The Puppet Crown, Harlod MacGrath [best new books to read .TXT] 📗

Bismarck looks hungrily toward Schleswig-Holstein. Austria casts amorous eyes at us. A protectorate? We did not need it. It was forced on us. When Austria assumed to dictate to us as to who should be king, she also robbed us of our true independence. Twenty years ago there was no duchy; it was all one kingdom. Who created this duchy when Albrecht came on the throne? Austria. Why? If we live we shall read." He rose, shook his lean legs. "I have been for the most part neutral. I shall remain neutral. There is an undercurrent on which you have failed to reckon. Austria, mistress of the confederation. There are two men whom you must watch. One is the archbishop."

"The archbishop?" The minister was surprised that the Marshal should concur with the Colonel. "And the other?"

"Your friend the Colonel," starting for the door.

The minister smiled. "Will you not dine with me?" he asked.

"Thanks. But I have the Servian minister on my hands to-night. A propos, tell the Colonel that I decline Belgrade. I prefer to die at home." And he vanished.

Von Wallenstein reviewed the statements of both his visitors.

"I shall watch Monseigneur the archbishop." Then he added, with a half-smile: "God save us if the Marshal's sword were half so sharp as his tongue! It was careless of me to forget that I had shut him up in the cabinet."

Meanwhile Beauvais walked slowly toward his quarters, with his saber caught up under his arm. Once he turned and gazed at the palace, whose windows began to flash with light.

"Yes, they are puppets and jackals, and I am the lion. For all there shall serve my ends. I shall win, and when I do-" He laughed silently. "Well, I am a comely man, and Madame the duchess shall be my wife."


CHAPTER VI


MADEMOISELLE OF THE VEIL

The public park at night was a revelation to Maurice, who, lonely and restless, strolled over from the hotel in quest of innocent amusement. He was none the worse for his unintended bath; indeed, if anything, he was much the better for it. His imagination was excited. It was not every day that a man could, at one and the same time, fall out of a boat and into the presence of a princess of royal blood.

He tried to remember all he had said to her, but only two utterances recurred to him; yet these caused him an exhilaration like the bouquet of old wine. He had told her that she was beautiful, indirectly, it was true; she had accepted his friendship, also indirectly, it was true. Now the logical sequence of all this was-but he broke into a light laugh. What little vanity he possessed was without conceit. Princesses of royal blood were beyond the reach of logical sequence; and besides, she was to be married on the twentieth of the month.

He followed one of the paths which led to the pavilion. It was a charming scene, radiant with gas lamps, the vivid kaleidoscope of gowns and uniforms. Beautiful faces flashed past him. There were in the air the vague essences of violet, rose and heliotrope. Sometimes he caught the echo of low laughter or the snatch of a gay song. The light of the lamps shot out on the crinkled surface of the lake in tongues of quivering flame, which danced a brave gavot with the phantom stars; and afar twinkled the dipping oars. The brilliant pavilion, which rested partly over land and partly over water, was thronged.

The band was playing airs from the operas of the day, and Maurice yielded to the spell of the romantic music. He leaned over the pavilion rail, and out of the blackness below he endeavored to conjure up the face of Nell (or was it Kate?) who had danced with him at the embassies in Vienna, fenced and ridden with him, till-till- with a gesture of impatience he flung away the end of his cigar.

Memory was altogether too elusive. It was neither Nell nor Kate he saw smiling up at him, nor anybody else in the world but the Princess Alexia, whose eyes were like wine in a sunset, whose lips were as red as the rose of Tours in France, and whose voice was sweeter than that throbbing up from the 'cello. If he thought much more of her, there would be a logical sequence on his side. He laughed again-with an effort-and settled back in his chair to renew his interest in the panorama revolving around him.

"They certainly know how to live in these countries," he thought, "for all their comic operas. All I need, to have this fairy scene made complete, is a woman to talk to. By George, what's to hinder me from finding one?" he added, seized by the spirit of mischief. He turned his head this way and that. "Ah! doubtless there is the one I'm looking for."

Seated alone at a table behind him was a woman dressed in gray. Her back was toward him, but he lost none of the beautiful contours of her figure. She wore a gray alpine hat, below the rim of which rebellious little curls escaped, curls of a fine red-brown, which, as they trailed to the nape of the firm white neck, lightened into a ruddy gold. Her delicate head was turned aside, and to all appearances her gaze was directed to the entrance to the pavilion. A heavy blue veil completely obscured her features; though Maurice could see a rose-tinted ear and the shadow of a curving chin and throat, which promised much. To a man there is always a mystery lurking behind a veil. So he rose, walked past her, returned and deliberately sat down in the chair opposite to hers. The fact that gendarmes moved among the crowd did not disturb him.

"Good evening, Mademoiselle," he said, politely lifting his hat.

She straightened haughtily. "Monsieur," she said, resentment, consternation and indignation struggling to predominate in her tones, "I did not give you permission to sit down. You are impertinent!"

"O, no," Maurice declared. "I am not impertinent. I am lonesome. In all Bleiberg I haven't a soul to talk to, excepting the hotel waiters, and they are uninteresting. Grant me the privilege of conversing with you for a moment. We shall never meet again; and I should not know you if we did. Whether you are old or young, plain or beautiful, it matters not. My only wish is to talk to a woman, to hear a woman's voice"

"Shall I call a gendarme, Monsieur, and have him search for your nurse?" The attitude which accompanied these words was anything but assuring.

He, however, evinced no alarm. He even laughed. "That was good! We shall get along finely, I am sure."

"Monsieur," she said, rising, "I repeat that I do not desire your company, nor to remain in the presence of your unspeakable effrontery."

"I beseech you!" implored Maurice, also rising. "I am a foreigner, lonesome, unhappy, thousands of miles from home-"

"You are English?" suddenly. She stood with the knuckle of her forefinger on her lips as if meditating. She sat down.

Maurice, greatly surprised, also sat down.

"English?" he repeated. His thought was: "What the deuce! This is the third time I have been asked that. Who is this gay Lothario the women seem to be expecting?" To her he continued: "And why do you ask me that?"

"Perhaps it is your accent. And what do you wish to say to me, Monsieur?" It was a voice of quality; all the anger had gone from it. She leaned on her elbows, her chin in her palms, and through the veil he caught the sparkle of a pair of wonderful eyes. "Let us converse in English," she added. "It is so long since I have had occasion to speak in that tongue." She repeated her question.

"O, I had no definite plan outlined," he answered; "just generalities, with the salt of repartee to season." He pondered over this sudden transition from wrath to mildness. An Englishman? Very well; it might grow interesting.

"Is it customary among the English to request to speak to strangers without the usual formalities of an introduction?"

"I can not say that it is," he answered truthfully enough; "but the procedure is never without a certain charm and excitement."

"Ah; then you were led to address me merely by the love of adventure?"

"That is it; the love of adventure. I should not have spoken to you had you not worn the veil." He remarked that her English was excellent.

"You differ from the average Englishman, who is usually wrapt up in himself and has no desire to talk to strangers. You have been a soldier."

The evolutions of his cane ceased. "How in the world did you guess that?" surprised beyond measure.

"Perhaps there is something suggestive in your shoulders."

He tried to peer behind the veil, but in vain. "Am I speaking to one I have met before?"

"I believe not; indeed, sir, I am positive."

"I have been a soldier, but my shoulders did not tell you that."

"Perhaps I have the gift of clairvoyance," gazing again toward the entrance.

"Or perhaps you have been to Vienna."

"Who knows? Most Englishmen are, or have been, soldiers."

"That is true." Inwardly, "There's my friend the Englishman again. She's guessing closer than she knows. Curious; she has mistaken me for some one she does not know, if that is possible." He was somewhat in a haze. "Well, you have remarkable eyes. However, let us talk of a more interesting subject; for instance, yourself. You, too, love adventure, that is, if I interpret the veil rightly."

"Yes; I like to see without being seen. But, of course, behind this love of adventure which you possess, there is an important mission."

"Ah!" he thought; "you are not quite sure of me." Aloud, "Yes, I came here to witness the comic opera."

"The comic opera? I do not understand?"

"I believed there was going to be trouble between the duchy and the kingdom, but unfortunately the prima donna has refused the part."

"The prima donna!" in a muffled voice. "Whom do you mean?"

"Son Altesse la Grande Duchesse! 'Voici le sabre de mon pere!'" And he whistled a bar from Offenbach, his eyes dancing.

"Sir!-I!-you do wrong to laugh at us!" a flash from the half- hidden eyes.

"Forgive me if I have offended you, but I-"

"Ah, sir, but you who live in a powerful country think we little folk have no hearts, that we have no wrongs to redress, no dreams of conquest and of power. You are wrong."

"And whose side do you defend?"

"I am a woman," was the equivocal answer.

"Which means that you are uncertain."

"I have long ago made up my mind."

"Wonderful! I always thought a woman's mind was like a time- table, subject to change without notice. So you have made up your mind?"

"I was born with its purpose defined," coldly.

"Ah, now I begin to doubt."

"What?" with a still lower degree of warmth.

"That you are a woman. Only goddesses do not change their minds- sometimes. Well, then you are on the weaker side."

"Or the stronger, since there are two sides."

"And the stronger?" persistently.

"The side which is not the weaker. But the subject is what you English call 'taboo.' It is treading on delicate ground to talk politics