The Prisoner of Zenda, Anthony Hope [best inspirational books txt] 📗

story that ever you heard!”

He started and cried: “You’re safe!” and wrung my hand. But a moment later he added:

“And what the devil are you laughing at?”

“Four gentlemen round a tea-table,” said I, laughing still, for it had been uncommonly ludicrous to see the formidable three altogether routed and scattered with no more deadly weapon than an ordinary tea-table.

Moreover, you will observe that I had honourably kept my word, and not fired till they did.

X A Great Chance for a Villain

It was the custom that the Prefect of Police should send every afternoon a report to me on the condition of the capital and the feeling of the people: the document included also an account of the movements of any persons whom the police had received instructions to watch. Since I had been in Strelsau, Sapt had been in the habit of reading the report and telling me any items of interest which it might contain. On the day after my adventure in the summerhouse, he came in as I was playing a hand of écarté with Fritz von Tarlenheim.

“The report is rather full of interest this afternoon,” he observed, sitting down.

“Do you find,” I asked, “any mention of a certain fracas?”

He shook his head with a smile.

“I find this first,” he said: “ ‘His Highness the Duke of Strelsau left the city (so far as it appears, suddenly), accompanied by several of his household. His destination is believed to be the Castle of Zenda, but the party travelled by road and not by train. MM. De Gautet, Bersonin, and Detchard followed an hour later, the last-named carrying his arm in a sling. The cause of his wound is not known, but it is suspected that he has fought a duel, probably incidental to a love affair.’ ”

“That is remotely true,” I observed, very well pleased to find that I had left my mark on the fellow.

“Then we come to this,” pursued Sapt: “ ‘Mme. de Mauban, whose movements have been watched according to instructions, left by train at midday. She took a ticket for Dresden⁠—’ ”

“It’s an old habit of hers,” said I.

“ ‘The Dresden train stops at Zenda.’ An acute fellow, this. And finally listen to this: ‘The state of feeling in the city is not satisfactory. The king is much criticized’ (you know, he’s told to be quite frank) ‘for taking no steps about his marriage. From enquiries among the entourage of the Princess Flavia, her Royal Highness is believed to be deeply offended by the remissness of his Majesty. The common people are coupling her name with that of the Duke of Strelsau, and the duke gains much popularity from the suggestion.’ I have caused the announcement that the king gives a ball tonight in honour of the princess to be widely diffused, and the effect is good.”

“That is news to me,” said I.

“Oh, the preparations are all made!” laughed Fritz. “I’ve seen to that.”

Sapt turned to me and said, in a sharp, decisive voice:

“You must make love to her tonight, you know.”

“I think it is very likely I shall, if I see her alone,” said I. “Hang it, Sapt, you don’t suppose I find it difficult?”

Fritz whistled a bar or two; then he said: “You’ll find it only too easy. Look here, I hate telling you this, but I must. The Countess Helga told me that the princess had become most attached to the king. Since the coronation, her feelings have undergone a marked development. It’s quite true that she is deeply wounded by the king’s apparent neglect.”

“Here’s a kettle of fish!” I groaned.

“Tut, tut!” said Sapt. “I suppose you’ve made pretty speeches to a girl before now? That’s all she wants.”

Fritz, himself a lover, understood better my distress. He laid his hand on my shoulder, but said nothing.

“I think, though,” pursued that cold-blooded old Sapt, “that you’d better make your offer tonight.”

“Good heavens!”

“Or, any rate, go near it; and I shall send a ‘semiofficial’ to the papers.”

“I’ll do nothing of the sort⁠—no more will you!” said I. “I utterly refuse to take part in making a fool of the princess.”

Sapt looked at me with his small keen eyes. A slow cunning smile passed over his face.

“All right, lad, all right,” said he. “We mustn’t press you too hard. Soothe her down a bit, if you can, you know. Now for Michael!”

“Oh, damn Michael!” said I. “He’ll do tomorrow. Here, Fritz, come for a stroll in the garden.”

Sapt at once yielded. His rough manner covered a wonderful tact⁠—and as I came to recognize more and more, a remarkable knowledge of human nature. Why did he urge me so little about the princess? Because he knew that her beauty and my ardour would carry me further than all his arguments⁠—and that the less I thought about the thing, the more likely was I to do it. He must have seen the unhappiness he might bring on the princess; but that went for nothing with him. Can I say, confidently, that he was wrong? If the king were restored, the princess must turn to him, either knowing or not knowing the change. And if the king were not restored to us? It was a subject that we had never yet spoken of. But I had an idea that, in such a case, Sapt meant to seat me on the throne of Ruritania for the term of my life. He would have set Satan himself there sooner than that pupil of his, Black Michael.

The ball was a sumptuous affair. I opened it by dancing a quadrille with Flavia; then I waltzed with her. Curious eyes and eager whispers attended us. We went in to supper; and, halfway through, I, half mad by then, for her glance had answered mine, and her quick breathing met my stammered sentences⁠—I rose in my place before all the brilliant crowd, and taking the Red Rose that I wore, flung the ribbon with its jewelled badge round her neck. In a tumult of applause