The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Prisoner of Zenda, by Anthony Hope

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THE PRISONER OF ZENDA

by Anthony Hope

CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1
The Rassendylls—With a Word on the Elphbergs

“I wonder when in the world you’re going to do anything, Rudolf?” said mybrother’s wife.

“My dear Rose,” I answered, laying down my egg-spoon, “why in the world shouldI do anything? My position is a comfortable one. I have an income nearlysufficient for my wants (no one’s income is ever quite sufficient, you know), Ienjoy an enviable social position: I am brother to Lord Burlesdon, andbrother-in-law to that charming lady, his countess. Behold, it is enough!”

“You are nine-and-twenty,” she observed, “and you’ve done nothing but—”

“Knock about? It is true. Our family doesn’t need to do things.”

This remark of mine rather annoyed Rose, for everybody knows (and thereforethere can be no harm in referring to the fact) that, pretty and accomplished asshe herself is, her family is hardly of the same standing as the Rassendylls.Besides her attractions, she possessed a large fortune, and my brother Robertwas wise enough not to mind about her ancestry. Ancestry is, in fact, a matterconcerning which the next observation of Rose’s has some truth.

“Good families are generally worse than any others,” she said.

Upon this I stroked my hair: I knew quite well what she meant.

“I’m so glad Robert’s is black!” she cried.

At this moment Robert (who rises at seven and works before breakfast) came in.He glanced at his wife: her cheek was slightly flushed; he patted itcaressingly.

“What’s the matter, my dear?” he asked.

“She objects to my doing nothing and having red hair,” said I, in an injuredtone.

“Oh! of course he can’t help his hair,” admitted Rose.

“It generally crops out once in a generation,” said my brother. “So does thenose. Rudolf has got them both.”

“I wish they didn’t crop out,” said Rose, still flushed.

“I rather like them myself,” said I, and, rising, I bowed to the portrait ofCountess Amelia.

My brother’s wife uttered an exclamation of impatience.

“I wish you’d take that picture away, Robert,” said she.

“My dear!” he cried.

“Good heavens!” I added.

“Then it might be forgotten,” she continued.

“Hardly—with Rudolf about,” said Robert, shaking his head.

“Why should it be forgotten?” I asked.

“Rudolf!” exclaimed my brother’s wife, blushing very prettily.

I laughed, and went on with my egg. At least I had shelved the question of what(if anything) I ought to do. And, by way of closing the discussion—and also, Imust admit, of exasperating my strict little sister-in-law a trifle more—Iobserved:

“I rather like being an Elphberg myself.”

When I read a story, I skip the explanations; yet the moment I begin to writeone, I find that I must have an explanation. For it is manifest that I mustexplain why my sister-in-law was vexed with my nose and hair, and why Iventured to call myself an Elphberg. For eminent as, I must protest, theRassendylls have been for many generations, yet participation in their blood ofcourse does not, at first sight, justify the boast of a connection with thegrander stock of the Elphbergs or a claim to be one of that Royal House. Forwhat relationship is there between Ruritania and Burlesdon, between the Palaceat Strelsau or the Castle of Zenda and Number 305 Park Lane, W.?

Well then—and I must premise that I am going, perforce, to rake up the veryscandal which my dear Lady Burlesdon wishes forgotten—in the year 1733, GeorgeII. sitting then on the throne, peace reigning for the moment, and the King andthe Prince of Wales being not yet at loggerheads, there came on a visit to theEnglish Court a certain prince, who was afterwards known to history as Rudolfthe Third of Ruritania. The prince was a tall, handsome young fellow, marked(maybe marred, it is not for me to say) by a somewhat unusually long, sharp andstraight nose, and a mass of dark-red hair—in fact, the nose and the hair whichhave stamped the Elphbergs time out of mind. He stayed some months in England,where he was most courteously received; yet, in the end, he left rather under acloud. For he fought a duel (it was considered highly well bred of him to waiveall question of his rank) with a nobleman, well known in the society of theday, not only for his own merits, but as the husband of a very beautiful wife.In that duel Prince Rudolf received a severe wound, and, recovering therefrom,was adroitly smuggled off by the Ruritanian ambassador, who had found him apretty handful. The nobleman was not wounded in the duel; but the morning beingraw and damp on the occasion of the meeting, he contracted a severe chill, and,failing to throw it off, he died some six months after the departure of PrinceRudolf, without having found leisure to adjust his relations with his wife—who,after another two months, bore an heir to the title and estates of the familyof Burlesdon. This lady was the Countess Amelia, whose picture my sister-in-lawwished to remove from the drawing-room in Park Lane; and her husband was James,fifth Earl of Burlesdon and twenty-second Baron Rassendyll, both in the peerageof England, and a Knight of the Garter. As for Rudolf, he went back toRuritania, married a wife, and ascended the throne, whereon his progeny in thedirect line have sat from then till this very hour—with one short interval.And, finally, if you walk through the picture galleries at Burlesdon, among thefifty portraits or so of the last century and a half, you will find five orsix, including that of the sixth earl, distinguished by long, sharp, straightnoses and a quantity of dark-red hair; these five or six have also blue eyes,whereas among the Rassendylls dark eyes are the commoner.

That is the explanation, and I am glad to have finished it: the blemishes onhonourable lineage are a delicate subject, and certainly this heredity we hearso much about is the finest scandalmonger in the world; it laughs atdiscretion, and writes strange entries between the lines of the “Peerages”.

It will be observed that my sister-in-law, with a want of logic that must havebeen peculiar to herself (since we are no longer allowed to lay it to thecharge of her sex), treated my complexion almost as an offence for which I wasresponsible, hastening to assume from that external sign inward qualities ofwhich I protest my entire innocence; and this unjust inference she sought tobuttress by pointing to the uselessness of the life I had led. Well, be that asit may, I had picked up a good deal of pleasure and a good deal of knowledge. Ihad been to a German school and a German university, and spoke German asreadily and perfectly as English; I was thoroughly at home in French; I had asmattering of Italian and enough Spanish to swear by. I was, I believe, astrong, though hardly fine swordsman and a good shot. I could ride anythingthat had a back to sit on; and my head was as cool a one as you could find, forall its flaming cover. If you say that I ought to have spent my time in usefullabour, I am out of Court and have nothing to say, save that my parents had nobusiness to leave me two thousand pounds a year and a roving disposition.

“The difference between you and Robert,” said my sister-in-law, who often(bless her!) speaks on a platform, and oftener still as if she were on one, “isthat he recognizes the duties of his position, and you see the opportunities ofyours.”

“To a man of spirit, my dear Rose,” I answered, “opportunities are duties.”

“Nonsense!” said she, tossing her head; and after a moment she went on: “Now,here’s Sir Jacob Borrodaile offering you exactly what you might be equal to.”

“A thousand thanks!” I murmured.

“He’s to have an Embassy in six months, and Robert says he is sure that he’lltake you as an attaché. Do take it, Rudolf—to please me.”

Now, when my sister-in-law puts the matter in that way, wrinkling her prettybrows, twisting her little hands, and growing wistful in the eyes, all onaccount of an idle scamp like myself, for whom she has no naturalresponsibility, I am visited with compunction. Moreover, I thought it possiblethat I could pass the time in the position suggested with some tolerableamusement. Therefore I said:

“My dear sister, if in six months’ time no unforeseen obstacle has arisen, andSir Jacob invites me, hang me if I don’t go with Sir Jacob!”

“Oh, Rudolf, how good of you! I am glad!”

“Where’s he going to?”

“He doesn’t know yet; but it’s sure to be a good Embassy.”

“Madame,” said I, “for your sake I’ll go, if it’s no more than a beggarlyLegation. When I do a thing, I don’t do it by halves.”

My promise, then, was given; but six months are six months, and seem aneternity, and, inasmuch as they stretched between me and my prospectiveindustry (I suppose attachés are industrious; but I know not, for I neverbecame attaché to Sir Jacob or anybody else), I cast about for some desirablemode of spending them. And it occurred to me suddenly that I would visitRuritania. It may seem strange that I had never visited that country yet; butmy father (in spite of a sneaking fondness for the Elphbergs, which led him togive me, his second son, the famous Elphberg name of Rudolf) had always beenaverse from my going, and, since his death, my brother, prompted by Rose, hadaccepted the family tradition which taught that a wide berth was to be given tothat country. But the moment Ruritania had come into my head I was eaten upwith a curiosity to see it. After all, red hair and long noses are not confinedto the House of Elphberg, and the old story seemed a preposterouslyinsufficient reason for debarring myself from acquaintance with a highlyinteresting and important kingdom, one which had played no small part inEuropean history, and might do the like again under the sway of a young andvigorous ruler, such as the new King was rumoured to be. My determination wasclinched by reading in The Timesthat Rudolf the Fifth was to be crownedat Strelsau in the course of the next three weeks, and that great magnificencewas to mark the occasion. At once I made up my mind to be present, and began mypreparations. But, inasmuch as it has never been my practice to furnish myrelatives with an itinerary of my journeys and in this case I anticipatedopposition to my wishes, I gave out that I was going for a ramble in theTyrol—an old haunt of mine—and propitiated Rose’s wrath by declaring that Iintended to study the political and social problems of the interestingcommunity which dwells in that neighbourhood.

“Perhaps,” I hinted darkly, “there may be an outcome of the expedition.”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“Well,” said I carelessly, “there seems a gap that might be filled by anexhaustive work on—”

“Oh! will you write a book?” she cried, clapping her hands. “That would besplendid, wouldn’t it, Robert?”

“It’s the best of introductions to political life nowadays,” observed mybrother, who has, by the way, introduced himself in this manner several timesover. Burlesdon on Ancient Theories and Modern Factsand The UltimateOutcome, by a Political Student, are both works of recognized eminence.

“I believe you are right, Bob, my boy,” said I.

“Now promise you’ll do it,” said Rose earnestly.

“No, I won’t promise; but if I find enough material, I will.”

“That’s fair enough,” said Robert.

“Oh, material doesn’t matter!” she said, pouting.

But this time she could get no more than a qualified promise out of me. To tellthe truth, I would have wagered a handsome sum that the story of my expeditionthat summer would stain no paper and spoil not a single pen. And that shows howlittle we know what the future holds; for here I am, fulfilling my qualifiedpromise, and writing, as I never thought to write, a book—though it will hardlyserve as an introduction to political life, and has not a jot to do with theTyrol.

Neither would it, I fear, please Lady Burlesdon, if I were to submit it to hercritical eye—a step which I have no intention of taking.

CHAPTER 2
Concerning the Colour of Men’s Hair

It was a maxim of my Uncle William’s that no man should pass through Pariswithout spending four-and-twenty hours there. My uncle spoke out of a ripeexperience of the world, and I honoured his advice by putting up for a day anda night at “The Continental” on my way to—the Tyrol. I called on GeorgeFeatherly at the Embassy, and we had a bit of dinner together at Durand’s, andafterwards dropped in to the Opera; and after that we had a little supper, andafter that we called on Bertram Bertrand, a versifier of some repute and Pariscorrespondent to The Critic. He had a very comfortable suite of rooms,and we found some pleasant fellows smoking and talking. It struck me, however,that Bertram himself was absent and in low spirits, and when everybody exceptourselves had gone, I rallied him on his moping preoccupation. He fenced withme for a while, but at last, flinging himself on a sofa, he exclaimed:

“Very well; have it your own way. I am in love—infernally in love!”

“Oh, you’ll write the better poetry,” said I, by way of consolation.

He ruffled his hair with his hand and smoked furiously. George Featherly,standing with his back to the mantelpiece, smiled unkindly.

“If it’s the old affair,” said he, “you may as well throw it up, Bert. She’sleaving Paris tomorrow.”

“I know that,” snapped Bertram.

“Not that it would make any difference if she stayed,” pursued the relentlessGeorge. “She flies higher than the paper trade, my boy!”

“Hang her!” said Bertram.

“It would make it more interesting for me,” I ventured to observe, “if I knewwho you were talking about.”

“Antoinette Mauban,” said George.

“De Mauban,” growled Bertram.

“Oho!” said I, passing by the question of the `de’. “You don’t mean to say,Bert—?”

“Can’t you let me alone?”

“Where’s she going to?” I asked, for the lady was something of a celebrity.

George jingled his money, smiled cruelly at poor Bertram, and answeredpleasantly:

“Nobody knows. By the way, Bert, I met a great man at her house the othernight—at least, about a month ago. Did you ever meet him—the Duke of Strelsau?”

“Yes, I did,” growled Bertram.

“An extremely accomplished man, I thought him.”

It was not hard to see that George’s references to the duke were intended toaggravate poor Bertram’s sufferings, so that I drew the inference that the dukehad distinguished Madame de Mauban by his attentions. She was a widow, rich,handsome, and, according to repute, ambitious. It was quite possible that she,as George put it, was flying as high as a personage who was everything he couldbe, short of enjoying strictly royal rank: for the duke was the son of the lateKing of Ruritania by a second and morganatic marriage, and half-brother to thenew King. He had been his father’s favourite, and it had occasioned someunfavourable comment when he had been created a duke, with a title derived fromno less a city than the capital itself. His mother had been of good, but notexalted, birth.

“He’s not in Paris now, is he?” I asked.

“Oh no! He’s gone back to be present at the King’s coronation; a ceremonywhich, I should say, he’ll not enjoy much. But, Bert, old man, don’t despair!He won’t marry the fair Antoinette—at least, not unless another plan comes tonothing. Still perhaps she—” He paused and added, with a laugh: “Royalattentions are hard to resist—you know that, don’t you, Rudolf?”

“Confound you!” said I; and rising, I left the hapless Bertram in George’shands and went home to bed.

The next day George Featherly went with me to the station, where I took aticket for Dresden.

“Going to see the pictures?” asked George, with a grin.

George is an inveterate gossip, and had I told him that I was off to Ruritania,the news would have been in London in three days and in Park Lane in a week. Iwas, therefore, about to return an evasive answer, when he saved my conscienceby leaving me suddenly and darting across the platform. Following him with myeyes, I saw him lift his hat and accost a graceful, fashionably dressed womanwho had just appeared from the booking-office. She was, perhaps, a year or twoover thirty, tall, dark, and of rather full figure. As George talked, I saw herglance at me, and my vanity was hurt by the thought that, muffled in a fur coatand a neck-wrapper (for it was a chilly April day) and wearing a softtravelling hat pulled down to my ears, I must be looking very far from my best.A moment later, George rejoined me.

“You’ve got a charming travelling companion,” he said. “That’s poor BertBertrand’s goddess, Antoinette de Mauban, and, like you, she’s going toDresden—also, no doubt, to see the pictures. It’s very queer, though, that shedoesn’t at present desire the honour of your acquaintance.”

“I didn’t ask to be introduced,” I observed, a little annoyed.

“Well, I offered to bring you to her; but she said, ‘Another time.’ Never mind,old fellow, perhaps there’ll be a smash, and you’ll have a chance of rescuingher and cutting out the Duke of Strelsau!”

No smash, however, happened, either to me or to Madame de Mauban. I can speakfor her as confidently as for myself; for when, after a night’s rest inDresden, I continued my journey, she got into the same train. Understandingthat she wished to be let alone, I avoided her carefully, but I saw that shewent the same way as I did to the very end of my journey, and I tookopportunities of having a good look at her, when I could do so unobserved.

As soon as we reached the Ruritanian frontier (where the old officer whopresided over the Custom House favoured me with such a stare that I felt surerthan before of my Elphberg physiognomy), I bought the papers, and found in themnews which affected my movements. For some reason, which was not clearlyexplained, and seemed to be something of a mystery, the date of the coronationhad been suddenly advanced, and the ceremony was to take place on the next daybut one. The whole country seemed in a stir about it, and it was evident thatStrelsau was thronged. Rooms were all let and hotels overflowing; there wouldbe very little chance of my obtaining a lodging, and I should certainly have topay an exorbitant charge for it. I made up my mind to stop at Zenda, a smalltown fifty miles short of the capital, and about ten from the frontier. Mytrain reached there in the evening; I would spend the next day, Tuesday, in awander over the hills, which were said to be very fine, and in taking a glanceat the famous Castle, and go over by train to Strelsau on the Wednesdaymorning, returning at night to sleep at Zenda.

Accordingly at Zenda I got out, and as the train passed where I stood on theplatform, I saw my friend Madame de Mauban in her place; clearly she was goingthrough to Strelsau, having, with more providence than I could boast, securedapartments there. I smiled to think how surprised George Featherly would havebeen to know that she and I had been fellow travellers for so long.

I was very kindly received at the hotel—it was really no more than an inn—keptby a fat old lady and her two daughters. They were good, quiet people, andseemed very little interested in the great doings at Strelsau. The old lady’shero was the duke, for he was now, under the late King’s will, master of theZenda estates and of the Castle, which rose grandly on its steep hill at theend of the valley a mile or so from the inn. The old lady, indeed, did nothesitate to express regret that the duke was not on the throne, instead of hisbrother.

“We know Duke Michael,” said she. “He has always lived among us; everyRuritanian knows Duke Michael. But the King is almost a stranger; he has beenso much abroad, not one in ten knows him even by sight.”

“And now,” chimed in one of the young women, “they say he has shaved off hisbeard, so that no one at all knows him.”

“Shaved his beard!” exclaimed her mother. “Who says so?”

“Johann, the duke’s keeper. He has seen the King.”

“Ah, yes. The King, sir, is now at the duke’s hunting-lodge in the forest here;from here he goes to Strelsau to be crowned on Wednesday morning.”

I was interested to hear this, and made up my mind to walk next day in thedirection of the lodge, on the chance of coming across the King. The old ladyran on garrulously:

“Ah, and I wish he would stay at his hunting—that and wine (and one thing more)are all he loves, they say—and suffer our duke to be crowned on Wednesday. ThatI wish, and I don’t care who knows it.”

“Hush, mother!” urged the daughters.

“Oh, there’s many to think as I do!” cried the old woman stubbornly.

I threw myself back in my deep armchair, and laughed at her zeal.

“For my part,” said the younger and prettier of the two daughters, a fair,buxom, smiling wench, “I hate Black Michael! A red Elphberg for me, mother! TheKing, they say, is as red as a fox or as—”

And she laughed mischievously as she cast a glance at me, and tossed her headat her sister’s reproving face.

“Many a man has cursed their red hair before now,” muttered the old lady—and Iremembered James, fifth Earl of Burlesdon.

“But never a woman!” cried the girl.

“Ay, and women, when it was too late,” was the stern answer, reducing the girlto silence and blushes.

“How comes the King here?” I asked, to break an embarrassed silence. “It is theduke’s land here, you say.”

“The duke invited him, sir, to rest here till Wednesday. The duke is atStrelsau, preparing the King’s reception.”

“Then they’re friends?”

“None better,” said the old lady.

But my rosy damsel tossed her head again; she was not to be repressed for long,and she broke out again:

“Ay, they love one another as men do who want the same place and the samewife!”

The old woman glowered; but the last words pricked my curiosity, and Iinterposed before she could begin scolding:

“What, the same wife, too! How’s that, young lady?”

“All the world knows that Black Michael—well then, mother, the duke—would givehis soul to marry his cousin, the Princess Flavia, and that she is to be thequeen.”

“Upon my word,” said I, “I begin to be sorry for your duke. But if a man willbe a younger son, why he must take what the elder leaves, and be as thankful toGod as he can;” and, thinking of myself, I shrugged my shoulders and laughed.And then I thought also of Antoinette de Mauban and her journey to Strelsau.

“It’s little dealing Black Michael has with—” began the girl, braving hermother’s anger; but as she spoke a heavy step sounded on the floor, and a gruffvoice asked in a threatening tone:

“Who talks of ‘Black Michael’ in his Highness’s own burgh?”

The girl gave a little shriek, half of fright—half, I think, of amusement.

“You’ll not tell of me, Johann?” she said.

“See where your chatter leads,” said the old lady.

The man who had spoken came forward.

“We have company, Johann,” said my hostess, and the fellow plucked off his cap.A moment later he saw me, and, to my amazement, he started back a step, asthough he had seen something wonderful.

“What ails you, Johann?” asked the elder girl. “This is a gentleman on histravels, come to see the coronation.”

The man had recovered himself, but he was staring at me with an intense,searching, almost fierce glance.

“Good evening to you,” said I.

“Good evening, sir,” he muttered, still scrutinizing me, and the merry girlbegan to laugh as she called—

“See, Johann, it is the colour you love! He started to see your hair, sir. It’snot the colour we see most of here in Zenda.”

“I crave your pardon, sir,” stammered the fellow, with puzzled eyes. “Iexpected to see no one.”

“Give him a glass to drink my health in; and I’ll bid you good night, andthanks to you, ladies, for your courtesy and pleasant conversation.”

So speaking, I rose to my feet, and with a slight bow turned to the door. Theyoung girl ran to light me on the way, and the man fell back to let me pass,his eyes still fixed on me. The moment I was by, he started a step forward,asking:

“Pray, sir, do you know our King?”

“I never saw him,” said I. “I hope to do so on Wednesday.”

He said no more, but I felt his eyes following me till the door closed behindme. My saucy conductor, looking over her shoulder at me as she preceded meupstairs, said:

“There’s no pleasing Master Johann for one of your colour, sir.”

“He prefers yours, maybe?” I suggested.

“I meant, sir, in a man,” she answered, with a coquettish glance.

“What,” asked I, taking hold of the other side of the candlestick, “does colourmatter in a man?”

“Nay, but I love yours—it’s the Elphberg red.”

“Colour in a man,” said I, “is a matter of no more moment than that!”—and Igave her something of no value.

“God send the kitchen door be shut!” said she.

“Amen!” said I, and left her.

In fact, however, as I now know, colour is sometimes of considerable moment toa man.

CHAPTER 3
A Merry Evening with a Distant Relative

I was not so unreasonable as to be prejudiced against the duke’s keeper becausehe disliked my complexion; and if I had been, his most civil and obligingconduct (as it seemed to me to be) next morning would have disarmed me. Hearingthat I was bound for Strelsau, he came to see me while I was breakfasting, andtold me that a sister of his who had married a well-to-do tradesman and livedin the capital, had invited him to occupy a room in her house. He had gladlyaccepted, but now found that his duties would not permit of his absence. Hebegged therefore that, if such humble (though, as he added, clean andcomfortable) lodgings would satisfy me, I would take his place. He pledged hissister’s acquiescence, and urged the inconvenience and crowding to which Ishould be subject in my journeys to and from Strelsau the next day. I acceptedhis offer without a moment’s hesitation, and he went off to telegraph to hissister, while I packed up and prepared to take the next train. But I stillhankered after the forest and the hunting-lodge, and when my little maid toldme that I could, by walking ten miles or so through the forest, hit the railwayat a roadside station, I decided to send my luggage direct to the address whichJohann had given, take my walk, and follow to Strelsau myself. Johann had goneoff and was not aware of the change in my plans; but, as its only effect was todelay my arrival at his sister’s for a few hours, there was no reason fortroubling to inform him of it. Doubtless the good lady would waste no anxietyon my account.

I took an early luncheon, and, having bidden my kind entertainers farewell,promising to return to them on my way home, I set out to climb the hill thatled to the Castle, and thence to the forest of Zenda. Half an hour’s leisurelywalking brought me to the Castle. It had been a fortress in old days, and theancient keep was still in good preservation and very imposing. Behind it stoodanother portion of the original castle, and behind that again, and separatedfrom it by a deep and broad moat, which ran all round the old buildings, was ahandsome modern chateau, erected by the last king, and now forming the countryresidence of the Duke of Strelsau. The old and the new portions were connectedby a drawbridge, and this indirect mode of access formed the only passagebetween the old building and the outer world; but leading to the modern chateauthere was a broad and handsome avenue. It was an ideal residence: when “BlackMichael” desired company, he could dwell in his chateau; if a fit ofmisanthropy seized him, he had merely to cross the bridge and draw it up afterhim (it ran on rollers), and nothing short of a regiment and a train ofartillery could fetch him out. I went on my way, glad that poor Black Michael,though he could not have the throne or the princess, had, at least, as fine aresidence as any prince in Europe.

Soon I entered the forest, and walked on for an hour or more in its cool sombreshade. The great trees enlaced with one another over my head, and the sunshinestole through in patches as bright as diamonds, and hardly bigger. I wasenchanted with the place, and, finding a felled tree-trunk, propped my backagainst it, and stretching my legs out gave myself up to undisturbedcontemplation of the solemn beauty of the woods and to the comfort of a goodcigar. And when the cigar was finished and I had (I suppose) inhaled as muchbeauty as I could, I went off into the most delightful sleep, regardless of mytrain to Strelsau and of the fast-waning afternoon. To remember a train in sucha spot would have been rank sacrilege. Instead of that, I fell to dreaming thatI was married to the Princess Flavia and dwelt in the Castle of Zenda, andbeguiled whole days with my love in the glades of the forest—which made a verypleasant dream. In fact, I was just impressing a fervent kiss on the charminglips of the princess, when I heard (and the voice seemed at first a part of thedream) someone exclaim, in rough strident tones.

“Why, the devil’s in it! Shave him, and he’d be the King!”

The idea seemed whimsical enough for a dream: by the sacrifice of my heavymoustache and carefully pointed imperial, I was to be transformed into amonarch! I was about to kiss the princess again, when I arrived (veryreluctantly) at the conclusion that I was awake.

I opened my eyes, and found two men regarding me with much curiosity. Both woreshooting costumes and carried guns. One was rather short and very stoutlybuilt, with a big bullet-shaped head, a bristly grey moustache, and smallpale-blue eyes, a trifle bloodshot. The other was a slender young fellow, ofmiddle height, dark in complexion, and bearing himself with grace anddistinction. I set the one down as an old soldier: the other for a gentlemanaccustomed to move in good society, but not unused to military life either. Itturned out afterwards that my guess was a good one.

The elder man approached me, beckoning the younger to follow. He did so,courteously raising his hat. I rose slowly to my feet.

“He’s the height, too!” I heard the elder murmur, as he surveyed my six feettwo inches of stature. Then, with a cavalier touch of the cap, he addressed me:

“May I ask your name?”

“As you have taken the first step in the acquaintance, gentlemen,” said I, witha smile, “suppose you give me a lead in the matter of names.”

The young man stepped forward with a pleasant smile.

“This,” said he, “is Colonel Sapt, and I am called Fritz von Tarlenheim: we areboth in the service of the King of Ruritania.”

I bowed and, baring my head, answered:

“I am Rudolf Rassendyll. I am a traveller from England; and once for a year ortwo I held a commission from her Majesty the Queen.”

“Then we are all brethren of the sword,” answered Tarlenheim, holding out hishand, which I took readily.

“Rassendyll, Rassendyll!” muttered Colonel Sapt; then a gleam of intelligenceflitted across his face.

“By Heaven!” he cried, “you’re of the Burlesdons?”

“My brother is now Lord Burlesdon,” said I.

“Thy head betrayeth thee,” he chuckled, pointing to my uncovered poll. “Why,Fritz, you know the story?”

The young man glanced apologetically at me. He felt a delicacy which mysister-in-law would have admired. To put him at his ease, I remarked with asmile:

“Ah! the story is known here as well as among us, it seems.”

“Known!” cried Sapt. “If you stay here, the deuce a man in all Ruritania willdoubt of it—or a woman either.”

I began to feel uncomfortable. Had I realized what a very plainly writtenpedigree I carried about with me, I should have thought long before I visitedRuritania. However, I was in for it now.

At this moment a ringing voice sounded from the wood behind us:

“Fritz, Fritz! where are you, man?”

Tarlenheim started, and said hastily:

“It’s the King!”

Old Sapt chuckled again.

Then a young man jumped out from behind the trunk of a tree and stood besideus. As I looked at him, I uttered an astonished cry; and he, seeing me, drewback in sudden wonder. Saving the hair on my face and a manner of consciousdignity which his position gave him, saving also that he lacked perhaps half aninch—nay, less than that, but still something—of my height, the King ofRuritania might have been Rudolf Rassendyll, and I, Rudolf, the King.

For an instant we stood motionless, looking at one another. Then I bared myhead again and bowed respectfully. The King found his voice, and asked inbewilderment:

“Colonel—Fritz—who is this gentleman?”

I was about to answer, when Colonel Sapt stepped between the King and me, andbegan to talk to his Majesty in a low growl. The King towered over Sapt, and,as he listened, his eyes now and again sought mine. I looked at him long andcarefully. The likeness was certainly astonishing, though I saw the points ofdifference also. The King’s face was slightly more fleshy than mine, the ovalof its contour the least trifle more pronounced, and, as I fancied, his mouthlacking something of the firmness (or obstinacy) which was to be gathered frommy close-shutting lips. But, for all that, and above all minor distinctions,the likeness rose striking, salient, wonderful.

Sapt ceased speaking, and the King still frowned. Then, gradually, the cornersof his mouth began to twitch, his nose came down (as mine does when I laugh),his eyes twinkled, and, behold! he burst into the merriest fit of irrepressiblelaughter, which rang through the woods and proclaimed him a jovial soul.

“Well met, cousin!” he cried, stepping up to me, clapping me on the back, andlaughing still. “You must forgive me if I was taken aback. A man doesn’t expectto see double at this time of day, eh, Fritz?”

“I must pray pardon, sire, for my presumption,” said I. “I trust it will notforfeit your Majesty’s favour.”

“By Heaven! you’ll always enjoy the King’s countenance,” he laughed, “whether Ilike it or not; and, sir, I shall very gladly add to it what services I can.Where are you travelling to?”

“To Strelsau, sire—to the coronation.”

The King looked at his friends: he still smiled, though his expression hintedsome uneasiness. But the humorous side of the matter caught him again.

“Fritz, Fritz!” he cried, “a thousand crowns for a sight of brother Michael’sface when he sees a pair of us!” and the merry laugh rang out again.

“Seriously,” observed Fritz von Tarlenheim, “I question Mr. Rassendyll’s wisdomin visiting Strelsau just now.”

The King lit a cigarette.

“Well, Sapt?” said he, questioningly.

“He mustn’t go,” growled the old fellow.

“Come, colonel, you mean that I should be in Mr. Rassendyll’s debt, if—”

“Oh, ay! wrap it up in the right way,” said Sapt, hauling a great pipe out ofhis pocket.

“Enough, sire,” said I. “I’ll leave Ruritania today.”

“No, by thunder, you shan’t—and that’s sans phrase, as Sapt likes it. For youshall dine with me tonight, happen what will afterwards. Come, man, you don’tmeet a new relation every day!”

“We dine sparingly tonight,” said Fritz von Tarlenheim.

“Not we—with our new cousin for a guest!” cried the King; and, as Fritzshrugged his shoulders, he added: “Oh! I’ll remember our early start, Fritz.”

“So will I—tomorrow morning,” said old Sapt, pulling at his pipe.

“O wise old Sapt!” cried the King. “Come, Mr. Rassendyll—by the way, what namedid they give you?”

“Your Majesty’s,” I answered, bowing.

“Well, that shows they weren’t ashamed of us,” he laughed. “Come, then, cousinRudolf; I’ve got no house of my own here, but my dear brother Michael lends usa place of his, and we’ll make shift to entertain you there;” and he put hisarm through mine and, signing to the others to accompany us, walked me off,westerly, through the forest.

We walked for more than half an hour, and the King smoked cigarettes andchattered incessantly. He was full of interest in my family, laughed heartilywhen I told him of the portraits with Elphberg hair in our galleries, and yetmore heartily when he heard that my expedition to Ruritania was a secret one.

“You have to visit your disreputable cousin on the sly, have you?” said he.

Suddenly emerging from the wood, we came on a small and rude hunting-lodge. Itwas a one-storey building, a sort of bungalow, built entirely of wood. As weapproached it, a little man in a plain livery came out to meet us. The onlyother person I saw about the place was a fat elderly woman, whom I afterwardsdiscovered to be the mother of Johann, the duke’s keeper.

“Well, is dinner ready, Josef?” asked the King.

The little servant informed us that it was, and we soon sat down to a plentifulmeal. The fare was plain enough: the King ate heartily, Fritz von Tarlenheimdelicately, old Sapt voraciously. I played a good knife and fork, as my customis; the King noticed my performance with approval.

“We’re all good trenchermen, we Elphbergs,” said he. “But what?—we’re eatingdry! Wine, Josef! wine, man! Are we beasts, to eat without drinking? Are wecattle, Josef?”

At this reproof Josef hastened to load the table with bottles.

“Remember tomorrow!” said Fritz.

“Ay—tomorrow!” said old Sapt.

The King drained a bumper to his “Cousin Rudolf,” as he was gracious—ormerry—enough to call me; and I drank its fellow to the “Elphberg Red,” whereathe laughed loudly.

Now, be the meat what it might, the wine we drank was beyond all price orpraise, and we did it justice. Fritz ventured once to stay the King’s hand.

“What?” cried the King. “Remember you start before I do, Master Fritz—you mustbe more sparing by two hours than I.”

Fritz saw that I did not understand.

“The colonel and I,” he explained, “leave here at six: we ride down to Zendaand return with the guard of honour to fetch the King at eight, and then we allride together to the station.”

“Hang that same guard!” growled Sapt.

“Oh! it’s very civil of my brother to ask the honour for his regiment,” saidthe King. “Come, cousin, you need not start early. Another bottle, man!”

I had another bottle—or, rather, a part of one, for the larger half travelledquickly down his Majesty’s throat. Fritz gave up his attempts at persuasion:from persuading, he fell to being persuaded, and soon we were all of us as fullof wine as we had any right to be. The King began talking of what he would doin the future, old Sapt of what he had done in the past, Fritz of somebeautiful girl or other, and I of the wonderful merits of the Elphberg dynasty.We all talked at once, and followed to the letter Sapt’s exhortation to let themorrow take care of itself.

At last the King set down his glass and leant back in his chair.

“I have drunk enough,” said he.

“Far be it from me to contradict the King,” said I.

Indeed, his remark was most absolutely true—so far as it went.

While I yet spoke, Josef came and set before the King a marvellous oldwicker-covered flagon. It had lain so long in some darkened cellar that itseemed to blink in the candlelight.

“His Highness the Duke of Strelsau bade me set this wine before the King, whenthe King was weary of all other wines, and pray the King to drink, for the lovethat he bears his brother.”

“Well done, Black Michael!” said the King. “Out with the cork, Josef. Hang him!Did he think I’d flinch from his bottle?”

The bottle was opened, and Josef filled the King’s glass. The King tasted it.Then, with a solemnity born of the hour and his own condition, he looked roundon us:

“Gentlemen, my friends—Rudolf, my cousin (‘tis a scandalous story, Rudolf, onmy honour!), everything is yours to the half of Ruritania. But ask me not for asingle drop of this divine bottle, which I will drink to the health ofthat—that sly knave, my brother, Black Michael.”

And the King seized the bottle and turned it over his mouth, and drained it andflung it from him, and laid his head on his arms on the table.

And we drank pleasant dreams to his Majesty—and that is all I remember of theevening. Perhaps it is enough.

CHAPTER 4
The King Keeps His Appointment

Whether I had slept a minute or a year I knew not. I awoke with a start and ashiver; my face, hair and clothes dripped water, and opposite me stood oldSapt, a sneering smile on his face and an empty bucket in his hand. On thetable by him sat Fritz von Tarlenheim, pale as a ghost and black as a crowunder the eyes.

I leapt to my feet in anger.

“Your joke goes too far, sir!” I cried.

“Tut, man, we’ve no time for quarrelling. Nothing else would rouse you. It’sfive o’clock.”

“I’ll thank you, Colonel Sapt—” I began again, hot in spirit, though I wasuncommonly cold in body.

“Rassendyll,” interrupted Fritz, getting down from the table and taking my arm,“look here.”

The King lay full length on the floor. His face was red as his hair, and hebreathed heavily. Sapt, the disrespectful old dog, kicked him sharply. He didnot stir, nor was there any break in his breathing. I saw that his face andhead were wet with water, as were mine.

“We’ve spent half an hour on him,” said Fritz.

“He drank three times what either of you did,” growled Sapt.

I knelt down and felt his pulse. It was alarmingly languid and slow. We threelooked at one another.

“Was it drugged—that last bottle?” I asked in a whisper.

“I don’t know,” said Sapt.

“We must get a doctor.”

“There’s none within ten miles, and a thousand doctors wouldn’t take him toStrelsau today. I know the look of it. He’ll not move for six or seven hoursyet.”

“But the coronation!” I cried in horror.

Fritz shrugged his shoulders, as I began to see was his habit on mostoccasions.

“We must send word that he’s ill,” he said.

“I suppose so,” said I.

Old Sapt, who seemed as fresh as a daisy, had lit his pipe and was puffing hardat it.

“If he’s not crowned today,” said he, “I’ll lay a crown he’s never crowned.”

“But heavens, why?”

“The whole nation’s there to meet him; half the army—ay, and Black Michael atthe head. Shall we send word that the King’s drunk?”

“That he’s ill,” said I, in correction.

“Ill!” echoed Sapt, with a scornful laugh. “They know his illnesses too well.He’s been ‘ill’ before!”

“Well, we must chance what they think,” said Fritz helplessly. “I’ll carry thenews and make the best of it.”

Sapt raised his hand.

“Tell me,” said he. “Do you think the King was drugged?”

“I do,” said I.

“And who drugged him?”

“That damned hound, Black Michael,” said Fritz between his teeth.

“Ay,” said Sapt, “that he might not come to be crowned. Rassendyll here doesn’tknow our pretty Michael. What think you, Fritz, has Michael no king ready? Hashalf Strelsau no other candidate? As God’s alive, man, the throne’s lost if theKing show himself not in Strelsau today. I know Black Michael.”

“We could carry him there,” said I.

“And a very pretty picture he makes,” sneered Sapt.

Fritz von Tarlenheim buried his face in his hands. The King breathed loudly andheavily. Sapt stirred him again with his foot.

“The drunken dog!” he said; “but he’s an Elphberg and the son of his father,and may I rot in hell before Black Michael sits in his place!”

For a moment or two we were all silent; then Sapt, knitting his bushy greybrows, took his pipe from his mouth and said to me:

“As a man grows old he believes in Fate. Fate sent you here. Fate sends you nowto Strelsau.”

I staggered back, murmuring “Good God!”

Fritz looked up with an eager, bewildered gaze.

“Impossible!” I muttered. “I should be known.”

“It’s a risk—against a certainty,” said Sapt. “If you shave, I’ll wager you’llnot be known. Are you afraid?”

“Sir!”

“Come, lad, there, there; but it’s your life, you know, if you’re known—andmine—and Fritz’s here. But, if you don’t go, I swear to you Black Michael willsit tonight on the throne, and the King lie in prison or his grave.”

“The King would never forgive it,” I stammered.

“Are we women? Who cares for his forgiveness?”

The clock ticked fifty times, and sixty and seventy times, as I stood inthought. Then I suppose a look came over my face, for old Sapt caught me by thehand, crying:

“You’ll go?”

“Yes, I’ll go,” said I, and I turned my eyes on the prostrate figure of theKing on the floor.

“Tonight,” Sapt went on in a hasty whisper, “we are to lodge in the Palace. Themoment they leave us you and I will mount our horses—Fritz must stay there andguard the King’s room—and ride here at a gallop. The King will be ready—Josefwill tell him—and he must ride back with me to Strelsau, and you ride as if thedevil were behind you to the frontier.”

I took it all in in a second, and nodded my head.

“There’s a chance,” said Fritz, with his first sign of hopefulness.

“If I escape detection,” said I.

“If we’re detected,” said Sapt. “I’ll send Black Michael down below before I gomyself, so help me heaven! Sit in that chair, man.”

I obeyed him.

He darted from the room, calling “Josef! Josef!” In three minutes he was back,and Josef with him. The latter carried a jug of hot water, soap and razors. Hewas trembling as Sapt told him how the land lay, and bade him shave me.

Suddenly Fritz smote on his thigh:

“But the guard! They’ll know! they’ll know!”

“Pooh! We shan’t wait for the guard. We’ll ride to Hofbau and catch a trainthere. When they come, the bird’ll be flown.”

“But the King?”

“The King will be in the wine-cellar. I’m going to carry him there now.”

“If they find him?”

“They won’t. How should they? Josef will put them off.”

“But—”

Sapt stamped his foot.

“We’re not playing,” he roared. “My God! don’t I know the risk? If they do findhim, he’s no worse off than if he isn’t crowned today in Strelsau.”

So speaking, he flung the door open and, stooping, put forth a strength I didnot dream he had, and lifted the King in his hands. And as he did so, the oldwoman, Johann the keeper’s mother, stood in the doorway. For a moment shestood, then she turned on her heel, without a sign of surprise, and clattereddown the passage.

“Has she heard?” cried Fritz.

“I’ll shut her mouth!” said Sapt grimly, and he bore off the King in his arms.

For me, I sat down in an armchair, and as I sat there, half-dazed, Josefclipped and scraped me till my moustache and imperial were things of the pastand my face was as bare as the King’s. And when Fritz saw me thus he drew along breath and exclaimed:—

“By Jove, we shall do it!”

It was six o’clock now, and we had no time to lose. Sapt hurried me into theKing’s room, and I dressed myself in the uniform of a colonel of the Guard,finding time as I slipped on the King’s boots to ask Sapt what he had done withthe old woman.

“She swore she’d heard nothing,” said he; “but to make sure I tied her legstogether and put a handkerchief in her mouth and bound her hands, and lockedher up in the coal-cellar, next door to the King. Josef will look after themboth later on.”

Then I burst out laughing, and even old Sapt grimly smiled.

“I fancy,” said he, “that when Josef tells them the King is gone they’ll thinkit is because we smelt a rat. For you may swear Black Michael doesn’t expect tosee him in Strelsau today.”

I put the King’s helmet on my head. Old Sapt handed me the King’s sword,looking at me long and carefully.

“Thank God, he shaved his beard!” he exclaimed.

“Why did he?” I asked.

“Because Princess Flavia said he grazed her cheek when he was graciouslypleased to give her a cousinly kiss. Come though, we must ride.”

“Is all safe here?”

“Nothing’s safe anywhere,” said Sapt, “but we can make it no safer.”

Fritz now rejoined us in the uniform of a captain in the same regiment as thatto which my dress belonged. In four minutes Sapt had arrayed himself in hisuniform. Josef called that the horses were ready. We jumped on their backs andstarted at a rapid trot. The game had begun. What would the issue of it be?

The cool morning air cleared my head, and I was able to take in all Sapt saidto me. He was wonderful. Fritz hardly spoke, riding like a man asleep, butSapt, without another word for the King, began at once to instruct me mostminutely in the history of my past life, of my family, of my tastes, pursuits,weaknesses, friends, companions, and servants. He told me the etiquette of theRuritanian Court, promising to be constantly at my elbow to point out everybodywhom I ought to know, and give me hints with what degree of favour to greetthem.

“By the way,” he said, “you’re a Catholic, I suppose?”

“Not I,” I answered.

“Lord, he’s a heretic!” groaned Sapt, and forthwith he fell to a rudimentarylesson in the practices and observances of the Romish faith.

“Luckily,” said he, “you won’t be expected to know much, for the King’snotoriously lax and careless about such matters. But you must be as civil asbutter to the Cardinal. We hope to win him over, because he and Michael have astanding quarrel about their precedence.”

We were by now at the station. Fritz had recovered nerve enough to explain tothe astonished station master that the King had changed his plans. The trainsteamed up. We got into a first-class carriage, and Sapt, leaning back on thecushions, went on with his lesson. I looked at my watch—the King’s watch itwas, of course. It was just eight.

“I wonder if they’ve gone to look for us,” I said.

“I hope they won’t find the King,” said Fritz nervously, and this time it wasSapt who shrugged his shoulders.

The train travelled well, and at half-past nine, looking out of the window, Isaw the towers and spires of a great city.

“Your capital, my liege,” grinned old Sapt, with a wave of his hand, and,leaning forward, he laid his finger on my pulse. “A little too quick,” said he,in his grumbling tone.

“I’m not made of stone!” I exclaimed.

“You’ll do,” said he, with a nod. “We must say Fritz here has caught the ague.Drain your flask, Fritz, for heaven’s sake, boy!”

Fritz did as he was bid.

“We’re an hour early,” said Sapt. “We’ll send word forward for your Majesty’sarrival, for there’ll be no one here to meet us yet. And meanwhile—”

“Meanwhile,” said I, “the King’ll be hanged if he doesn’t have some breakfast.”

Old Sapt chuckled, and held out his hand.

“You’re an Elphberg, every inch of you,” said he. Then he paused, and lookingat us, said quietly, “God send we may be alive tonight!”

“Amen!” said Fritz von Tarlenheim.

The train stopped. Fritz and Sapt leapt out, uncovered, and held the door forme. I choked down a lump that rose in my throat, settled my helmet firmly on myhead, and (I’m not ashamed to say it) breathed a short prayer to God. Then Istepped on the platform of the station at Strelsau.

A moment later, all was bustle and confusion: men hurrying up, hats in hand,and hurrying off again; men conducting me to the buffet; men mounting andriding in hot haste to the quarters of the troops, to the Cathedral, to theresidence of Duke Michael. Even as I swallowed the last drop of my cup ofcoffee, the bells throughout all the city broke out into a joyful peal, and thesound of a military band and of men cheering smote upon my ear.

King Rudolf the Fifth was in his good city of Strelsau! And they shoutedoutside—

“God save the King!”

Old Sapt’s mouth wrinkled into a smile.

“God save ’em both!” he whispered. “Courage, lad!” and I felt his hand press myknee.

CHAPTER 5
The Adventures of an Understudy

With Fritz von Tarlenheim and Colonel Sapt close behind me, I stepped out ofthe buffet on to the platform. The last thing I did was to feel if my revolverwere handy and my sword loose in the scabbard. A gay group of officers and highdignitaries stood awaiting me, at their head a tall old man, covered withmedals, and of military bearing. He wore the yellow and red ribbon of the RedRose of Ruritania—which, by the way, decorated my unworthy breast also.

“Marshal Strakencz,” whispered Sapt, and I knew that I was in the presence ofthe most famous veteran of the Ruritanian army.

Just behind the Marshal stood a short spare man, in flowing robes of black andcrimson.

“The Chancellor of the Kingdom,” whispered Sapt.

The Marshal greeted me in a few loyal words, and proceeded to deliver anapology from the Duke of Strelsau. The duke, it seemed, had been afflicted witha sudden indisposition which made it impossible for him to come to the station,but he craved leave to await his Majesty at the Cathedral. I expressed myconcern, accepted the Marshal’s excuses very suavely, and received thecompliments of a large number of distinguished personages. No one betrayed theleast suspicion, and I felt my nerve returning and the agitated beating of myheart subsiding. But Fritz was still pale, and his hand shook like a leaf as heextended it to the Marshal.

Presently we formed procession and took our way to the door of the station.Here I mounted my horse, the Marshal holding my stirrup. The civil dignitarieswent off to their carriages, and I started to ride through the streets with theMarshal on my right and Sapt (who, as my chief aide-de-camp, was entitled tothe place) on my left. The city of Strelsau is partly old and partly new.Spacious modern boulevards and residential quarters surround and embrace thenarrow, tortuous, and picturesque streets of the original town. In the outercircles the upper classes live; in the inner the shops are situated; and,behind their prosperous fronts, lie hidden populous but wretched lanes andalleys, filled with a poverty-stricken, turbulent, and (in large measure)criminal class. These social and local divisions corresponded, as I knew fromSapt’s information, to another division more important to me. The New Town wasfor the King; but to the Old Town Michael of Strelsau was a hope, a hero, and adarling.

The scene was very brilliant as we passed along the Grand Boulevard and on tothe great square where the Royal Palace stood. Here I was in the midst of mydevoted adherents. Every house was hung with red and bedecked with flags andmottoes. The streets were lined with raised seats on each side, and I passedalong, bowing this way and that, under a shower of cheers, blessings, andwaving handkerchiefs. The balconies were full of gaily dressed ladies, whoclapped their hands and curtsied and threw their brightest glances at me. Atorrent of red roses fell on me; one bloom lodged in my horse’s mane, and Itook it and stuck it in my coat. The Marshal smiled grimly. I had stolen someglances at his face, but he was too impassive to show me whether his sympathieswere with me or not.

“The red rose for the Elphbergs, Marshal,” said I gaily, and he nodded.

I have written “gaily,” and a strange word it must seem. But the truth is, thatI was drunk with excitement. At that moment I believed—I almost believed—that Iwas in very truth the King; and, with a look of laughing triumph, I raised myeyes to the beauty-laden balconies again . . . and then I started. For, lookingdown on me, with her handsome face and proud smile, was the lady who had beenmy fellow traveller—Antoinette de Mauban; and I saw her also start, and herlips moved, and she leant forward and gazed at me. And I, collecting myself,met her eyes full and square, while again I felt my revolver. Suppose she hadcried aloud, “That’s not the King!”

Well, we went by; and then the Marshal, turning round in his saddle, waved hishand, and the Cuirassiers closed round us, so that the crowd could not comenear me. We were leaving my quarter and entering Duke Michael’s, and thisaction of the Marshal’s showed me more clearly than words what the state offeeling in the town must be. But if Fate made me a King, the least I could dowas to play the part handsomely.

“Why this change in our order, Marshal?” said I.

The Marshal bit his white moustache.

“It is more prudent, sire,” he murmured.

I drew rein.

“Let those in front ride on,” said I, “till they are fifty yards ahead. But doyou, Marshal, and Colonel Sapt and my friends, wait here till I have riddenfifty yards. And see that no one is nearer to me. I will have my people seethat their King trusts them.”

Sapt laid his hand on my arm. I shook him off. The Marshal hesitated.

“Am I not understood?” said I; and, biting his moustache again, he gave theorders. I saw old Sapt smiling into his beard, but he shook his head at me. IfI had been killed in open day in the streets of Strelsau, Sapt’s position wouldhave been a difficult one.

Perhaps I ought to say that I was dressed all in white, except my boots. I worea silver helmet with gilt ornaments, and the broad ribbon of the Rose lookedwell across my chest. I should be paying a poor compliment to the King if I didnot set modesty aside and admit that I made a very fine figure. So the peoplethought; for when I, riding alone, entered the dingy, sparsely decorated,sombre streets of the Old Town, there was first a murmur, then a cheer, and awoman, from a window above a cookshop, cried the old local saying:

“If he’s red, he’s right!” whereat I laughed and took off my helmet that shemight see that I was of the right colour and they cheered me again at that.

It was more interesting riding thus alone, for I heard the comments of thecrowd.

“He looks paler than his wont,” said one.

“You’d look pale if you lived as he does,” was the highly disrespectful retort.

“He’s a bigger man than I thought,” said another.

“So he had a good jaw under that beard after all,” commented a third.

“The pictures of him aren’t handsome enough,” declared a pretty girl, takinggreat care that I should hear. No doubt it was mere flattery.

But, in spite of these signs of approval and interest, the mass of the peoplereceived me in silence and with sullen looks, and my dear brother’s portraitornamented most of the windows—which was an ironical sort of greeting to theKing. I was quite glad that he had been spared the unpleasant sight. He was aman of quick temper, and perhaps he would not have taken it so placidly as Idid.

At last we were at the Cathedral. Its great grey front, embellished withhundreds of statues and boasting a pair of the finest oak doors in Europe, rosefor the first time before me, and the sudden sense of my audacity almostovercame me. Everything was in a mist as I dismounted. I saw the Marshal andSapt dimly, and dimly the throng of gorgeously robed priests who awaited me.And my eyes were still dim as I walked up the great nave, with the pealing ofthe organ in my ears. I saw nothing of the brilliant throng that filled it, Ihardly distinguished the stately figure of the Cardinal as he rose from thearchiepiscopal throne to greet me. Two faces only stood out side by sideclearly before my eyes—the face of a girl, pale and lovely, surmounted by acrown of the glorious Elphberg hair (for in a woman it is glorious), and theface of a man, whose full-blooded red cheeks, black hair, and dark deep eyestold me that at last I was in the presence of my brother, Black Michael. Andwhen he saw me his red cheeks went pale all in a moment, and his helmet fellwith a clatter on the floor. Till that moment I believe that he had notrealized that the King was in very truth come to Strelsau.

Of what followed next I remember nothing. I knelt before the altar and theCardinal anointed my head. Then I rose to my feet, and stretched out my handand took from him the crown of Ruritania and set it on my head, and I swore theold oath of the King; and (if it were a sin, may it be forgiven me) I receivedthe Holy Sacrament there before them all. Then the great organ pealed outagain, the Marshal bade the heralds proclaim me, and Rudolf the Fifth wascrowned King; of which imposing ceremony an excellent picture hangs now in mydining-room. The portrait of the King is very good.

Then the lady with the pale face and the glorious hair, her train held by twopages, stepped from her place and came to where I stood. And a herald cried:

“Her Royal Highness the Princess Flavia!”

She curtsied low, and put her hand under mine and raised my hand and kissed it.And for an instant I thought what I had best do. Then I drew her to me andkissed her twice on the cheek, and she blushed red, and—then his Eminence theCardinal Archbishop slipped in front of Black Michael, and kissed my hand andpresented me with a letter from the Pope—the first and last which I havereceived from that exalted quarter!

And then came the Duke of Strelsau. His step trembled, I swear, and he lookedto the right and to the left, as a man looks who thinks on flight; and his facewas patched with red and white, and his hand shook so that it jumped undermine, and I felt his lips dry and parched. And I glanced at Sapt, who wassmiling again into his beard, and, resolutely doing my duty in that station oflife to which I had been marvellously called, I took my dear Michael by bothhands and kissed him on the cheek. I think we were both glad when that wasover!

But neither in the face of the princess nor in that of any other did I see theleast doubt or questioning. Yet, had I and the King stood side by side, shecould have told us in an instant, or, at least, on a little consideration. Butneither she nor anyone else dreamed or imagined that I could be other than theKing. So the likeness served, and for an hour I stood there, feeling as wearyand blase as though I had been a king all my life; and everybody kissed myhand, and the ambassadors paid me their respects, among them old Lord Topham,at whose house in Grosvenor Square I had danced a score of times. Thank heaven,the old man was as blind as a bat, and did not claim my acquaintance.

Then back we went through the streets to the Palace, and I heard them cheeringBlack Michael; but he, Fritz told me, sat biting his nails like a man in areverie, and even his own friends said that he should have made a braver show.I was in a carriage now, side by side with the Princess Flavia, and a roughfellow cried out:

“And when’s the wedding?” and as he spoke another struck him in the face,crying “Long live Duke Michael!” and the princess coloured—it was an admirabletint—and looked straight in front of her.

Now I felt in a difficulty, because I had forgotten to ask Sapt the state of myaffections, or how far matters had gone between the princess and myself.Frankly, had I been the King, the further they had gone the better should Ihave been pleased. For I am not a slow-blooded man, and I had not kissedPrincess Flavia’s cheek for nothing. These thoughts passed through my head,but, not being sure of my ground, I said nothing; and in a moment or two theprincess, recovering her equanimity, turned to me.

“Do you know, Rudolf,” said she, “you look somehow different today?”

The fact was not surprising, but the remark was disquieting.

“You look,” she went on, “more sober, more sedate; you’re almost careworn, andI declare you’re thinner. Surely it’s not possible that you’ve begun to takeanything seriously?”

The princess seemed to hold of the King much the same opinion that LadyBurlesdon held of me.

I braced myself up to the conversation.

“Would that please you?” I asked softly.

“Oh, you know my views,” said she, turning her eyes away.

“Whatever pleases you I try to do,” I said; and, as I saw her smile and blush,I thought that I was playing the King’s hand very well for him. So I continuedand what I said was perfectly true:

“I assure you, my dear cousin, that nothing in my life has affected me morethan the reception I’ve been greeted with today.”

She smiled brightly, but in an instant grew grave again, and whispered:

“Did you notice Michael?”

“Yes,” said I, adding, “he wasn’t enjoying himself.”

“Do be careful!” she went on. “You don’t—indeed you don’t—keep enough watch onhim. You know—”

“I know,” said I, “that he wants what I’ve got.”

“Yes. Hush!”

Then—and I can’t justify it, for I committed the King far beyond what I had aright to do—I suppose she carried me off my feet—I went on:

“And perhaps also something which I haven’t got yet, but hope to win some day.”

This was my answer. Had I been the King, I should have thought it encouraging:

“Haven’t you enough responsibilities on you for one day, cousin?”

Bang, bang! Blare, blare! We were at the Palace. Guns were firing and trumpetsblowing. Rows of lackeys stood waiting, and, handing the princess up the broadmarble staircase, I took formal possession, as a crowned King, of the House ofmy ancestors, and sat down at my own table, with my cousin on my right hand, onher other side Black Michael, and on my left his Eminence the Cardinal. Behindmy chair stood Sapt; and at the end of the table, I saw Fritz von Tarlenheimdrain to the bottom his glass of champagne rather sooner than he decentlyshould.

I wondered what the King of Ruritania was doing.

CHAPTER 6
The Secret of a Cellar

We were in the King’s dressing-room—Fritz von Tarlenheim, Sapt, and I. I flungmyself exhausted into an armchair. Sapt lit his pipe. He uttered nocongratulations on the marvellous success of our wild risk, but his wholebearing was eloquent of satisfaction. The triumph, aided perhaps by good wine,had made a new man of Fritz.

“What a day for you to remember!” he cried. “Gad, I’d like to be King fortwelve hours myself! But, Rassendyll, you mustn’t throw your heart too muchinto the part. I don’t wonder Black Michael looked blacker than ever—you andthe princess had so much to say to one another.”

“How beautiful she is!” I exclaimed.

“Never mind the woman,” growled Sapt. “Are you ready to start?”

“Yes,” said I, with a sigh.

It was five o’clock, and at twelve I should be no more than Rudolf Rassendyll.I remarked on it in a joking tone.

“You’ll be lucky,” observed Sapt grimly, “if you’re not the late RudolfRassendyll. By Heaven! I feel my head wobbling on my shoulders every minuteyou’re in the city. Do you know, friend, that Michael has had news from Zenda?He went into a room alone to read it—and he came out looking like a man dazed.”

“I’m ready,” said I, this news making me none the more eager to linger.

Sapt sat down.

“I must write us an order to leave the city. Michael’s Governor, you know, andwe must be prepared for hindrances. You must sign the order.”

“My dear colonel, I’ve not been bred a forger!”

Out of his pocket Sapt produced a piece of paper.

“There’s the King’s signature,” he said, “and here,” he went on, after anothersearch in his pocket, “is some tracing paper. If you can’t manage a ‘Rudolf’ inten minutes, why—I can.”

“Your education has been more comprehensive than mine,” said I. “You write it.”

And a very tolerable forgery did this versatile hero produce.

“Now, Fritz,” said he, “the King goes to bed. He is upset. No one is to see himtill nine o’clock tomorrow. You understand—no one?”

“I understand,” answered Fritz.

“Michael may come, and claim immediate audience. You’ll answer that onlyprinces of the blood are entitled to it.”

“That’ll annoy Michael,” laughed Fritz.

“You quite understand?” asked Sapt again. “If the door of this room is openedwhile we’re away, you’re not to be alive to tell us about it.”

“I need no schooling, colonel,” said Fritz, a trifle haughtily.

“Here, wrap yourself in this big cloak,” Sapt continued to me, “and put on thisflat cap. My orderly rides with me to the hunting-lodge tonight.”

“There’s an obstacle,” I observed. “The horse doesn’t live that can carry meforty miles.”

“Oh, yes, he does—two of him: one here—one at the lodge. Now, are you ready?”

“I’m ready,” said I.

Fritz held out his hand.

“In case,” said he; and we shook hands heartily.

“Damn your sentiment!” growled Sapt. “Come along.”

He went, not to the door, but to a panel in the wall.

“In the old King’s time,” said he, “I knew this way well.”

I followed him, and we walked, as I should estimate, near two hundred yardsalong a narrow passage. Then we came to a stout oak door. Sapt unlocked it. Wepassed through, and found ourselves in a quiet street that ran along the backof the Palace gardens. A man was waiting for us with two horses. One was amagnificent bay, up to any weight; the other a sturdy brown. Sapt signed to meto mount the bay. Without a word to the man, we mounted and rode away. The townwas full of noise and merriment, but we took secluded ways. My cloak waswrapped over half my face; the capacious flat cap hid every lock of mytell-tale hair. By Sapt’s directions, I crouched on my saddle, and rode withsuch a round back as I hope never to exhibit on a horse again. Down a longnarrow lane we went, meeting some wanderers and some roisterers; and, as werode, we heard the Cathedral bells still clanging out their welcome to theKing. It was half-past six, and still light. At last we came to the city walland to a gate.

“Have your weapon ready,” whispered Sapt. “We must stop his mouth, if hetalks.”

I put my hand on my revolver. Sapt hailed the doorkeeper. The stars fought forus! A little girl of fourteen tripped out.

“Please, sir, father’s gone to see the King.”

“He’d better have stayed here,” said Sapt to me, grinning.

“But he said I wasn’t to open the gate, sir.”

“Did he, my dear?” said Sapt, dismounting. “Then give me the key.”

The key was in the child’s hand. Sapt gave her a crown.

“Here’s an order from the King. Show it to your father. Orderly, open thegate!”

I leapt down. Between us we rolled back the great gate, led our horses out, andclosed it again.

“I shall be sorry for the doorkeeper if Michael finds out that he wasn’t there.Now then, lad, for a canter. We mustn’t go too fast while we’re near the town.”

Once, however, outside the city, we ran little danger, for everybody else wasinside, merry-making; and as the evening fell we quickened our pace, mysplendid horse bounding along under me as though I had been a feather. It was afine night, and presently the moon appeared. We talked little on the way, andchiefly about the progress we were making.

“I wonder what the duke’s despatches told him,” said I, once.

“Ay, I wonder!” responded Sapt.

We stopped for a draught of wine and to bait our horses, losing half an hourthus. I dared not go into the inn, and stayed with the horses in the stable.Then we went ahead again, and had covered some five-and-twenty miles, when Saptabruptly stopped.

“Hark!” he cried.

I listened. Away, far behind us, in the still of the evening—it was justhalf-past nine—we heard the beat of horses’ hoofs. The wind blowing strongbehind us, carried the sound. I glanced at Sapt.

“Come on!” he cried, and spurred his horse into a gallop. When we next pausedto listen, the hoof-beats were not audible, and we relaxed our pace. Then weheard them again. Sapt jumped down and laid his ear to the ground.

“There are two,” he said. “They’re only a mile behind. Thank God the roadcurves in and out, and the wind’s our way.”

We galloped on. We seemed to be holding our own. We had entered the outskirtsof the forest of Zenda, and the trees, closing in behind us as the track ziggedand zagged, prevented us seeing our pursuers, and them from seeing us.

Another half-hour brought us to a divide of the road. Sapt drew rein.

“To the right is our road,” he said. “To the left, to the Castle. Each abouteight miles. Get down.”

“But they’ll be on us!” I cried.

“Get down!” he repeated brusquely; and I obeyed. The wood was dense up to thevery edge of the road. We led our horses into the covert, bound handkerchiefsover their eyes, and stood beside them.

“You want to see who they are?” I whispered.

“Ay, and where they’re going,” he answered.

I saw that his revolver was in his hand.

Nearer and nearer came the hoofs. The moon shone out now clear and full, sothat the road was white with it. The ground was hard, and we had left notraces.

“Here they come!” whispered Sapt.

“It’s the duke!”

“I thought so,” he answered.

It was the duke; and with him a burly fellow whom I knew well, and who hadcause to know me afterwards—Max Holf, brother to Johann the keeper, andbody-servant to his Highness. They were up to us: the duke reined up. I sawSapt’s finger curl lovingly towards the trigger. I believe he would have giventen years of his life for a shot; and he could have picked off Black Michael aseasily as I could a barn-door fowl in a farmyard. I laid my hand on his arm. Henodded reassuringly: he was always ready to sacrifice inclination to duty.

“Which way?” asked Black Michael.

“To the Castle, your Highness,” urged his companion. “There we shall learn thetruth.”

For an instant the duke hesitated.

“I thought I heard hoofs,” said he.

“I think not, your Highness.”

“Why shouldn’t we go to the lodge?”

“I fear a trap. If all is well, why go to the lodge? If not, it’s a snare totrap us.”

Suddenly the duke’s horse neighed. In an instant we folded our cloaks closeround our horses’ heads, and, holding them thus, covered the duke and hisattendant with our revolvers. If they had found us, they had been dead men, orour prisoners.

Michael waited a moment longer. Then he cried:

“To Zenda, then!” and setting spurs to his horse, galloped on.

Sapt raised his weapon after him, and there was such an expression of wistfulregret on his face that I had much ado not to burst out laughing.

For ten minutes we stayed where we were.

“You see,” said Sapt, “they’ve sent him news that all is well.”

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“God knows,” said Sapt, frowning heavily. “But it’s brought him from Strelsauin a rare puzzle.”

Then we mounted, and rode as fast as our weary horses could lay their feet tothe ground. For those last eight miles we spoke no more. Our minds were full ofapprehension. “All is well.” What did it mean? Was all well with the King?

At last the lodge came in sight. Spurring our horses to a last gallop, we rodeup to the gate. All was still and quiet. Not a soul came to meet us. Wedismounted in haste. Suddenly Sapt caught me by the arm.

“Look there!” he said, pointing to the ground.

I looked down. At my feet lay five or six silk handkerchiefs, torn and slashedand rent. I turned to him questioningly.

“They’re what I tied the old woman up with,” said he. “Fasten the horses, andcome along.”

The handle of the door turned without resistance. We passed into the room whichhad been the scene of last night’s bout. It was still strewn with the remnantsof our meal and with empty bottles.

“Come on,” cried Sapt, whose marvellous composure had at last almost given way.

We rushed down the passage towards the cellars. The door of the coal-cellarstood wide open.

“They found the old woman,” said I.

“You might have known that from the handkerchiefs,” he said.

Then we came opposite the door of the wine-cellar. It was shut. It looked inall respects as it had looked when we left it that morning.

“Come, it’s all right,” said I.

A loud oath from Sapt rang out. His face turned pale, and he pointed again atthe floor. From under the door a red stain had spread over the floor of thepassage and dried there. Sapt sank against the opposite wall. I tried the door.It was locked.

“Where’s Josef?” muttered Sapt.

“Where’s the King?” I responded.

Sapt took out a flask and put it to his lips. I ran back to the dining-room,and seized a heavy poker from the fireplace. In my terror and excitement Irained blows on the lock of the door, and I fired a cartridge into it. It gaveway, and the door swung open.

“Give me a light,” said I; but Sapt still leant against the wall.

He was, of course, more moved than I, for he loved his master. Afraid forhimself he was not—no man ever saw him that; but to think what might lie inthat dark cellar was enough to turn any man’s face pale. I went myself, andtook a silver candlestick from the dining-table and struck a light, and, as Ireturned, I felt the hot wax drip on my naked hand as the candle swayed to andfro; so that I cannot afford to despise Colonel Sapt for his agitation.

I came to the door of the cellar. The red stain turning more and more to a dullbrown, stretched inside. I walked two yards into the cellar, and held thecandle high above my head. I saw the full bins of wine; I saw spiders crawlingon the walls; I saw, too, a couple of empty bottles lying on the floor; andthen, away in the corner, I saw the body of a man, lying flat on his back, withhis arms stretched wide, and a crimson gash across his throat. I walked to himand knelt down beside him, and commended to God the soul of a faithful man. Forit was the body of Josef, the little servant, slain in guarding the King.

I felt a hand on my shoulders, and, turning, saw Sapt, eyes glaring andterror-struck, beside me.

“The King? My God! the King?” he whispered hoarsely.

I threw the candle’s gleam over every inch of the cellar.

“The King is not here,” said I.

CHAPTER 7
His Majesty Sleeps in Strelsau

I put my arm round Sapt’s waist and supported him out of the cellar, drawingthe battered door close after me. For ten minutes or more we sat silent in thedining-room. Then old Sapt rubbed his knuckles into his eyes, gave one greatgasp, and was himself again. As the clock on the mantelpiece struck one hestamped his foot on the floor, saying:

“They’ve got the King!”

“Yes,” said I, “‘all’s well!’ as Black Michael’s despatch said. What a momentit must have been for him when the royal salutes fired at Strelsau thismorning! I wonder when he got the message?”

“It must have been sent in the morning,” said Sapt. “They must have sent itbefore news of your arrival at Strelsau reached Zenda—I suppose it came fromZenda.”

“And he’s carried it about all day!” I exclaimed. “Upon my honour, I’m not theonly man who’s had a trying day! What did he think, Sapt?”

“What does that matter? What does he think, lad, now?”

I rose to my feet.

“We must get back,” I said, “and rouse every soldier in Strelsau. We ought tobe in pursuit of Michael before midday.”

Old Sapt pulled out his pipe and carefully lit it from the candle whichguttered on the table.

“The King may be murdered while we sit here!” I urged.

Sapt smoked on for a moment in silence.

“That cursed old woman!” he broke out. “She must have attracted their attentionsomehow. I see the game. They came up to kidnap the King, and—as I say—somehowthey found him. If you hadn’t gone to Strelsau, you and I and Fritz had been inheaven by now!”

“And the King?”

“Who knows where the King is now?” he asked.

“Come, let’s be off!” said I; but he sat still. And suddenly he burst into oneof his grating chuckles:

“By Jove, we’ve shaken up Black Michael!”

“Come, come!” I repeated impatiently.

“And we’ll shake him up a bit more,” he added, a cunning smile broadening onhis wrinkled, weather-beaten face, and his teeth working on an end of hisgrizzled moustache. “Ay, lad, we’ll go back to Strelsau. The King shall be inhis capital again tomorrow.”

“The King?”

“The crowned King!”

“You’re mad!” I cried.

“If we go back and tell the trick we played, what would you give for ourlives?”

“Just what they’re worth,” said I.

“And for the King’s throne? Do you think that the nobles and the people willenjoy being fooled as you’ve fooled them? Do you think they’ll love a King whowas too drunk to be crowned, and sent a servant to personate him?”

“He was drugged—and I’m no servant.”

“Mine will be Black Michael’s version.”

He rose, came to me, and laid his hand on my shoulder.

“Lad,” he said, “if you play the man, you may save the King yet. Go back andkeep his throne warm for him.”

“But the duke knows—the villains he has employed know—”

“Ay, but they can’t speak!” roared Sapt in grim triumph.

“We’ve got ’em! How can they denounce you without denouncing themselves? Thisis not the King, because we kidnapped the King and murdered his servant. Canthey say that?”

The position flashed on me. Whether Michael knew me or not, he could not speak.Unless he produced the King, what could he do? And if he produced the King,where was he? For a moment I was carried away headlong; but in an instant thedifficulties came strong upon me.

“I must be found out,” I urged.

“Perhaps; but every hour’s something. Above all, we must have a King inStrelsau, or the city will be Michael’s in four-and-twenty hours, and whatwould the King’s life be worth then—or his throne? Lad, you must do it!”

“Suppose they kill the King?”

“They’ll kill him, if you don’t.”

“Sapt, suppose they have killed the King?”

“Then, by heaven, you’re as good an Elphberg as Black Michael, and you shallreign in Ruritania! But I don’t believe they have; nor will they kill him ifyou’re on the throne. Will they kill him, to put you in?”

It was a wild plan—wilder even and more hopeless than the trick we had alreadycarried through; but as I listened to Sapt I saw the strong points in our game.And then I was a young man and I loved action, and I was offered such a hand insuch a game as perhaps never man played yet.

“I shall be found out,” I said.

“Perhaps,” said Sapt. “Come! to Strelsau! We shall be caught like rats in atrap if we stay here.”

“Sapt,” I cried, “I’ll try it!”

“Well played!” said he. “I hope they’ve left us the horses. I’ll go and see.”

“We must bury that poor fellow,” said I.

“No time,” said Sapt.

“I’ll do it.”

“Hang you!” he grinned. “I make you a King, and—Well, do it. Go and fetch him,while I look to the horses. He can’t lie very deep, but I doubt if he’ll careabout that. Poor little Josef! He was an honest bit of a man.”

He went out, and I went to the cellar. I raised poor Josef in my arms and borehim into the passage and thence towards the door of the house. Just inside Ilaid him down, remembering that I must find spades for our task. At thisinstant Sapt came up.

“The horses are all right; there’s the own brother to the one that brought youhere. But you may save yourself that job.”

“I’ll not go before he’s buried.”

“Yes, you will.”

“Not I, Colonel Sapt; not for all Ruritania.”

“You fool!” said he. “Come here.”

He drew me to the door. The moon was sinking, but about three hundred yardsaway, coming along the road from Zenda, I made out a party of men. There wereseven or eight of them; four were on horseback and the rest were walking, and Isaw that they carried long implements, which I guessed to be spades andmattocks, on their shoulders.

“They’ll save you the trouble,” said Sapt. “Come along.”

He was right. The approaching party must, beyond doubt, be Duke Michael’s men,come to remove the traces of their evil work. I hesitated no longer, but anirresistible desire seized me.

Pointing to the corpse of poor little Josef, I said to Sapt:

“Colonel, we ought to strike a blow for him!”

“You’d like to give him some company, eh! But it’s too risky work, yourMajesty.”

“I must have a slap at ’em,” said I.

Sapt wavered.

“Well,” said he, “it’s not business, you know; but you’ve been a good boy—andif we come to grief, why, hang me, it’ll save us lot of thinking! I’ll show youhow to touch them.”

He cautiously closed the open chink of the door.

Then we retreated through the house and made our way to the back entrance. Hereour horses were standing. A carriage-drive swept all round the lodge.

“Revolver ready?” asked Sapt.

“No; steel for me,” said I.

“Gad, you’re thirsty tonight,” chuckled Sapt. “So be it.”

We mounted, drawing our swords, and waited silently for a minute or two. Thenwe heard the tramp of men on the drive the other side of the house. They cameto a stand, and one cried:

“Now then, fetch him out!”

“Now!” whispered Sapt.

Driving the spurs into our horses, we rushed at a gallop round the house, andin a moment we were among the ruffians. Sapt told me afterwards that he killeda man, and I believe him; but I saw no more of him. With a cut, I split thehead of a fellow on a brown horse, and he fell to the ground. Then I foundmyself opposite a big man, and I was half conscious of another to my right. Itwas too warm to stay, and with a simultaneous action I drove my spurs into myhorse again and my sword full into the big man’s breast. His bullet whizzedpast my ear—I could almost swear it touched it. I wrenched at the sword, but itwould not come, and I dropped it and galloped after Sapt, whom I now saw abouttwenty yards ahead. I waved my hand in farewell, and dropped it a second laterwith a yell, for a bullet had grazed my finger and I felt the blood. Old Saptturned round in the saddle. Someone fired again, but they had no rifles, and wewere out of range. Sapt fell to laughing.

“That’s one to me and two to you, with decent luck,” said he. “Little Josefwill have company.”

“Ay, they’ll be a parti carrée,” said I. My blood was up, and I rejoicedto have killed them.

“Well, a pleasant night’s work to the rest!” said he. “I wonder if they noticedyou?”

“The big fellow did; as I stuck him I heard him cry, ‘The King!’”

“Good! good! Oh, we’ll give Black Michael some work before we’ve done!”

Pausing an instant, we made a bandage for my wounded finger, which was bleedingfreely and ached severely, the bone being much bruised. Then we rode on, askingof our good horses all that was in them. The excitement of the fight and of ourgreat resolve died away, and we rode in gloomy silence. Day broke clear andcold. We found a farmer just up, and made him give us sustenance for ourselvesand our horses. I, feigning a toothache, muffled my face closely. Then aheadagain, till Strelsau lay before us. It was eight o’clock or nearing nine, andthe gates were all open, as they always were save when the duke’s caprice orintrigues shut them. We rode in by the same way as we had come out the eveningbefore, all four of us—the men and the horses—wearied and jaded. The streetswere even quieter than when we had gone: everyone was sleeping off last night’srevelry, and we met hardly a soul till we reached the little gate of thePalace. There Sapt’s old groom was waiting for us.

“Is all well, sir?” he asked.

“All’s well,” said Sapt, and the man, coming to me, took my hand to kiss.

“The King’s hurt!” he cried.

“It’s nothing,” said I, as I dismounted; “I caught my finger in the door.”

“Remember—silence!” said Sapt. “Ah! but, my good Freyler, I do not need to tellyou that!”

The old fellow shrugged his shoulders.

“All young men like to ride abroad now and again, why not the King?” said he;and Sapt’s laugh left his opinion of my motives undisturbed.

“You should always trust a man,” observed Sapt, fitting the key in the lock,“just as far as you must.”

We went in and reached the dressing-room. Flinging open the door, we saw Fritzvon Tarlenheim stretched, fully dressed, on the sofa. He seemed to have beensleeping, but our entry woke him. He leapt to his feet, gave one glance at me,and with a joyful cry, threw himself on his knees before me.

“Thank God, sire! thank God, you’re safe!” he cried, stretching his hand up tocatch hold of mine.

I confess that I was moved. This King, whatever his faults, made people lovehim. For a moment I could not bear to speak or break the poor fellow’sillusion. But tough old Sapt had no such feeling. He slapped his hand on histhigh delightedly.

“Bravo, lad!” cried he. “We shall do!”

Fritz looked up in bewilderment. I held out my hand.

“You’re wounded, sire!” he exclaimed.

“It’s only a scratch,” said I, “but—” I paused.

He rose to his feet with a bewildered air. Holding my hand, he looked me up anddown, and down and up. Then suddenly he dropped my hand and reeled back.

“Where’s the King? Where’s the King?” he cried.

“Hush, you fool!” hissed Sapt. “Not so loud! Here’s the King!”

A knock sounded on the door. Sapt seized me by the hand.

“Here, quick, to the bedroom! Off with your cap and boots. Get into bed. Covereverything up.”

I did as I was bid. A moment later Sapt looked in, nodded, grinned, andintroduced an extremely smart and deferential young gentleman, who came up tomy bedside, bowing again and again, and informed me that he was of thehousehold of the Princess Flavia, and that her Royal Highness had sent himespecially to enquire how the King’s health was after the fatigues which hisMajesty had undergone yesterday.

“My best thanks, sir, to my cousin,” said I; “and tell her Royal Highness thatI was never better in my life.”

“The King,” added old Sapt (who, I began to find, loved a good lie for its ownsake), “has slept without a break all night.”

The young gentleman (he reminded me of “Osric” in Hamlet) bowed himself outagain. The farce was over, and Fritz von Tarlenheim’s pale face recalled us toreality—though, in faith, the farce had to be reality for us now.

“Is the King dead?” he whispered.

“Please God, no,” said I. “But he’s in the hands of Black Michael!”

CHAPTER 8
A Fair Cousin and a Dark Brother

A real king’s life is perhaps a hard one; but a pretended king’s is, I warrant,much harder. On the next day, Sapt instructed me in my duties—what I ought todo and what I ought to know—for three hours; then I snatched breakfast, withSapt still opposite me, telling me that the King always took white wine in themorning and was known to detest all highly seasoned dishes. Then came theChancellor, for another three hours; and to him I had to explain that the hurtto my finger (we turned that bullet to happy account) prevented me fromwriting—whence arose great to-do, hunting of precedents and so forth, ending inmy “making my mark,” and the Chancellor attesting it with a superfluity ofsolemn oaths. Then the French ambassador was introduced, to present hiscredentials; here my ignorance was of no importance, as the King would havebeen equally raw to the business (we worked through the whole corpsdiplomatiquein the next few days, a demise of the Crown necessitating allthis bother).

Then, at last, I was left alone. I called my new servant (we had chosen, tosucceed poor Josef, a young man who had never known the King), had abrandy-and-soda brought to me, and observed to Sapt that I trusted that I mightnow have a rest. Fritz von Tarlenheim was standing by.

“By heaven!” he cried, “we waste time. Aren’t we going to throw Black Michaelby the heels?”

“Gently, my son, gently,” said Sapt, knitting his brows. “It would be apleasure, but it might cost us dear. Would Michael fall and leave the Kingalive?”

“And,” I suggested, “while the King is here in Strelsau, on his throne, whatgrievance has he against his dear brother Michael?”

“Are we to do nothing, then?”

“We’re to do nothing stupid,” growled Sapt.

“In fact, Fritz,” said I, “I am reminded of a situation in one of our Englishplays—The Critic—have you heard of it? Or, if you like, of two men, eachcovering the other with a revolver. For I can’t expose Michael without exposingmyself—”

“And the King,” put in Sapt.

“And, hang me if Michael won’t expose himself, if he tries to expose me!”

“It’s very pretty,” said old Sapt.

“If I’m found out,” I pursued, “I will make a clean breast of it, and fight itout with the duke; but at present I’m waiting for a move from him.”

“He’ll kill the King,” said Fritz.

“Not he,” said Sapt.

“Half of the Six are in Strelsau,” said Fritz.

“Only half? You’re sure?” asked Sapt eagerly.

“Yes—only half.”

“Then the King’s alive, for the other three are guarding him!” cried Sapt.

“Yes—you’re right!” exclaimed Fritz, his face brightening. “If the King weredead and buried, they’d all be here with Michael. You know Michael’s back,colonel?”

“I know, curse him!”

“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” said I, “who are the Six?”

“I think you’ll make their acquaintance soon,” said Sapt. “They are sixgentlemen whom Michael maintains in his household: they belong to him body andsoul. There are three Ruritanians; then there’s a Frenchman, a Belgian, and oneof your countrymen.”

“They’d all cut a throat if Michael told them,” said Fritz.

“Perhaps they’ll cut mine,” I suggested.

“Nothing more likely,” agreed Sapt. “Who are here, Fritz?”

“De Gautet, Bersonin, and Detchard.”

“The foreigners! It’s as plain as a pikestaff. He’s brought them, and left theRuritanians with the King; that’s because he wants to commit the Ruritanians asdeep as he can.”

“They were none of them among our friends at the lodge, then?” I asked.

“I wish they had been,” said Sapt wistfully. “They had been, not six, but four,by now.”

I had already developed one attribute of royalty—a feeling that I need notreveal all my mind or my secret designs even to my intimate friends. I hadfully resolved on my course of action. I meant to make myself as popular as Icould, and at the same time to show no disfavour to Michael. By these means Ihoped to allay the hostility of his adherents, and make it appear, if an openconflict came about, that he was ungrateful and not oppressed.

Yet an open conflict was not what I hoped for.

The King’s interest demanded secrecy; and while secrecy lasted, I had a finegame to play in Strelsau, Michael should not grow stronger for delay!

I ordered my horse, and, attended by Fritz von Tarlenheim, rode in the grandnew avenue of the Royal Park, returning all the salutes which I received withpunctilious politeness. Then I rode through a few of the streets, stopped andbought flowers of a pretty girl, paying her with a piece of gold; and then,having attracted the desired amount of attention (for I had a trail of half athousand people after me), I rode to the residence of the Princess Flavia, andasked if she would receive me. This step created much interest, and was metwith shouts of approval. The princess was very popular, and the Chancellorhimself had not scrupled to hint to me that the more I pressed my suit, and themore rapidly I brought it to a prosperous conclusion, the stronger should I bein the affection of my subjects. The Chancellor, of course, did not understandthe difficulties which lay in the way of following his loyal and excellentadvice. However, I thought I could do no harm by calling; and in this viewFritz supported me with a cordiality that surprised me, until he confessed thathe also had his motives for liking a visit to the princess’s house, whichmotive was no other than a great desire to see the princess’s lady-in-waitingand bosom friend, the Countess Helga von Strofzin.

Etiquette seconded Fritz’s hopes. While I was ushered into the princess’s room,he remained with the countess in the ante-chamber: in spite of the people andservants who were hanging about, I doubt not that they managed atête-à-tête;but I had no leisure to think of them, for I was playingthe most delicate move in all my difficult game. I had to keep the princessdevoted to me—and yet indifferent to me: I had to show affection for her—andnot feel it. I had to make love for another, and that to a girl who—princess orno princess—was the most beautiful I had ever seen. Well, I braced myself tothe task, made no easier by the charming embarrassment with which I wasreceived. How I succeeded in carrying out my programme will appear hereafter.

“You are gaining golden laurels,” she said. “You are like the prince inShakespeare who was transformed by becoming king. But I’m forgetting you areKing, sire.”

“I ask you to speak nothing but what your heart tells you—and to call menothing but my name.”

She looked at me for a moment.

“Then I’m glad and proud, Rudolf,” said she. “Why, as I told you, your veryface is changed.”

I acknowledged the compliment, but I disliked the topic; so I said:

“My brother is back, I hear. He made an excursion, didn’t he?”

“Yes, he is here,” she said, frowning a little.

“He can’t stay long from Strelsau, it seems,” I observed, smiling. “Well, weare all glad to see him. The nearer he is, the better.”

The princess glanced at me with a gleam of amusement in her eyes.

“Why, cousin? Is it that you can—?”

“See better what he’s doing? Perhaps,” said I. “And why are you glad?”

“I didn’t say I was glad,” she answered.

“Some people say so for you.”

“There are many insolent people,” she said, with delightful haughtiness.

“Possibly you mean that I am one?”

“Your Majesty could not be,” she said, curtseying in feigned deference, butadding, mischievously, after a pause: “Unless, that is—”

“Well, unless what?”

“Unless you tell me that I mind a snap of my fingers where the Duke of Strelsauis.”

Really, I wished that I had been the King.

“You don’t care where cousin Michael—”

“Ah, cousin Michael! I call him the Duke of Strelsau.”

“You call him Michael when you meet him?”

“Yes—by the orders of your father.”

“I see. And now by mine?”

“If those are your orders.”

“Oh, decidedly! We must all be pleasant to our dear Michael.”

“You order me to receive his friends, too, I suppose?”

“The Six?”

“You call them that, too?”

“To be in the fashion, I do. But I order you to receive no one unless youlike.”

“Except yourself?”

“I pray for myself. I could not order.”

As I spoke, there came a cheer from the street. The princess ran to the window.

“It is he!” she cried. “It is—the Duke of Strelsau!”

I smiled, but said nothing. She returned to her seat. For a few moments we satin silence. The noise outside subsided, but I heard the tread of feet in theante-room. I began to talk on general subjects. This went on for some minutes.I wondered what had become of Michael, but it did not seem to be for me tointerfere. All at once, to my great surprise, Flavia, clasping her hands askedin an agitated voice:

“Are you wise to make him angry?”

“What? Who? How am I making him angry?”

“Why, by keeping him waiting.”

“My dear cousin, I don’t want to keep him—”

“Well, then, is he to come in?”

“Of course, if you wish it.”

She looked at me curiously.

“How funny you are,” she said. “Of course no one could be announced while I waswith you.”

Here was a charming attribute of royalty!

“An excellent etiquette!” I cried. “But I had clean forgotten it; and if I werealone with someone else, couldn’t you be announced?”

“You know as well as I do. I could be, because I am of the Blood;” and shestill looked puzzled.

“I never could remember all these silly rules,” said I, rather feebly, as Iinwardly cursed Fritz for not posting me up. “But I’ll repair my fault.”

I jumped up, flung open the door, and advanced into the ante-room. Michael wassitting at a table, a heavy frown on his face. Everyone else was standing, savethat impudent young dog Fritz, who was lounging easily in an armchair, andflirting with the Countess Helga. He leapt up as I entered, with a deferentialalacrity that lent point to his former nonchalance. I had no difficulty inunderstanding that the duke might not like young Fritz.

I held out my hand, Michael took it, and I embraced him. Then I drew him withme into the inner room.

“Brother,” I said, “if I had known you were here, you should not have waited amoment before I asked the princess to permit me to bring you to her.”

He thanked me, but coldly. The man had many qualities, but he could not hidehis feelings. A mere stranger could have seen that he hated me, and hated worseto see me with Princess Flavia; yet I am persuaded that he tried to concealboth feelings, and, further, that he tried to persuade me that he believed Iwas verily the King. I did not know, of course; but, unless the King were animpostor, at once cleverer and more audacious than I (and I began to thinksomething of myself in that role), Michael could not believe that. And, if hedidn’t, how he must have loathed paying me deference, and hearing my “Michael”and my “Flavia!”

“Your hand is hurt, sire,” he observed, with concern.

“Yes, I was playing a game with a mongrel dog” (I meant to stir him), “and youknow, brother, such have uncertain tempers.”

He smiled sourly, and his dark eyes rested on me for a moment.

“But is there no danger from the bite?” cried Flavia anxiously.

“None from this,” said I. “If I gave him a chance to bite deeper, it would bedifferent, cousin.”

“But surely he has been destroyed?” said she.

“Not yet. We’re waiting to see if his bite is harmful.”

“And if it is?” asked Michael, with his sour smile.

“He’ll be knocked on the head, brother,” said I.

“You won’t play with him any more?” urged Flavia.

“Perhaps I shall.”

“He might bite again.”

“Doubtless he’ll try,” said I, smiling.

Then, fearing Michael would say something which I must appear to resent (for,though I might show him my hate, I must seem to be full of favour), I began tocompliment him on the magnificent condition of his regiment, and of their loyalgreeting to me on the day of my coronation. Thence I passed to a rapturousdescription of the hunting-lodge which he had lent me. But he rose suddenly tohis feet. His temper was failing him, and, with an excuse, he said farewell.However, as he reached the door he stopped, saying:

“Three friends of mine are very anxious to have the honour of being presentedto you, sire. They are here in the ante-chamber.”

I joined him directly, passing my arm through his. The look on his face washoney to me. We entered the ante-chamber in fraternal fashion. Michaelbeckoned, and three men came forward.

“These gentlemen,” said Michael, with a stately courtesy which, to do himjustice, he could assume with perfect grace and ease, “are the loyalest andmost devoted of your Majesty’s servants, and are my very faithful and attachedfriends.”

“On the last ground as much as the first,” said I, “I am very pleased to seethem.”

They came one by one and kissed my hand—De Gautet, a tall lean fellow, withhair standing straight up and waxed moustache; Bersonin, the Belgian, a portlyman of middle height with a bald head (though he was not far past thirty); andlast, the Englishman, Detchard, a narrow-faced fellow, with close-cut fair hairand a bronzed complexion. He was a finely made man, broad in the shoulder andslender in the hips. A good fighter, but a crooked customer, I put him downfor. I spoke to him in English, with a slight foreign accent, and I swear thefellow smiled, though he hid the smile in an instant.

“So Mr. Detchard is in the secret,” thought I.

Having got rid of my dear brother and his friends, I returned to make my adieuto my cousin. She was standing at the door. I bade her farewell, taking herhand in mine.

“Rudolf,” she said, very low, “be careful, won’t you?”

“Of what?”

“You know—I can’t say. But think what your life is to—”

“Well to—?”

“To Ruritania.”

Was I right to play the part, or wrong to play the part? I know not: evil layboth ways, and I dared not tell her the truth.

“Only to Ruritania?” I asked softly.

A sudden flush spread over her incomparable face.

“To your friends, too,” she said.

“Friends?”

“And to your cousin,” she whispered, “and loving servant.”

I could not speak. I kissed her hand, and went out cursing myself.

Outside I found Master Fritz, quite reckless of the footmen, playing atcat’s-cradle with the Countess Helga.

“Hang it!” said he, “we can’t always be plotting. Love claims his share.”

“I’m inclined to think he does,” said I; and Fritz, who had been by my side,dropped respectfully behind.

CHAPTER 9
A New Use for a Tea-table

If I were to detail the ordinary events of my daily life at this time, theymight prove instructive to people who are not familiar with the inside ofpalaces; if I revealed some of the secrets I learnt, they might prove ofinterest to the statesmen of Europe. I intend to do neither of these things. Ishould be between the Scylla of dullness and the Charybdis of indiscretion, andI feel that I had far better confine myself strictly to the underground dramawhich was being played beneath the surface of Ruritanian politics. I need onlysay that the secret of my imposture defied detection. I made mistakes. I hadbad minutes: it needed all the tact and graciousness whereof I was master tosmooth over some apparent lapses of memory and unmindfulness of oldacquaintances of which I was guilty. But I escaped, and I attribute my escape,as I have said before, most of all, to the very audacity of the enterprise. Itis my belief that, given the necessary physical likeness, it was far easier topretend to be King of Ruritania than it would have been to personate mynext-door neighbour. One day Sapt came into my room. He threw me a letter,saying:

“That’s for you—a woman’s hand, I think. But I’ve some news for you first.”

“What’s that?”

“The King’s at the Castle of Zenda,” said he.

“How do you know?”

“Because the other half of Michael’s Six are there. I had enquiries made, andthey’re all there—Lauengram, Krafstein, and young Rupert Hentzau: three rogues,too, on my honour, as fine as live in Ruritania.”

“Well?”

“Well, Fritz wants you to march to the Castle with horse, foot, and artillery.”

“And drag the moat?” I asked.

“That would be about it,” grinned Sapt, “and we shouldn’t find the King’s bodythen.”

“You think it’s certain he’s there?”

“Very probable. Besides the fact of those three being there, the drawbridge iskept up, and no one goes in without an order from young Hentzau or BlackMichael himself. We must tie Fritz up.”

“I’ll go to Zenda,” said I.

“You’re mad.”

“Some day.”

“Oh, perhaps. You’ll very likely stay there though, if you do.”

“That may be, my friend,” said I carelessly.

“His Majesty looks sulky,” observed Sapt. “How’s the love affair?”

“Damn you, hold your tongue!” I said.

He looked at me for a moment, then he lit his pipe. It was quite true that Iwas in a bad temper, and I went on perversely:

“Wherever I go, I’m dogged by half a dozen fellows.”

“I know you are; I send ’em,” he replied composedly.

“What for?”

“Well,” said Sapt, puffing away, “it wouldn’t be exactly inconvenient for BlackMichael if you disappeared. With you gone, the old game that we stopped wouldbe played—or he’d have a shot at it.”

“I can take care of myself.”

“De Gautet, Bersonin, and Detchard are in Strelsau; and any one of them, lad,would cut your throat as readily—as readily as I would Black Michael’s, and adeal more treacherously. What’s the letter?”

I opened it and read it aloud:

“If the King desires to know what it deeply concerns the King to know, let himdo as this letter bids him. At the end of the New Avenue there stands a housein large grounds. The house has a portico, with a statue of a nymph on it. Awall encloses the garden; there is a gate in the wall at the back. At twelveo’clock tonight, if the King enters alone by that gate, turns to the right, andwalks twenty yards, he will find a summerhouse, approached by a flight of sixsteps. If he mounts and enters, he will find someone who will tell him whattouches most dearly his life and his throne. This is written by a faithfulfriend. He must be alone. If he neglects the invitation his life will be indanger. Let him show this to no one, or he will ruin a woman who loves him:Black Michael does not pardon.”

“No,” observed Sapt, as I ended, “but he can dictate a very pretty letter.”

I had arrived at the same conclusion, and was about to throw the letter away,when I saw there was more writing on the other side.

“Hallo! there’s some more.”

“If you hesitate,” the writer continued, “consult Colonel Sapt—”

“Eh,” exclaimed that gentleman, genuinely astonished. “Does she take me for agreater fool than you?”

I waved to him to be silent.

“Ask him what woman would do most to prevent the duke from marrying his cousin,and therefore most to prevent him becoming king? And ask if her name beginswith—A?”

I sprang to my feet. Sapt laid down his pipe.

“Antoinette de Mauban, by heaven!” I cried.

“How do you know?” asked Sapt.

I told him what I knew of the lady, and how I knew it. He nodded.

“It’s so far true that she’s had a great row with Michael,” said he,thoughtfully.

“If she would, she could be useful,” I said.

“I believe, though, that Michael wrote that letter.”

“So do I, but I mean to know for certain. I shall go, Sapt.”

“No, I shall go,” said he.

“You may go as far as the gate.”

“I shall go to the summer-house.”

“I’m hanged if you shall!”

I rose and leant my back against the mantelpiece.

“Sapt, I believe in that woman, and I shall go.”

“I don’t believe in any woman,” said Sapt, “and you shan’t go.”

“I either go to the summer-house or back to England,” said I.

Sapt began to know exactly how far he could lead or drive, and when he mustfollow.

“We’re playing against time,” I added. “Every day we leave the King where he isthere is fresh risk. Every day I masquerade like this, there is fresh risk.Sapt, we must play high; we must force the game.”

“So be it,” he said, with a sigh.

To cut the story short, at half-past eleven that night Sapt and I mounted ourhorses. Fritz was again left on guard, our destination not being revealed tohim. It was a very dark night. I wore no sword, but I carried a revolver, along knife, and a bull’s-eye lantern. We arrived outside the gate. Idismounted. Sapt held out his hand.

“I shall wait here,” he said. “If I hear a shot, I’ll—”

“Stay where you are; it’s the King’s only chance. You mustn’t come to grieftoo.”

“You’re right, lad. Good luck!”

I pressed the little gate. It yielded, and I found myself in a wild sort ofshrubbery. There was a grass-grown path and, turning to the right as I had beenbidden, I followed it cautiously. My lantern was closed, the revolver was in myhand. I heard not a sound. Presently a large dark object loomed out of thegloom ahead of me. It was the summer-house. Reaching the steps, I mounted themand found myself confronted by a weak, rickety wooden door, which hung upon thelatch. I pushed it open and walked in. A woman flew to me and seized my hand.

“Shut the door,” she whispered.

I obeyed and turned the light of my lantern on her. She was in evening dress,arrayed very sumptuously, and her dark striking beauty was marvellouslydisplayed in the glare of the bull’s-eye. The summer-house was a bare littleroom, furnished only with a couple of chairs and a small iron table, such asone sees in a tea garden or an open-air cafe.

“Don’t talk,” she said. “We’ve no time. Listen! I know you, Mr. Rassendyll. Iwrote that letter at the duke’s orders.”

“So I thought,” said I.

“In twenty minutes three men will be here to kill you.”

“Three—the three?”

“Yes. You must be gone by then. If not, tonight you’ll be killed—”

“Or they will.”

“Listen, listen! When you’re killed, your body will be taken to a low quarterof the town. It will be found there. Michael will at once arrest all yourfriends—Colonel Sapt and Captain von Tarlenheim first—proclaim a state of siegein Strelsau, and send a messenger to Zenda. The other three will murder theKing in the Castle, and the duke will proclaim either himself or theprincess—himself, if he is strong enough. Anyhow, he’ll marry her, and becomeking in fact, and soon in name. Do you see?”

“It’s a pretty plot. But why, madame, do you—?”

“Say I’m a Christian—or say I’m jealous. My God! shall I see him marry her? Nowgo; but remember—this is what I have to tell you—that never, by night or byday, are you safe. Three men follow you as a guard. Is it not so? Well, threefollow them; Michael’s three are never two hundred yards from you. Your life isnot worth a moment if ever they find you alone. Now go. Stay, the gate will beguarded by now. Go down softly, go past the summer-house, on for a hundredyards, and you’ll find a ladder against the wall. Get over it, and fly for yourlife.”

“And you?” I asked.

“I have my game to play too. If he finds out what I have done, we shall notmeet again. If not, I may yet—But never mind. Go at once.”

“But what will you tell him?”

“That you never came—that you saw through the trick.”

I took her hand and kissed it.

“Madame,” said I, “you have served the King well tonight. Where is he in theCastle?”

She sank her voice to a fearful whisper. I listened eagerly.

“Across the drawbridge you come to a heavy door; behind that lies—Hark! What’sthat?”

There were steps outside.

“They’re coming! They’re too soon! Heavens! they’re too soon!” and she turnedpale as death.

“They seem to me,” said I, “to be in the nick of time.”

“Close your lantern. See, there’s a chink in the door. Can you see them?”

I put my eye to the chink. On the lowest step I saw three dim figures. I cockedmy revolver. Antoinette hastily laid her hand on mine.

“You may kill one,” said she. “But what then?”

A voice came from outside—a voice that spoke perfect English.

“Mr. Rassendyll,” it said.

I made no answer.

“We want to talk to you. Will you promise not to shoot till we’ve done?”

“Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr. Detchard?” I said.

“Never mind names.”

“Then let mine alone.”

“All right, sire. I’ve an offer for you.”

I still had my eye to the chink. The three had mounted two steps more; threerevolvers pointed full at the door.

“Will you let us in? We pledge our honour to observe the truce.”

“Don’t trust them,” whispered Antoinette.

“We can speak through the door,” said I.

“But you might open it and fire,” objected Detchard; “and though we shouldfinish you, you might finish one of us. Will you give your honour not to firewhile we talk?”

“Don’t trust them,” whispered Antoinette again.

A sudden idea struck me. I considered it for a moment. It seemed feasible.

“I give my honour not to fire before you do,” said I; “but I won’t let you in.Stand outside and talk.”

“That’s sensible,” he said.

The three mounted the last step, and stood just outside the door. I laid my earto the chink. I could hear no words, but Detchard’s head was close to that ofthe taller of his companions (De Gautet, I guessed).

“H’m! Private communications,” thought I. Then I said aloud:

“Well, gentlemen, what’s the offer?”

“A safe-conduct to the frontier, and fifty thousand pounds English.”

“No, no,” whispered Antoinette in the lowest of whispers. “They aretreacherous.”

“That seems handsome,” said I, reconnoitering through the chink. They were allclose together, just outside the door now.

I had probed the hearts of the ruffians, and I did not need Antoinette’swarning. They meant to “rush” me as soon as I was engaged in talk.

“Give me a minute to consider,” said I; and I thought I heard a laugh outside.

I turned to Antoinette.

“Stand up close to the wall, out of the line of fire from the door,” Iwhispered.

“What are you going to do?” she asked in fright.

“You’ll see,” said I.

I took up the little iron table. It was not very heavy for a man of mystrength, and I held it by the legs. The top, protruding in front of me, made acomplete screen for my head and body. I fastened my closed lantern to my beltand put my revolver in a handy pocket. Suddenly I saw the door move ever soslightly—perhaps it was the wind, perhaps it was a hand trying it outside.

I drew back as far as I could from the door, holding the table in the positionthat I have described. Then I called out:

“Gentlemen, I accept your offer, relying on your honour. If you will open thedoor—”

“Open it yourself,” said Detchard.

“It opens outwards,” said I. “Stand back a little, gentlemen, or I shall hityou when I open it.”

I went and fumbled with the latch. Then I stole back to my place on tiptoe.

“I can’t open it!” I cried. “The latch has caught.”

“Tut! I’ll open it!” cried Detchard. “Nonsense, Bersonin, why not? Are youafraid of one man?”

I smiled to myself. An instant later the door was flung back. The gleam of alantern showed me the three close together outside, their revolvers levelled.With a shout, I charged at my utmost pace across the summer-house and throughthe doorway. Three shots rang out and battered into my shield. Another moment,and I leapt out and the table caught them full and square, and in a tumbling,swearing, struggling mass, they and I and that brave table, rolled down thesteps of the summerhouse to the ground below. Antoinette de Mauban shrieked,but I rose to my feet, laughing aloud.

De Gautet and Bersonin lay like men stunned. Detchard was under the table, but,as I rose, he pushed it from him and fired again. I raised my revolver and tooka snap shot; I heard him curse, and then I ran like a hare, laughing as I went,past the summer-house and along by the wall. I heard steps behind me, andturning round I fired again for luck. The steps ceased.

“Please God,” said I, “she told me the truth about the ladder!” for the wallwas high and topped with iron spikes.

Yes, there it was. I was up and over in a minute. Doubling back, I saw thehorses; then I heard a shot. It was Sapt. He had heard us, and was battling andraging with the locked gate, hammering it and firing into the keyhole like aman possessed. He had quite forgotten that he was not to take part in thefight. Whereat I laughed again, and said, as I clapped him on the shoulder:

“Come home to bed, old chap. I’ve got the finest tea-table story that ever youheard!”

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

“And what the devil are you laughing at?”

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

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

CHAPTER 10
A Great Chance for a Villain

It was the custom that the Prefect of Police should send every afternoon areport to me on the condition of the capital and the feeling of the people: thedocument included also an account of the movements of any persons whom thepolice had received instructions to watch. Since I had been in Strelsau, Sapthad been in the habit of reading the report and telling me any items ofinterest which it might contain. On the day after my adventure in thesummer-house, he came in as I was playing a hand of écartéwith Fritzvon Tarlenheim.

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

“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. Hisdestination is believed to be the Castle of Zenda, but the party travelled byroad and not by train. MM De Gautet, Bersonin, and Detchard followed an hourlater, the last-named carrying his arm in a sling. The cause of his wound isnot known, but it is suspected that he has fought a duel, probably incidentalto a love affair.’”

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

“Then we come to this,” pursued Sapt: “‘Madame de Mauban, whose movements havebeen watched according to instructions, left by train at midday. She took aticket for Dresden—’”

“It’s an old habit of hers,” said I.

“‘The Dresden train stops at Zenda.’ An acute fellow, this. And finally listento this: ‘The state of feeling in the city is not satisfactory. The King ismuch criticized’ (you know, he’s told to be quite frank) ‘for taking no stepsabout his marriage. From enquiries among the entourage of the Princess Flavia,her Royal Highness is believed to be deeply offended by the remissness of hisMajesty. The common people are coupling her name with that of the Duke ofStrelsau, and the duke gains much popularity from the suggestion.’ I havecaused the announcement that the King gives a ball tonight in honour of theprincess 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. Lookhere, I hate telling you this, but I must. The Countess Helga told me that theprincess had become most attached to the King. Since the coronation, herfeelings have undergone a marked development. It’s quite true that she isdeeply 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 beforenow? That’s all she wants.”

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

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

“Good heavens!”

“Or, any rate, go near it: and I shall send a ‘semi-official’ to the papers.”

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

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

“All right, lad, all right,” said he. “We mustn’t press you too hard. Sootheher 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 strollin the garden.”

Sapt at once yielded. His rough manner covered a wonderful tact—and as I cameto recognize more and more, a remarkable knowledge of human nature. Why did heurge me so little about the princess? Because he knew that her beauty and myardour would carry me further than all his arguments—and that the less Ithought about the thing, the more likely was I to do it. He must have seen theunhappiness 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, theprincess must turn to him, either knowing or not knowing the change. And if theKing 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 ofRuritania for the term of my life. He would have set Satan himself there soonerthan that pupil of his, Black Michael.

The ball was a sumptuous affair. I opened it by dancing a quadrille withFlavia: then I waltzed with her. Curious eyes and eager whispers attended us.We went in to supper; and, half way through, I, half mad by then, for herglance had answered mine, and her quick breathing met my stammered sentences—Irose in my place before all the brilliant crowd, and taking the Red Rose that Iwore, flung the ribbon with its jewelled badge round her neck. In a tumult ofapplause I sat down: I saw Sapt smiling over his wine, and Fritz frowning. Therest of the meal passed in silence; neither Flavia nor I could speak. Fritztouched me on the shoulder, and I rose, gave her my arm, and walked down thehall into a little room, where coffee was served to us. The gentlemen andladies in attendance withdrew, and we were alone.

The little room had French windows opening on the gardens. The night was fine,cool, and fragrant. Flavia sat down, and I stood opposite her. I was strugglingwith myself: if she had not looked at me, I believe that even then I shouldhave won my fight. But suddenly, involuntarily, she gave me one brief glance—aglance of question, hurriedly turned aside; a blush that the question had evercome spread over her cheek, and she caught her breath. Ah, if you had seen her!I forgot the King in Zenda. I forgot the King in Strelsau. She was aprincess—and I an impostor. Do you think I remembered that? I threw myself onmy knee and seized her hands in mine. I said nothing. Why should I? The softsounds of the night set my wooing to a wordless melody, as I pressed my kisseson her lips.

She pushed me from her, crying suddenly:

“Ah! is it true? or is it only because you must?”

“It’s true!” I said, in low smothered tones—“true that I love you more thanlife—or truth—or honour!”

She set no meaning to my words, treating them as one of love’s sweetextravagances. She came close to me, and whispered:

“Oh, if you were not the King! Then I could show you how I love you! How is itthat I love you now, Rudolf?”

“Now?”

“Yes—just lately. I—I never did before.”

Pure triumph filled me. It was I—Rudolf Rassendyll—who had won her! I caughther round the waist.

“You didn’t love me before?” I asked.

She looked up into my face, smiling, as she whispered:

“It must have been your Crown. I felt it first on the Coronation Day.”

“Never before?” I asked eagerly.

She laughed low.

“You speak as if you would be pleased to hear me say ‘Yes’ to that,” she said.

“Would ‘Yes’ be true?”

“Yes,” I just heard her breathe, and she went on in an instant: “Be careful,Rudolf; be careful, dear. He will be mad now.”

“What, Michael? If Michael were the worst—”

“What worse is there?”

There was yet a chance for me. Controlling myself with a mighty effort, I tookmy hands off her and stood a yard or two away. I remember now the note of thewind in the elm trees outside.

“If I were not the King,” I began, “if I were only a private gentleman—”

Before I could finish, her hand was in mine.

“If you were a convict in the prison of Strelsau, you would be my King,” shesaid.

And under my breath I groaned, “God forgive me!” and, holding her hand in mine,I said again:

“If I were not the King—”

“Hush, hush!” she whispered. “I don’t deserve it—I don’t deserve to be doubted.Ah, Rudolf! does a woman who marries without love look on the man as I look onyou?”

And she hid her face from me.

For more than a minute we stood there together; and I, even with my arm abouther, summoned up what honour and conscience her beauty and the toils that I wasin had left me.

“Flavia,” I said, in a strange dry voice that seemed not my own, “I am not—”

As I spoke—as she raised her eyes to me—there was a heavy step on the graveloutside, and a man appeared at the window. A little cry burst from Flavia, asshe sprang back from me. My half-finished sentence died on my lips. Sapt stoodthere, bowing low, but with a stern frown on his face.

“A thousand pardons, sire,” said he, “but his Eminence the Cardinal has waitedthis quarter of an hour to offer his respectful adieu to your Majesty.”

I met his eye full and square; and I read in it an angry warning. How long hehad been a listener I knew not, but he had come in upon us in the nick of time.

“We must not keep his Eminence waiting,” said I.

But Flavia, in whose love there lay no shame, with radiant eyes and blushingface, held out her hand to Sapt. She said nothing, but no man could have missedher meaning, who had ever seen a woman in the exultation of love. A sour, yetsad, smile passed over the old soldier’s face, and there was tenderness in hisvoice, as bending to kiss her hand, he said:

“In joy and sorrow, in good times and bad, God save your Royal Highness!”

He paused and added, glancing at me and drawing himself up to militaryerectness:

“But, before all comes the King—God save the King!”

And Flavia caught at my hand and kissed it, murmuring:

“Amen! Good God, Amen!”

We went into the ballroom again. Forced to receive adieus, I was separated fromFlavia: everyone, when they left me, went to her. Sapt was out and in of thethrong, and where he had been, glances, smiles, and whispers were rife. Idoubted not that, true to his relentless purpose, he was spreading the newsthat he had learnt. To uphold the Crown and beat Black Michael—that was his oneresolve. Flavia, myself—ay, and the real King in Zenda, were pieces in hisgame; and pawns have no business with passions. Not even at the walls of thePalace did he stop; for when at last I handed Flavia down the broad marblesteps and into her carriage, there was a great crowd awaiting us, and we werewelcomed with deafening cheers. What could I do? Had I spoken then, they wouldhave refused to believe that I was not the King; they might have believed thatthe King had run mad. By Sapt’s devices and my own ungoverned passion I hadbeen forced on, and the way back had closed behind me; and the passion stilldrove me in the same direction as the devices seduced me. I faced all Strelsauthat night as the King and the accepted suitor of the Princess Flavia.

At last, at three in the morning, when the cold light of dawning day began tosteal in, I was in my dressing-room, and Sapt alone was with me. I sat like aman dazed, staring into the fire; he puffed at his pipe; Fritz was gone to bed,having almost refused to speak to me. On the table by me lay a rose; it hadbeen in Flavia’s dress, and, as we parted, she had kissed it and given it tome.

Sapt advanced his hand towards the rose, but, with a quick movement, I shutmine down upon it.

“That’s mine,” I said, “not yours—nor the King’s either.”

“We struck a good blow for the King tonight,” said he.

I turned on him fiercely.

“What’s to prevent me striking a blow for myself?” I said.

He nodded his head.

“I know what’s in your mind,” he said. “Yes, lad; but you’re bound in honour.”

“Have you left me any honour?”

“Oh, come, to play a little trick on a girl—”

“You can spare me that. Colonel Sapt, if you would not have me utterly avillain—if you would not have your King rot in Zenda, while Michael and I playfor the great stake outside—You follow me?”

“Ay, I follow you.”

“We must act, and quickly! You saw tonight—you heard—tonight—”

“I did,” said he.

“Your cursed acuteness told you what I should do. Well, leave me here aweek—and there’s another problem for you. Do you find the answer?”

“Yes, I find it,” he answered, frowning heavily. “But if you did that, you’dhave to fight me first—and kill me.”

“Well, and if I had—or a score of men? I tell you, I could raise all Strelsauon you in an hour, and choke you with your lies—yes, your mad lies—in yourmouth.”

“It’s gospel truth,” he said—“thanks to my advice you could.”

“I could marry the princess, and send Michael and his brother together to—”

“I’m not denying it, lad,” said he.

“Then, in God’s name,” I cried, stretching out my hands to him, “let us go toZenda and crush this Michael and bring the King back to his own again.” The oldfellow stood and looked at me for full a minute.

“And the princess?” he said.

I bowed my head to meet my hands, and crushed the rose between my fingers andmy lips.

I felt his hand on my shoulder, and his voice sounded husky as he whispered lowin my ear:

“Before God, you’re the finest Elphberg of them all. But I have eaten of theKing’s bread, and I am the King’s servant. Come, we will go to Zenda!”

And I looked up and caught him by the hand. And the eyes of both of us werewet.

CHAPTER 11
Hunting a Very Big Boar

The terrible temptation which was assailing me will now be understood. I wouldso force Michael’s hand that he must kill the King. I was in a position to bidhim defiance and tighten my grasp on the crown—not for its own sake, butbecause the King of Ruritania was to wed the Princess Flavia. What of Sapt andFritz? Ah! but a man cannot be held to write down in cold blood the wild andblack thoughts that storm his brain when an uncontrolled passion has battered abreach for them. Yet, unless he sets up as a saint, he need not hate himselffor them. He is better employed, as it humbly seems to me, in giving thanksthat power to resist was vouchsafed to him, than in fretting over wickedimpulses which come unsought and extort an unwilling hospitality from theweakness of our nature.

It was a fine bright morning when I walked, unattended, to the princess’shouse, carrying a nosegay in my hand. Policy made excuses for love, and everyattention that I paid her, while it riveted my own chains, bound closer to methe people of the great city, who worshipped her. I found Fritz’sinamorata, the Countess Helga, gathering blooms in the garden for hermistress’s wear, and prevailed on her to take mine in their place. The girl wasrosy with happiness, for Fritz, in his turn, had not wasted his evening, and nodark shadow hung over his wooing, save the hatred which the Duke of Strelsauwas known to bear him.

“And that,” she said, with a mischievous smile, “your Majesty has made of nomoment. Yes, I will take the flowers; shall I tell you, sire, what is the firstthing the princess does with them?”

We were talking on a broad terrace that ran along the back of the house, and awindow above our heads stood open.

“Madame!” cried the countess merrily, and Flavia herself looked out. I bared myhead and bowed. She wore a white gown, and her hair was loosely gathered in aknot. She kissed her hand to me, crying:

“Bring the King up, Helga; I’ll give him some coffee.”

The countess, with a gay glance, led the way, and took me into Flavia’smorning-room. And, left alone, we greeted one another as lovers are wont. Thenthe princess laid two letters before me. One was from Black Michael—a mostcourteous request that she would honour him by spending a day at his Castle ofZenda, as had been her custom once a year in the summer, when the place and itsgardens were in the height of their great beauty. I threw the letter down indisgust, and Flavia laughed at me. Then, growing grave again, she pointed tothe other sheet.

“I don’t know who that comes from,” she said. “Read it.”

I knew in a moment. There was no signature at all this time, but thehandwriting was the same as that which had told me of the snare in thesummer-house: it was Antoinette de Mauban’s.

“I have no cause to love you,” it ran, “but God forbid that you should fallinto the power of the duke. Accept no invitations of his. Go nowhere without alarge guard—a regiment is not too much to make you safe. Show this, if you can,to him who reigns in Strelsau.”

“Why doesn’t it say ‘the King’?” asked Flavia, leaning over my shoulder, sothat the ripple of her hair played on my cheek. “Is it a hoax?”

“As you value life, and more than life, my queen,” I said, “obey it to the veryletter. A regiment shall camp round your house today. See that you do not goout unless well guarded.”

“An order, sire?” she asked, a little rebellious.

“Yes, an order, madame—if you love me.”

“Ah!” she cried; and I could not but kiss her.

“You know who sent it?” she asked.

“I guess,” said I. “It is from a good friend—and I fear, an unhappy woman. Youmust be ill, Flavia, and unable to go to Zenda. Make your excuses as cold andformal as you like.”

“So you feel strong enough to anger Michael?” she said, with a proud smile.

“I’m strong enough for anything, while you are safe,” said I.

Soon I tore myself away from her, and then, without consulting Sapt, I took myway to the house of Marshal Strakencz. I had seen something of the old general,and I liked and trusted him. Sapt was less enthusiastic, but I had learnt bynow that Sapt was best pleased when he could do everything, and jealousy playedsome part in his views. As things were now, I had more work than Sapt and Fritzcould manage, for they must come with me to Zenda, and I wanted a man to guardwhat I loved most in all the world, and suffer me to set about my task ofreleasing the King with a quiet mind.

The Marshal received me with most loyal kindness. To some extent, I took himinto my confidence. I charged him with the care of the princess, looking himfull and significantly in the face as I bade him let no one from her cousin theduke approach her, unless he himself were there and a dozen of his men withhim.

“You may be right, sire,” said he, shaking his grey head sadly. “I have knownbetter men than the duke do worse things than that for love.”

I could quite appreciate the remark, but I said:

“There’s something beside love, Marshal. Love’s for the heart; is there nothingmy brother might like for his head?”

“I pray that you wrong him, sire.”

“Marshal, I’m leaving Strelsau for a few days. Every evening I will send acourier to you. If for three days none comes, you will publish an order which Iwill give you, depriving Duke Michael of the governorship of Strelsau andappointing you in his place. You will declare a state of siege. Then you willsend word to Michael that you demand an audience of the King—You follow me?”

“Ay, sire.”

“—In twenty-four hours. If he does not produce the King” (I laid my hand on hisknee), “then the King is dead, and you will proclaim the next heir. You knowwho that is?”

“The Princess Flavia.”

“And swear to me, on your faith and honour and by the fear of the living God,that you will stand by her to the death, and kill that reptile, and seat herwhere I sit now.”

“On my faith and honour, and by the fear of God, I swear it! And may AlmightyGod preserve your Majesty, for I think that you go on an errand of danger.”

“I hope that no life more precious than mine may be demanded,” said I, rising.Then I held out my hand to him.

“Marshal,” I said, “in days to come, it may be—I know not—that you will hearstrange things of the man who speaks to you now. Let him be what he may, andwho he may, what say you of the manner in which he has borne himself as King inStrelsau?”

The old man, holding my hand, spoke to me, man to man.

“I have known many of the Elphbergs,” said he, “and I have seen you. And,happen what may, you have borne yourself as a wise King and a brave man; ay,and you have proved as courteous a gentleman and as gallant a lover as any thathave been of the House.”

“Be that my epitaph,” said I, “when the time comes that another sits on thethrone of Ruritania.”

“God send a far day, and may I not see it!” said he.

I was much moved, and the Marshal’s worn face twitched. I sat down and wrote myorder.

“I can hardly yet write,” said I; “my finger is stiff still.”

It was, in fact, the first time that I had ventured to write more than asignature; and in spite of the pains I had taken to learn the King’s hand, Iwas not yet perfect in it.

“Indeed, sire,” he said, “it differs a little from your ordinary handwriting.It is unfortunate, for it may lead to a suspicion of forgery.”

“Marshal,” said I, with a laugh, “what use are the guns of Strelsau, if theycan’t assuage a little suspicion?”

He smiled grimly, and took the paper.

“Colonel Sapt and Fritz von Tarlenheim go with me,” I continued.

“You go to seek the duke?” he asked in a low tone.

“Yes, the duke, and someone else of whom I have need, and who is at Zenda,” Ireplied.

“I wish I could go with you,” he cried, tugging at his white moustache. “I’dlike to strike a blow for you and your crown.”

“I leave you what is more than my life and more than my crown,” said I,“because you are the man I trust more than all other in Ruritania.”

“I will deliver her to you safe and sound,” said he, “and, failing that, I willmake her queen.”

We parted, and I returned to the Palace and told Sapt and Fritz what I haddone. Sapt had a few faults to find and a few grumbles to utter. This wasmerely what I expected, for Sapt liked to be consulted beforehand, not informedafterwards; but on the whole he approved of my plans, and his spirits rose highas the hour of action drew nearer and nearer. Fritz, too, was ready; though he,poor fellow, risked more than Sapt did, for he was a lover, and his happinesshung in the scale. Yet how I envied him! For the triumphant issue which wouldcrown him with happiness and unite him to his mistress, the success for whichwe were bound to hope and strive and struggle, meant to me sorrow more certainand greater than if I were doomed to fail. He understood something of this, forwhen we were alone (save for old Sapt, who was smoking at the other end of theroom) he passed his arm through mine, saying:

“It’s hard for you. Don’t think I don’t trust you; I know you have nothing buttrue thoughts in your heart.”

But I turned away from him, thankful that he could not see what my heart held,but only be witness to the deeds that my hands were to do.

Yet even he did not understand, for he had not dared to lift his eyes to thePrincess Flavia, as I had lifted mine.

Our plans were now all made, even as we proceeded to carry them out, and asthey will hereafter appear. The next morning we were to start on the huntingexcursion. I had made all arrangements for being absent, and now there was onlyone thing left to do—the hardest, the most heart-breaking. As evening fell, Idrove through the busy streets to Flavia’s residence. I was recognized as Iwent and heartily cheered. I played my part, and made shift to look the happylover. In spite of my depression, I was almost amused at the coolness anddelicate hauteur with which my sweet lover received me. She had heard that theKing was leaving Strelsau on a hunting expedition.

“I regret that we cannot amuse your Majesty here in Strelsau,” she said,tapping her foot lightly on the floor. “I would have offered you moreentertainment, but I was foolish enough to think—”

“Well, what?” I asked, leaning over her.

“That just for a day or two after—after last night—you might be happy withoutmuch gaiety;” and she turned pettishly from me, as she added, “I hope the boarswill be more engrossing.”

“I’m going after a very big boar,” said I; and, because I could not help it, Ibegan to play with her hair, but she moved her head away.

“Are you offended with me?” I asked, in feigned surprise, for I could notresist tormenting her a little. I had never seen her angry, and every freshaspect of her was a delight to me.

“What right have I to be offended? True, you said last night that every houraway from me was wasted. But a very big boar! that’s a different thing.”

“Perhaps the boar will hunt me,” I suggested. “Perhaps, Flavia, he’ll catchme.”

She made no answer.

“You are not touched even by that danger?”

Still she said nothing; and I, stealing round, found her eyes full of tears.

“You weep for my danger?”

Then she spoke very low:

“This is like what you used to be; but not like the King—the King I—I have cometo love!”

With a sudden great groan, I caught her to my heart.

“My darling!” I cried, forgetting everything but her, “did you dream that Ileft you to go hunting?”

“What then, Rudolf? Ah! you’re not going—?”

“Well, it is hunting. I go to seek Michael in his lair.”

She had turned very pale.

“So, you see, sweet, I was not so poor a lover as you thought me. I shall notbe long gone.”

“You will write to me, Rudolf?”

I was weak, but I could not say a word to stir suspicion in her.

“I’ll send you all my heart every day,” said I.

“And you’ll run no danger?”

“None that I need not.”

“And when will you be back? Ah, how long will it be!”

“When shall I be back?” I repeated.

“Yes, yes! Don’t be long, dear, don’t be long. I shan’t sleep while you’reaway.”

“I don’t know when I shall be back,” said I.

“Soon, Rudolf, soon?”

“God knows, my darling. But, if never—”

“Hush, hush!” and she pressed her lips to mine.

“If never,” I whispered, “you must take my place; you’ll be the only one of theHouse then. You must reign, and not weep for me.”

For a moment she drew herself up like a very queen.

“Yes, I will!” she said. “I will reign. I will do my part though all my lifewill be empty and my heart dead; yet I’ll do it!”

She paused, and sinking against me again, wailed softly.

“Come soon! come soon!”

Carried away, I cried loudly:

“As God lives, I—yes, I myself—will see you once more before I die!”

“What do you mean?” she exclaimed, with wondering eyes; but I had no answer forher, and she gazed at me with her wondering eyes.

I dared not ask her to forget, she would have found it an insult. I could nottell her then who and what I was. She was weeping, and I had but to dry hertears.

“Shall a man not come back to the loveliest lady in all the wide world?” saidI. “A thousand Michaels should not keep me from you!”

She clung to me, a little comforted.

“You won’t let Michael hurt you?”

“No, sweetheart.”

“Or keep you from me?”

“No, sweetheart.”

“Nor anyone else?”

And again I answered:

“No, sweetheart.”

Yet there was one—not Michael—who, if he lived, must keep me from her; and forwhose life I was going forth to stake my own. And his figure—the lithe, buoyantfigure I had met in the woods of Zenda—the dull, inert mass I had left in thecellar of the hunting-lodge—seemed to rise, double-shaped, before me, and tocome between us, thrusting itself in even where she lay, pale, exhausted,fainting, in my arms, and yet looking up at me with those eyes that bore suchlove as I have never seen, and haunt me now, and will till the ground closesover me—and (who knows?) perhaps beyond.

CHAPTER 12
I Receive a Visitor and Bait a Hook

About five miles from Zenda—on the opposite side from that on which the Castleis situated, there lies a large tract of wood. It is rising ground, and in thecentre of the demesne, on the top of the hill, stands a fine modern chateau,the property of a distant kinsman of Fritz’s, the Count Stanislas vonTarlenheim. Count Stanislas himself was a student and a recluse. He seldomvisited the house, and had, on Fritz’s request, very readily and courteouslyoffered me its hospitality for myself and my party. This, then, was ourdestination; chosen ostensibly for the sake of the boar-hunting (for the woodwas carefully preserved, and boars, once common all over Ruritania, were stillto be found there in considerable numbers), really because it brought us withinstriking distance of the Duke of Strelsau’s more magnificent dwelling on theother side of the town. A large party of servants, with horses and luggage,started early in the morning; we followed at midday, travelling by train forthirty miles, and then mounting our horses to ride the remaining distance tothe chateau.

We were a gallant party. Besides Sapt and Fritz, I was accompanied by tengentlemen: every one of them had been carefully chosen, and no less carefullysounded, by my two friends, and all were devotedly attached to the person ofthe King. They were told a part of the truth; the attempt on my life in thesummer-house was revealed to them, as a spur to their loyalty and an incitementagainst Michael. They were also informed that a friend of the King’s wassuspected to be forcibly confined within the Castle of Zenda. His rescue wasone of the objects of the expedition; but, it was added, the King’s main desirewas to carry into effect certain steps against his treacherous brother, as tothe precise nature of which they could not at present be further enlightened.Enough that the King commanded their services, and would rely on their devotionwhen occasion arose to call for it. Young, well-bred, brave, and loyal, theyasked no more: they were ready to prove their dutiful obedience, and prayed fora fight as the best and most exhilarating mode of showing it.

Thus the scene was shifted from Strelsau to the chateau of Tarlenheim andCastle of Zenda, which frowned at us across the valley. I tried to shift mythoughts also, to forget my love, and to bend all my energies to the taskbefore me. It was to get the King out of the Castle alive. Force was useless:in some trick lay the chance; and I had already an inkling of what we must do.But I was terribly hampered by the publicity which attended my movements.Michael must know by now of my expedition; and I knew Michael too well tosuppose that his eyes would be blinded by the feint of the boar-hunt. He wouldunderstand very well what the real quarry was. That, however, must berisked—that and all it might mean; for Sapt, no less than myself, recognizedthat the present state of things had become unendurable. And there was onething that I dared to calculate on—not, as I now know, without warrant. It wasthis—that Black Michael would not believe that I meant well by the King. Hecould not appreciate—I will not say an honest man, for the thoughts of my ownheart have been revealed—but a man acting honestly. He saw my opportunity as Ihad seen it, as Sapt had seen it; he knew the princess—nay (and I declare thata sneaking sort of pity for him invaded me), in his way he loved her; he wouldthink that Sapt and Fritz could be bribed, so the bribe was large enough.Thinking thus, would he kill the King, my rival and my danger? Ay, verily, thathe would, with as little compunction as he would kill a rat. But he would killRudolf Rassendyll first, if he could; and nothing but the certainty of beingutterly damned by the release of the King alive and his restoration to thethrone would drive him to throw away the trump card which he held in reserve tobaulk the supposed game of the impudent impostor Rassendyll. Musing on all thisas I rode along, I took courage.

Michael knew of my coming, sure enough. I had not been in the house an hour,when an imposing Embassy arrived from him. He did not quite reach the impudenceof sending my would-be assassins, but he sent the other three of his famousSix—the three Ruritanian gentlemen—Lauengram, Krafstein, and Rupert Hentzau. Afine, strapping trio they were, splendidly horsed and admirably equipped. YoungRupert, who looked a dare-devil, and could not have been more than twenty-twoor twenty-three, took the lead, and made us the neatest speech, wherein mydevoted subject and loving brother Michael of Strelsau, prayed me to pardon himfor not paying his addresses in person, and, further, for not putting hisCastle at my disposal; the reason for both of these apparent derelictions beingthat he and several of his servants lay sick of scarlet fever, and were in avery sad, and also a very infectious state. So declared young Rupert with aninsolent smile on his curling upper lip and a toss of his thick hair—he was ahandsome villain, and the gossip ran that many a lady had troubled her heartfor him already.

“If my brother has scarlet fever,” said I, “he is nearer my complexion than heis wont to be, my lord. I trust he does not suffer?”

“He is able to attend to his affairs, sire.”

“I hope all beneath your roof are not sick. What of my good friends, De Gautet,Bersonin, and Detchard? I heard the last had suffered a hurt.”

Lauengram and Krafstein looked glum and uneasy, but young Rupert’s smile grewbroader.

“He hopes soon to find a medicine for it, sire,” he answered.

And I burst out laughing, for I knew what medicine Detchard longed for—it iscalled Revenge.

“You will dine with us, gentlemen?” I asked.

Young Rupert was profuse in apologies. They had urgent duties at the Castle.

“Then,” said I, with a wave of my hand, “to our next meeting, gentlemen. May itmake us better acquainted.”

“We will pray your Majesty for an early opportunity,” quoth Rupert airily; andhe strode past Sapt with such jeering scorn on his face that I saw the oldfellow clench his fist and scowl black as night.

For my part, if a man must needs be a knave, I would have him a debonair knave,and I liked Rupert Hentzau better than his long-faced, close-eyed companions.It makes your sin no worse, as I conceive, to do it à la modeandstylishly.

Now it was a curious thing that on this first night, instead of eating theexcellent dinner my cooks had prepared for me, I must needs leave my gentlemento eat it alone, under Sapt’s presiding care, and ride myself with Fritz to thetown of Zenda and a certain little inn that I knew of. There was little dangerin the excursion; the evenings were long and light, and the road this side ofZenda well frequented. So off we rode, with a groom behind us. I muffled myselfup in a big cloak.

“Fritz,” said I, as we entered the town, “there’s an uncommonly pretty girl atthis inn.”

“How do you know?” he asked.

“Because I’ve been there,” said I.

“Since—?” he began.

“No. Before,” said I.

“But they’ll recognize you?”

“Well, of course they will. Now, don’t argue, my good fellow, but listen to me.We’re two gentlemen of the King’s household, and one of us has a toothache. Theother will order a private room and dinner, and, further, a bottle of the bestwine for the sufferer. And if he be as clever a fellow as I take him for, thepretty girl and no other will wait on us.”

“What if she won’t?” objected Fritz.

“My dear Fritz,” said I, “if she won’t for you, she will for me.”

We were at the inn. Nothing of me but my eyes was visible as I walked in. Thelandlady received us; two minutes later, my little friend (ever, I fear me, onthe look-out for such guests as might prove amusing) made her appearance.Dinner and the wine were ordered. I sat down in the private room. A minutelater Fritz came in.

“She’s coming,” he said.

“If she were not, I should have to doubt the Countess Helga’s taste.”

She came in. I gave her time to set the wine down—I didn’t want it dropped.Fritz poured out a glass and gave it to me.

“Is the gentleman in great pain?” the girl asked, sympathetically.

“The gentleman is no worse than when he saw you last,” said I, throwing away mycloak.

She started, with a little shriek. Then she cried:

“It was the King, then! I told mother so the moment I saw his picture. Oh, sir,forgive me!”

“Faith, you gave me nothing that hurt much,” said I.

“But the things we said!”

“I forgive them for the thing you did.”

“I must go and tell mother.”

“Stop,” said I, assuming a graver air. “We are not here for sport tonight. Goand bring dinner, and not a word of the King being here.”

She came back in a few minutes, looking grave, yet very curious.

“Well, how is Johann?” I asked, beginning my dinner.

“Oh, that fellow, sir—my lord King, I mean!”

“‘Sir’ will do, please. How is he?”

“We hardly see him now, sir.”

“And why not?”

“I told him he came too often, sir,” said she, tossing her head.

“So he sulks and stays away?”

“Yes, sir.”

“But you could bring him back?” I suggested with a smile.

“Perhaps I could,” said she.

“I know your powers, you see,” said I, and she blushed with pleasure.

“It’s not only that, sir, that keeps him away. He’s very busy at the Castle.”

“But there’s no shooting on now.”

“No, sir; but he’s in charge of the house.”

“Johann turned housemaid?”

The little girl was brimming over with gossip.

“Well, there are no others,” said she. “There’s not a woman there—not as aservant, I mean. They do say—but perhaps it’s false, sir.”

“Let’s have it for what it’s worth,” said I.

“Indeed, I’m ashamed to tell you, sir.”

“Oh, see, I’m looking at the ceiling.”

“They do say there is a lady there, sir; but, except for her, there’s not awoman in the place. And Johann has to wait on the gentlemen.”

“Poor Johann! He must be overworked. Yet I’m sure he could find half an hour tocome and see you.”

“It would depend on the time, sir, perhaps.”

“Do you love him?” I asked.

“Not I, sir.”

“And you wish to serve the King?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then tell him to meet you at the second milestone out of Zenda tomorrowevening at ten o’clock. Say you’ll be there and will walk home with him.”

“Do you mean him harm, sir?”

“Not if he will do as I bid him. But I think I’ve told you enough, my prettymaid. See that you do as I bid you. And, mind, no one is to know that the Kinghas been here.”

I spoke a little sternly, for there is seldom harm in infusing a little fearinto a woman’s liking for you, and I softened the effect by giving her ahandsome present. Then we dined, and, wrapping my cloak about my face, withFritz leading the way, we went downstairs to our horses again.

It was but half-past eight, and hardly yet dark; the streets were full for sucha quiet little place, and I could see that gossip was all agog. With the Kingon one side and the duke on the other, Zenda felt itself the centre of allRuritania. We jogged gently through the town, but set our horses to a sharperpace when we reached the open country.

“You want to catch this fellow Johann?” asked Fritz.

“Ay, and I fancy I’ve baited the hook right. Our little Delilah will bring ourSamson. It is not enough, Fritz, to have no women in a house, though brotherMichael shows some wisdom there. If you want safety, you must have none withinfifty miles.”

“None nearer than Strelsau, for instance,” said poor Fritz, with a lovelornsigh.

We reached the avenue of the chateau, and were soon at the house. As the hoofsof our horses sounded on the gravel, Sapt rushed out to meet us.

“Thank God, you’re safe!” he cried. “Have you seen anything of them?”

“Of whom?” I asked, dismounting.

He drew us aside, that the grooms might not hear.

“Lad,” he said to me, “you must not ride about here, unless with half a dozenof us. You know among our men a tall young fellow, Bernenstein by name?”

I knew him. He was a fine strapping young man, almost of my height, and oflight complexion.

“He lies in his room upstairs, with a bullet through his arm.”

“The deuce he does!”

“After dinner he strolled out alone, and went a mile or so into the wood; andas he walked, he thought he saw three men among the trees; and one levelled agun at him. He had no weapon, and he started at a run back towards the house.But one of them fired, and he was hit, and had much ado to reach here before hefainted. By good luck, they feared to pursue him nearer the house.”

He paused and added:

“Lad, the bullet was meant for you.”

“It is very likely,” said I, “and it’s first blood to brother Michael.”

“I wonder which three it was,” said Fritz.

“Well, Sapt,” I said, “I went out tonight for no idle purpose, as you shallhear. But there’s one thing in my mind.”

“What’s that?” he asked.

“Why this,” I answered. “That I shall ill requite the very great honoursRuritania has done me if I depart from it leaving one of those Sixalive—neither with the help of God, will I.”

And Sapt shook my hand on that.

CHAPTER 13
An Improvement on Jacob’s Ladder

In the morning of the day after that on which I swore my oath against the Six,I gave certain orders, and then rested in greater contentment than I had knownfor some time. I was at work; and work, though it cannot cure love, is yet anarcotic to it; so that Sapt, who grew feverish, marvelled to see me sprawlingin an armchair in the sunshine, listening to one of my friends who sang meamorous songs in a mellow voice and induced in me a pleasing melancholy. Thuswas I engaged when young Rupert Hentzau, who feared neither man nor devil, androde through the demesne—where every tree might hide a marksman, for all heknew—as though it had been the park at Strelsau, cantered up to where I lay,bowing with burlesque deference, and craving private speech with me in order todeliver a message from the Duke of Strelsau. I made all withdraw, and then hesaid, seating himself by me:

“The King is in love, it seems?”

“Not with life, my lord,” said I, smiling.

“It is well,” he rejoined. “Come, we are alone, Rassendyll—”

I rose to a sitting posture.

“What’s the matter?” he asked.

“I was about to call one of my gentlemen to bring your horse, my lord. If youdo not know how to address the King, my brother must find another messenger.”

“Why keep up the farce?” he asked, negligently dusting his boot with his glove.

“Because it is not finished yet; and meanwhile I’ll choose my own name.”

“Oh, so be it! Yet I spoke in love for you; for indeed you are a man after myown heart.”

“Saving my poor honesty,” said I, “maybe I am. But that I keep faith with men,and honour with women, maybe I am, my lord.”

He darted a glance at me—a glance of anger.

“Is your mother dead?” said I.

“Ay, she’s dead.”

“She may thank God,” said I, and I heard him curse me softly. “Well, what’s themessage?” I continued.

I had touched him on the raw, for all the world knew he had broken his mother’sheart and flaunted his mistresses in her house; and his airy manner was gonefor the moment.

“The duke offers you more than I would,” he growled. “A halter for you, sire,was my suggestion. But he offers you safe-conduct across the frontier and amillion crowns.”

“I prefer your offer, my lord, if I am bound to one.”

“You refuse?”

“Of course.”

“I told Michael you would;” and the villain, his temper restored, gave me thesunniest of smiles. “The fact is, between ourselves,” he continued, “Michaeldoesn’t understand a gentleman.”

I began to laugh.

“And you?” I asked.

“I do,” he said. “Well, well, the halter be it.”

“I’m sorry you won’t live to see it,” I observed.

“Has his Majesty done me the honour to fasten a particular quarrel on me?”

“I would you were a few years older, though.”

“Oh, God gives years, but the devil gives increase,” laughed he. “I can hold myown.”

“How is your prisoner?” I asked.

“The K—?”

“Your prisoner.”

“I forgot your wishes, sire. Well, he is alive.”

He rose to his feet; I imitated him. Then, with a smile, he said:

“And the pretty princess? Faith, I’ll wager the next Elphberg will be redenough, for all that Black Michael will be called his father.”

I sprang a step towards him, clenching my hand. He did not move an inch, andhis lip curled in insolent amusement.

“Go, while your skin’s whole!” I muttered. He had repaid me with interest myhit about his mother.

Then came the most audacious thing I have known in my life. My friends weresome thirty yards away. Rupert called to a groom to bring him his horse, anddismissed the fellow with a crown. The horse stood near. I stood still,suspecting nothing. Rupert made as though to mount; then he suddenly turned tome: his left hand resting in his belt, his right outstretched: “Shake hands,”he said.

I bowed, and did as he had foreseen—I put my hands behind me. Quicker thanthought, his left hand darted out at me, and a small dagger flashed in the air;he struck me in the left shoulder—had I not swerved, it had been my heart. Witha cry, I staggered back. Without touching the stirrup, he leapt upon his horseand was off like an arrow, pursued by cries and revolver shots—the last asuseless as the first—and I sank into my chair, bleeding profusely, as I watchedthe devil’s brat disappear down the long avenue. My friends surrounded me, andthen I fainted.

I suppose that I was put to bed, and there lay, unconscious, or half conscious,for many hours; for it was night when I awoke to my full mind, and found Fritzbeside me. I was weak and weary, but he bade me be of good cheer, saying thatmy wound would soon heal, and that meanwhile all had gone well, for Johann, thekeeper, had fallen into the snare we had laid for him, and was even now in thehouse.

“And the queer thing is,” pursued Fritz, “that I fancy he’s not altogethersorry to find himself here. He seems to think that when Black Michael hasbrought off his coup, witnesses of how it was effected—saving, of course, theSix themselves—will not be at a premium.”

This idea argued a shrewdness in our captive which led me to build hopes on hisassistance. I ordered him to be brought in at once. Sapt conducted him, and sethim in a chair by my bedside. He was sullen, and afraid; but, to say truth,after young Rupert’s exploit, we also had our fears, and, if he got as far aspossible from Sapt’s formidable six-shooter, Sapt kept him as far as he couldfrom me. Moreover, when he came in his hands were bound, but that I would notsuffer.

I need not stay to recount the safeguards and rewards we promised thefellow—all of which were honourably observed and paid, so that he lives now inprosperity (though where I may not mention); and we were the more free inasmuchas we soon learnt that he was rather a weak man than a wicked, and had actedthroughout this matter more from fear of the duke and of his own brother Maxthan for any love of what was done. But he had persuaded all of his loyalty;and though not in their secret counsels, was yet, by his knowledge of theirdispositions within the Castle, able to lay bare before us the very heart oftheir devices. And here, in brief, is his story:

Below the level of the ground in the Castle, approached by a flight of stonesteps which abutted on the end of the drawbridge, were situated two smallrooms, cut out of the rock itself. The outer of the two had no windows, but wasalways lighted with candles; the inner had one square window, which gave uponthe moat. In the outer room there lay always, day and night, three of the Six;and the instructions of Duke Michael were, that on any attack being made on theouter room, the three were to defend the door of it so long as they couldwithout risk to themselves. But, so soon as the door should be in danger ofbeing forced, then Rupert Hentzau or Detchard (for one of these two was alwaysthere) should leave the others to hold it as long as they could, and himselfpass into the inner room, and, without more ado, kill the King who lay there,well-treated indeed, but without weapons, and with his arms confined in finesteel chains, which did not allow him to move his elbow more than three inchesfrom his side. Thus, before the outer door were stormed, the King would bedead. And his body? For his body would be evidence as damning as himself.

“Nay, sir,” said Johann, “his Highness has thought of that. While the two holdthe outer room, the one who has killed the King unlocks the bars in the squarewindow (they turn on a hinge). The window now gives no light, for its mouth ischoked by a great pipe of earthenware; and this pipe, which is large enough tolet pass through it the body of a man, passes into the moat, coming to an endimmediately above the surface of the water, so that there is no perceptibleinterval between water and pipe. The King being dead, his murderer swiftly tiesa weight to the body, and, dragging it to the window, raises it by a pulley(for, lest the weight should prove too great, Detchard has provided one) tillit is level with the mouth of the pipe. He inserts the feet in the pipe, andpushes the body down. Silently, without splash or sound, it falls into thewater and thence to the bottom of the moat, which is twenty feet deepthereabouts. This done, the murderer cries loudly, ‘All’s well!’ and himselfslides down the pipe; and the others, if they can and the attack is not toohot, run to the inner room and, seeking a moment’s delay, bar the door, and intheir turn slide down. And though the King rises not from the bottom, they riseand swim round to the other side, where the orders are for men to wait themwith ropes, to haul them out, and horses. And here, if things go ill, the dukewill join them and seek safety by riding; but if all goes well, they willreturn to the Castle, and have their enemies in a trap. That, sir, is the planof his Highness for the disposal of the King in case of need. But it is not tobe used till the last; for, as we all know, he is not minded to kill the Kingunless he can, before or soon after, kill you also, sir. Now, sir, I havespoken the truth, as God is my witness, and I pray you to shield me from thevengeance of Duke Michael; for if, after he knows what I have done, I fall intohis hands, I shall pray for one thing out of all the world—a speedy death, andthat I shall not obtain from him!”

The fellow’s story was rudely told, but our questions supplemented hisnarrative. What he had told us applied to an armed attack; but if suspicionswere aroused, and there came overwhelming force—such, for instance, as I, theKing, could bring—the idea of resistance would be abandoned; the King would bequietly murdered and slid down the pipe. And—here comes an ingenious touch—oneof the Six would take his place in the cell, and, on the entrance of thesearchers, loudly demand release and redress; and Michael, being summoned,would confess to hasty action, but he would say the man had angered him byseeking the favour of a lady in the Castle (this was Antoinette de Mauban) andhe had confined him there, as he conceived he, as Lord of Zenda, had right todo. But he was now, on receiving his apology, content to let him go, and so endthe gossip which, to his Highness’s annoyance, had arisen concerning a prisonerin Zenda, and had given his visitors the trouble of this enquiry. The visitors,baffled, would retire, and Michael could, at his leisure, dispose of the bodyof the King.

Sapt, Fritz, and I in my bed, looked round on one another in horror andbewilderment at the cruelty and cunning of the plan. Whether I went in peace orin war, openly at the head of a corps, or secretly by a stealthy assault, theKing would be dead before I could come near him. If Michael were stronger andovercame my party, there would be an end. But if I were stronger, I should haveno way to punish him, no means of proving any guilt in him without proving myown guilt also. On the other hand, I should be left as King (ah! for a momentmy pulse quickened) and it would be for the future to witness the finalstruggle between him and me. He seemed to have made triumph possible and ruinimpossible. At the worst, he would stand as well as he had stood before Icrossed his path—with but one man between him and the throne, and that man animpostor; at best, there would be none left to stand against him. I had begunto think that Black Michael was over fond of leaving the fighting to hisfriends; but now I acknowledged that the brains, if not the arms, of theconspiracy were his.

“Does the King know this?” I asked.

“I and my brother,” answered Johann, “put up the pipe, under the orders of myLord of Hentzau. He was on guard that day, and the King asked my lord what itmeant. ‘Faith,’ he answered, with his airy laugh, ‘it’s a new improvement onthe ladder of Jacob, whereby, as you have read, sire, men pass from the earthto heaven. We thought it not meet that your Majesty should go, in case, sire,you must go, by the common route. So we have made you a pretty private passagewhere the vulgar cannot stare at you or incommode your passage. That, sire, isthe meaning of that pipe.’ And he laughed and bowed, and prayed the King’sleave to replenish the King’s glass—for the King was at supper. And the King,though he is a brave man, as are all of his House, grew red and then white ashe looked on the pipe and at the merry devil who mocked him. Ah, sir” (and thefellow shuddered), “it is not easy to sleep quiet in the Castle of Zenda, forall of them would as soon cut a man’s throat as play a game at cards; and myLord Rupert would choose it sooner for a pastime than any other—ay, sooner thanhe would ruin a woman, though that he loves also.”

The man ceased, and I bade Fritz take him away and have him carefully guarded;and, turning to him, I added:

“If anyone asks you if there is a prisoner in Zenda, you may answer ‘Yes.’ Butif any asks who the prisoner is, do not answer. For all my promises will notsave you if any man here learns from you the truth as to the prisoner of Zenda.I’ll kill you like a dog if the thing be so much as breathed within the house!”

Then, when he was gone, I looked at Sapt.

“It’s a hard nut!” said I.

“So hard,” said he, shaking his grizzled head, “that as I think, this time nextyear is like to find you still King of Ruritania!” and he broke out into curseson Michael’s cunning.

I lay back on my pillows.

“There seems to me,” I observed, “to be two ways by which the King can come outof Zenda alive. One is by treachery in the duke’s followers.”

“You can leave that out,” said Sapt.

“I hope not,” I rejoined, “because the other I was about to mention is—by amiracle from heaven!”

CHAPTER 14
A Night Outside the Castle

It would have surprised the good people of Ruritania to know of the foregoingtalk; for, according to the official reports, I had suffered a grievous anddangerous hurt from an accidental spear-thrust, received in the course of mysport. I caused the bulletins to be of a very serious character, and createdgreat public excitement, whereby three things occurred: first, I gravelyoffended the medical faculty of Strelsau by refusing to summon to my bedsideany of them, save a young man, a friend of Fritz’s, whom we could trust;secondly, I received word from Marshal Strakencz that my orders seemed to haveno more weight than his, and that the Princess Flavia was leaving forTarlenheim under his unwilling escort (news whereat I strove not to be glad andproud); and thirdly, my brother, the Duke of Strelsau, although too wellinformed to believe the account of the origin of my sickness, was yet persuadedby the reports and by my seeming inactivity that I was in truth incapable ofaction, and that my life was in some danger. This I learnt from the man Johann,whom I was compelled to trust and send back to Zenda, where, by the way, RupertHentzau had him soundly flogged for daring to smirch the morals of Zenda bystaying out all night in the pursuits of love. This, from Rupert, Johann deeplyresented, and the duke’s approval of it did more to bind the keeper to my sidethan all my promises.

On Flavia’s arrival I cannot dwell. Her joy at finding me up and well, insteadof on my back and fighting with death, makes a picture that even now dancesbefore my eyes till they grow too dim to see it; and her reproaches that I hadnot trusted even her must excuse the means I took to quiet them. In truth, tohave her with me once more was like a taste of heaven to a damned soul, thesweeter for the inevitable doom that was to follow; and I rejoiced in beingable to waste two whole days with her. And when I had wasted two days, the Dukeof Strelsau arranged a hunting-party.

The stroke was near now. For Sapt and I, after anxious consultations, hadresolved that we must risk a blow, our resolution being clinched by Johann’snews that the King grew peaked, pale, and ill, and that his health was breakingdown under his rigorous confinement. Now a man—be he king or no king—may aswell die swiftly and as becomes a gentleman, from bullet or thrust, as rot hislife out in a cellar! That thought made prompt action advisable in theinterests of the King; from my own point of view, it grew more and morenecessary. For Strakencz urged on me the need of a speedy marriage, and my owninclinations seconded him with such terrible insistence that I feared for myresolution. I do not believe that I should have done the deed I dreamt of; butI might have come to flight, and my flight would have ruined the cause.And—yes, I am no saint (ask my little sister-in-law), and worse still mighthave happened.

It is perhaps as strange a thing as has ever been in the history of a countrythat the King’s brother and the King’s personator, in a time of profoundoutward peace, near a placid, undisturbed country town, under semblance ofamity, should wage a desperate war for the person and life of the King. Yetsuch was the struggle that began now between Zenda and Tarlenheim. When I lookback on the time, I seem to myself to have been half mad. Sapt has told me thatI suffered no interference and listened to no remonstrances; and if ever a Kingof Ruritania ruled like a despot, I was, in those days, the man. Look where Iwould, I saw nothing that made life sweet to me, and I took my life in my handand carried it carelessly as a man dangles an old glove. At first they stroveto guard me, to keep me safe, to persuade me not to expose myself; but whenthey saw how I was set, there grew up among them—whether they knew the truth ornot—a feeling that Fate ruled the issue, and that I must be left to play mygame with Michael my own way.

Late next night I rose from table, where Flavia had sat by me, and conductedher to the door of her apartments. There I kissed her hand, and bade her sleepsound and wake to happy days. Then I changed my clothes and went out. Sapt andFritz were waiting for me with six men and the horses. Over his saddle Saptcarried a long coil of rope, and both were heavily armed. I had with me a shortstout cudgel and a long knife. Making a circuit, we avoided the town, and in anhour found ourselves slowly mounting the hill that led to the Castle of Zenda.The night was dark and very stormy; gusts of wind and spits of rain caught usas we breasted the incline, and the great trees moaned and sighed. When we cameto a thick clump, about a quarter of a mile from the Castle, we bade our sixfriends hide there with the horses. Sapt had a whistle, and they could rejoinus in a few moments if danger came: but, up to now, we had met no one. I hopedthat Michael was still off his guard, believing me to be safe in bed. Howeverthat might be, we gained the top of the hill without accident, and foundourselves on the edge of the moat where it sweeps under the road, separatingthe Old Castle from it. A tree stood on the edge of the bank, and Sapt,silently and diligently, set to make fast the rope. I stripped off my boots,took a pull at a flask of brandy, loosened the knife in its sheath, and tookthe cudgel between my teeth. Then I shook hands with my friends, not heeding alast look of entreaty from Fritz, and laid hold of the rope. I was going tohave a look at “Jacob’s Ladder.”

Gently I lowered myself into the water. Though the night was wild, the day hadbeen warm and bright, and the water was not cold. I struck out, and began toswim round the great walls which frowned above me. I could see only three yardsahead; I had then good hopes of not being seen, as I crept along close underthe damp, moss-grown masonry. There were lights from the new part of the Castleon the other side, and now and again I heard laughter and merry shouts. Ifancied I recognized young Rupert Hentzau’s ringing tones, and pictured himflushed with wine. Recalling my thoughts to the business in hand, I rested amoment. If Johann’s description were right, I must be near the window now. Veryslowly I moved; and out of the darkness ahead loomed a shape. It was the pipe,curving from the window to the water: about four feet of its surface weredisplayed; it was as big round as two men. I was about to approach it, when Isaw something else, and my heart stood still. The nose of a boat protrudedbeyond the pipe on the other side; and listening intently, I heard a slightshuffle—as of a man shifting his position. Who was the man who guardedMichael’s invention? Was he awake or was he asleep? I felt if my knife wereready, and trod water; as I did so, I found bottom under my feet. Thefoundations of the Castle extended some fifteen inches, making a ledge; and Istood on it, out of water from my armpits upwards. Then I crouched and peeredthrough the darkness under the pipe, where, curving, it left a space.

There was a man in the boat. A rifle lay by him—I saw the gleam of the barrel.Here was the sentinel! He sat very still. I listened; he breathed heavily,regularly, monotonously. By heaven, he slept! Kneeling on the shelf, I drewforward under the pipe till my face was within two feet of his. He was a bigman, I saw. It was Max Holf, the brother of Johann. My hand stole to my belt,and I drew out my knife. Of all the deeds of my life, I love the least to thinkof this, and whether it were the act of a man or a traitor I will not ask. Isaid to myself: “It is war—and the King’s life is the stake.” And I raisedmyself from beneath the pipe and stood up by the boat, which lay moored by theledge. Holding my breath, I marked the spot and raised my arm. The great fellowstirred. He opened his eyes—wide, wider. He gasped in terror at my face andclutched at his rifle. I struck home. And I heard the chorus of a love-songfrom the opposite bank.

Leaving him where he lay, a huddled mass, I turned to “Jacob’s Ladder.” My timewas short. This fellow’s turn of watching might be over directly, and reliefwould come. Leaning over the pipe, I examined it, from the end near the waterto the topmost extremity where it passed, or seemed to pass, through themasonry of the wall. There was no break in it, no chink. Dropping on my knees,I tested the under side. And my breath went quick and fast, for on this lowerside, where the pipe should have clung close to the masonry, there was a gleamof light! That light must come from the cell of the King! I set my shoulderagainst the pipe and exerted my strength. The chink widened a very, verylittle, and hastily I desisted; I had done enough to show that the pipe was notfixed in the masonry at the lower side.

Then I heard a voice—a harsh, grating voice:

“Well, sire, if you have had enough of my society, I will leave you to repose;but I must fasten the little ornaments first.”

It was Detchard! I caught the English accent in a moment.

“Have you anything to ask, sire, before we part?”

The King’s voice followed. It was his, though it was faint and hollow—differentfrom the merry tones I had heard in the glades of the forest.

“Pray my brother,” said the King, “to kill me. I am dying by inches here.”

“The duke does not desire your death, sire—yet,” sneered Detchard; “when hedoes behold your path to heaven!”

The King answered:

“So be it! And now, if your orders allow it, pray leave me.”

“May you dream of paradise!” said the ruffian.

The light disappeared. I heard the bolts of the door run home. And then I heardthe sobs of the King. He was alone, as he thought. Who dares mock at him?

I did not venture to speak to him. The risk of some exclamation escaping him insurprise was too great. I dared do nothing that night; and my task now was toget myself away in safety, and to carry off the carcass of the dead man. Toleave him there would tell too much. Casting loose the boat, I got in. The windwas blowing a gale now, and there was little danger of oars being heard. Irowed swiftly round to where my friends waited. I had just reached the spot,when a loud whistle sounded over the moat behind me.

“Hullo, Max!” I heard shouted.

I hailed Sapt in a low tone. The rope came down. I tied it round the corpse,and then went up it myself.

“Whistle you too,” I whispered, “for our men, and haul in the line. No talknow.”

They hauled up the body. Just as it reached the road, three men on horsebackswept round from the front of the Castle. We saw them; but, being on footourselves, we escaped their notice. But we heard our men coming up with ashout.

“The devil, but it’s dark!” cried a ringing voice.

It was young Rupert. A moment later, shots rang out. Our people had met them. Istarted forward at a run, Sapt and Fritz following me.

“Thrust, thrust!” cried Rupert again, and a loud groan following told that hehimself was not behind-hand.

“I’m done, Rupert!” cried a voice. “They’re three to one. Save yourself!”

I ran on, holding my cudgel in my hand. Suddenly a horse came towards me. A manwas on it, leaning over his shoulder.

“Are you cooked too, Krafstein?” he cried.

There was no answer.

I sprang to the horse’s head. It was Rupert Hentzau.

“At last!” I cried.

For we seemed to have him. He had only his sword in his hand. My men were hotupon him; Sapt and Fritz were running up. I had outstripped them; but if theygot close enough to fire, he must die or surrender.

“At last!” I cried.

“It’s the play-actor!” cried he, slashing at my cudgel. He cut it clean in two;and, judging discretion better than death, I ducked my head and (I blush totell it) scampered for my life. The devil was in Rupert Hentzau; for he putspurs to his horse, and I, turning to look, saw him ride, full gallop, to theedge of the moat and leap in, while the shots of our party fell thick round himlike hail. With one gleam of moonlight we should have riddled him with balls;but, in the darkness, he won to the corner of the Castle, and vanished from oursight.

“The deuce take him!” grinned Sapt.

“It’s a pity,” said I, “that he’s a villain. Whom have we got?”

We had Lauengram and Krafstein: they lay dead; and, concealment being no longerpossible, we flung them, with Max, into the moat; and, drawing together in acompact body, rode off down the hill. And, in our midst, went the bodies ofthree gallant gentlemen. Thus we travelled home, heavy at heart for the deathof our friends, sore uneasy concerning the King, and cut to the quick thatyoung Rupert had played yet another winning hand with us.

For my own part, I was vexed and angry that I had killed no man in open fight,but only stabbed a knave in his sleep. And I did not love to hear Rupert callme a play-actor.

CHAPTER 15
I Talk with a Tempter

Ruritania is not England, or the quarrel between Duke Michael and myself couldnot have gone on, with the extraordinary incidents which marked it, withoutmore public notice being directed to it. Duels were frequent among all theupper classes, and private quarrels between great men kept the old habit ofspreading to their friends and dependents. Nevertheless, after the affray whichI have just related, such reports began to circulate that I felt it necessaryto be on my guard. The death of the gentlemen involved could not be hidden fromtheir relatives. I issued a stern order, declaring that duelling had attainedunprecedented licence (the Chancellor drew up the document for me, and verywell he did it), and forbidding it save in the gravest cases. I sent a publicand stately apology to Michael, and he returned a deferential and courteousreply to me; for our one point of union was—and it underlay all our differencesand induced an unwilling harmony between our actions—that we could neither ofus afford to throw our cards on the table. He, as well as I, was a“play-actor”, and, hating one another, we combined to dupe public opinion.Unfortunately, however, the necessity for concealment involved the necessity ofdelay: the King might die in his prison, or even be spirited off somewhereelse; it could not be helped. For a little while I was compelled to observe atruce, and my only consolation was that Flavia most warmly approved of my edictagainst duelling, and, when I expressed delight at having won her favour,prayed me, if her favour were any motive to me, to prohibit the practicealtogether.

“Wait till we are married,” said I, smiling.

Not the least peculiar result of the truce and of the secrecy which dictated itwas that the town of Zenda became in the day-time—I would not have trusted farto its protection by night—a sort of neutral zone, where both parties couldsafely go; and I, riding down one day with Flavia and Sapt, had an encounterwith an acquaintance, which presented a ludicrous side, but was at the sametime embarrassing. As I rode along, I met a dignified looking person driving ina two-horsed carriage. He stopped his horses, got out, and approached me,bowing low. I recognized the Head of the Strelsau Police.

“Your Majesty’s ordinance as to duelling is receiving our best attention,” heassured me.

If the best attention involved his presence in Zenda, I determined at once todispense with it.

“Is that what brings you to Zenda, Prefect?” I asked.

“Why no, sire; I am here because I desired to oblige the British Ambassador.”

“What’s the British Ambassador doing dans cette galère?” said I,carelessly.

“A young countryman of his, sire—a man of some position—is missing. His friendshave not heard from him for two months, and there is reason to believe that hewas last seen in Zenda.”

Flavia was paying little attention. I dared not look at Sapt.

“What reason?”

“A friend of his in Paris—a certain M. Featherly—has given us information whichmakes it possible that he came here, and the officials of the railway recollecthis name on some luggage.”

“What was his name?”

“Rassendyll, sire,” he answered; and I saw that the name meant nothing to him.But, glancing at Flavia, he lowered his voice, as he went on: “It is thoughtthat he may have followed a lady here. Has your Majesty heard of a certainMadame de Mauban?”

“Why, yes,” said I, my eye involuntarily travelling towards the Castle.

“She arrived in Ruritania about the same time as this Rassendyll.”

I caught the Prefect’s glance; he was regarding me with enquiry writ large onhis face.

“Sapt,” said I, “I must speak a word to the Prefect. Will you ride on a fewpaces with the princess?” And I added to the Prefect: “Come, sir, what do youmean?”

He drew close to me, and I bent in the saddle.

“If he were in love with the lady?” he whispered. “Nothing has been heard ofhim for two months;” and this time it was the eye of the Prefect whichtravelled towards the Castle.

“Yes, the lady is there,” I said quietly. “But I don’t suppose Mr.Rassendyll—is that the name?—is.”

“The duke,” he whispered, “does not like rivals, sire.”

“You’re right there,” said I, with all sincerity. “But surely you hint at avery grave charge?”

He spread his hands out in apology. I whispered in his ear:

“This is a grave matter. Go back to Strelsau—”

“But, sire, if I have a clue here?”

“Go back to Strelsau,” I repeated. “Tell the Ambassador that you have a clue,but that you must be left alone for a week or two. Meanwhile, I’ll chargemyself with looking into the matter.”

“The Ambassador is very pressing, sir.”

“You must quiet him. Come, sir; you see that if your suspicions are correct, itis an affair in which we must move with caution. We can have no scandal. Mindyou return tonight.”

He promised to obey me, and I rode on to rejoin my companions, a little easierin my mind. Enquiries after me must be stopped at all hazards for a week ortwo; and this clever official had come surprisingly near the truth. Hisimpression might be useful some day, but if he acted on it now it might meanthe worse to the King. Heartily did I curse George Featherly for not holdinghis tongue.

“Well,” asked Flavia, “have you finished your business?”

“Most satisfactorily,” said I. “Come, shall we turn round? We are almosttrenching on my brother’s territory.”

We were, in fact, at the extreme end of the town, just where the hills begin tomount towards the Castle. We cast our eyes up, admiring the massive beauty ofthe old walls, and we saw a cortègewinding slowly down the hill. On itcame.

“Let us go back,” said Sapt.

“I should like to stay,” said Flavia; and I reined my horse beside hers.

We could distinguish the approaching party now. There came first two mountedservants in black uniforms, relieved only by a silver badge. These werefollowed by a car drawn by four horses: on it, under a heavy pall, lay acoffin; behind it rode a man in plain black clothes, carrying his hat in hishand. Sapt uncovered, and we stood waiting, Flavia keeping by me and laying herhand on my arm.

“It is one of the gentlemen killed in the quarrel, I expect,” she said.

I beckoned to a groom.

“Ride and ask whom they escort,” I ordered.

He rode up to the servants, and I saw him pass on to the gentleman who rodebehind.

“It’s Rupert of Hentzau,” whispered Sapt.

Rupert it was, and directly afterwards, waving to the procession to standstill, Rupert trotted up to me. He was in a frock-coat, tightly buttoned, andtrousers. He wore an aspect of sadness, and he bowed with profound respect. Yetsuddenly he smiled, and I smiled too, for old Sapt’s hand lay in his leftbreast-pocket, and Rupert and I both guessed what lay in the hand inside thepocket.

“Your Majesty asks whom we escort,” said Rupert. “It is my dear friend, Albertof Lauengram.”

“Sir,” said I, “no one regrets the unfortunate affair more than I. Myordinance, which I mean to have obeyed, is witness to it.”

“Poor fellow!” said Flavia softly, and I saw Rupert’s eyes flash at her.Whereat I grew red; for, if I had my way, Rupert Hentzau should not havedefiled her by so much as a glance. Yet he did it and dared to let admirationbe seen in his look.

“Your Majesty’s words are gracious,” he said. “I grieve for my friend. Yet,sire, others must soon lie as he lies now.”

“It is a thing we all do well to remember, my lord,” I rejoined.

“Even kings, sire,” said Rupert, in a moralizing tone; and old Sapt sworesoftly by my side.

“It is true,” said I. “How fares my brother, my lord?”

“He is better, sire.”

“I am rejoiced.”

“He hopes soon to leave for Strelsau, when his health is secured.”

“He is only convalescent then?”

“There remain one or two small troubles,” answered the insolent fellow, in themildest tone in the world.

“Express my earnest hope,” said Flavia, “that they may soon cease to troublehim.”

“Your Royal Highness’s wish is, humbly, my own,” said Rupert, with a boldglance that brought a blush to Flavia’s cheek.

I bowed; and Rupert, bowing lower, backed his horse and signed to his party toproceed. With a sudden impulse, I rode after him. He turned swiftly, fearingthat, even in the presence of the dead and before a lady’s eyes, I meant himmischief.

“You fought as a brave man the other night,” I said. “Come, you are young, sir.If you will deliver your prisoner alive to me, you shall come to no hurt.”

He looked at me with a mocking smile; but suddenly he rode nearer to me.

“I’m unarmed,” he said; “and our old Sapt there could pick me off in a minute.”

“I’m not afraid,” said I.

“No, curse you!” he answered. “Look here, I made you a proposal from the dukeonce.”

“I’ll hear nothing from Black Michael,” said I.

“Then hear one from me.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Attack the Castleboldly. Let Sapt and Tarlenheim lead.”

“Go on,” said I.

“Arrange the time with me.”

“I have such confidence in you, my lord!”

“Tut! I’m talking business now. Sapt there and Fritz will fall; Black Michaelwill fall—”

“What!”

“—Black Michael will fall, like the dog he is; the prisoner, as you call him,will go by ‘Jacob’s Ladder’—ah, you know that!—to hell! Two men will be left—I,Rupert Hentzau, and you, the King of Ruritania.”

He paused, and then, in a voice that quivered with eagerness, added:

“Isn’t that a hand to play?—a throne and your princess! And for me, say acompetence and your Majesty’s gratitude.”

“Surely,” I exclaimed, “while you’re above ground, hell wants its master!”

“Well, think it over,” he said. “And, look you, it would take more than ascruple or two to keep me from yonder girl,” and his evil eye flashed again ather I loved.

“Get out of my reach!” said I; and yet in a moment I began to laugh for thevery audacity of it.

“Would you turn against your master?” I asked.

He swore at Michael for being what the offspring of a legal, though morganatic,union should not be called, and said to me in an almost confidential andapparently friendly tone:

“He gets in my way, you know. He’s a jealous brute! Faith, I nearly stuck aknife into him last night; he came most cursedly mal àpropos!”

My temper was well under control now; I was learning something.

“A lady?” I asked negligently.

“Ay, and a beauty,” he nodded. “But you’ve seen her.”

“Ah! was it at a tea-party, when some of your friends got on the wrong side ofthe table?”

“What can you expect of fools like Detchard and De Gautet? I wish I’d beenthere.”

“And the duke interferes?”

“Well,” said Rupert meditatively, “that’s hardly a fair way of putting it,perhaps. I want to interfere.”

“And she prefers the duke?”

“Ay, the silly creature! Ah, well, you think about my plan,” and, with a bow,he pricked his horse and trotted after the body of his friend.

I went back to Flavia and Sapt, pondering on the strangeness of the man. Wickedmen I have known in plenty, but Rupert Hentzau remains unique in my experience.And if there be another anywhere, let him be caught and hanged out of hand. Sosay I!

“He’s very handsome, isn’t he?” said Flavia.

Well, of course, she didn’t know him as I did; yet I was put out, for I thoughthis bold glances would have made her angry. But my dear Flavia was a woman, andso—she was not put out. On the contrary, she thought young Rupert veryhandsome—as, beyond question, the ruffian was.

“And how sad he looked at his friend’s death!” said she.

“He’ll have better reason to be sad at his own,” observed Sapt, with a grimsmile.

As for me, I grew sulky; unreasonable it was perhaps, for what better businesshad I to look at her with love than had even Rupert’s lustful eyes? And sulky Iremained till, as evening fell and we rode up to Tarlenheim, Sapt having fallenbehind in case anyone should be following us, Flavia, riding close beside me,said softly, with a little half-ashamed laugh:

“Unless you smile, Rudolf, I cry. Why are you angry?”

“It was something that fellow said to me,” said I, but I was smiling as wereached the door and dismounted.

There a servant handed me a note: it was unaddressed.

“Is it for me?” I asked.

“Yes, sire; a boy brought it.”

I tore it open:

Johann carries this for me. I warned you once. In the name of God, and if youare a man, rescue me from this den of murderers!—A. de M.

I handed it to Sapt; but all that the tough old soul said in reply to thispiteous appeal was:

“Whose fault brought her there?”

Nevertheless, not being faultless myself, I took leave to pity Antoinette deMauban.

CHAPTER 16
A Desperate Plan

As I had ridden publicly in Zenda, and had talked there with Rupert Hentzau, ofcourse all pretence of illness was at an end. I marked the effect on thegarrison of Zenda: they ceased to be seen abroad; and any of my men who wentnear the Castle reported that the utmost vigilance prevailed there. Touched asI was by Madame de Mauban’s appeal, I seemed as powerless to befriend her as Ihad proved to help the King. Michael bade me defiance; and although he too hadbeen seen outside the walls, with more disregard for appearances than he hadhitherto shown, he did not take the trouble to send any excuse for his failureto wait on the King. Time ran on in inactivity, when every moment was pressing;for not only was I faced with the new danger which the stir about mydisappearance brought on me, but great murmurs had arisen in Strelsau at mycontinued absence from the city. They had been greater, but for the knowledgethat Flavia was with me; and for this reason I suffered her to stay, though Ihated to have her where danger was, and though every day of our present sweetintercourse strained my endurance almost to breaking. As a final blow, nothingwould content my advisers, Strakencz and the Chancellor (who came out fromStrelsau to make an urgent representation to me), save that I should appoint aday for the public solemnization of my betrothal, a ceremony which in Ruritaniais well nigh as binding and great a thing as the marriage itself. And this—withFlavia sitting by me—I was forced to do, setting a date a fortnight ahead, andappointing the Cathedral in Strelsau as the place. And this formal act beingpublished far and wide, caused great joy throughout the kingdom, and was thetalk of all tongues; so that I reckoned there were but two men who chafed atit—I mean Black Michael and myself; and but one who did not know of it—that onethe man whose name I bore, the King of Ruritania.

In truth, I heard something of the way the news was received in the Castle; forafter an interval of three days, the man Johann, greedy for more money, thoughfearful for his life, again found means to visit us. He had been waiting on theduke when the tidings came. Black Michael’s face had grown blacker still, andhe had sworn savagely; nor was he better pleased when young Rupert took oaththat I meant to do as I said, and turning to Madame de Mauban, wished her joyon a rival gone. Michael’s hand stole towards his sword (said Johann), but nota bit did Rupert care; for he rallied the duke on having made a better Kingthan had reigned for years past in Ruritania. “And,” said he, with a meaningbow to his exasperated master, “the devil sends the princess a finer man thanheaven had marked out for her, by my soul, it does!” Then Michael harshly badehim hold his tongue, and leave them; but Rupert must needs first kiss madame’shand, which he did as though he loved her, while Michael glared at him.

This was the lighter side of the fellow’s news; but more serious came behind,and it was plain that if time pressed at Tarlenheim, it pressed none the lessfiercely at Zenda. For the King was very sick: Johann had seen him, and he waswasted and hardly able to move. “There could be no thought of taking anotherfor him now.” So alarmed were they, that they had sent for a physician fromStrelsau; and the physician having been introduced into the King’s cell, hadcome forth pale and trembling, and urgently prayed the duke to let him go backand meddle no more in the affair; but the duke would not, and held him there aprisoner, telling him his life was safe if the King lived while the dukedesired and died when the duke desired—not otherwise. And, persuaded by thephysician, they had allowed Madame de Mauban to visit the King and give himsuch attendance as his state needed, and as only a woman can give. Yet his lifehung in the balance; and I was still strong and whole and free. Wherefore greatgloom reigned at Zenda; and save when they quarrelled, to which they were veryprone, they hardly spoke. But the deeper the depression of the rest, youngRupert went about Satan’s work with a smile in his eye and a song on his lip;and laughed “fit to burst” (said Johann) because the duke always set Detchardto guard the King when Madame de Mauban was in the cell—which precaution was,indeed, not unwise in my careful brother. Thus Johann told his tale and seizedhis crowns. Yet he besought us to allow him to stay with us in Tarlenheim, andnot venture his head again in the lion’s den; but we had need of him there,and, although I refused to constrain him, I prevailed on him by increasedrewards to go back and carry tidings to Madame de Mauban that I was working forher, and that, if she could, she should speak one word of comfort to the King.For while suspense is bad for the sick, yet despair is worse still, and itmight be that the King lay dying of mere hopelessness, for I could learn of nodefinite disease that afflicted him.

“And how do they guard the King now?” I asked, remembering that two of the Sixwere dead, and Max Holf also.

“Detchard and Bersonin watch by night, Rupert Hentzau and De Gautet by day,sir,” he answered.

“Only two at a time?”

“Ay, sir; but the others rest in a room just above, and are within sound of acry or a whistle.”

“A room just above? I didn’t know of that. Is there any communication betweenit and the room where they watch?”

“No, sir. You must go down a few stairs and through the door by the drawbridge,and so to where the King is lodged.”

“And that door is locked?”

“Only the four lords have keys, sir.”

I drew nearer to him.

“And have they keys of the grating?” I asked in a low whisper.

“I think, sir, only Detchard and Rupert.”

“Where does the duke lodge?”

“In the chateau, on the first floor. His apartments are on the right as you gotowards the drawbridge.”

“And Madame de Mauban?”

“Just opposite, on the left. But her door is locked after she has entered.”

“To keep her in?”

“Doubtless, sir.”

“Perhaps for another reason?”

“It is possible.”

“And the duke, I suppose, has the key?”

“Yes. And the drawbridge is drawn back at night, and of that, too, the dukeholds the key, so that it cannot be run across the moat without application tohim.”

“And where do you sleep?”

“In the entrance hall of the chateau, with five servants.”

“Armed?”

“They have pikes, sir, but no firearms. The duke will not trust them withfirearms.”

Then at last I took the matter boldly in my hands. I had failed once at“Jacob’s Ladder;” I should fail again there. I must make the attack from theother side.

“I have promised you twenty thousand crowns,” said I. “You shall have fiftythousand if you will do what I ask of you tomorrow night. But, first, do thoseservants know who your prisoner is?”

“No, sir. They believe him to be some private enemy of the duke’s.”

“And they would not doubt that I am the King?”

“How should they?” he asked.

“Look to this, then. Tomorrow, at two in the morning exactly, fling open thefront door of the chateau. Don’t fail by an instant.”

“Shall you be there, sir?”

“Ask no questions. Do what I tell you. Say the hall is close, or what you will.That is all I ask of you.”

“And may I escape by the door, sir, when I have opened it?”

“Yes, as quick as your legs will carry you. One thing more. Carry this note tomadame—oh, it’s in French, you can’t read it—and charge her, for the sake ofall our lives, not to fail in what it orders.”

The man was trembling but I had to trust to what he had of courage and to whathe had of honesty. I dared not wait, for I feared that the King would die.

When the fellow was gone, I called Sapt and Fritz to me, and unfolded the planthat I had formed. Sapt shook his head over it.

“Why can’t you wait?” he asked.

“The King may die.”

“Michael will be forced to act before that.”

“Then,” said I, “the King may live.”

“Well, and if he does?”

“For a fortnight?” I asked simply.

And Sapt bit his moustache.

Suddenly Fritz von Tarlenheim laid his hand on my shoulder.

“Let us go and make the attempt,” said he.

“I mean you to go—don’t be afraid,” said I.

“Ay, but do you stay here, and take care of the princess.”

A gleam came into old Sapt’s eye.

“We should have Michael one way or the other then,” he chuckled; “whereas ifyou go and are killed with the King, what will become of those of us who areleft?”

“They will serve Queen Flavia,” said I, “and I would to God I could be one ofthem.”

A pause followed. Old Sapt broke it by saying sadly, yet with an unmeantdrollery that set Fritz and me laughing:

“Why didn’t old Rudolf the Third marry your—great-grandmother, was it?”

“Come,” said I, “it is the King we are thinking about.”

“It is true,” said Fritz.

“Moreover,” I went on, “I have been an impostor for the profit of another, butI will not be one for my own; and if the King is not alive and on his thronebefore the day of betrothal comes, I will tell the truth, come what may.”

“You shall go, lad,” said Sapt.

Here is the plan I had made. A strong party under Sapt’s command was to stealup to the door of the chateau. If discovered prematurely, they were to killanyone who found them—with their swords, for I wanted no noise of firing. Ifall went well, they would be at the door when Johann opened it. They were torush in and secure the servants if their mere presence and the use of theKing’s name were not enough. At the same moment—and on this hinged the plan—awoman’s cry was to ring out loud and shrill from Antoinette de Mauban’schamber. Again and again she was to cry: “Help, help! Michael, help!” and thento utter the name of young Rupert Hentzau. Then, as we hoped, Michael, in fury,would rush out of his apartments opposite, and fall alive into the hands ofSapt. Still the cries would go on; and my men would let down the drawbridge;and it would be strange if Rupert, hearing his name thus taken in vain, did notdescend from where he slept and seek to cross. De Gautet might or might notcome with him: that must be left to chance.

And when Rupert set his foot on the drawbridge? There was my part: for I wasminded for another swim in the moat; and, lest I should grow weary, I hadresolved to take with me a small wooden ladder, on which I could rest my armsin the water—and my feet when I left it. I would rear it against the wall justby the bridge; and when the bridge was across, I would stealthily creep on toit—and then if Rupert or De Gautet crossed in safety, it would be mymisfortune, not my fault. They dead, two men only would remain; and for them wemust trust to the confusion we had created and to a sudden rush. We should havethe keys of the door that led to the all-important rooms. Perhaps they wouldrush out. If they stood by their orders, then the King’s life hung on theswiftness with which we could force the outer door; and I thanked God that notRupert Hentzau watched, but Detchard. For though Detchard was a cool man,relentless, and no coward, he had neither the dash nor the recklessness ofRupert. Moreover, he, if any one of them, really loved Black Michael, and itmight be that he would leave Bersonin to guard the King, and rush across thebridge to take part in the affray on the other side.

So I planned—desperately. And, that our enemy might be the better lulled tosecurity, I gave orders that our residence should be brilliantly lighted fromtop to bottom, as though we were engaged in revelry; and should so be kept allnight, with music playing and people moving to and fro. Strakencz would bethere, and he was to conceal our departure, if he could, from Flavia. And if wecame not again by the morning, he was to march, openly and in force to theCastle, and demand the person of the King; if Black Michael were not there, asI did not think he would be, the Marshal would take Flavia with him, as swiftlyas he could, to Strelsau, and there proclaim Black Michael’s treachery and theprobable death of the King, and rally all that there was honest and true roundthe banner of the princess. And, to say truth, this was what I thought mostlikely to happen. For I had great doubts whether either the King or BlackMichael or I had more than a day to live. Well, if Black Michael died, and ifI, the play-actor, slew Rupert Hentzau with my own hand, and then died myself,it might be that Fate would deal as lightly with Ruritania as could be hoped,notwithstanding that she demanded the life of the King—and to her dealing thuswith me, I was in no temper to make objection.

It was late when we rose from conference, and I betook me to the princess’sapartments. She was pensive that evening; yet, when I left her, she flung herarms about me and grew, for an instant, bashfully radiant as she slipped a ringon my finger. I was wearing the King’s ring; but I had also on my little fingera plain band of gold engraved with the motto of our family: “Nil QuaeFeci.” This I took off and put on her, and signed to her to let me go. Andshe, understanding, stood away and watched me with dimmed eyes.

“Wear that ring, even though you wear another when you are queen,” I said.

“Whatever else I wear, this I will wear till I die and after,” said she, as shekissed the ring.

CHAPTER 17
Young Rupert’s Midnight Diversions

The night came fine and clear. I had prayed for dirty weather, such as hadfavoured my previous voyage in the moat, but Fortune was this time against me.Still I reckoned that by keeping close under the wall and in the shadow I couldescape detection from the windows of the chateau that looked out on the sceneof my efforts. If they searched the moat, indeed, my scheme must fail; but Idid not think they would. They had made “Jacob’s Ladder” secure against attack.Johann had himself helped to fix it closely to the masonry on the under side,so that it could not now be moved from below any more than from above. Anassault with explosives or a long battering with picks alone could displace it,and the noise involved in either of these operations put them out of thequestion. What harm, then, could a man do in the moat? I trusted that BlackMichael, putting this query to himself, would answer confidently, “None;”while, even if Johann meant treachery, he did not know my scheme, and woulddoubtless expect to see me, at the head of my friends, before the frontentrance to the chateau. There, I said to Sapt, was the real danger. “Andthere,” I added, “you shall be. Doesn’t that content you?”

But it did not. Dearly would he have liked to come with me, had I not utterlyrefused to take him. One man might escape notice, to double the party more thandoubled the risk; and when he ventured to hint once again that my life was toovaluable, I, knowing the secret thought he clung to, sternly bade him besilent, assuring him that unless the King lived through the night, I would notlive through it either.

At twelve o’clock, Sapt’s command left the chateau of Tarlenheim and struck offto the right, riding by unfrequented roads, and avoiding the town of Zenda. Ifall went well, they would be in front of the Castle by about a quarter to two.Leaving their horses half a mile off, they were to steal up to the entrance andhold themselves in readiness for the opening of the door. If the door were notopened by two, they were to send Fritz von Tarlenheim round to the other sideof the Castle. I would meet him there if I were alive, and we would consultwhether to storm the Castle or not. If I were not there, they were to returnwith all speed to Tarlenheim, rouse the Marshal, and march in force to Zenda.For if not there, I should be dead; and I knew that the King would not be alivefive minutes after I ceased to breathe. I must now leave Sapt and his friends,and relate how I myself proceeded on this eventful night. I went out on thegood horse which had carried me, on the night of the coronation, back from thehunting-lodge to Strelsau. I carried a revolver in the saddle and my sword. Iwas covered with a large cloak, and under this I wore a warm, tight-fittingwoollen jersey, a pair of knickerbockers, thick stockings, and light canvasshoes. I had rubbed myself thoroughly with oil, and I carried a large flask ofwhisky. The night was warm, but I might probably be immersed a long while, andit was necessary to take every precaution against cold: for cold not only sapsa man’s courage if he has to die, but impairs his energy if others have to die,and, finally, gives him rheumatics, if it be God’s will that he lives. Also Itied round my body a length of thin but stout cord, and I did not forget myladder. I, starting after Sapt, took a shorter route, skirting the town to theleft, and found myself in the outskirts of the forest at about half-pasttwelve. I tied my horse up in a thick clump of trees, leaving the revolver inits pocket in the saddle—it would be no use to me—and, ladder in hand, made myway to the edge of the moat. Here I unwound my rope from about my waist, boundit securely round the trunk of a tree on the bank, and let myself down. TheCastle clock struck a quarter to one as I felt the water under me and began toswim round the keep, pushing the ladder before me, and hugging the Castle wall.Thus voyaging, I came to my old friend, “Jacob’s Ladder,” and felt the ledge ofthe masonry under me. I crouched down in the shadow of the great pipe—I triedto stir it, but it was quite immovable—and waited. I remember that mypredominant feeling was neither anxiety for the King nor longing for Flavia,but an intense desire to smoke; and this craving, of course, I could notgratify.

The drawbridge was still in its place. I saw its airy, slight framework aboveme, some ten yards to my right, as I crouched with my back against the wall ofthe King’s cell. I made out a window two yards my side of it and nearly on thesame level. That, if Johann spoke true, must belong to the duke’s apartments;and on the other side, in about the same relative position, must be Madame deMauban’s window. Women are careless, forgetful creatures. I prayed that shemight not forget that she was to be the victim of a brutal attempt at twoo’clock precisely. I was rather amused at the part I had assigned to my youngfriend Rupert Hentzau; but I owed him a stroke—for, even as I sat, my shoulderached where he had, with an audacity that seemed half to hide his treachery,struck at me, in the sight of all my friends, on the terrace at Tarlenheim.

Suddenly the duke’s window grew bright. The shutters were not closed, and theinterior became partially visible to me as I cautiously raised myself till Istood on tiptoe. Thus placed, my range of sight embraced a yard or more insidethe window, while the radius of light did not reach me. The window was flungopen and someone looked out. I marked Antoinette de Mauban’s graceful figure,and, though her face was in shadow, the fine outline of her head was revealedagainst the light behind. I longed to cry softly, “Remember!” but I darednot—and happily, for a moment later a man came up and stood by her. He tried toput his arm round her waist, but with a swift motion she sprang away and leantagainst the shutter, her profile towards me. I made out who the newcomer was:it was young Rupert. A low laugh from him made me sure, as he leant forward,stretching out his hand towards her.

“Gently, gently!” I murmured. “You’re too soon, my boy!”

His head was close to hers. I suppose he whispered to her, for I saw her pointto the moat, and I heard her say, in slow and distinct tones:

“I had rather throw myself out of this window!”

He came close up to the window and looked out.

“It looks cold,” said he. “Come, Antoinette, are you serious?”

She made no answer so far as I heard; and he, smiting his hand petulantly onthe window-sill, went on, in the voice of some spoilt child:

“Hang Black Michael! Isn’t the princess enough for him? Is he to haveeverything? What the devil do you see in Black Michael?”

“If I told him what you say—” she began.

“Well, tell him,” said Rupert, carelessly; and, catching her off her guard, hesprang forward and kissed her, laughing, and crying, “There’s something to tellhim!”

If I had kept my revolver with me, I should have been very sorely tempted.Being spared the temptation, I merely added this new score to his account.

“Though, faith,” said Rupert, “it’s little he cares. He’s mad about theprincess, you know. He talks of nothing but cutting the play-actor’s throat.”

Didn’t he, indeed?

“And if I do it for him, what do you think he’s promised me?”

The unhappy woman raised her hands above her head, in prayer or in despair.

“But I detest waiting,” said Rupert; and I saw that he was about to lay hishand on her again, when there was a noise of a door in the room opening, and aharsh voice cried:

“What are you doing here, sir?”

Rupert turned his back to the window, bowed low, and said, in his loud, merrytones: “Apologizing for your absence, sir. Could I leave the lady alone?”

The newcomer must be Black Michael. I saw him directly, as he advanced towardsthe window. He caught young Rupert by the arm.

“The moat would hold more than the King!” said he, with a significant gesture.

“Does your Highness threaten me?” asked Rupert.

“A threat is more warning than most men get from me.”

“Yet,” observed Rupert, “Rudolf Rassendyll has been much threatened, and yetlives!”

“Am I in fault because my servants bungle?” asked Michael scornfully.

“Your Highness has run no risk of bungling!” sneered Rupert.

It was telling the duke that he shirked danger as plain as ever I have heard aman told. Black Michael had self-control. I dare say he scowled—it was a greatregret to me that I could not see their faces better—but his voice was even andcalm, as he answered:

“Enough, enough! We mustn’t quarrel, Rupert. Are Detchard and Bersonin at theirposts?”

“They are, sir.”

“I need you no more.”

“Nay, I’m not oppressed with fatigue,” said Rupert.

“Pray, sir, leave us,” said Michael, more impatiently. “In ten minutes thedrawbridge will be drawn back, and I presume you have no wish to swim to yourbed.”

Rupert’s figure disappeared. I heard the door open and shut again. Michael andAntoinette de Mauban were left together. To my chagrin, the duke laid his handon the window and closed it. He stood talking to Antoinette for a moment ortwo. She shook her head, and he turned impatiently away. She left the window.The door sounded again, and Black Michael closed the shutters.

“De Gautet, De Gautet, man!” sounded from the drawbridge. “Unless you want abath before your bed, come along!”

It was Rupert’s voice, coming from the end of the drawbridge. A moment later heand De Gautet stepped out on the bridge. Rupert’s arm was through De Gautet’s,and in the middle of the bridge he detained his companion and leant over. Idropped behind the shelter of “Jacob’s Ladder.”

Then Master Rupert had a little sport. He took from De Gautet a bottle which hecarried, and put it to his lips.

“Hardly a drop!” he cried discontentedly, and flung it in the moat.

It fell, as I judged from the sound and the circles on the water, within a yardof the pipe. And Rupert, taking out his revolver, began to shoot at it. Thefirst two shots missed the bottle, but hit the pipe. The third shattered thebottle. I hoped that the young ruffian would be content; but he emptied theother barrels at the pipe, and one, skimming over the pipe, whistled through myhair as I crouched on the other side.

“‘Ware bridge!” a voice cried, to my relief.

Rupert and De Gautet cried, “A moment!” and ran across. The bridge was drawnback, and all became still. The clock struck a quarter-past one. I rose andstretched myself and yawned.

I think some ten minutes had passed when I heard a slight noise to my right. Ipeered over the pipe, and saw a dark figure standing in the gateway that led tothe bridge. It was a man. By the careless, graceful poise, I guessed it to beRupert again. He held a sword in his hand, and he stood motionless for a minuteor two. Wild thoughts ran through me. On what mischief was the young fiend bentnow? Then he laughed low to himself; then he turned his face to the wall, tooka step in my direction, and, to my surprise, began to climb down the wall. Inan instant I saw that there must be steps in the wall; it was plain. They werecut into or affixed to the wall, at intervals of about eighteen inches. Rupertset his foot on the lower one. Then he placed his sword between his teeth,turned round, and noiselessly let himself into the water. Had it been a matterof my life only, I would have swum to meet him. Dearly would I have loved tofight it out with him then and there—with steel, on a fine night, and none tocome between us. But there was the King! I restrained myself, but I could notbridle my swift breathing, and I watched him with the intensest eagerness.

He swam leisurely and quietly across. There were more steps up on the otherside, and he climbed them. When he set foot in the gateway, standing on thedrawn-back bridge, he felt in his pocket and took something out. I heard himunlock the door. I could hear no noise of its closing behind him. He vanishedfrom my sight.

Abandoning my ladder—I saw I did not need it now—I swam to the side of thebridge and climbed half way up the steps. There I hung with my sword in myhand, listening eagerly. The duke’s room was shuttered and dark. There was alight in the window on the opposite side of the bridge. Not a sound broke thesilence, till half-past one chimed from the great clock in the tower of thechateau.

There were other plots than mine afoot in the Castle that night.

CHAPTER 18
The Forcing of the Trap

The position wherein I stood does not appear very favourable to thought; yetfor the next moment or two I thought profoundly. I had, I told myself, scoredone point. Be Rupert Hentzau’s errand what it might, and the villainy he wasengaged on what it would, I had scored one point. He was on the other side ofthe moat from the King, and it would be by no fault of mine if ever he set footon the same side again. I had three left to deal with: two on guard and DeGautet in his bed. Ah, if I had the keys! I would have risked everything andattacked Detchard and Bersonin before their friends could join them. But I waspowerless. I must wait till the coming of my friends enticed someone to crossthe bridge—someone with the keys. And I waited, as it seemed, for half an hour,really for about five minutes, before the next act in the rapid drama began.

All was still on the other side. The duke’s room remained inscrutable behindits shutters. The light burnt steadily in Madame de Mauban’s window. Then Iheard the faintest, faintest sound: it came from behind the door which led tothe drawbridge on the other side of the moat. It but just reached my ear, yet Icould not be mistaken as to what it was. It was made by a key being turned verycarefully and slowly. Who was turning it? And of what room was it the key?There leapt before my eyes the picture of young Rupert, with the key in onehand, his sword in the other, and an evil smile on his face. But I did not knowwhat door it was, nor on which of his favourite pursuits young Rupert wasspending the hours of that night.

I was soon to be enlightened, for the next moment—before my friends could benear the chateau door—before Johann the keeper would have thought to nervehimself for his task—there was a sudden crash from the room with the lightedwindow. It sounded as though someone had flung down a lamp; and the window wentdark and black. At the same instant a cry rang out, shrill in the night: “Help,help! Michael, help!” and was followed by a shriek of utter terror.

I was tingling in every nerve. I stood on the topmost step, clinging to thethreshold of the gate with my right hand and holding my sword in my left.Suddenly I perceived that the gateway was broader than the bridge; there was adark corner on the opposite side where a man could stand. I darted across andstood there. Thus placed, I commanded the path, and no man could pass betweenthe chateau and the old Castle till he had tried conclusions with me.

There was another shriek. Then a door was flung open and clanged against thewall, and I heard the handle of a door savagely twisted.

“Open the door! In God’s name, what’s the matter?” cried a voice—the voice ofBlack Michael himself.

He was answered by the very words I had written in my letter.

“Help, Michael—Hentzau!”

A fierce oath rang out from the duke, and with a loud thud he threw himselfagainst the door. At the same moment I heard a window above my head open, and avoice cried: “What’s the matter?” and I heard a man’s hasty footsteps. Igrasped my sword. If De Gautet came my way, the Six would be less by one more.

Then I heard the clash of crossed swords and a tramp of feet and—I cannot tellthe thing so quickly as it happened, for all seemed to come at once. There wasan angry cry from madame’s room, the cry of a wounded man; the window was flungopen; young Rupert stood there sword in hand. He turned his back, and I saw hisbody go forward to the lunge.

“Ah, Johann, there’s one for you! Come on, Michael!”

Johann was there, then—come to the rescue of the duke! How would he open thedoor for me? For I feared that Rupert had slain him.

“Help!” cried the duke’s voice, faint and husky.

I heard a step on the stairs above me; and I heard a stir down to my left, inthe direction of the King’s cell. But, before anything happened on my side ofthe moat, I saw five or six men round young Rupert in the embrasure of madame’swindow. Three or four times he lunged with incomparable dash and dexterity. Foran instant they fell back, leaving a ring round him. He leapt on the parapet ofthe window, laughing as he leapt, and waving his sword in his hand. He wasdrunk with blood, and he laughed again wildly as he flung himself headlong intothe moat.

What became of him then? I did not see: for as he leapt, De Gautet’s lean facelooked out through the door by me, and, without a second’s hesitation, I struckat him with all the strength God had given me, and he fell dead in the doorwaywithout a word or a groan. I dropped on my knees by him. Where were the keys? Ifound myself muttering: “The keys, man, the keys?” as though he had been yetalive and could listen; and when I could not find them, I—God forgive me!—Ibelieve I struck a dead man’s face.

At last I had them. There were but three. Seizing the largest, I felt the lockof the door that led to the cell. I fitted in the key. It was right. The lockturned. I drew the door close behind me and locked it as noiselessly as Icould, putting the key in my pocket.

I found myself at the top of a flight of steep stone stairs. An oil lamp burntdimly in the bracket. I took it down and held it in my hand; and I stood andlistened.

“What in the devil can it be?” I heard a voice say.

It came from behind a door that faced me at the bottom of the stairs.

And another answered:

“Shall we kill him?”

I strained to hear the answer, and could have sobbed with relief whenDetchard’s voice came grating and cold:

“Wait a bit. There’ll be trouble if we strike too soon.”

There was a moment’s silence. Then I heard the bolt of the door cautiouslydrawn back. Instantly I put out the light I held, replacing the lamp in thebracket.

“It’s dark—the lamp’s out. Have you a light?” said the other voice—Bersonin’s.

No doubt they had a light, but they should not use it. It was come to thecrisis now, and I rushed down the steps and flung myself against the door.Bersonin had unbolted it and it gave way before me. The Belgian stood theresword in hand, and Detchard was sitting on a couch at the side of the room. Inastonishment at seeing me, Bersonin recoiled; Detchard jumped to his sword. Irushed madly at the Belgian: he gave way before me, and I drove him up againstthe wall. He was no swordsman, though he fought bravely, and in a moment he layon the floor before me. I turned—Detchard was not there. Faithful to hisorders, he had not risked a fight with me, but had rushed straight to the doorof the King’s room, opened it and slammed it behind him. Even now he was at hiswork inside.

And surely he would have killed the King, and perhaps me also, had it not beenfor one devoted man who gave his life for the King. For when I forced the door,the sight I saw was this: the King stood in the corner of the room: broken byhis sickness, he could do nothing; his fettered hands moved uselessly up anddown, and he was laughing horribly in half-mad delirium. Detchard and thedoctor were together in the middle of the room; and the doctor had flunghimself on the murderer, pinning his hands to his sides for an instant. ThenDetchard wrenched himself free from the feeble grip, and, as I entered, drovehis sword through the hapless man. Then he turned on me, crying:

“At last!”

We were sword to sword. By blessed chance, neither he nor Bersonin had beenwearing their revolvers. I found them afterwards, ready loaded, on themantelpiece of the outer room: it was hard by the door, ready to their hands,but my sudden rush in had cut off access to them. Yes, we were man to man: andwe began to fight, silently, sternly, and hard. Yet I remember little of it,save that the man was my match with the sword—nay, and more, for he knew moretricks than I; and that he forced me back against the bars that guarded theentrance to “Jacob’s Ladder.” And I saw a smile on his face, and he wounded mein the left arm.

No glory do I take for that contest. I believe that the man would have masteredme and slain me, and then done his butcher’s work, for he was the most skilfulswordsman I have ever met; but even as he pressed me hard, the half-mad,wasted, wan creature in the corner leapt high in lunatic mirth, shrieking:

“It’s cousin Rudolf! Cousin Rudolf! I’ll help you, cousin Rudolf!” and catchingup a chair in his hands (he could but just lift it from the ground and hold ituselessly before him) he came towards us. Hope came to me. “Come on!” I cried.“Come on! Drive it against his legs.”

Detchard replied with a savage thrust. He all but had me.

“Come on! Come on, man!” I cried. “Come and share the fun!”

And the King laughed gleefully, and came on, pushing his chair before him.

With an oath Detchard skipped back, and, before I knew what he was doing, hadturned his sword against the King. He made one fierce cut at the King, and theKing, with a piteous cry, dropped where he stood. The stout ruffian turned toface me again. But his own hand had prepared his destruction: for in turning hetrod in the pool of blood that flowed from the dead physician. He slipped; hefell. Like a dart I was upon him. I caught him by the throat, and before hecould recover himself I drove my point through his neck, and with a stifledcurse he fell across the body of his victim.

Was the King dead? It was my first thought. I rushed to where he lay. Ay, itseemed as if he were dead, for he had a great gash across his forehead, and helay still in a huddled heap on the floor. I dropped on my knees beside him, andleant my ear down to hear if he breathed. But before I could there was a loudrattle from the outside. I knew the sound: the drawbridge was being pushed out.A moment later it rang home against the wall on my side of the moat. I shouldbe caught in a trap and the King with me, if he yet lived. He must take hischance, to live or die. I took my sword, and passed into the outer room. Whowere pushing the drawbridge out—my men? If so, all was well. My eye fell on therevolvers, and I seized one; and paused to listen in the doorway of the outerroom. To listen, say I? Yes, and to get my breath: and I tore my shirt andtwisted a strip of it round my bleeding arm; and stood listening again. I wouldhave given the world to hear Sapt’s voice. For I was faint, spent, and weary.And that wild-cat Rupert Hentzau was yet at large in the Castle. Yet, because Icould better defend the narrow door at the top of the stairs than the widerentrance to the room, I dragged myself up the steps, and stood behind itlistening.

What was the sound? Again a strange one for the place and time. An easy,scornful, merry laugh—the laugh of young Rupert Hentzau! I could scarcelybelieve that a sane man would laugh. Yet the laugh told me that my men had notcome; for they must have shot Rupert ere now, if they had come. And the clockstruck half-past two! My God! The door had not been opened! They had gone tothe bank! They had not found me! They had gone by now back to Tarlenheim, withthe news of the King’s death—and mine. Well, it would be true before they gotthere. Was not Rupert laughing in triumph?

For a moment, I sank, unnerved, against the door. Then I started up alertagain, for Rupert cried scornfully:

“Well, the bridge is there! Come over it! And in God’s name, let’s see BlackMichael. Keep back, you curs! Michael, come and fight for her!”

If it were a three-cornered fight, I might yet bear my part. I turned the keyin the door and looked out.

CHAPTER 19
Face to Face in the Forest

For a moment I could see nothing, for the glare of lanterns and torches caughtme full in the eyes from the other side of the bridge. But soon the scene grewclear: and it was a strange scene. The bridge was in its place. At the far endof it stood a group of the duke’s servants; two or three carried the lightswhich had dazzled me, three or four held pikes in rest. They were huddledtogether; their weapons were protruded before them; their faces were pale andagitated. To put it plainly, they looked in as arrant a fright as I have seenmen look, and they gazed apprehensively at a man who stood in the middle of thebridge, sword in hand. Rupert Hentzau was in his trousers and shirt; the whitelinen was stained with blood, but his easy, buoyant pose told me that he washimself either not touched at all or merely scratched. There he stood, holdingthe bridge against them, and daring them to come on; or, rather, bidding themsend Black Michael to him; and they, having no firearms, cowered before thedesperate man and dared not attack him. They whispered to one another; and inthe backmost rank, I saw my friend Johann, leaning against the portal of thedoor and stanching with a handkerchief the blood which flowed from a wound inhis cheek.

By marvellous chance, I was master. The cravens would oppose me no more thanthey dared attack Rupert. I had but to raise my revolver, and I sent him to hisaccount with his sins on his head. He did not so much as know that I was there.I did nothing—why, I hardly know to this day. I had killed one man stealthilythat night, and another by luck rather than skill—perhaps it was that. Again,villain as the man was, I did not relish being one of a crowd againsthim—perhaps it was that. But stronger than either of these restrained feelingscame a curiosity and a fascination which held me spellbound, watching for theoutcome of the scene.

“Michael, you dog! Michael! If you can stand, come on!” cried Rupert; and headvanced a step, the group shrinking back a little before him. “Michael, youbastard! Come on!”

The answer to his taunts came in the wild cry of a woman:

“He’s dead! My God, he’s dead!”

“Dead!” shouted Rupert. “I struck better than I knew!” and he laughedtriumphantly. Then he went on: “Down with your weapons there! I’m your masternow! Down with them, I say!”

I believe they would have obeyed, but as he spoke came new things. First, therearose a distant sound, as of shouts and knockings from the other side of thechateau. My heart leapt. It must be my men, come by a happy disobedience toseek me. The noise continued, but none of the rest seemed to heed it. Theirattention was chained by what now happened before their eyes. The group ofservants parted and a woman staggered on to the bridge. Antoinette de Maubanwas in a loose white robe, her dark hair streamed over her shoulders, her facewas ghastly pale, and her eyes gleamed wildly in the light of the torches. Inher shaking hand she held a revolver, and, as she tottered forward, she firedit at Rupert Hentzau. The ball missed him, and struck the woodwork over myhead.

“Faith, madame,” laughed Rupert, “had your eyes been no more deadly than yourshooting, I had not been in this scrape—nor Black Michael in hell—tonight!”

She took no notice of his words. With a wonderful effort, she calmed herselftill she stood still and rigid. Then very slowly and deliberately she began toraise her arm again, taking most careful aim.

He would be mad to risk it. He must rush on her, chancing the bullet, orretreat towards me. I covered him with my weapon.

He did neither. Before she had got her aim, he bowed in his most gracefulfashion, cried “I can’t kill where I’ve kissed,” and before she or I could stophim, laid his hand on the parapet of the bridge, and lightly leapt into themoat.

At that very moment I heard a rush of feet, and a voice I knew—Sapt’s—cry:“God! it’s the duke—dead!” Then I knew that the King needed me no more, andthrowing down my revolver, I sprang out on the bridge. There was a cry of wildwonder, “The King!” and then I, like Rupert of Hentzau, sword in hand, vaultedover the parapet, intent on finishing my quarrel with him where I saw his curlyhead fifteen yards off in the water of the moat.

He swam swiftly and easily. I was weary and half crippled with my wounded arm.I could not gain on him. For a time I made no sound, but as we rounded thecorner of the old keep I cried:

“Stop, Rupert, stop!”

I saw him look over his shoulder, but he swam on. He was under the bank now,searching, as I guessed, for a spot that he could climb. I knew there to benone—but there was my rope, which would still be hanging where I had left it.He would come to where it was before I could. Perhaps he would miss it—perhapshe would find it; and if he drew it up after him, he would get a good start ofme. I put forth all my remaining strength and pressed on. At last I began togain on him; for he, occupied with his search, unconsciously slackened hispace.

Ah, he had found it! A low shout of triumph came from him. He laid hold of itand began to haul himself up. I was near enough to hear him mutter: “How thedevil comes this here?” I was at the rope, and he, hanging in mid air, saw me,but I could not reach him.

“Hullo! who’s here?” he cried in startled tones.

For a moment, I believe, he took me for the King—I dare say I was pale enoughto lend colour to the thought; but an instant later he cried:

“Why it’s the play-actor! How come you here, man?”

And so saying he gained the bank.

I laid hold of the rope, but I paused. He stood on the bank, sword in hand, andhe could cut my head open or spit me through the heart as I came up. I let gothe rope.

“Never mind,” said I; “but as I am here, I think I’ll stay.”

He smiled down on me.

“These women are the deuce—” he began; when suddenly the great bell of theCastle started to ring furiously, and a loud shout reached us from the moat.

Rupert smiled again, and waved his hand to me.

“I should like a turn with you, but it’s a little too hot!” said he, and hedisappeared from above me.

In an instant, without thinking of danger, I laid my hand to the rope. I wasup. I saw him thirty yards off, running like a deer towards the shelter of theforest. For once Rupert Hentzau had chosen discretion for his part. I laid myfeet to the ground and rushed after him, calling to him to stand. He would not.Unwounded and vigorous, he gained on me at every step; but, forgettingeverything in the world except him and my thirst for his blood, I pressed on,and soon the deep shades of the forest of Zenda engulfed us both, pursued andpursuer.

It was three o’clock now, and day was dawning. I was on a long straight grassavenue, and a hundred yards ahead ran young Rupert, his curls waving in thefresh breeze. I was weary and panting; he looked over his shoulder and wavedhis hand again to me. He was mocking me, for he saw he had the pace of me. Iwas forced to pause for breath. A moment later, Rupert turned sharply to theright and was lost from my sight.

I thought all was over, and in deep vexation sank on the ground. But I was upagain directly, for a scream rang through the forest—a woman’s scream. Puttingforth the last of my strength, I ran on to the place where he had turned out ofmy sight, and, turning also, I saw him again. But alas! I could not touch him.He was in the act of lifting a girl down from her horse; doubtless it was herscream that I heard. She looked like a small farmer’s or a peasant’s daughter,and she carried a basket on her arm. Probably she was on her way to the earlymarket at Zenda. Her horse was a stout, well shaped animal. Master Rupertlifted her down amid her shrieks—the sight of him frightened her; but hetreated her gently, laughed, kissed her, and gave her money. Then he jumped onthe horse, sitting sideways like a woman; and then he waited for me. I, on mypart, waited for him.

Presently he rode towards me, keeping his distance, however. He lifted up hishand, saying:

“What did you in the Castle?”

“I killed three of your friends,” said I.

“What! You got to the cells?”

“Yes.”

“And the King?”

“He was hurt by Detchard before I killed Detchard, but I pray that he lives.”

“You fool!” said Rupert, pleasantly.

“One thing more I did.”

“And what’s that?”

“I spared your life. I was behind you on the bridge, with a revolver in myhand.”

“No? Faith, I was between two fires!”

“Get off your horse,” I cried, “and fight like a man.”

“Before a lady!” said he, pointing to the girl. “Fie, your Majesty!”

Then in my rage, hardly knowing what I did, I rushed at him. For a moment heseemed to waver. Then he reined his horse in and stood waiting for me. On Iwent in my folly. I seized the bridle and I struck at him. He parried andthrust at me. I fell back a pace and rushed at him again; and this time Ireached his face and laid his cheek open, and darted back almost before hecould strike me. He seemed almost dazed at the fierceness of my attack;otherwise I think he must have killed me. I sank on my knee panting, expectinghim to ride at me. And so he would have done, and then and there, I doubt not,one or both of us would have died; but at the moment there came a shout frombehind us, and, looking round, I saw, just at the turn of the avenue, a man ona horse. He was riding hard, and he carried a revolver in his hand. It wasFritz von Tarlenheim, my faithful friend. Rupert saw him, and knew that thegame was up. He checked his rush at me and flung his leg over the saddle, butyet for just a moment he waited. Leaning forward, he tossed his hair off hisforehead and smiled, and said: “Au revoir, Rudolf Rassendyll!”

Then, with his cheek streaming blood, but his lips laughing and his bodyswaying with ease and grace, he bowed to me; and he bowed to the farm-girl, whohad drawn near in trembling fascination, and he waved his hand to Fritz, whowas just within range and let fly a shot at him. The ball came nigh doing itswork, for it struck the sword he held, and he dropped the sword with an oath,wringing his fingers and clapped his heels hard on his horse’s belly, and rodeaway at a gallop.

And I watched him go down the long avenue, riding as though he rode for hispleasure and singing as he went, for all there was that gash in his cheek.

Once again he turned to wave his hand, and then the gloom of thickets swallowedhim and he was lost from our sight. Thus he vanished—reckless and wary,graceful and graceless, handsome, debonair, vile, and unconquered. And I flungmy sword passionately on the ground and cried to Fritz to ride after him. ButFritz stopped his horse, and leapt down and ran to me, and knelt, putting hisarm about me. And indeed it was time, for the wound that Detchard had given mewas broken forth afresh, and my blood was staining the ground.

“Then give me the horse!” I cried, staggering to my feet and throwing his armsoff me. And the strength of my rage carried me so far as where the horse stood,and then I fell prone beside it. And Fritz knelt by me again.

“Fritz!” I said.

“Ay, friend—dear friend!” he said, tender as a woman.

“Is the King alive?”

He took his handkerchief and wiped my lips, and bent and kissed me on theforehead.

“Thanks to the most gallant gentleman that lives,” said he softly, “the King isalive!”

The little farm-girl stood by us, weeping for fright and wide-eyed for wonder;for she had seen me at Zenda; and was not I, pallid, dripping, foul, and bloodyas I was—yet was not I the King?

And when I heard that the King was alive, I strove to cry “Hurrah!” But I couldnot speak, and I laid my head back in Fritz’s arms and closed my eyes, and Igroaned; and then, lest Fritz should do me wrong in his thoughts, I opened myeyes and tried to say “Hurrah!” again. But I could not. And being very tired,and now very cold, I huddled myself close up to Fritz, to get the warmth ofhim, and shut my eyes again and went to sleep.

CHAPTER 20
The Prisoner and the King

In order to a full understanding of what had occurred in the Castle of Zenda,it is necessary to supplement my account of what I myself saw and did on thatnight by relating briefly what I afterwards learnt from Fritz and Madame deMauban. The story told by the latter explained clearly how it happened that thecry which I had arranged as a stratagem and a sham had come, in dreadfulreality, before its time, and had thus, as it seemed at the moment, ruined ourhopes, while in the end it had favoured them. The unhappy woman, fired, Ibelieve by a genuine attachment to the Duke of Strelsau, no less than by thedazzling prospects which a dominion over him opened before her eyes, hadfollowed him at his request from Paris to Ruritania. He was a man of strongpassions, but of stronger will, and his cool head ruled both. He was content totake all and give nothing. When she arrived, she was not long in finding thatshe had a rival in the Princess Flavia; rendered desperate, she stood atnothing which might give, or keep for her, her power over the duke. As I say,he took and gave not. Simultaneously, Antoinette found herself entangled in hisaudacious schemes. Unwilling to abandon him, bound to him by the chains ofshame and hope, yet she would not be a decoy, nor, at his bidding, lure me todeath. Hence the letters of warning she had written. Whether the lines she sentto Flavia were inspired by good or bad feeling, by jealousy or by pity, I donot know; but here also she served us well. When the duke went to Zenda, sheaccompanied him; and here for the first time she learnt the full measure of hiscruelty, and was touched with compassion for the unfortunate King. From thistime she was with us; yet, from what she told me, I know that she still (aswomen will) loved Michael, and trusted to gain his life, if not his pardon,from the King, as the reward for her assistance. His triumph she did notdesire, for she loathed his crime, and loathed yet more fiercely what would bethe prize of it—his marriage with his cousin, Princess Flavia.

At Zenda new forces came into play—the lust and daring of young Rupert. He wascaught by her beauty, perhaps; perhaps it was enough for him that she belongedto another man, and that she hated him. For many days there had been quarrelsand ill will between him and the duke, and the scene which I had witnessed inthe duke’s room was but one of many. Rupert’s proposals to me, of which shehad, of course, been ignorant, in no way surprised her when I related them; shehad herself warned Michael against Rupert, even when she was calling on me todeliver her from both of them. On this night, then, Rupert had determined tohave his will. When she had gone to her room, he, having furnished himself witha key to it, had made his entrance. Her cries had brought the duke, and therein the dark room, while she screamed, the men had fought; and Rupert, havingwounded his master with a mortal blow, had, on the servants rushing in, escapedthrough the window as I have described. The duke’s blood, spurting out, hadstained his opponent’s shirt; but Rupert, not knowing that he had dealt Michaelhis death, was eager to finish the encounter. How he meant to deal with theother three of the band, I know not. I dare say he did not think, for thekilling of Michael was not premeditated. Antoinette, left alone with the duke,had tried to stanch his wound, and thus was she busied till he died; and then,hearing Rupert’s taunts, she had come forth to avenge him. Me she had not seen,nor did she till I darted out of my ambush, and leapt after Rupert into themoat.

The same moment found my friends on the scene. They had reached the chateau indue time, and waited ready by the door. But Johann, swept with the rest to therescue of the duke, did not open it; nay, he took a part against Rupert,putting himself forward more bravely than any in his anxiety to avertsuspicion; and he had received a wound, in the embrasure of the window. Tillnearly half-past two Sapt waited; then, following my orders, he had sent Fritzto search the banks of the moat. I was not there. Hastening back, Fritz toldSapt; and Sapt was for following orders still, and riding at full speed back toTarlenheim; while Fritz would not hear of abandoning me, let me have orderedwhat I would. On this they disputed some few minutes; then Sapt, persuaded byFritz, detached a party under Bernenstein to gallop back to Tarlenheim andbring up the marshal, while the rest fell to on the great door of the chateau.For several minutes it resisted them; then, just as Antoinette de Mauban firedat Rupert of Hentzau on the bridge, they broke in, eight of them in all: andthe first door they came to was the door of Michael’s room; and Michael laydead across the threshold, with a sword-thrust through his breast. Sapt criedout at his death, as I had heard, and they rushed on the servants; but these,in fear, dropped their weapons, and Antoinette flung herself weeping at Sapt’sfeet. And all she cried was that I had been at the end of the bridge and leaptoff. “What of the prisoner?” asked Sapt; but she shook her head. Then Sapt andFritz, with the gentlemen behind them, crossed the bridge, slowly, warily, andwithout noise; and Fritz stumbled over the body of De Gautet in the way of thedoor. They felt him and found him dead.

Then they consulted, listening eagerly for any sound from the cells below; butthere came none, and they were greatly afraid that the King’s guards had killedhim, and having pushed his body through the great pipe, had escaped the sameway themselves. Yet, because I had been seen here, they had still some hope(thus indeed Fritz, in his friendship, told me); and going back to Michael’sbody, pushing aside Antoinette, who prayed by it, they found a key to the doorwhich I had locked, and opened the door. The staircase was dark, and they wouldnot use a torch at first, lest they should be more exposed to fire. But soonFritz cried: “The door down there is open! See, there is light!” So they wenton boldly, and found none to oppose them. And when they came to the outer roomand saw the Belgian, Bersonin, lying dead, they thanked God, Sapt saying: “Ay,he has been here.” Then rushing into the King’s cell, they found Detchard lyingdead across the dead physician, and the King on his back with his chair by him.And Fritz cried: “He’s dead!” and Sapt drove all out of the room except Fritz,and knelt down by the King; and, having learnt more of wounds and the sign ofdeath than I, he soon knew that the King was not dead, nor, if properlyattended, would die. And they covered his face and carried him to DukeMichael’s room, and laid him there; and Antoinette rose from praying by thebody of the duke and went to bathe the King’s head and dress his wounds, till adoctor came. And Sapt, seeing I had been there, and having heard Antoinette’sstory, sent Fritz to search the moat and then the forest. He dared send no oneelse. And Fritz found my horse, and feared the worst. Then, as I have told, hefound me, guided by the shout with which I had called on Rupert to stop andface me. And I think a man has never been more glad to find his own brotheralive than was Fritz to come on me; so that, in love and anxiety for me, hethought nothing of a thing so great as would have been the death of RupertHentzau. Yet, had Fritz killed him, I should have grudged it.

The enterprise of the King’s rescue being thus prosperously concluded, it layon Colonel Sapt to secure secrecy as to the King ever having been in need ofrescue. Antoinette de Mauban and Johann the keeper (who, indeed, was too muchhurt to be wagging his tongue just now) were sworn to reveal nothing; and Fritzwent forth to find—not the King, but the unnamed friend of the King, who hadlain in Zenda and flashed for a moment before the dazed eyes of Duke Michael’sservants on the drawbridge. The metamorphosis had happened; and the King,wounded almost to death by the attacks of the gaolers who guarded his friend,had at last overcome them, and rested now, wounded but alive, in BlackMichael’s own room in the Castle. There he had been carried, his face coveredwith a cloak, from the cell; and thence orders issued, that if his friend werefound, he should be brought directly and privately to the King, and thatmeanwhile messengers should ride at full speed to Tarlenheim, to tell MarshallStrakencz to assure the princess of the King’s safety and to come himself withall speed to greet the King. The princess was enjoined to remain at Tarlenheim,and there await her cousin’s coming or his further injunctions. Thus the Kingwould come to his own again, having wrought brave deeds, and escaped, almost bya miracle, the treacherous assault of his unnatural brother.

This ingenious arrangement of my long-headed old friend prospered in every way,save where it encountered a force that often defeats the most cunning schemes.I mean nothing else than the pleasure of a woman. For, let her cousin andsovereign send what command he chose (or Colonel Sapt chose for him), and letMarshal Strakencz insist as he would, the Princess Flavia was in no way mindedto rest at Tarlenheim while her lover lay wounded at Zenda; and when theMarshal, with a small suite, rode forth from Tarlenheim on the way to Zenda,the princess’s carriage followed immediately behind, and in this order theypassed through the town, where the report was already rife that the King, goingthe night before to remonstrate with his brother, in all friendliness, for thathe held one of the King’s friends in confinement in the Castle, had been mosttraitorously set upon; that there had been a desperate conflict; that the dukewas slain with several of his gentlemen; and that the King, wounded as he was,had seized and held the Castle of Zenda. All of which talk made, as may besupposed, a mighty excitement: and the wires were set in motion, and thetidings came to Strelsau only just after orders had been sent thither to paradethe troops and overawe the dissatisfied quarters of the town with a display offorce.

Thus the Princess Flavia came to Zenda. And as she drove up the hill, with theMarshal riding by the wheel and still imploring her to return in obedience tothe King’s orders, Fritz von Tarlenheim, with the prisoner of Zenda, came tothe edge of the forest. I had revived from my swoon, and walked, resting onFritz’s arm; and looking out from the cover of the trees, I saw the princess.Suddenly understanding from a glance at my companion’s face that we must notmeet her, I sank on my knees behind a clump of bushes. But there was one whomwe had forgotten, but who followed us, and was not disposed to let slip thechance of earning a smile and maybe a crown or two; and, while we lay hidden,the little farm-girl came by us and ran to the princess, curtseying and crying:

“Madame, the King is here—in the bushes! May I guide you to him, madame?”

“Nonsense, child!” said old Strakencz; “the King lies wounded in the Castle.”

“Yes, sir, he’s wounded, I know; but he’s there—with Count Fritz—and not at theCastle,” she persisted.

“Is he in two places, or are there two Kings?” asked Flavia, bewildered. “Andhow should he be there?”

“He pursued a gentleman, madame, and they fought till Count Fritz came; and theother gentleman took my father’s horse from me and rode away; but the King ishere with Count Fritz. Why, madame, is there another man in Ruritania like theKing?”

“No, my child,” said Flavia softly (I was told it afterwards), and she smiledand gave the girl money. “I will go and see this gentleman,” and she rose toalight from the carriage.

But at this moment Sapt came riding from the Castle, and, seeing the princess,made the best of a bad job, and cried to her that the King was well tended andin no danger.

“In the Castle?” she asked.

“Where else, madame?” said he, bowing.

“But this girl says he is yonder—with Count Fritz.”

Sapt turned his eyes on the child with an incredulous smile.

“Every fine gentleman is a King to such,” said he.

“Why, he’s as like the King as one pea to another, madame!” cried the girl, alittle shaken but still obstinate.

Sapt started round. The old Marshal’s face asked unspoken questions. Flavia’sglance was no less eloquent. Suspicion spread quick.

“I’ll ride myself and see this man,” said Sapt hastily.

“Nay, I’ll come myself,” said the princess.

“Then come alone,” he whispered.

And she, obedient to the strange hinting in his face, prayed the Marshal andthe rest to wait; and she and Sapt came on foot towards where we lay, Saptwaving to the farm-girl to keep at a distance. And when I saw them coming, Isat in a sad heap on the ground, and buried my face in my hands. I could notlook at her. Fritz knelt by me, laying his hand on my shoulder.

“Speak low, whatever you say,” I heard Sapt whisper as they came up; and thenext thing I heard was a low cry—half of joy, half of fear—from the princess:

“It is he! Are you hurt?”

And she fell on the ground by me, and gently pulled my hands away; but I keptmy eyes to the ground.

“It is the King!” she said. “Pray, Colonel Sapt, tell me where lay the wit ofthe joke you played on me?”

We answered none of us; we three were silent before her. Regardless of them,she threw her arms round my neck and kissed me. Then Sapt spoke in a low hoarsewhisper:

“It is not the King. Don’t kiss him; he’s not the King.”

She drew back for a moment; then, with an arm still round my neck, she asked,in superb indignation:

“Do I not know my love? Rudolf my love!”

“It is not the King,” said old Sapt again; and a sudden sob broke fromtender-hearted Fritz.

It was the sob that told her no comedy was afoot.

“He is the King!” she cried. “It is the King’s face—the King’s ring—my ring! Itis my love!”

“Your love, madame,” said old Sapt, “but not the King. The King is there in theCastle. This gentleman—”

“Look at me, Rudolf! look at me!” she cried, taking my face between her hands.“Why do you let them torment me? Tell me what it means!”

Then I spoke, gazing into her eyes.

“God forgive me, madame!” I said. “I am not the King!”

I felt her hands clutch my cheeks. She gazed at me as never man’s face wasscanned yet. And I, silent again, saw wonder born, and doubt grow, and terrorspring to life as she looked. And very gradually the grasp of her handsslackened; she turned to Sapt, to Fritz, and back to me: then suddenly shereeled forward and fell in my arms; and with a great cry of pain I gathered herto me and kissed her lips. Sapt laid his hand on my arm. I looked up in hisface. And I laid her softly on the ground, and stood up, looking on her,cursing heaven that young Rupert’s sword had spared me for this sharper pang.

CHAPTER 21
If love were all!

It was night, and I was in the cell wherein the King had lain in the Castle ofZenda. The great pipe that Rupert of Hentzau had nicknamed “Jacob’s Ladder” wasgone, and the lights in the room across the moat twinkled in the darkness. Allwas still; the din and clash of strife were gone. I had spent the day hidden inthe forest, from the time when Fritz had led me off, leaving Sapt with theprincess. Under cover of dusk, muffled up, I had been brought to the Castle andlodged where I now lay. Though three men had died there—two of them by myhand—I was not troubled by ghosts. I had thrown myself on a pallet by thewindow, and was looking out on the black water; Johann, the keeper, still palefrom his wound, but not much hurt besides, had brought me supper. He told methat the King was doing well, that he had seen the princess; that she and he,Sapt and Fritz, had been long together. Marshal Strakencz was gone to Strelsau;Black Michael lay in his coffin, and Antoinette de Mauban watched by him; had Inot heard, from the chapel, priests singing mass for him?

Outside there were strange rumours afloat. Some said that the prisoner of Zendawas dead; some, that he had vanished yet alive; some, that he was a friend whohad served the King well in some adventure in England; others, that he haddiscovered the Duke’s plots, and had therefore been kidnapped by him. One ortwo shrewd fellows shook their heads and said only that they would say nothing,but they had suspicions that more was to be known than was known, if ColonelSapt would tell all he knew.

Thus Johann chattered till I sent him away and lay there alone, thinking, notof the future, but—as a man is wont to do when stirring things have happened tohim—rehearsing the events of the past weeks, and wondering how strangely theyhad fallen out. And above me, in the stillness of the night, I heard thestandards flapping against their poles, for Black Michael’s banner hung therehalf-mast high, and above it the royal flag of Ruritania, floating for onenight more over my head. Habit grows so quick, that only by an effort did Irecollect that it floated no longer for me.

Presently Fritz von Tarlenheim came into the room. I was standing then by thewindow; the glass was opened, and I was idly fingering the cement which clungto the masonry where “Jacob’s Ladder” had been. He told me briefly that theKing wanted me, and together we crossed the drawbridge and entered the roomthat had been Black Michael’s.

The King was lying there in bed; our doctor from Tarlenheim was in attendanceon him, and whispered to me that my visit must be brief. The King held out hishand and shook mine. Fritz and the doctor withdrew to the window.

I took the King’s ring from my finger and placed it on his.

“I have tried not to dishonour it, sire,” said I.

“I can’t talk much to you,” he said, in a weak voice. “I have had a great fightwith Sapt and the Marshal—for we have told the Marshal everything. I wanted totake you to Strelsau and keep you with me, and tell everyone of what you haddone; and you would have been my best and nearest friend, Cousin Rudolf. Butthey tell me I must not, and that the secret must be kept—if kept it can be.”

“They are right, sire. Let me go. My work here is done.”

“Yes, it is done, as no man but you could have done it. When they see me again,I shall have my beard on; I shall—yes, faith, I shall be wasted with sickness.They will not wonder that the King looks changed in face. Cousin, I shall tryto let them find him changed in nothing else. You have shown me how to play theKing.”

“Sire,” said I. “I can take no praise from you. It is by the narrowest grace ofGod that I was not a worse traitor than your brother.”

He turned inquiring eyes on me; but a sick man shrinks from puzzles, and he hadno strength to question me. His glance fell on Flavia’s ring, which I wore. Ithought he would question me about it; but, after fingering it idly, he let hishead fall on his pillow.

“I don’t know when I shall see you again,” he said faintly, almost listlessly.

“If I can ever serve you again, sire,” I answered.

His eyelids closed. Fritz came with the doctor. I kissed the King’s hand, andlet Fritz lead me away. I have never seen the King since.

Outside, Fritz turned, not to the right, back towards the drawbridge, but tothe left, and without speaking led me upstairs, through a handsome corridor inthe chateau.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

Looking away from me, Fritz answered:

“She has sent for you. When it is over, come back to the bridge. I’ll wait foryou there.”

“What does she want?” said I, breathing quickly.

He shook his head.

“Does she know everything?”

“Yes, everything.”

He opened a door, and gently pushing me in, closed it behind me. I found myselfin a drawing-room, small and richly furnished. At first I thought that I wasalone, for the light that came from a pair of shaded candles on the mantelpiecewas very dim. But presently I discerned a woman’s figure standing by thewindow. I knew it was the princess, and I walked up to her, fell on one knee,and carried the hand that hung by her side to my lips. She neither moved norspoke. I rose to my feet, and, piercing the gloom with my eager eyes, saw herpale face and the gleam of her hair, and before I knew, I spoke softly:

“Flavia!”

She trembled a little, and looked round. Then she darted to me, taking hold ofme.

“Don’t stand, don’t stand! No, you mustn’t! You’re hurt! Sit down—here, here!”

She made me sit on a sofa, and put her hand on my forehead.

“How hot your head is,” she said, sinking on her knees by me. Then she laid herhead against me, and I heard her murmur: “My darling, how hot your head is!”

Somehow love gives even to a dull man the knowledge of his lover’s heart. I hadcome to humble myself and pray pardon for my presumption; but what I said nowwas:

“I love you with all my heart and soul!”

For what troubled and shamed her? Not her love for me, but the fear that I hadcounterfeited the lover as I had acted the King, and taken her kisses with asmothered smile.

“With all my life and heart,” said I, as she clung to me. “Always, from thefirst moment I saw you in the Cathedral! There has been but one woman in theworld to me—and there will be no other. But God forgive me the wrong I’ve doneyou!”

“They made you do it!” she said quickly; and she added, raising her head andlooking in my eyes: “It might have made no difference if I’d known it. It wasalways you, never the King!”

“I meant to tell you,” said I. “I was going to on the night of the ball inStrelsau, when Sapt interrupted me. After that, I couldn’t—I couldn’t risklosing you before—before—I must! My darling, for you I nearly left the King todie!”

“I know, I know! What are we to do now, Rudolf?”

I put my arm round her and held her up while I said:

“I am going away tonight.”

“Ah, no, no!” she cried. “Not tonight!”

“I must go tonight, before more people have seen me. And how would you have mestay, sweetheart, except—?”

“If I could come with you!” she whispered very low.

“My God!” said I roughly, “don’t talk about that!” and I thrust her a littleback from me.

“Why not? I love you. You are as good a gentleman as the King!”

Then I was false to all that I should have held by. For I caught her in my armsand prayed her, in words that I will not write, to come with me, daring allRuritania to take her from me. And for a while she listened, with wondering,dazzled eyes. But as her eyes looked on me, I grew ashamed, and my voice diedaway in broken murmurs and stammerings, and at last I was silent.

She drew herself away from me and stood against the wall, while I sat on theedge of the sofa, trembling in every limb, knowing what I had done—loathing it,obstinate not to undo it. So we rested a long time.

“I am mad!” I said sullenly.

“I love your madness, dear,” she answered.

Her face was away from me, but I caught the sparkle of a tear on her cheek. Iclutched the sofa with my hand and held myself there.

“Is love the only thing?” she asked, in low, sweet tones that seemed to bring acalm even to my wrung heart. “If love were the only thing, I would followyou—in rags, if need be—to the world’s end; for you hold my heart in the hollowof your hand! But is love the only thing?”

I made no answer. It gives me shame now to think that I would not help her.

She came near me and laid her hand on my shoulder. I put my hand up and heldhers.

“I know people write and talk as if it were. Perhaps, for some, Fate lets itbe. Ah, if I were one of them! But if love had been the only thing, you wouldhave let the King die in his cell.”

I kissed her hand.

“Honour binds a woman too, Rudolf. My honour lies in being true to my countryand my House. I don’t know why God has let me love you; but I know that I muststay.”

Still I said nothing; and she, pausing a while, then went on:

“Your ring will always be on my finger, your heart in my heart, the touch ofyour lips on mine. But you must go and I must stay. Perhaps I must do what itkills me to think of doing.”

I knew what she meant, and a shiver ran through me. But I could not utterlyfail her. I rose and took her hand.

“Do what you will, or what you must,” I said. “I think God shows His purposesto such as you. My part is lighter; for your ring shall be on my finger andyour heart in mine, and no touch save of your lips will ever be on mine. So,may God comfort you, my darling!”

There struck on our ears the sound of singing. The priests in the chapel weresinging masses for the souls of those who lay dead. They seemed to chant arequiem over our buried joy, to pray forgiveness for our love that would notdie. The soft, sweet, pitiful music rose and fell as we stood opposite oneanother, her hands in mine.

“My queen and my beauty!” said I.

“My lover and true knight!” she said. “Perhaps we shall never see one anotheragain. Kiss me, my dear, and go!”

I kissed her as she bade me; but at the last she clung to me, whisperingnothing but my name, and that over and over again—and again—and again; and thenI left her.

Rapidly I walked down to the bridge. Sapt and Fritz were waiting for me. Undertheir directions I changed my dress, and muffling my face, as I had done morethan once before, I mounted with them at the door of the Castle, and we threerode through the night and on to the breaking day, and found ourselves at alittle roadside station just over the border of Ruritania. The train was notquite due, and I walked with them in a meadow by a little brook while we waitedfor it. They promised to send me all news; they overwhelmed me withkindness—even old Sapt was touched to gentleness, while Fritz was halfunmanned. I listened in a kind of dream to all they said. “Rudolf! Rudolf!Rudolf!” still rang in my ears—a burden of sorrow and of love. At last they sawthat I could not heed them, and we walked up and down in silence, till Fritztouched me on the arm, and I saw, a mile or more away, the blue smoke of thetrain. Then I held out a hand to each of them.

“We are all but half-men this morning,” said I, smiling. “But we have been men,eh, Sapt and Fritz, old friends? We have run a good course between us.”

“We have defeated traitors and set the King firm on his throne,” said Sapt.

Then Fritz von Tarlenheim suddenly, before I could discern his purpose or stayhim, uncovered his head and bent as he used to do, and kissed my hand; and as Isnatched it away, he said, trying to laugh:

“Heaven doesn’t always make the right men kings!”

Old Sapt twisted his mouth as he wrung my hand.

“The devil has his share in most things,” said he.

The people at the station looked curiously at the tall man with the muffledface, but we took no notice of their glances. I stood with my two friends andwaited till the train came up to us. Then we shook hands again, saying nothing;and both this time—and, indeed, from old Sapt it seemed strange—bared theirheads, and so stood still till the train bore me away from their sight. So thatit was thought some great man travelled privately for his pleasure from thelittle station that morning; whereas, in truth it was only I, RudolfRassendyll, an English gentleman, a cadet of a good house, but a man of nowealth nor position, nor of much rank. They would have been disappointed toknow that. Yet had they known all they would have looked more curiously still.For, be I what I might now, I had been for three months a King, which, if not athing to be proud of, is at least an experience to have undergone. Doubtless Ishould have thought more of it, had there not echoed through the air, from thetowers of Zenda that we were leaving far away, into my ears and into my heartthe cry of a woman’s love—“Rudolf! Rudolf! Rudolf!”

Hark! I hear it now!

CHAPTER 22
Present, Past—and Future?

The details of my return home can have but little interest. I went straight tothe Tyrol and spent a quiet fortnight—mostly on my back, for a severe chilldeveloped itself; and I was also the victim of a nervous reaction, which mademe weak as a baby. As soon as I had reached my quarters, I sent an apparentlycareless postcard to my brother, announcing my good health and prospectivereturn. That would serve to satisfy the inquiries as to my whereabouts, whichwere probably still vexing the Prefect of the Police of Strelsau. I let mymoustache and imperial grow again; and as hair comes quickly on my face, theywere respectable, though not luxuriant, by the time that I landed myself inParis and called on my friend George Featherly. My interview with him waschiefly remarkable for the number of unwilling but necessary falsehoods that Itold; and I rallied him unmercifully when he told me that he had made up hismind that I had gone in the track of Madame de Mauban to Strelsau. The lady, itappeared, was back in Paris, but was living in great seclusion—a fact for whichgossip found no difficulty in accounting. Did not all the world know of thetreachery and death of Duke Michael? Nevertheless, George bade Bertram Bertrandbe of good cheer, “for,” said he flippantly, “a live poet is better than a deadduke.” Then he turned on me and asked:

“What have you been doing to your moustache?”

“To tell the truth,” I answered, assuming a sly air, “a man now and then hasreasons for wishing to alter his appearance. But it’s coming on very wellagain.”

“What? Then I wasn’t so far out! If not the fair Antoinette, there was acharmer?”

“There is always a charmer,” said I, sententiously.

But George would not be satisfied till he had wormed out of me (he took muchpride in his ingenuity) an absolutely imaginary love-affair, attended with theproper soupçonof scandal, which had kept me all this time in thepeaceful regions of the Tyrol. In return for this narrative, George regaled mewith a great deal of what he called “inside information” (known only todiplomatists), as to the true course of events in Ruritania, the plots andcounterplots. In his opinion, he told me, with a significant nod, there wasmore to be said for Black Michael than the public supposed; and he hinted at awell-founded suspicion that the mysterious prisoner of Zenda, concerning whom agood many paragraphs had appeared, was not a man at all, but (here I had muchado not to smile) a woman disguised as a man; and that strife between the Kingand his brother for this imaginary lady’s favour was at the bottom of theirquarrel.

“Perhaps it was Madame de Mauban herself,” I suggested.

“No!” said George decisively, “Antoinette de Mauban was jealous of her, andbetrayed the duke to the King for that reason. And, to confirm what I say, it’swell known that the Princess Flavia is now extremely cold to the King, afterhaving been most affectionate.”

At this point I changed the subject, and escaped from George’s “inspired”delusions. But if diplomatists never know anything more than they had succeededin finding out in this instance, they appear to me to be somewhat expensiveluxuries.

While in Paris I wrote to Antoinette, though I did not venture to call uponher. I received in return a very affecting letter, in which she assured me thatthe King’s generosity and kindness, no less than her regard for me, bound herconscience to absolute secrecy. She expressed the intention of settling in thecountry, and withdrawing herself entirely from society. Whether she carried outher designs, I have never heard; but as I have not met her, or heard news ofher up to this time, it is probable that she did. There is no doubt that shewas deeply attached to the Duke of Strelsau; and her conduct at the time of hisdeath proved that no knowledge of the man’s real character was enough to roother regard for him out of her heart.

I had one more battle left to fight—a battle that would, I knew, be severe, andwas bound to end in my complete defeat. Was I not back from the Tyrol, withouthaving made any study of its inhabitants, institutions, scenery, fauna, flora,or other features? Had I not simply wasted my time in my usual frivolous,good-for-nothing way? That was the aspect of the matter which, I was obliged toadmit, would present itself to my sister-in-law; and against a verdict based onsuch evidence, I had really no defence to offer. It may be supposed, then, thatI presented myself in Park Lane in a shamefaced, sheepish fashion. On thewhole, my reception was not so alarming as I had feared. It turned out that Ihad done, not what Rose wished, but—the next best thing—what she prophesied.She had declared that I should make no notes, record no observations, gather nomaterials. My brother, on the other hand, had been weak enough to maintain thata serious resolve had at length animated me.

When I returned empty-handed, Rose was so occupied in triumphing over Burlesdonthat she let me down quite easily, devoting the greater part of her reproachesto my failure to advertise my friends of my whereabouts.

“We’ve wasted a lot of time trying to find you,” she said.

“I know you have,” said I. “Half our ambassadors have led weary lives on myaccount. George Featherly told me so. But why should you have been anxious? Ican take care of myself.”

“Oh, it wasn’t that,” she cried scornfully, “but I wanted to tell you about SirJacob Borrodaile. You know, he’s got an Embassy—at least, he will have in amonth—and he wrote to say he hoped you would go with him.”

“Where’s he going to?”

“He’s going to succeed Lord Topham at Strelsau,” said she. “You couldn’t have anicer place, short of Paris.”

“Strelsau! H’m!” said I, glancing at my brother.

“Oh, thatdoesn’t matter!” exclaimed Rose impatiently. “Now, you willgo, won’t you?”

“I don’t know that I care about it!”

“Oh, you’re too exasperating!”

“And I don’t think I can go to Strelsau. My dear Rose, would it be—suitable?”

“Oh, nobody remembers that horrid old story now.”

Upon this, I took out of my pocket a portrait of the King of Ruritania. It hadbeen taken a month or two before he ascended the throne. She could not miss mypoint when I said, putting it into her hands:

“In case you’ve not seen, or not noticed, a picture of Rudolf V, there he is.Don’t you think they might recall the story, if I appeared at the Court ofRuritania?”

My sister-in-law looked at the portrait, and then at me.

“Good gracious!” she said, and flung the photograph down on the table.

“What do you say, Bob?” I asked.

Burlesdon got up, went to a corner of the room, and searched in a heap ofnewspapers. Presently he came back with a copy of the Illustrated London News.Opening the paper, he displayed a double-page engraving of the Coronation ofRudolf V at Strelsau. The photograph and the picture he laid side by side. Isat at the table fronting them; and, as I looked, I grew absorbed. My eyetravelled from my own portrait to Sapt, to Strakencz, to the rich robes of theCardinal, to Black Michael’s face, to the stately figure of the princess by hisside. Long I looked and eagerly. I was roused by my brother’s hand on myshoulder. He was gazing down at me with a puzzled expression.

“It’s a remarkable likeness, you see,” said I. “I really think I had better notgo to Ruritania.”

Rose, though half convinced, would not abandon her position.

“It’s just an excuse,” she said pettishly. “You don’t want to do anything. Why,you might become an ambassador!”

“I don’t think I want to be an ambassador,” said I.

“It’s more than you ever will be,” she retorted.

That is very likely true, but it is not more than I have been.

The idea of being an ambassador could scarcely dazzle me. I had been a king!

So pretty Rose left us in dudgeon; and Burlesdon, lighting a cigarette, lookedat me still with that curious gaze.

“That picture in the paper—” he said.

“Well, what of it? It shows that the King of Ruritania and your humble servantare as like as two peas.”

My brother shook his head.

“I suppose so,” he said. “But I should know you from the man in thephotograph.”

“And not from the picture in the paper?”

“I should know the photograph from the picture: the picture’s very like thephotograph, but—”

“Well?”

“It’s more like you!” said my brother.

My brother is a good man and true—so that, for all that he is a married man andmighty fond of his wife, he should know any secret of mine. But this secret wasnot mine, and I could not tell it to him.

“I don’t think it’s so much like me as the photograph,” said I boldly. “But,anyhow, Bob, I won’t go to Strelsau.”

“No, don’t go to Strelsau, Rudolf,” said he.

And whether he suspects anything, or has a glimmer of the truth, I do not know.If he has, he keeps it to himself, and he and I never refer to it. And we letSir Jacob Borrodaile find another attaché.

Since all these events whose history I have set down happened I have lived avery quiet life at a small house which I have taken in the country. Theordinary ambitions and aims of men in my position seem to me dull andunattractive. I have little fancy for the whirl of society, and none for thejostle of politics. Lady Burlesdon utterly despairs of me; my neighbours thinkme an indolent, dreamy, unsociable fellow. Yet I am a young man; and sometimesI have a fancy—the superstitious would call it a presentiment—that my part inlife is not yet altogether played; that, somehow and some day, I shall mixagain in great affairs, I shall again spin policies in a busy brain, match mywits against my enemies’, brace my muscles to fight a good fight and strikestout blows. Such is the tissue of my thoughts as, with gun or rod in hand, Iwander through the woods or by the side of the stream. Whether the fancy willbe fulfilled, I cannot tell—still less whether the scene that, led by memory, Ilay for my new exploits will be the true one—for I love to see myself onceagain in the crowded streets of Strelsau, or beneath the frowning keep of theCastle of Zenda.

Thus led, my broodings leave the future, and turn back on the past. Shapes risebefore me in long array—the wild first revel with the King, the rush with mybrave tea-table, the night in the moat, the pursuit in the forest: my friendsand my foes, the people who learnt to love and honour me, the desperate men whotried to kill me. And, from amidst these last, comes one who alone of all ofthem yet moves on earth, though where I know not, yet plans (as I do not doubt)wickedness, yet turns women’s hearts to softness and men’s to fear and hate.Where is young Rupert of Hentzau—the boy who came so nigh to beating me? Whenhis name comes into my head, I feel my hand grip and the blood move quickerthrough my veins: and the hint of Fate—the presentiment—seems to grow strongerand more definite, and to whisper insistently in my ear that I have yet a handto play with young Rupert; therefore I exercise myself in arms, and seek to putoff the day when the vigour of youth must leave me.

One break comes every year in my quiet life. Then I go to Dresden, and there Iam met by my dear friend and companion, Fritz von Tarlenheim. Last time, hispretty wife Helga came, and a lusty crowing baby with her. And for a week Fritzand I are together, and I hear all of what falls out in Strelsau; and in theevenings, as we walk and smoke together, we talk of Sapt, and of the King, andoften of young Rupert; and, as the hours grow small, at last we speak ofFlavia. For every year Fritz carries with him to Dresden a little box; in itlies a red rose, and round the stalk of the rose is a slip of paper with thewords written: “Rudolf—Flavia—always.” And the like I send back by him. Thatmessage, and the wearing of the rings, are all that now bind me and the Queenof Ruritania. For—nobler, as I hold her, for the act—she has followed where herduty to her country and her House led her, and is the wife of the King, unitinghis subjects to him by the love they bear to her, giving peace and quiet daysto thousands by her self-sacrifice. There are moments when I dare not think ofit, but there are others when I rise in spirit to where she ever dwells; then Ican thank God that I love the noblest lady in the world, the most gracious andbeautiful, and that there was nothing in my love that made her fall short inher high duty.

Shall I see her face again—the pale face and the glorious hair? Of that I knownothing; Fate has no hint, my heart no presentiment. I do not know. In thisworld, perhaps—nay, it is likely—never. And can it be that somewhere, in amanner whereof our flesh-bound minds have no apprehension, she and I will betogether again, with nothing to come between us, nothing to forbid our love?That I know not, nor wiser heads than mine. But if it be never—if I can neverhold sweet converse again with her, or look upon her face, or know from her herlove; why, then, this side the grave, I will live as becomes the man whom sheloves; and, for the other side, I must pray a dreamless sleep.

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