still remained. He knew that the Crown Prince was a man of
brutal instinct, and utterly unsuited as husband of a sweet, refined,
gentle woman such as Claire. It was, indeed, a tragedy--a dark tragedy.
In a low voice he inquired what had occurred, but she made no mention of
the brutal, cowardly blow which had felled her insensible, cut her lip,
and broken her white teeth. She only explained very briefly the
incident of the three guests at dinner, and the amazing conversation she
had afterwards overheard.
"It is a dastardly plot!" he cried in quick anger. "Why, you are as
sane as I am, and yet the Crown Prince, in order to get rid of you, will
allow these doctors to certify you as a lunatic! The conspiracy shall
be exposed in the press. I will myself expose it!" he declared,
clenching his fists.
"No, Carl," she exclaimed quickly. "I have never done anything against
my husband's interest, nor have I ever made complaint against him. I
shall not do so now. Remember, what I have just told you is in strict
confidence. The public must not know of it."
"Then will you actually remain a victim and keep silence, allowing these
people to thus misjudge you?" he asked in a tone of reproach.
"To bring opprobrium upon my husband is to bring scandal upon the Court
and nation," was her answer. "I am still Crown Princess, and I have
still my duty to perform towards the people."
"You are a woman of such high ideals, Princess," he said, accepting her
reproof. "Most other wives who have been treated as you have would have
sought to retaliate."
"Why should I? My husband is but the weak-principled puppet of a
scandalous Court. It is not his own fault. He is goaded on by those
who fear that I may reign as Queen."
"Few women would regard him in such a very generous light," Leitolf
remarked, still stunned by the latest plot which she had revealed. If
there was an ingenious conspiracy to confine her in an asylum, then
surely it would be an easy matter for the very fact of her flight to be
misconstrued into insanity. They would tear her child from her, and
imprison her, despairing and brokenhearted. The thought of it goaded
him to desperation. She told him of her intention of returning to her
father, the Archduke Charles, and of living in future in her old home at
Wartenstein--that magnificent castle of which they both had such
pleasant recollections.
"And I shall be in Rome," he sighed. "Ah, Princess, I shall often think
of you, often and often."
"Never write to me, I beg of you, Carl," she said apprehensively. "Your
letter might fall into other hands, and certainly would be
misunderstood. The world at large does not believe in platonic
friendship between man and woman, remember."
"True," he murmured. "That is why they say that you and I are still
lovers, which is a foul and abominable lie." Their eyes met, and she
saw a deep, earnest look in his face that told her that he was thinking
still of those days long ago, and of that giddy intoxication of heart
and sense which belongs to the novelty of passion which we feel once,
and but once, in our lives.
At that moment the train came to a standstill at the little station of
Gratzen, and, unnoticed by them, a man passed the carriage and peered in
inquisitively. He was a thick-set, grey-bearded, hard-faced German,
somewhat round-shouldered, rather badly dressed, who, leaning heavily
upon his stick, walked with the air of an invalid.
He afterwards turned quickly upon his heel and again limped past, gazing
in, so as to satisfy himself that he was not mistaken.
Then entering a compartment at the rear of the train the old fellow
resumed his journey, smiling to himself, and stroking his beard with his
thin, bony hand, as though he had made a very valuable discovery and yet
was puzzled.
CHAPTER TWELVE.
"AN OPEN SCANDAL!"
At Klosterneuberg, six miles from Vienna, Leitolf kissed her hand in
deep reverence, taking sad leave of her, for on arrival at the capital
she would probably be recognised, and they both deemed it judicious that
she should be alone.
"Good-bye," he said earnestly, holding her hand as the train ran into
the suburban station. "This meeting of ours has been a strange and
unexpected one, and this is, I suppose, our last leave-taking. I have
nothing to add," he sighed. "You know that I am ever your servant, ever
ready to serve your Imperial Highness in whatsoever manner you may
command. May God bless and comfort you. Adieu."
"Good-bye, Carl," she said brokenly. It was all she could say. She
restrained her tears by dint of great effort.
Then, when he had gone and closed the carriage door, she burst into a
fit of sobbing. By his absence it seemed to her that the light of her
life had been extinguished. She was alone, in hopeless despair.
Darkness had now fallen, and as the train rushed on its final run along
the precipitous slopes of the Kahlenberg, little Ignatia placed her arms
around her mother's neck and said,--
"Mother, don't cry, or I shall tell Allen, and she'll scold you. Poor,
dear mother!"
The Princess kissed the child's soft arms, and at length managed to dry
her own eyes, assuming her hat and veil in preparation for arrival at
the capital. And none too soon, for ere she had dressed Ignatia and
assumed her own disguise the train slowed down and stopped, while the
door was thrown open and a porter stood ready to take her wraps.
She took Ignatia in her arms and descended in the great station, bright
beneath its electric lamps, and full of bustle and movement. She saw
nothing more of Leitolf, who had disappeared into the crowd. He had
wished her farewell for ever.
A fiacre conveyed her to her father's magnificent palace in the
Parkring, where on arrival the gorgeous concierge, mistaking her for a
domestic, treated her with scant courtesy.
"His Imperial Highness the Archduke is not in Vienna," was his answer.
"What's your business with him, pray?"
The Princess, laughing, raised her veil, whereupon the gruff old fellow,
a highly-trusted servant, stammered deep apologies, took off his hat,
and bent to kiss the hand of the daughter of the Imperial house.
"My father is away, Franz? Where is he?"
"At Wartenstein, your Imperial Highness. He left yesterday," and he
rang the electric bell to summon the major-domo.
She resolved to remain the night, and then resume her journey to the
castle. Therefore, with little Ignatia still in her arms, she ascended
the grand staircase, preceded by the pompous servitor, until she reached
the small green-and-gilt salon which she always used when she came
there.
Two maids were quickly in attendance, electric lights were switched on
everywhere, and the bustle of servants commenced as soon as the news
spread that the Archduchess Claire had returned.
Several of the officials of the Archducal Court came to salute her, and
the housekeeper came to her to receive orders, which, being simple, were
quickly given.
She retired to her room with little Ignatia, and after putting the child
to bed, removed the dust of travel and went to one of the smaller
dining-rooms, where two men in the Imperial livery served her dinner in
stiff silence.
Her father being absent, many of the rooms were closed, the furniture
swathed in holland, and the quiet of the great, gorgeous place was to
her distinctly depressing. She was anxious to know how her father would
take her flight--whether he would approve of it or blame her.
She sent distinct orders to Franz that no notice was to be given to the
journals of her unexpected return, remarking at the same time that he
need not send to the station, as she had arrived without baggage. If it
were known in Vienna that she had returned, the news would quickly be
telegraphed back to Treysa. Besides, when the fact of her presence in
the Austrian capital was known, she would, as Crown Princess, be
compelled by Court etiquette to go at once and salute her uncle the
Emperor. This she had no desire to do just at present. His hard,
unjust words at her last interview with him still rankled in her memory.
His Majesty was not her friend. That had recently been made entirely
plain.
So, after dining, she chatted for a short time with De Bothmer, her
father's private secretary, who came to pay his respects to her, and
then retired to her own room--the room with the old ivory crucifix where
the oil light burnt dimly in its red glass.
She crossed herself before it, and her lips moved in silent prayer.
A maid came to her and reported that little Ignatia was sleeping
soundly, but that was not sufficient. She went herself along the
corridor to the child's room and saw that she was comfortable, giving
certain instructions with maternal anxiety.
Then she returned to her room accompanied by the woman, who, inquisitive
regarding her young mistress's return, began to chat to her while she
brushed and plaited her hair, telling her all the latest gossip of the
palace.
The Archduke, her father, had, it appeared, gone to Wartenstein for a
fortnight, and had arranged to go afterwards to Vichy for the cure, and
thence to Paris; therefore, next morning, taking the maid with her to
look after little Ignatia, she left Vienna again for the Tyrol,
travelling by Linz and Salsburg to Rosenheim, and then changing on to
the Innsbruck line and alighting, about six o'clock in the evening, at
the little station of Rattenberg. There she took a hired carriage along
the post road into the beautiful Zillerthal Alps, where, high up in a
commanding position ten miles away, her old home was situated--one of
the finest and best-preserved mediaeval castles in Europe.
It was already dark, and rain was falling as the four horses, with their
jingling bells, toiled up the steep, winding road, the driver cracking
his whip, proud to have the honour of driving her Imperial Highness, who
until four years ago had spent the greater part of her life there.
Little Ignatia, tired out by so much travelling, slept upon her mother's
knee, and the Crown Princess herself dozed for a time, waking to find
that they were still toiling up through the little village of Fugen,
which was her own property.
Presently, three miles farther on, she looked out of the carriage
window, and there, high up in the darkness, she saw the lighted windows
of the great, grim stronghold which, nearly a thousand years ago, had
been the fortress of the ancient Kings of Carinthia, those warlike
ancestors of hers whose valiant deeds are still recorded in song and
story.
Half an hour later the horses clattered into the great courtyard of the
castle, and the old castellan came forth in utter amazement to bow
before her.
Electric bells were rung, servants came forward quickly, the Archduke's
chamberlain appeared in surprise, and the news spread in an instant
through the servants' quarters that the Archduchess Claire--whom the
whole household worshipped--had returned and had brought with her the
tiny Princess Ignatia.
Everywhere men and women bowed low before her as, preceded by the
black-coated chamberlain, she went through those great, old vaulted
halls she knew so well, and up the old stone winding stairs to the room
which was still reserved for her, and which had not been disturbed since
she had left it to marry.
On entering she glanced around, and sighed in relief. At last she was
back at home again in dear old Wartenstein. Her dream of liberty was
actually realised!
Little Ignatia and the nurse were given an adjoining room which she had
used as a dressing-room, and as she stood there alone every object in
the apartment brought back to her sweet memories of her girlhood, with
all its peaceful hours of bliss, happiness, and high ideals.
It was not a large room, but extremely cosy. The windows in the
ponderous walls allowed deep alcoves, where she loved to sit and read on
summer evenings, and upon one wall was the wonderful old
fourteenth-century tapestry representing a tournament, which had been a
scene always before her ever since she could remember. The bed, too,
was gilded, quaint and old-fashioned, with hangings of rich crimson silk
brocade of three centuries ago. Indeed, the only modern innovations
there were the big toilet-table with its ancient silver bowl and ewer,
and the two electric lights suspended above.
Old Adelheid, her maid when she was a girl, came quickly to her, and
almost shed tears of joy at her young mistress's return. Adelheid, a
stout, round-faced, grey-haired woman, had nursed her as a child, and it
was she who had served her until the day when she had left Vienna for
Treysa after her unfortunate marriage.
"My sweet Princess!" cried the old serving-woman as she entered, and,
bending, kissed her hand, "only this moment I heard that you had come
back to us. This is really a most delightful surprise. I heard that
you were in Vienna the other day, and wondered whether you would come to
see us all at old Wartenstein--or whether at your Court so far away you
had forgotten us all."
"Forgotten you, Adelheid!" she exclaimed quickly, pushing her fair hair
from her brow, for her head ached after her fatiguing journey; "why, I
am always thinking of the dear old place, and of you--who used to scold
me so."
"When you deserved it, my Princess," laughed the pleasant old woman.
"Ah!" she added, "those were happy times, weren't they? But you were
often really incorrigible, you know, especially when you used to go down
into the valley and meet young Carl Leitolf in secret. You remember--
eh? And how I found you out?"
Claire held her breath for a moment at mention of that name.
"Yes, Adelheid," she said in a somewhat changed tone. "And you were
very good. You never betrayed our secret."
"No. Because I believed that you both loved each other--that
boy-and-girl love which is so very sweet while it lasts, but is no more
durable than the thistledown. But let us talk of the present now. I'll
go and order dinner for you, and see that you have everything
comfortable. I hope you will stay with us a long, long time. This is
your first return since your marriage, remember."
"Where is my father?" her Highness asked, taking off her hat, and
rearranging her hair before the mirror.
"In the green salon. He was with the secretary, Wernhardt, but I passed
the latter going out as I came up the stairs. The Archduke is therefore
alone."
"Then I will go and see him before I dine," she said; so, summoning all
her courage, she gave a final touch to her hair and went out, and down
the winding stairs, afterwards making her way to the opposite side of
the ponderous stronghold, where her father's study--called the green
salon on account of the old green silk hangings and upholstery--was
situated.
She halted at the door, but for an instant only; then, pale-faced and
determined, she entered the fine room with the groined roof, where, at a
table at the farther end, her father, in plain evening dress, was
writing beneath a shaded lamp.
He raised his bald head and glanced round to see who was the intruder
who entered there without knocking. Then, recognising his daughter, he
turned slowly in his writing-chair, his brows knit, exclaiming coldly
the single inquiry,--
"Well?"
His displeasure at her appearance was apparent. He did not even welcome
her, or inquire the reason of her return. The expression upon his thin,
grey face showed her that he was annoyed.
She rushed across to kiss him, but he put out his hand coldly, and held
her at arm's length.
"There is time for that later, Claire," he said in a hard voice. "I
understand that you have left Treysa?"
"Yes, I have. Who told you?"
"The Crown Prince, your husband, has informed me by telegraph of your
scandalous action."
"Scandalous action!" she cried quickly, while in self-defence she began
to implore the sympathy of the hard-hearted old Archduke, a man of iron
will and a bigot as regarded religion. In a few quick sentences, as she
stood before him in the centre of the room, she told him of all she had
suffered; of her tragic life in her gilded prison at Treysa; of the
insults heaped upon her by the King and Queen; of her husband's
ill-treatment; and finally, of the ingenious plot to certify her as
demented.
"And I have come to you, father, for protection for myself and my
child," she added earnestly. "If I remain longer at Treysa my enemies
will drive me really insane. I have tried to do my duty, God knows, but
those who seek my downfall are, alas! too strong. I am a woman, alone
and helpless. Surely you, my own father, will not refuse to assist your
daughter, who is the victim of a foul and dastardly plot?" she cried in
tears, advancing towards him. "I have come back to live here with my
child in seclusion and in peace--to obtain the freedom for which I have
longed ever since I entered that scandalous and unscrupulous Court of
Treysa. I implore of you, father, for my dear, dead mother's sake, to
have pity upon me, to at least stand by me as my one friend in all the
world--you--my own father!"
He remained perfectly unmoved. His thin, bloodless face only relaxed
into a dubious smile, and he responded in a hard voice,--
"You have another friend, Claire," Then he rose from his chair, his eyes
suddenly aflame with anger as he asked, "Why do you come here with such
lies as these upon your lips? To ask my assistance is utterly useless.
I have done with you. It is too late to-night for you to leave
Wartenstein, but recollect that you go from here before ten o'clock
to-morrow morning, and that during my lifetime you never enter again
beneath this roof!"
"But, father--why?" she gasped, staring at him amazed.
"Why? Why, because the whole world is scandalised by your conduct!
Every one knows that the reason of your unhappiness with the Crown
Prince is because you have a lover--that low-bred fellow Leitolf--a man
of the people," he sneered. "Your conduct at Treysa was an open
scandal, and in Vienna you actually visited him at his hotel. The
Emperor called me, and told me so. He is highly indignant that you
should bring such an outrageous scandal upon our house, and--"
"Father, I deny that Count Leitolf is my lover!" she cried, interrupting
him. "Even you, my own father, defame me," she added bitterly.
"Defame you!" he sneered. "Bah! you cannot deceive me when you have
actually eloped from Treysa with the fellow. See," he cried, taking a
telegram from the table and holding it before her, "do you deny what is
here reported--that you and he travelled together, and that he descended
from the train just before reaching Vienna, in fear of recognition.
No," he went on, while she stood before him utterly stunned and rendered
speechless by his words, which, alas! showed the terrible
misconstruction placed upon their injudicious companionship upon the
journey. "No, you cannot deny it! You will leave Wartenstein tomorrow,
for you have grown tired of your husband; you have invented the story of
the plot to declare you insane; and you have renounced your crown and
position in order to elope with Leitolf! From to-night I no longer
regard you as my daughter. Go!" and he pointed imperiously to the door.
"Go back to the people--the common herd of whom you are so very fond--
go back to your miserable lover if you wish. To me your future is quite
immaterial, and understand perfectly that I forbid you ever to return
beneath my roof. You have scandalised the whole of Europe, and you and
your lover may now act just as you may think proper."
"But, father!" she protested, heartbroken, bursting into bitter tears.
"Leitolf is not my lover! I swear to you it is all untrue!"
"Go!" he shouted, his face red with anger. "I have said all I need say.
Go! Leave me. I will never see you again--never--_never_!"
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
THE MAN WITH THE RED CRAVAT.
A secret service agent--one of the spies of the crafty old Minister
Minckeldeym--had followed Claire from Treysa. Her accidental meeting
with Leitolf had, he declared, been prearranged.
It was now said that she, a Crown Princess of the Imperial blood, had
eloped with her lover! The Court scandal was complete.
Alone in her room that night she sat for hours sobbing, while the great
castle was silent. She was now both homeless and friendless. All the
desperate appeals she had made to her father had been entirely
unavailing. He was a hard man always. She had, he declared, brought a
shameful scandal upon this Imperial house, and he would have nothing
further to do with her. Time after time she stoutly denied the false
and abominable charge, trying to explain the dastardly plot against her,
and the combination of circumstances which led to her meeting with the
Count at Protovin. But he would hear no explanation. Leitolf was her
lover, he declared, and all her excuses were utterly useless. He
refused her his protection, and cast her out as no child of his.
After long hours of tears and ceaseless sobbing, a strange thought
crossed her mind. True, she was unjustly condemned as having eloped
with Carl; yet, after all, was not even that preferable to the fate to
which her husband had conspired to relegate her? The whole of Europe
would say that she left the Court in company with a lover, and she bit
her lip when she thought of the cruel libel. Yet, supposing that they
had no ground for this gossip, was it not more than likely that her
enemies would seek to follow her and confine her in an asylum?
The strange combination of circumstances had, however, given them good
ground for declaring that she had eloped, and if such report got abroad,
as it apparently had done, then her husband would be compelled to sue
for a divorce.
She held her breath. Her fingers clenched themselves into her palms at
thought of it--a divorce on account of the man who had always, from her
girlhood, been her true, loyal, and platonic friend! And if it was
sought to prove what was untrue? Should she defend herself, and
establish her innocence? Or would she, by refusing to make defence,
obtain the freedom from Court which she sought?
She had been utterly dumbfounded by her father's allegations that she
had eloped. Until he had denounced her she had never for one moment
seen the grave peril in which his presence at Protovin had placed her.
He had compromised her quite unintentionally. Her own pure nature and
open mind had never suspected for one moment that those who wished her
ill would declare that she had eloped.
Now, as she sat there in the dead silence, she saw plainly, when too
late, how injudicious she had been--how, indeed, she had played into the
hands of those who sought her downfall. It was a false step to go to
Leitolf at the hotel in Vienna, and a worse action still to ask that he
should be recalled from her Court and sent away as attache to Rome. The
very fact that she showed interest in him had, of course, lent colour to
the grave scandals that were being everywhere whispered. Now the report
that she, an Imperial Archduchess, had eloped with him would set the
empires of Austria and Germany agog.
What the future was to be she did not attempt to contemplate. She was
plunged in despair, utterly hopeless, broken, and without a friend
except Steinbach. Was it destiny that she should be so utterly
misjudged? Even her own father had sent her forth as an outcast!
Early next morning, taking little Ignatia and the bag containing her
jewels, but leaving the maid behind, she drove from the castle, glancing
back at it with heavy heart as the carriage descended into the green,
fertile valley, gazing for the last time upon that old home she loved so
well. It was her last sight of it. She would never again look upon it,
she sadly told herself.
She, an Imperial Archduchess of Austria, Crown Princess of a great
German kingdom, a Dame of the Croix Etoilee, a woman who might any day
become a reigning queen, had renounced her crown and her position, and
was now an outcast! Hers was a curious position--stranger, perhaps,
than that in which any woman had before found herself. Many a royalty
is to-day unhappy in her domestic life, suffering in silence, yet making
a brave show towards the world. She had tried to do the same. She had
suffered without complaint for more than three long, dark years--until
her husband had not only struck her and disfigured her, but had
contemplated ridding himself of her by the foulest and most cowardly
means his devilish ingenuity could devise.
As she drove through those clean, prosperous villages which were on her
own private property, the people came forth, cheering with enthusiasm
and rushing to the carriage to kiss her hand. But she only smiled upon
them sadly--not, they said, shaking their heads after she had passed,
not the same smile as in the old days, before she married the German
Prince and went to far-off Treysa.
The stationmaster at Rattenberg came forward to make his obeisance, and
as certain military manoeuvres were in progress and some troops were
drawn up before the station, both officers and men drew up and saluted.
An old colonel whom she had known well before her marriage came forward,
and bowing, offered to see her to her compartment, expressing delight at
having met her again.
"Your Imperial Highness will never be forgotten here," declared the
gallant, red-faced old fellow, who wore fierce white moustaches. "The
poor are always wondering whether you are ever coming back. And at last
your Highness is here! And going--where?"
She hesitated. Truth to tell, she had never thought of her destination.
"I go now to Lucerne, incognito," she replied, for want of something
else to say; and they both walked on to the platform, he carrying
Henriette's cheap little leather bag containing her jewels.
"So this," he said, "is our little Princess Ignatia, about whom we have
heard so much." And laughingly he touched the shy child's soft cheek
caressingly.
"And who are you?" inquired the child wonderingly, examining his bright
uniform from head to foot.
The Princess joined in the Colonel's laughter. Usually the child was
shy, but, strangely enough, always talkativ
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